Legal Maxims: Summaries and Extracts from Selected Case Law

Author(s):  
Giuliana Ziccardi Capaldo

Obligations Concerning Negotiations Relating to Cessation of the Nuclear Arms Race and to Nuclear Disarmament(Marshall Islands v. India) Jurisdiction of the Court and Admissibility of the Application, Judgment, 5 October 2016Immunities and Criminal Proceedings (Equatorial Guinea v. France), Request for the Indication of Provisional Measures, Order, 7 December 2016...

2017 ◽  
Vol 76 (01) ◽  
pp. 1-4
Author(s):  
Federica I. Paddeu

ON 5 October 2016, the International Court of Justice handed down its decision in the three parallel proceedings involving the Marshall Islands (as applicant) and India, Pakistan and the UK (as respondents): Obligations concerning Negotiations relating to Cessation of the Nuclear Arms Race and to Nuclear Disarmament (Marshall Islands v India). The Marshall Islands claimed that the respondent states had failed to meet their obligation to negotiate the cessation of the nuclear arms race and nuclear disarmament in good faith, either under Article VI of the Non-Proliferation Treaty (claim against the UK) and/or customary law (against all three respondents). All three respondents formulated objections to jurisdiction and admissibility. In all three cases, they objected that a “dispute” did not exist between them and the applicant. The Court, by a narrow majority (extremely narrow in the case against the UK: by the casting vote of the President), declined to exercise jurisdiction on the basis that no dispute existed between the parties.


AJIL Unbound ◽  
2017 ◽  
Vol 111 ◽  
pp. 75-80 ◽  
Author(s):  
George R. B. Galindo

The International Court of Justice (ICJ)’s 2016 judgments on the three cases Obligations concerning negotiations relating to cessation of the nuclear arms race and to nuclear disarmament show the omnipresence of the dichotomy between form and substance in the Court's case-law. Commentators and several dissenting judges have stressed that the judgments represent a landmark in the sense that the Court has radically departed from the consideration of flexible standards in applying procedural rules to the determination of the issue of identification of a legal dispute. In other words, it made form prevail over substance.


2018 ◽  
Vol 49 (1) ◽  
pp. 53
Author(s):  
Devesh Awmee

The International Court of Justice recently gave judgment in Obligations Concerning Negotiations Relating to Cessation of the Nuclear Arms Race and to Nuclear Disarmament. The case concerned three parallel claims brought by the Marshall Islands against India, Pakistan and the United Kingdom for their alleged failure to fulfil obligations concerning negotiations relating to the cessation of the nuclear arms race and nuclear disarmament under art VI of the Non-Proliferation Treaty and customary international law. The Court in all three proceedings dismissed the claims at the preliminary objections phase on the sole ground that a legal dispute did not exist between the parties. In determining whether a legal dispute existed, the Court appears to have deviated from the objective determination taken in its previous jurisprudence by introducing, for the first time, a new requirement of "awareness". The Court also failed to address the other preliminary objections brought by the United Kingdom such as the Monetary Gold principle, which appears to have been a more credible avenue for the Court to dismiss the case. The case illustrates the failure by the Court to yet again confront the issue of nuclear weapons.


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