Non corrigé
Uncorrected
CR 2011/12
International Court Cour internationale
of Justice de Justice
THHEAGUE LAAYE
YEAR 2011
Public sitting
held on Wednesday 30 March 2011, at 3 p.m., at the Peace Palace,
President Owada presiding,
in the case concerning Application of the Interim Accord of 13 September 1995
(the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia v. Greece)
________________
VERBATIM RECORD
________________
ANNÉE 2011
Audience publique
tenue le mercredi 30 mars 2011, à 15 heures, au Palais de la Paix,
sous la présidence de M. Owada, président,
en l’affaire relative à l’Application de l’accord intérimaire du 13 septembre 1995
(ex-République yougoslave de Macédoine c. Grèce)
____________________
COMPTE RENDU
____________________ - 2 -
Present: Presiewtada
Vice-Presdenkta
Judges Koroma
Al-Khasawneh
Simma
Abraham
Keith
Sepúlveda-Amor
Bennouna
Skotnikov
Cançado Trindade
Yusuf
Greenwood
Xue
Donoghue
Judges ad hoc Roucounas
Vukas
Registrar Couvreur
⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯ - 3 -
Présents : M. Owada,président
vceMpra,ident
KoroMa.
Al-Khasawneh
Simma
Abraham
Keith
Sepúlveda-Amor
Bennouna
Skotnikov
Crnçade
Yusuf
Greenwood
Xue mes
Djngogshue,
RoMcou.nas
juVeskas, ad hoc
Cgoefferr,
⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯ - 4 -
The Government of the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia is represented by:
H.E.Mr.Antonio Miloshoski, Minister for Foreign Affairs of the former Yugoslav Republic of
Macedonia,
as Agent;
H.E.Mr.Nikola Dimitrov, Ambassador of the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia to the
Kingdom of the Netherlands,
as Co-Agent;
Mr.Philippe Sands, Q.C., Professor of Law, Un iversity College London, Barrister, Matrix
Chambers, London,
Mr.Sean D.Murphy, Patricia Roberts Harris Research Professor of Law, George Washington
University,
Mrs. Geneviève Bastid Burdeau, Professor of Law, University of Paris I, Panthéon-Sorbonne,
Mr.Pierre Klein, Professor of International Law, Director of the Centre of International Law,
Université Libre de Bruxelles,
Ms Blinne Ní Ghrálaigh, Barrister, Matrix Chambers, London,
as Counsel;
Mr. Saso Georgievski, Professor of Law, University Sts Cyril and Methodius, Skopje,
Mr. Toni Deskoski, Professor of Law, University Sts Cyril and Methodius, Skopje,
Mr. Igor Djundev, Ambassador, State Counsellor, Ministry of Foreign Affairs,
Mr.GoranStevcevski, State Counsellor, International Law Directorate, Ministry of Foreign
Affairs,
MsElizabetaGjorgjieva, Minister Plenipoten tiary, Deputy-Head of Mission of the former
Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia to the European Union,
Ms Aleksandra Miovska, Head of Co-ordination Sector, Cabinet Minister for Foreign Affairs,
as Advisers;
Mr. Mile Prangoski, Research Assistant, Cabinet of Minister for Foreign Affairs,
Mr. Remi Reichold, Research Assistant, Matrix Chambers, London,
as Assistants; - 5 -
Le Gouvernement de l’ex-République yougoslave de Macédoine est représenté par :
S. Exc. M. Antonio Miloshoski, ministre des affaires étrangères de l’ex-R épublique yougoslave de
Macédoine,
comme agent ;
S. Exc. M. Nikola Dimitrov, ambassadeur de l’ ex-République yougoslave de Macédoine auprès du
Royaume des Pays-Bas,
comme coagent ;
M.PhilippeSands, Q.C., professeur de droit au Un iversity College de Londres, avocat, Matrix
Chambers, Londres,
M.SeanD.Murphy, professeur de droit à la George Washington University, titulaire de la chaire
de recherche Patricia Roberts Harris,
Mme Geneviève Bastid Burdeau, professeur de droit à l’Université Paris I, Panthéon-Sorbonne,
