On 2 November 1992, Iran filed an application instituting proceedings against the United States in respect of a dispute arising out of the attack on and the destruction of three offshore oil production complexes. In it, Iran contended that these acts constituted a fundamental breach of various provisions of the Treaty of Amity, Economic Relations and Consular Rights between the United States and Iran, signed in 1955.

On 17 June 1996, the United States Supreme Court denied a petition for certiorari submitted by counsel for Radovan Karadžić, the infamous Bosnian-Serb leader indicted by the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) for various international crimes. Thus, the Court let the decision of the US Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit in the companion cases of Kadić v. Karadžić and Doe I and Doe II v. Karadžić, stand. The latter was a set of cases brought by Croat and Muslim citizens of Bosnia-Herzegovina in the US courts against Radovan Karadžić after he was duly served process while in New York. The cases will now proceed, however slowly, with a trial on the merits, addressing the plaintiffs' claims concerning Karadžić's responsibility for acts of genocide; war crimes; torture; summary execution; related crimes against humanity; acts of rape; forced prostitution; forced impregnation; other cruel, inhumane, and degrading treatment; assault and battery; sexual and ethnic inequality; and wrongful death. As remedies, the plaintiffs seek compensatory and punitive damages, attorney fees and, in one instance, injunctive relief.

It is always a pleasure and privilege to address a body of students as they commence their graduate studies. You have climbed the foothills successfully and have reached the first plateau. But there are many peaks ahead, and as you commence your ascent of one of them today, I wish you the very best of luck in reaching the sunlit plateau that lies ahead. When you arrive there, you will no doubt see other peaks which you may wish to climb, because any branch of study reveals ever higher and higher peaks. The higher you go, the more you see. These summits are sometimes even hidden in the clouds. You keep discovering them, and even if their existence is known, they are often unexplored territory. Pathways have to be found through them. That is part of the intellectual excitement you will commence today as you leave the well-trodden paths and begin to carve out pathways for yourselves. I congratulate you and wish you God speed on your journey.

The World Health Organization (WHO) had, among other things, been examining and deliberating the hazardous effects to health by the use of nuclear weapons. These discussions culminated in a resolution which requested an advisory opinion from the International Court of Justice (ICJ) on the legality of the use of nuclear weapons in the following terms: [i]n view of the health and environmental effects, would the use of nuclear weapons by a Stare in war or other armed conflict be a breach of its obligations under international law including the WHO Constitution?

In this article, special attention will be given to the recent judgment of the European Court of Human Right in the case of Akdivar and Others v. Turkey. Since 1985, a violent conflict has raged in the South-Eastern region of Turkey, between the Turkish security forces and sections of the Kurdish population in favour of Kurdish autonomy, in particular members of the PKK (Workers' Party of Kurdistan). Since 1987, 10 of the 11 provinces of South-Eastern Turkey have been subjected to emergency rule, which was in force at the time of the facts complained of. The main issue in this case concerned the fact that during this conflict, a large number of villages have been destroyed and evacuated by the security forces. According to the applicants, the alleged burning of their houses by the security forces constituted, inter alia, a violation of Article 3 (the prohibition of torture and inhuman treatment or punishment) and Article 8 (the right of respect for private life, family life, and home) of the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR), and Article 1 of Protocol No. 1 (property rights).

The case-law of the International Court of Justice (Court) is replete with arguments about whether the Court has jurisdiction to entertain the particular dispute (or request for advisory opinion) with which the Court is faced. These arguments are framed at one level as matters of interpretation of the relevant instruments. But they typically play out as well a multiplicity of variations on the overlapping themes of sovereignty (the extent to which states have been prepared to concede decision-making to third-party settlement mechanisms) and justiciability (the extent to which they will accept that an issue may be governed by ‘law’ and thus be susceptible to resolution by judicial actors).

By an application filed on 29 March 1994, Cameroon instituted proceedings against Nigeria, relying on the declarations under Article 36(2) of the Statute of the Court, made by both states without reservations. The dispute, according to the Application, related “essentially to the question of sovereignty over the Bakassi Peninsula”, where, “since the end of 1993”, the Nigerian troops were “occupying several Cameroonian localities”. Cameroon also requested the Court “to determine the course of the maritime boundary between the two states beyond the line fixed in 1975”. In an ‘Additional Application’, filed on 6 June 1994, Cameroon extended the subject of the dispute “essentially to the question of sovereignty over a part of the territory of Cameroon in the area of Lake Chad”, which had become the object of “the official […] claim […] by […] Nigeria quite recently, for the first time”; and also requested the Court “to specify definitely” the whole frontier line from Lake Chad to the sea, and to examine the two Applications as a single case. In its counter-memorial, filed within the prescribed time-limit (18 December 1995), Nigeria raised objections to the jurisdiction of the Court and the admissibility of the Cameroonian claims, whereupon the proceedings on the merits were suspended and the President of the Court fixed 15 May 1996 as the time-limit within which Cameroon might present its observations on the Nigerian objections.

Tadić (indictment of 13 February 1995)

1. Order of Trial Chamber II Granting the Withdrawal of Assigned Counsel on 22 April 1997.

2. Opinion and Judgment on 7 May 1997.

3. Order of the return of a Detained Witness (Dragan Opacić) on 27 May 1997.

4. Order of the President Assigning Judges of the Tribunal to the Bench of the Appeals Chamber in the Case of Dragan Opacić on 12 June 1997.

