World Court Digest

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III.	The International Court of Justice
1.	FUNDAMENTAL PRINCIPLES
1.4.	Political Questions/ Determination of the Existence of a Dispute

¤ Application of the Convention on the Prevention
and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide
(Bosnia and Herzegovina v. Yugoslavia),
Preliminary Objections, Judgment of 11 July 1996,
I.C.J. Reports 1996, p. 595

[614-615] 27. In order to determine whether it has jurisdiction to entertain the case on the basis of Article IX of the Genocide Convention, it remain for the Court to verify whether there is a dispute between the Parties that falls within the scope of that provision. Article IX of the Convention is, worded as follows:

"Disputes between the Contracting Parties relating to the interpretation, application or fulfilment of the present Convention, including those relating to the responsibility of a State for genocide or for any of the other acts enumerated in article III, shall be submitted to the International Court of Justice at the request of any of the parties to the dispute."

It is jurisdiction ratione materiae, as so defined, to which Yugoslavia's fifth objection relates.

28. In their final form, the principal requests submitted by Bosnia and Herzegovina are for the Court to adjudge and declare that Yugoslavia has in several ways violated the Genocide Convention; to order Yugoslavia to cease the acts contrary to the obligations stipulated in the Convention; and to declare that Yugoslavia has incurred international responsibility by reason of those violations, for which it must make appropriate reparation. While Yugoslavia has refrained from filing a Counter-Memorial on the merits and has raised preliminary objections, it has nevertheless wholly denied all of Bosnia and Herzegovina's allegations, whether at the stage of proceedings relating to the requests for the indication of provisional measures, or at the stage of the present proceedings relating to those objections.

29. In conformity with well-established jurisprudence, the Court accordingly notes that there persists

"a situation in which the two sides hold clearly opposite views concerning the question of the performance or non-performance of certain treaty obligations" (Interpretation of Peace Treaties with Bulgaria, Hungary and Romania, First Phase, Advisory Opinion, I.C.J. Reports 1950, p. 74)

and that, by reason of the rejection by Yugoslavia of the complaints formulated against it by Bosnia and Herzegovina, "there is a legal dispute" between them (East Timor (Portugal v. Australia), I.C.J. Reports 1995, p. 100, para. 22).

[p. 621] 43. According to the first preliminary objection of Yugoslavia, the Application is said to be inadmissible on the ground that it refers to vents that took place within the framework of a civil war, and there is consequently no international dispute upon which the Court could make a finding.
This objection is very close to the fifth objection which the Court has already considered (paragraphs 27-33). In responding to the latter objection, the Court has in fact also answered this. Having noted that there does indeed exist between the Parties a dispute falling within the provisions of Article IX of the Genocide Convention - that is to say an international dispute -, the Court cannot find that the Application is inadmissible on the sole ground that, in order to decide the dispute, it would be impelled to take account of events that may have occurred in a context of civil war.

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