M.PierreKlein, professeur de droit internationa l, directeur du centre de droit international de
l’Université Libre de Bruxelles,
Mme Blinne Ní Ghrálaigh, avocat, Matrix Chambers, Londres,
comme conseils ;
M. Saso Georgievski, professeur de droit à l’Université Saints-Cyrille-et-Méthode de Skopje,
M. Toni Deskoski, professeur de droit à l’Université Saints-Cyrille-et-Méthode de Skopje,
M. Igor Djundev, ambassadeur, conseiller d’Etat au ministère des affaires étrangères,
M.GoranStevcevski, conseiller d’Etat au minist ère des affaires étrangè res, direction du droit
international,
Mme Elizabeta Gjorgjieva, ministre plénipotentiaire, chef adjoint de la mission de l’ex-République
yougoslave de Macédoine auprès de l’Union européenne,
MmeAleksandraMiovska, chef du département de la coordination au cabinet du ministre des
affaires étrangères,
comme conseillers ;
M. Mile Prangoski, assistant de recherche au cabinet du ministre des affaires étrangères,
M. Remi Reichold, assistant de recherche, Matrix Chambers, Londres,
comme assistants ; - 6 -
Ms Elena Bodeva, Third Secretary, Embassy of the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia in the
Kingdom of the Netherlands,
as Liaison Officer with the International Court of Justice;
Mr. Ilija Kasaposki, Security Officer of the Foreign Minister. - 7 -
MmeElenaBodeva, troisième secrétaire à l’ ambassade de l’ex-République yougoslave de
Macédoine au Royaume des Pays-Bas,
comme attaché de liaison auprès de la Cour internationale de Justice ;
M. Ilija Kasaposki, agent chargé de la sécurité du ministre des affaires étrangères. - 8 -
The Government of the Hellenic Republic is represented by:
H.E. Mr. Georges Savvaides, Ambassador of Greece,
MsMariaTelalian, Legal Adviser, Head of the Public International Law Section of the Legal
Department, Ministry of Foreign Affairs,
as Agents;
MrG. eorgeAbi-Saab, Honorary Professor of In ternational Law, Graduate Institute of
International Studies, Geneva, member of the Institut de droit international,
Mr.JamesCrawford, S.C., F.B.A., Whewell Professor of International Law, University of
Cambridge, member of the Institut de droit international,
Mr.AlainPellet, Professor of International Law, University of Paris Ouest, Nanterre-La Défense,
member and former Chairman of the Interna tional Law Commission, associate member of the
Institut de droit international,
Mr.MichaelReisman, Myres S. McDougal Professor of International Law, Yale Law School,
member of the Institut de droit international,
as Senior Counsel and Advocates;
Mr.ArghyriosFatouros, Honorary Professor of International Law, University of Athens, member
of the Institut de droit international,
Mr. Linos-Alexandre Sicilianos, Professor of International Law, University of Athens,
Mr. Evangelos Kofos, former Minister-Counsellor, Ministry of Foreign Affairs, specialist on
Balkan affairs,
Csounsel;
Mr.TomGrant, Research Fellow, Lauterpacht Ce ntre for International Law, University of
Cambridge,
Mr.AlexandrosKolliopoulos, Assistant Legal Advi ser, Public International Law Section of the
Legal Department, Ministry of Foreign Affairs,
Mr. Michael Stellakatos-Loverdos, Assistant Legal Adviser, Public International Law Section of
the Legal Department, Ministry of Foreign Affairs,
MsAlinaMiron, Researcher, Centre de droit inte rnational de Nanterre (CEDIN), University of
Paris Ouest, Nanterre-La Défense,
Asdvisers;
H.E. Mr. Ioannis Economides, Ambassador of Greece to the Kingdom of the Netherlands,
MsAlexandraPapadopoulou, Minister Plenipotentiary, Head of the Greek Liaison Office in
Skopje, - 9 -
Le Gouvernement de la République hellénique est représenté par :
