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A Non-Aligned Crusade for International Law?

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  21 July 2009

Marcel Brus
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Extract

From 26 to 29 June the Ministers of Foreign Affairs of the Movement of Non-Aligned Countries convened at the premisses of the Peace Palace in The Hague to discuss the issue of peace and the rule of law in international affairs. This meeting was the start of a campaign for a Decade of International Law. This was the first occasion that an extraordinary ministerial conference of the Non-Aligned Movement was not held in one of its member countries. The Hague was chosen to underline the historic ties between this city and the (early) development of international law. This year it will be 90 years ago that the First Hague Peace Conference was held on the initiative of Emperor Nicholas II of Russia. This conference (together with the Second Hague Peace Conference of 1907) became a landmark in the history of the codification of international law and especially the development of mechanisms for the peaceful settlement of international disputes between states. The two most important conventions that were adopted at that conference were the Convention with Respect to the Law and Customs of War on Land and the Convention for the Pacific Settlement of International Disputes.

Type
Current Legal Developments
Information
Leiden Journal of International Law , Volume 2 , Issue 2 , November 1989 , pp. 240 - 247
Copyright
Copyright © Foundation of the Leiden Journal of International Law 1989

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References

1. See infra section 2.

2. The term ‘ Non-Aligned Movement’ (NAM) is commonly accepted as the official name of the group of non-aligned countries, although it is not always consistently used – not even in official NAM documents. See. e.g., Willetts, P. The Non-Aligned Movement: The Origin of a Third World Alliance 41–45 (1978).Google Scholar

3. See, e.g., Oppenheim, L. 1 International Law 59 (8th ed., Lauterpacht, H ed, 1955); Wehberg, H. La Contribution des Conferences de la Paix de La Haye au Progris de Droit International, 37 Recueil des Cours 533–664 (1931-III);Google ScholarTanja, GJ.DePeriode 1815–1920, in Compendium Volkenrechtsgeschiedenis (Eyffingered., 1989).Google Scholar

4. See Boyle, F.A. World Politics and International Law 41 (1985).Google Scholar

5. The Hague Declaration of the Ministers of Foreign Affairs of the Movement of Non-Aligned Countries Meeting to Discuss the Issue of Peace and the Rule of Law in International Affairs (NAM/CONF.8/P.R.L./MM/2/REV. 1). All quotations without specific references are from this text.

6. See infra section 3.

7. The Committee consists of six members: Yugoslavia (Chairman), Angola, Indonesia, Iraq, Nicaragua and Senegal.

8. In a first draft declaration for the conference in The Hague in June 1989 it was proposed that the Ministerial Committee should visit all member countries “that have not yet declared their acceptance of the compulsory jurisdiction of the International Court of Justice, with a view to ensuring the full acceptance of such jurisdiction by Non-Aligned States before the end of the Decade“. This however was dropped since some members could not accept such a quick move towards compulsory jurisdiction.

9. Le Monde Diplomatique, Oct. 1961, p.4, cited in Philippe Braillard & Mohammed-Reza Djalili, The Third World and International Relations 93 (1984).

10. The aims and principles of the Non-Aligned Movement have not always been very explicit. At the Havana Conference (1979) these were spelled out for the first time. See Ministry of External Affairs India, Two Decades of Non-alignment: Documents of the Gatherings of the Non-Aligned Countries 1961–1982 at 401 (1983). Also, Singham, A.W. & Hune, J. Non-Alignment in an Age of Alignments 224–225 (1986).Google ScholarCf. Syatauw, J.J.G. 25 Jaar Niet-Gebondenheid. Beschouwingen naar Aanleiding van de Achtste Topconferenlie in Harare, 1986,16 Transaktie 149 (1987) (citing a more compressed formulation of the aims and principles as distributed at the Conference in Harare (1986) by the government of Zimbabwe).Google Scholar

11. Radovan Vukadinovic, Conflicts Between Non-Aligned Countries, in The Third World and International Relations, supra note 7, at 144.

12. NAC/Conf.6/F.M./WP.2(1979).

13. NAC/Conf.6/L.l/Rev.l(1979).

14. NAC/Conf.6/F.M./WP.3 (1979).

15. id.

16. Supra note 10.

17. Documents of the Sixth Conference of Heads of State or Government of Non Aligned Countries, Held at Havana, Cuba, from 3 to 9 September 1979, UN Doc. A/34/542 (1979).

18. Documents of the Ministerial meeting of the Co-ordinating Bureau of the Non-Aligned Countries, Held at Havana from 31 May to 5 June 1982, UN Doc. A/37/333-S/15278 (1982).

19. Final Documents of the Seventh Conference of Heads of State or Government of Non Aligned Countries, held at New Delhi from 7 to 12 March 1983, UN Doc. A/38/132-S/15675 (1983); Final Documents of the Eighth Conference of Heads of State or Government of Non Aligned Countries, held at Harare, Zimbabwe, from 1–6 September 1986, UN Doc. A/41/697-S/18392 (1986).

20. Supra note 17, par. 171.

21. Supra note 17, par. 286.

22. UN Doc A/43/667-S/20212 par. 253, Annex I (1988). The core body of the Working Group consists of five members from Africa, four from Asia, three from Latin America and the Caribbean and one from Europe. The Chairman of the Movement is an ex officio member.

23. UN Doc. A/43/667-S/20212 par. C, Annex IV (1988).

24. At the ninth non-aligned summit in Belgrade the Heads of Slate or Government considered the meeting held in The Hague and (he declaration adopted by it to constitute an important contribution to the issue of peace and international law and strongly supported the initiative that the UN General Assembly declares the next decade to be The Decade of Peace and International Law. NAC 9/PC/Doc. 21 (1989). Why the conference decided to change the name of the decade by including the word ‘peace’ is not completely clear. It would be regrettable if this is intended to bring about a shift in the discussion from the role of international law – and especially (compulsory) judicial dispute settlement – to disarmament and other security issues.

25. The fact that the countries of the Non-Aligned Movement have become “in this last half of the century the battlegrounds for bloody wars“ is fully acknowledged in the 1989 The Hague Declaration. One of the most obvious examples has been, until recently, the war between Iran and Iraq.

26. E.g., Burkina Faso v. Mali as a genuine border conflict (1986ICJ Rep. 554) and the continental shelf delimitation cases of Libya v. Malta (1985 ICJ Rep. 13) and Tunisia v. Libya (1982 ICJ Rep. 18).