Suchergebnisse

The Committee on International Criminal Jurisdiction appointed by the General Assembly of the United Nations met in Geneva in August, 1951. Its report, accompanied by a Draft Statute for an International Criminal Court, has been submitted to the, governments of Member States for comment before June 1, 1952.

On December 18, 1951 the International Court of Justice delivered its judgment in the fisheries case which had been brought before the Court by the United Kingdom against Norway. By a vote of ten to two the Court established the validity of the Norwegian Royal Decree of 1935 in international law. This reserved to Norway an exclusive fishing zone of four miles based on lines connecting the outermost land points of the jagged coast. Through an eight to four vote the Court sanctioned the Norwegian system of straight baselines and overruled the United Kingdom contention that the four-mile belt should more closely follow coastal contours. This decision ended two years of litigation over a forty-five year controversy.

South West Africa Cases (Ethiopia v. South Africa and Liberia v. South Africa): On October 2, 1962, the International Court of Justice held the first of the public hearings on the preliminary objections to the jurisdiction of the Court, raised by the government of the Republic of South Africa in these cases. After opening the sitting and briefly recalling the stages in the written proceedings covered since the institution of the cases on November 4, 1960, the President of the Court proceeded to the installation of the two judges ad hoc designated by the parties in accordance with Article 31, paragraphs 3 and 5, of the Statute of the International Court of Justice. The two judges ad hoc were Sir Louis Mbanefo, Chief Justice of the High Court, Eastern Region of Nigeria, designated by Ethiopia and Liberia acting in concert, and the Honorable Jacques Theodore van Wyk, Judge of the Appellate Division of the Supreme Court of South Africa, designated by the government of the Republic of South Africa. The President announced that Judge Córdova was prevented by his health from sitting in the present proceedings.

Corfu Channel Case: Public sittings of the International Court of Justice on the preliminary objection filed by Albania on the Corfu Channe Case1 were held on February 26, 27, 28 and March 1, 2 and 5, 1948. The decision of the Court was given on March 25,1948.

Minquiers and Ecrehos Case: In a judgment of November 17,1953, the International Court of Justice unanimously found that jurisdiction over the island groups of Minquiers and Ecrehos was vested in the United Kingdom. The Court interpreted the special agreement concluded between the United Kingdom and France on September 24, 1951, by which the Court was seized of the dispute, as eliminating the possibility of finding the territories to be res nullius or having a status of condominium. The Court further interpreted the phrase "in so far as they are capable of appropriation" as meaning that the Court was asked to determine which party had sovereignty over each island group and not the sovereignty of individual units of which each group consisted.