5. Decision on Application for Leave to Appeal in the Case of Dragan Opacić on 2 June 1997.

6. Order Regarding Pre-sentencing Hearing on 12 June 1997.

7. Order of the President Assigning Judges to the Appeals Chamber on 16 June 1997

8. Judgment on 7 May 1997.

9. Revised Order of the President Assigning Judges to the Appeals Chamber

10. Sentencing Judgment on 14 July 1997.

On 8 July 1991, Qatar filed an application instituting proceedings against Bahrain in respect of certain disputes between the two states relating to sovereignty over the Hawar Islands, sovereign rights over the shoals of Dibal and Qit'at Jaradah, and the delimitation of the maritime areas of the two states.

Tadić (indictment of 13 February 1995) Opinion and Judgment of Trial Chamber II of May 1997.

On Wednesday 6 November 1996, the United Nations General Assembly and Security Council re-elected Judges Mohammed Bedjaoui (Algeria), Stephen M. Schwebel (United States), and Vladlen S. Vereshchetin (Russian Federation) as members of the Court. On the same date, Pieter H. Kooijmans (Netherlands) and José F. Rezek (Brazil) were elected as members of the Court as of 6 February 1997. Kooijmans and Rezek have replaced Judges Luigi Ferrari Bravo (Italy), who completed the late Judge Ago's term, and Mohammed Shahabuddeen (Guyana), who completed his nine year term.

The first person to be sentenced by the United Nations ad hoc International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (Tribunal) was Dražen Erdemović, a member of the Bosnian Serb Army who had pleaded guilty to one count of a crime against humanity – murder – and another of violations of the laws and customs of war – murder. Erdemović was a soldier in the 10th Sabotage Detachment of the Bosnian Serb army and the charges against him arose in connection with the slaughter of Bosnian Muslim civilians in the United Nations ‘safe areas’ of Srebrenica and Potocari.

Established in 1993, the International Criminal Tribunal for the Prosecution of Persons Responsible for Serious Violations of International Humanitarian Law Committed in the Territory of the Former Yugoslavia Since 1991 (International Tribunal) has steadily become more active in its quest to fulfil its mandate, moving from the establishment stage to the working stage most notably over the past two years. The trial of Dusko Tadić, the first full scale trial before the International Tribunal, was held from 7 May 1996 through 28 November 1996 and the final judgment was rendered on 7 May 1997. Pursuant to a guilty plea, the accused Drazen Erdemović was sentenced on 29 November 1996. In addition, two trials, one of which is based on the Celebići indictment against four accused, Esad Landžo, Zenjil Delalić, Zdravko Mucić, and Hazim Delić, and began on 10 March 1997, and one against Tihomir Blaskić, are currently underway. The motions submitted and arguments that have been and will be made during these proceedings have, and will continue to, force the trial and appellate chambers of the International Tribunal to apply and interpret for the first time many of the International Tribunal's Rules of Procedure and Evidence (Rules). One of the issues that is no doubt relevant for the judges of the trial chambers as they deliberate the final judgments in these cases is the modicum of proof necessary to find the accused guilty of the infractions of international humanitarian law charged in the relevant indictment.

In a small note which Peter Kooijmans wrote to me in answer to a letter in which I congratulated him with his election as Judge in the International Court of Justice – the first Netherlands Judge in the Court after World War II apart from Professor Riphagen who only served as a Judge ad hoc in the Barcelona Traction, Light and Power Company Ltd. case – he stated that he considered himself to be a privileged man. Privileged, because the new position would allow him to continue to remain active in the field of international law considerably beyond the retirement age of 65 which applies to professors of international law and most other people in The Netherlands. Privileged, I would like to add, also in another respect. Very rarely it will be given to one person in his lifetime to fulfil so many different honourable positions in the field of international law and international relations at such a high level of responsibility as has been the case with Peter Kooijmans: Professor of public international law, United Nations Special Rapporteur on Torture, State Secretary (Staatssecretaris) for Foreign Affairs, in particular disarmament matters (1973–1977), Minister for Foreign Affairs and, finally, Judge in the International Court of Justice.

Human rights constitute a challenge that Peter Kooijmans never refused or will refuse, both in his academic and government activities. For a long time he has been in the forefront of those who have struggled for the promotion and protection on human rights for everyone, everywhere in the world. As he said himself: “I myself would not have devoted so much of my time to the cause of human rights […] if I had not believed it to be a just cause and worthy task.“ The issue of human rights first became a major concern for him when he was State Secretary for Foreign Affairs (1973–1977), when he had the Dutch foreign policy within the United Nations (including human rights questions) in his portfolio. It was during that period that the United Nations was gradually changing its course, by shifting the emphasis from standard setting in the field of human rights to supervision over the implementation of international human rights norms. He was then working in the shadow of Max van der Stoel, Minister for Foreign Affairs, who was himself an outspoken protagonist of international human rights. It was Max van der Stoel who, after he had again become Minister for Foreign Affairs during the shortlived Van Agt II cabinet (1981–1982), requested Peter Kooijmans to succeed him as Chairman of the Netherlands' delegation to the United Nations Commission on Human Rights, the main political organ of the United Nations in the field of human rights. With his usual sense for realism, Kooijmans once described this Commission as “a crooked stick to make straight stroke”.

When Peter Kooijmans took up his position as judge in the International Court of Justice on 6 February 1997, a formal end came to a career of about 30 years of teaching public international law in the Netherlands. This is why the Leiden Journal of International Law has asked me to write a few words about the work and person of Peter Kooijmans as a teacher of public international law, a task which I accepted with great pleasure, also on behalf of other staff members who have worked with Peter Kooijmans for many years.