S. Exc. M. Georges Savvaides, ambassadeur de Grèce,
MmeMariaTelalian, conseiller juridique, chef de la section de droit international public du
département juridique au ministère des affaires étrangères,
comme agents ;
M.GeorgesAbi-Saab, professeur honoraire de droit international à l’Institut universitaire des
hautes études internationales de Genève, membre de l’Institut de droit international,
M.JamesCrawford, S.C., F.B.A., professeur de droit international à l’Université de Cambridge,
titulaire de la chaire Whewell, membre de l’Institut de droit international,
M.AlainPellet, professeur de droit international à l’Université ParisOuest, Nanterre-LaDéfense,
membre et ancien président de la Commission du droit international, membre associé de
l’Institut de droit international,
M. Michael Reisman, professeur de droit internationa l à l’Université de Yale, titulaire de la chaire
Myres S. McDougal, membre de l’Institut de droit international,
comme conseils principaux et avocats ;
M.Arghyrios Fatouros, professeur honoraire de dr oit international à l’Université nationale
d’Athènes, membre de l’Institut de droit international,
M. Linos-Alexandre Sicilianos, professeur de droit international à l’Université nationale d’Athènes,
M. Evangelos Kofos, ancien ministre-conseiller au ministère des affaires étrangères, spécialiste des
Balkans,
comme conseils ;
M.TomGrant, collaborateur scientifique au La uterpacht Centre for International Law de
l’Université de Cambridge,
M. Alexandros Kolliopoulos, conseiller juridique adjoint à la secti on de droit international public
du département juridique au ministère des affaires étrangères,
M. Michael Stellakatos-Loverdos, conseiller juridique adjoint à la section de droit international
public du département juridique au ministère des affaires étrangères,
MmeAlinaMiron, chercheur au Centre de droit international de Nanterre (CEDIN), Université
Paris Ouest, Nanterre-La Défense,
comme conseillers ;
S. Exc. M. Ioannis Economides, ambassadeur de Grèce auprès du Royaume des Pays-Bas,
Mme Alexandra Papadopoulou, ministre plénipotentiaire, chef du bureau de liaison de la Grèce à
Skopje, - 10 -
Mr. Efstathios Paizis Paradellis, First Counsellor, Embassy of Greece in the Kingdom of the
Netherlands,
Mr.EliasKastanas, Assistant Legal Adviser, P ublic International Law Section of the Legal
Department, Ministry of Foreign Affairs,
Mr. Konstantinos Kodellas, Embassy Secretary,
as Diplomatic Advisers;
Mr. Ioannis Korovilas, Embassy attaché,
Mr. Kosmas Triantafyllidis, Embassy attaché,
as Administrative Staff. - 11 -
M. Efstathios Paizis Paradellis, premier conseiller à l’ambassade de Grèce au Royaume des
Pays-Bas,
M.EliasKastanas, conseiller juridique adjoint à la section de droit international public du
département juridique au ministère des affaires étrangères,
M. Konstantinos Kodellas, secrétaire d’ambassade,
comme conseillers diplomatiques ;
M. Ioannis Korovilas, attaché d’ambassade,
M. Kosmas Triantafyllidis, attaché d’ambassade,
comme personnel administratif. - 12 -
The PRESIDENT: Please be seated. The sitting is open. The Court meets today to hear the
second round of oral argument of Greece. Now I unde rstand that the first speaker to take the floor,
according to the information that I have been supplied with, is MsMaria Telalian, the Legal
Adviser. Am I right? I call Ms Telalian, the Agent of Greece to take the floor.
TEL sALIAN:
INTRODUCTION
1. Mr.President, Members of the Court, in opening Greece’s reply, I will make a few
preliminary remarks, then outline the order of our presentations.
