Authors: Shatakhi Kaul and Aaditya Vikram Sharma*
Pakistan’s Foreign Minister Mr. Shah Mehmood Qureshi has said that the country will approach the International Court of Justice against India’s recent actions in Jammu and Kashmir.Is this rhetoric or is there any substance in his comments?
On 5 August 2019, India revoked the special status given to Jammu and Kashmir under Article 370 of the Constitution of India. Pakistan’s Prime Minister, Mr. Imran Khan stated that he would take up this issue in all international forums. Significantly, on 16 August 2019, the dispute was heard by the United Nations Security Council (SC) for the first time since 1971, however no statement was issued by the SC. The Pakistani PM also stated that his country is considering how to approach the International Court of Justice (ICJ). On 20 August 2019, the Foreign Minister of Pakistan, Mr. Shah Mehmood Qureshi categorically stated that the country will approach the ICJ. The question which arises is whether the ICJ is a sustainable avenue for the Kashmir dispute?
The International Court of Justice
The ICJ is an international court which was established by the United Nations Charter in June 1945. Countries which join the United Nations (UN) automatically become parties to the ICJ. Located in the Peace Palace at the Hague, the court settles contentious disputes in accordance with international law. It also gives advisory opinions on legal questions referred to it by authorized UN organs and specialized agencies. To take up any case, the court first needs to establish its jurisdiction. As stated above, it has two types of jurisdictions— contentious and advisory.
Contentious Jurisdiction
Let’s first talk about contentious cases. If Pakistan wishes to file a claim against India at the ICJ, it would be under this jurisdiction. As per Article 34 of the Statute of the ICJ, only States can be parties to cases. Further, there will be no jurisdiction without the consent of the State concerned. So, if Pakistan files a case in the ICJ against India regarding Kashmir, the court will be able to go ahead with the case only if India gives consent to it. This consent is deemed to be given under Article 36 of the Statute of the ICJ, which deals with the compulsory jurisdiction of the court. However, Article 36 (2) allows countries to give declarations, which alters the general jurisdiction of the world court concerning them. These declarations are looked into by the court when a case is filed by one State against another. In case of a dispute regarding the ICJ’s jurisdiction, the matter is resolved by the court’s decision under Article 36 (6).
India’s declaration specifies that the ICJ’s jurisdiction does not extend to any matters dealing with any nation which is or was a member of the Commonwealth of Nations. Pakistan is a commonwealth nation. In 1999,Pakistan approached the ICJ after India shot down a Pakistani Breguet Atlantic maritime patrol aircraft over the Rann of Kutch. The court refused to entertain the case on the basis of India’s commonwealth declaration.
Further, both India and Pakistan have declared that no dispute shall be taken up by the ICJ in case a treaty mechanism exists. The Shimla Agreement, 1971 and the Lahore Declaration, 1999 form part of such an arrangement. But, there is another option for Pakistan. If an international treaty allows nations to approach the ICJ, then the doors are open to its intervention. For instance, in the Jadhav Case (India v. Pakistan), the ICJ deemed that it had jurisdiction through Article 1 of the Optional Protocol to the Vienna Convention on Consular Relations which had been ratified by both the countries.
Pakistan has said that it will approach the ICJ against the alleged human rights violations in Jammu and Kashmir. So, here, it would be apt to consider International Human Rights treaties. In a recent article, Judge James Crawford (currently a sitting judge at the ICJ) and Amelia Keane (formerly an Associate Legal Officer at ICJ) stated that only five Human Rights treaties allow access to the ICJ. India has ratified four of them- the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, the Convention on the Political Rights of Women, the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination, and the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women. None of them apply to the situation at hand. The most relevant international human rights treaty, the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, 1966,does not open the door to approach the ICJ. In other words, a contentious jurisdiction for this issue will be very difficult (if not impossible), to establish for Pakistan.
Advisory Jurisdiction
Article 96 of the UN Charter allows either the General Assembly or the Security Council or any organ/specialized agency of the UN to approach the ICJ and request an advisory opinion. The opinion of the court is not binding but carries great weight. In such cases, the consent of States is not necessary. Further, the ICJ is willing to rule on questions which have both legal and political elements. This is what happened in the Advisory Opinion concerning the Legality of the Threat or Use of Nuclear Weapons. In that case, the ICJ ruled that the question put to it was a legal one, as it had to adjudge the case on the basis of relevant principles and rules of international law. The presence of the political aspect was irrelevant until the legal element existed.
The same happened recently when the ICJ rendered its Advisory Opinion in the Chagos Archipelago case. The Chagos islands historically formed part of the British Colony of Mauritius. In 1965, three years before Mauritius became independent, the British detached it from the colony and made it part of British Indian Ocean Territory (BIOT). When Mauritius gained independence in 1968, the archipelago was denied to it. Mauritius tried to file a contentious case against Great Britain, but the ICJ lacked jurisdiction. However, the General Assembly (GA) was able to refer the question to the ICJ. In its opinion, the court deemed that the UK should end its control of the island as rapidly as possible.
So could an advisory case with reference to Kashmir end up at the ICJ? Maybe. In the Chagos Island case, the ICJ specifically noted that it had taken up the Chagos dispute because the GA had not asked it to determine a territorial question (para 86). The Kashmir dispute is fundamentally a territorial dispute. However, the human rights angle could still be explored by the court. Nevertheless, advisory cases can only end up with the ICJ if nations agree to do so. It is not clear if Pakistan would be able to wrangle up enough diplomatic muscle to bring majority nations on board in the UN for referring the dispute to the ICJ. In the SC meeting on the 16th of August, an isolated China rendered the sole support to Pakistan. It was a closed doors meeting and no statement was issued.
Closing
It seems Pakistan’s aim is not to get a decision from the world court, but rather to get the Kashmiri issue internationalised. Prima facie, ICJ has no jurisdiction in the matter. Its advisory jurisdiction cannot be compelled either. So will the ICJ open the door to Pakistan? It doesn’t seem likely.
*Aaditya Vikram Sharma is an Assistant Professor at Vivekananda Institute of Professional Studies, Delhi. Both authors are writing in their personal capacity.
