Suchergebnisse

It is my intention to appeal to scholars of a younger generation to undertake research on the thesis which, on the basis of my experience at the International Court of Justice–and I have been a serving Member for almost a quarter of a century–I shall be presenting in this paper. In my view, one subject missing from contemporary studies on the function and work of the International Court of Justice is a pragmatic examination of the manner in which certain contentious cases presented to the International Court of Justice have disappeared from view and of whether a judgment, once handed down, has actually been complied with by the parties to the dispute.

Under the traditional rules of international law, the sea was divided into the high seas and the territorial seas and in each case different rules and regulations obtained. As for the exploitation of fishery resources, the coastal state possessed unquestioned rights to regulate any such exploitation within its territorial sea and to apply its domestic legislation fully to any person engaged in such activities. Similarly, the coastal state was free to prohibit fishing by foreigners in its territorial sea and thus to monopolize those fishery resources. On the high seas, however, no state was allowed, at least in principle, to impose its jurisdiction upon any foreign vessel, since fishing on the high seas fell under the general regime of the high seas. The existence of these two disparate regimes, namely, exploitation under the full control of the coastal state and exploitation free from interference by any country, was a fundamental presumption underlying the exploitation of fishery resources.