The regular, triennial elections for the International Court of Justice (ICJ), with a third of the fifteen seats on the Court coming up for renewal or replacement, were held on November 15, 1990. The five successful candidates thus elected, or re-elected, qualified for regular nine-year terms beginning on February 6, 1991. In the result, two incumbent judges, from France (Judge Guillaume) and Great Britian (Judge Jennings), who were candidates for re-election, were successful. Two other incumbent judges, from Argentina (the retiring Court President, Judge Ruda) and from Sénégal (Judge M'Baye), did not present themselves for re-election. A third incumbent judge, from India (Judge Pathak, who had been elected to the Court in a casual election held in April 1989), was nominated for re-election by a country other than his own, but chose to withdraw after the close of nominations and before the actual balloting. These three seats of the Court were filled by the election of candidates from Venezuela (Aguilar Mawdsley), Madagascar (Ranjeva), and Sri Lanka (Weeramantry).

Canadian lawyers and all those interested in international affairs will be pleased to know that the Sixth Committee of the General Assembly concluded on November 15, 1990 its deliberations on the report of the working group on the United Nations Decade of International Law (“the Vukas Report”) under the chairmanship of Professor Budislav Vukas of Yugoslavia (“the Vukas Committee”). The Vukas Report sets out the proposed program of activities for the first period of the Decade, being the period 1990-92, and represents another important step towards the implementation of Resolution 44/23 of November 17, 1989, and the fulfilment of the aspirations connected with that resolution for strengthening the international legal order. The Report was well received by the delegations of states to the Sixth Committee and on November 19, 1990, the General Assembly adopted by consensus the program of activities set out in the Report, the Decade thus achieving more tangible form.