2. Mr.President, during the oral pleadings, the Applicant repeatedly stated that had Greece
considered the Applicant’s behaviour to be a material breach of the Interim Accord, it would have
declared that treaty to be void, or would have susp ended it. This is exactly the kind of action that
Greece has tried to avoid throughout these years, given the importance which it attaches to the
Interim Accord and to its role in regional stabilityand, above all, to the procedure agreed therein
for resolving the difference over the name. That last point is critical: as was explained, the Interim
Accord aims not only at normalizing relations between the two countries, regulating a broad range
of issues in a number of areas, mainly to the benefit of the Applicant, but also at establishing a firm
framework for the resolution of the dispute over the name issue through political negotiations under
the auspices of the United Nations. Above all, Greece has sought and seeks establishing genuine
and friendly relations with the Applicant by laying, through the agreed mech anisms of the Interim
Accord, the groundwork for a mutually acceptable so lution of the difference over the name of the
Applicant. Therefore, we maintain that this important treaty is still ⎯ and must remain ⎯ in force
in so far as its reciprocal obligations are effectively and bona fide implemented by both Parties.
3. Mr. President, Members of the Court, th e Applicant’s breaches of the Interim Accord, as
was stated last Friday, are many and varied. There was a pattern of behaviour before the NATO
Bucharest Summit in 2008. The evidence adduced by Greece is not exhaustive, but enough has
been presented to give some idea of the impact of that behaviour on the maintenance of
good-neighbourly relations and the stability of the region as a whole. - 13 -
4. Counsel for the Applicant, in trying to diminish the legal importance of this behaviour, has
questioned whether a mere construction of a statue, or the naming of an airport, or the naming of a
stretch of a highway, could establish an internatio nal injury in these circ umstances. The answer,
Mr. President, which is to be found in the Interim Accord, is yes. The obligations assumed by the
Applicant in that instrument are concrete a nd precise and Greece has on many occasions publicly
protested against the unlawful conduct which violated them, as ProfessorPellet will once again
show.
5. Mr.President, Members of the Court, Gree ce in its introductory statement expressed its
deep commitment to this Court. But, regretfully , we consider that the main objective of the claim
which the Applicant brought before you is to create a fait accompli against Greece, by trying to
obtain through a judgment what it could not gain through the procedures prescribed by the Security
Council and agreed in the Interim Accord. Evidently the Applicant entertains the hope that the
Court will view this case in isolation from the name dispute and the régime which Security Council
resolution817(1993) imposes. The Applicant al so cherishes the hope that it can persuade the
Court to take jurisdiction even though it is expres sly excluded by Article21, paragraph2, of the
Interim Accord. In effect, this Application is asking the Court to circumvent the procedures and
substantive rights of the Interim Accord and its sh ared commitment to negotiate a resolution of the
difference over the name. Rather than negotiate, as it committed itself in the Interim Accord, the
Applicant wants to get judicial sanction to use the very name which Security Council
resolution817 precludes within all the internationa l organizations to which Greece is a member.
The Applicant also seeks to have the Court to order Greece to acquiesce to the Applicant’s
demands, irrespective of the specific treaty obligations assumed by the latter to such organizations.
The Applicant also seeks to have the Court depr ive Greece of its right to object according to
Article11(1) of the Interim Accord. In sum, Mr.President, you are presented with a carefully
crafted strategy aimed at eviscerating the Interim Accord and the Security Council resolution.
6. Mr.President, the Agent of the Applicant in its closing statement made some remarks
which I feel cannot be ignored: First, it was said that “due to Greece’s opposition the Applicant
has suffered delays and setbacks in our quest for international recognition and legitimacy, often
compromising the interest for stability in the region”. This remark, Mr.President, is inaccurate. - 14 -
Moreover, the Applicant here contradicts its own previous statements admitting that its Application
is not simply about an alleged violation of Artic le11 of the Interim Accord, but is part of a
long-term effort to resolve the dispute in ways violating its commitments in the Interim Accord.
