Litigation Strategy At The International Court A Case Study Of The Nicaragua V United States Dispute

Contents.

This book analyses Nicaragua's role in the development of international law, through its participation in cases that have come before the International Court of Justice. Nicaragua has appeared before the ICJ in fourteen cases, either as an applicant, respondent or intervening State, thus setting an important example of committment to the peaceful judicial settlement of disputes. The “Nicaraguan” cases have enabled the ICJ to take positions on and clarify a whole range of important procedural, jurisdictional and substantive legal issues, which have inspired the jurisprudence of international and regional courts and tribunals and influenced the development of international law. The book focuses on reviewing Nicaragua's cases before the ICJ, using a thematic approach to identify their impact on international law. Each chapter includes a discussion of the relevant cases on a particular theme and their impact over time on general as well as specific branches of international law, notably through their use as precedent by other international and regional courts and tribunals.

This book examines why states resort to international adjudication or arbitration for the resolution of their disputes.

The international law on the use of force is one of the oldest branches of international law. It is an area twinned with the emergence of international law as a concept in itself, and which sees law and politics collide. The number of armed conflicts is equal only to the number of methodological approaches used to describe them. Many violent encounters are well known. The Kosovo Crisis in 1999 and the US-led invasion of Iraq in 2003 spring easily to the minds of most scholars and academics, and gain extensive coverage in this text. Other conflicts, including the Belgian operation in Stanleyville, and the Ethiopian Intervention in Somalia, are often overlooked to our peril. Ruys and Corten's expert-written text compares over sixty different instances of the use of cross border force since the adoption of the UN Charter in 1945, from all out warfare to hostile encounters between individual units, targeted killings, and hostage rescue operations, to ask a complex question. How much authority does the power of precedent really have in the law of the use of force?

First published in 2002. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.

2 Dispute Settlement Under UNCLOS