World Court Digest

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III.	The International Court of Justice
1.	FUNDAMENTAL PRINCIPLES
1.1.	General Questions

¤ Case Concerning Maritime
Delimitation and Territorial
Question between Qatar and
Bahrain (Qatar v. Bahrain)
Judgment of 16 March 2001

[p. 212 J.D.O. Bedjaoui, Ranjeva and Koroma] 206. In this particularly sensitive case, where public opinion is easily roused, it would have been open to the Court to render its Judgment more readily acceptable if it had taken the initiative of more or less directly encouraging the two Parties to envisage the possibility of mutual financial compensation. The Court's judicial function is not basically incompatible with a certain capacity to make suggestions, or even indicate guidelines, to the parties. Juridical technique has more resources in this regard than might be imagined. On the opening day of the hearings, Professor Salmon made it clear that the return of the Hawars to Qatar would necessarily be accompanied by the compensation of any interests affected by such decision. We are thinking rather of an additional possibility, which would have been open to the Court thanks to a certain effort of the imagination from which it should not have debarred itself, particularly in a case so sensitive for both Parties.

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