Even more revealing, it acknowledges that it has already abandoned its commitment to negotiate
and is proceeding to arrogate a name in violation of the Interim Accord and the resolutionof the
Security Council. It is exactly this unlawful c onduct by the Applicant rather than Greece’s alleged
conduct within NATO that jeopardizes the stab ility in the region. NATO’s decision merely
reflected the Alliance’s concern over the lack of good-neighbourly relations against Greece, and it
has been reiterated in every meeting subsequent to Bucharest.
7. Second, in speaking of its disinterest in monopolizing the contested name, the Applicant
trivializes an issue of grave and genuine concern to my country. This is an attempt to mislead the
international community about the Applicant’s real intentions in this regard which are far from
innocent. Those real intentions can be gained from textbooks, maps, encyclopaedias, statements of
its officials, all alleging historical injustice a nd asserting, as Greece showed in its pleadings, that
the Applicant’s “geographical and ethnic boundaries” extend beyond its present day borders and
cover territories that are under “Greek” or “Bulgarian ” “rule”. This, Mr. President, is a real threat
to regional peace and stability.
8. Mr.President, Members of the Court, Greece’s reply presentations are structured as
follows. In a moment I would ask you, Mr. Presi dent, to call on Professor Reisman who will deal
with jurisdiction and admissibility. Then Professor Crawford will deal with Articles11 and22.
ProfessorPellet is in charge of violations, defences and remedies. ProfessorAbi-Saab will
conclude the legal presentation, and he will be followed by AmbassadorSavvaides who will
present our conclusions and submissions.
I thank you, Mr. President and Members of the Court, for your attention.
The PRESIDENT: I thank MadameMariaTe lalian for her statement. I now invite
Professor Michael Reisman to take the floor. - 15 -
RMEr. MAN:
JURISDICTION AND ADMISSIBILITY
The jurisdictional clause
1. Mr. President, Members of the Court, by now, the Interim Accord’s jurisdictional clause is
so well known to the Court that there is no need to recite it.
[Slide 2 ⎯ displayed but not read]
“Any difference or dispute that arises between the Parties concerning the
interpretation or implementation of this Inte rim Accord may be submitted by either of
them to the International Court of Justice, except for the difference referred to in
Article 5, paragraph 1.”
[3li.e What triggers its “except for” phrase and excludes the Court’s jurisdiction? Last
week, Greece drew the Court’s attention to the f act that the Applicant, in its Request, [slide 4] had
put forward, as the proper standard, that th e subject of the dispute “does not concern ⎯ either
directly or indirectly ⎯ the difference referred to in Article 5”. [Displayed but not read]
“Upon the filing of the present Application, any matters in dispute between the
Parties concerning the interpretation or application of Article 11 of the Interim Accord
of 1995 are plainly subject to the compulsory jurisdiction of the Court. [Slide 5] The
subject of the dispute does not concern ⎯ either directly or indirectly ⎯ the
difference referred to in Article5, para graph1, of the Interim Accord and,
accordingly, the exception to jurisdiction prov ided for in Article21, paragraph2, of
the Interim Accord does not apply.”
5. On Monday, when we referred to his position, ProfessorKlein accused us of trying to
“tirer avantage du fait que la ligne d’argumentation de l’Etat requérant sur ce point aurait évolué”:
that the argument on this point has evolved 1. Mr.President, French is a language whose subtlety
and refinement I have long admired an d I understand that it loses a certain je ne sais quoi when
translated into a vulgar demotic such as my Amer ican English. But to a simple English speaker,
“aurait évolué” in that sentence means, “Oops! We lose on that argument, so let us drop it and rig
up another.”
6. Now, far be it from me to say that the Applicant is not entitled to abandon one argument
and devise another. As early as Socobelge, the Permanent Court said that parties can revise their
arguments in the oral phase and, as far as I’m concer ned, the Applicant can argue anything it likes.
1
CR 2011/11, p. 37, para. 3. - 16 -
But the Applicant cannot banish that argument fro m the case merely by dissociating itself from it,
all the more so when Greece had timeously agreed that it is the proper test for the operation of the
“except for” phrase. Yet ProfessorKlein, having stat ed that the core question is “which is the
2
correct interpretation” , quickly moved on to the Applicant’s alternative argument, which involves
interpolating words into Article 21, a tactic to which I will return. Professor Klein never succeeded
in explaining why the first theory of jurisdiction is wrong and why our friends had to “evolve”
away from it ⎯ aside from the fact that it defeats the Applicant’s case for jurisdiction. [Slide 6]
7. One would assume, Mr.President, that the proper international legal method for an
enquiry of this sort would be to go to the text of Article 21 itself. Now, the debate has focused on
the “except for” phrase, [slide 7] but that phrase can no more be severed from the rest of the Article
in which it is found than can Article11, paragrap h 1, be severed from the rest of the Interim
Accord. The submission to jurisdiction in the pr imary clause of Article21 is for “differences or
disputes concerning the interpretation or implemen tation” of the Interim Accord and the “except
for” phrase is presumably also to be read in the light of those words, in the sense of “except for”
the interpretation or implementation of the difference referred to in Article 5, paragraph 1. Given
the interpretation that the text virtually forces on the reader, one is all the more puzzled by
ProfessorKlein’s assertion, that ⎯ I am quoting in my translation ⎯ “the compromissory clause
excludes ‘the difference referred to in Article 5, paragraph 1’ and not, for example, ‘the differences
3
relative to the application of Article 5, paragra ph 1’ which would be an entirely different matter” .
Why is it “an entirely different matter”? The text of Article 21 lends itself to “the interpretation or
implementation” of the difference for both the principal clause and the “except for” phrase.
[Slide 8]
8. Mr. President, Members of the Court, the difference over the name was the major,
unresolved issue in the Interim Accord. It was to be resolved by good faith negotiation and not to
be submitted to this Court. Given the entire, integrated structure of the Interim Accord, would it be
reasonable to assume that if the words “resoluti on of” had actually appeared in the “except for”
phrase so as to preclude the Court’s direct resolu tion of the difference over the name, the same
2
CR 2011/11, p. 38, para. 4.
3Ibid., p. 38, para. 6. - 17 -
Parties would have intended the same clause to allow the Court to decide matters that indirectly
concerned the name issue and would influence it or, even, effectively resolve it? And ⎯ as I will
explain in a moment ⎯ the goal of the Applicant and the clear consequence of acceding to its
prayers here will be effectively to resolve the name issue in its favour.
9. If the Parties had wanted to restrict the “except for” phrase to “except for the resolution of
the name issue”, they would have inserted the words “resolution of the name issue” and the
Applicant’s lawyers would have drafted the initial request in those terms, rather than the words
“does not concern directly or indirectly”. But an application must rely on the text of the
jurisdictional clause so there is no opportunity to plead around it and so counsel for the Applicant
chose the proper standard at that stage. The Applicant initiated this case before you, assuring you
that “the subject of the dispute does not concern ⎯ either directly or indirectly ⎯ the difference
referred to in Article5”. It then stated the legal standard correctly, indeed, it stated the only
interpretation that is consistent with the text, the context and the objects and purposes of the
Interim Accord.
10. But does the Applicant’s claim concern “e ither directly or indirectly” the difference
referred to in Article5? Because the Applicant now rejects the jurisdictional theory it initially
promoted, it does not deign to answer that ques tion, though the question could not have figured
more prominently in our first round. Mr.President, if silence is not acquiescence, it is, at least,
acknowledgment of the absence of an answer. Is there any serious doubt as to the answer to that
question? Having listened to arguments over two week s, is it not clear that this case is directly ⎯
and certainly indirectly ⎯ concerned with the name issue? Indeed, with effectively resolving it?
11. Thomas Reed Powell, an old professor at the Harvard Law School, was renowned for his
sarcastic wit and he was not particularly respectful of lawyers. He used to say to his students, “if
you can think about something attached to something else, without thinking about what it’s
attached to... you have the mind of a lawyer”. And, Mr.President, that is precisely what the
Applicant is asking the Court to do in order to enable it to squeeze its claim into the jurisdictional
space clearly delimited by Article 21. The Appli cant asks you to think about something, attached
to something else, without thinking about what it is attached to. And, at the same time, to pretend
that it does not “directly” or “indirectly concern” it. Greece submits there is no rational way to say - 18 -
that the issues which the Applicant raises in this case do not “directly” and certainly “indirectly”
concern the difference described in resolution 817.
12. But does the “concern directly or indirectly” test overshoot and destroy all jurisdiction?
The Parties agree that Article 21 accords the Court a central judicial role, but disagreed as to which
specific provisions are excluded from that role by the “except for” phrase. Greece has had some
difficulty understanding the “evolutions” of the Applicant’s view on this point but Professor Klein
has been very helpful. The Applicant initially argued that Greece’s interpretation ⎯ which is to
say the Applicant’s initial or pre-evolutionary interpretation ⎯ excluded any provision of the
Interim Accord 4. That argument then “evolved” into “a considerable number of provisions” in the 5
Interim Accord, only to “devolve” back, in Professor Klein’s pleading this week, to any provision,
on the theory that Greece could always connect a dispute arising under any Article in the Interim
6
Accord to the difference in Article5 . But that is a caricature. The issue is never merely the
jurisdictional argument of one of the Parties. It can certainly be forced, as we believe the
Applicant’s manifestly is. It is the virtue of th ird-party decision that the claim of any applicant to
jurisdiction is never based on its own ipse dixit; the claim is ultimately adjudicated by the Court,
which decides based upon a reasonable interpretation of the text, in its context.
13. The core issue here is, of course, not which other provisions of the Interim Accord might
be excluded from jurisdiction by Article21’s “excep t for” phrase. The issue is whether a claim
arising under Article11, paragra ph1, is to be excluded from jurisdiction. Now, last week,
ProfessorKlein and I observed on the allusive structure of the “except for” phrase. Article21
refers to a “difference which is referred to in Artic le5”, which in turn refers to Security Council
resolutions 817 and 845. But, if you track the seque nce of allusions to their source, it is clear that
the difference to which Article21’s “except for” phrase refers and excludes is to be found in
Security Council resolution 817.
14. Now, aside from the jurisdictional clause itself, there are only two other provisions in the
23articles of the Interim Accord which explic itly mention and incorporate resolution817:
4Reply, para. 3.15.
5
CR 2011/5, p. 58, para. 5 (Klein).
6CR2011/11, p. 37, para. 3 (Klein). - 19 -
Article5 and Article11, paragraph1. These are the only two. So while the “except for” phrase
might, depending on the particular facts of the case, relate indirectly to disputes arising under some
other provisions, disputes arising under Article 5 and Article 11 are certainly going to fall under the
“except for” phrase.
15. Professor Klein refers to this as a “creative reading”, “lecture particulièrement créative” . 7
In New Haven, we do not view the word “crea tive” as pejorative but my colleagues and students
there would hardly bestow the adjective “creative” on a simple and incontrovertible reading of the
text of the Interim Accord.
16. Confronting even this modest “creativ ity” seems to have had a dizzying effect on
ProfessorKlein, as he then overflows into a descrip tion of this “reading” as “fantaisiste”. Then,
truly carried away, he concludes “Nulle part ailleurs ⎯ nulle part ⎯ ne retrouve-t-on dans le texte
de l’accord la moindre mention d’un differend à l’égard duquel la Cour ne pourrait exercer sa
compétence.” 8 “Nowhere can one find in the text of the Accord the least mention of a difference
with regard to which the Court cannot exercise its competence.” So, Mr. President, the Applicant’s
position has ultimately evolved to asserting that the “except for” phrase in Article 21 applies to no
part of the Interim Accord. In the Applicant’ s normative universe, the “except for” phrase in
Article21, like the heart of resolution817, has been totally exsanguinated. And that,
Mr.President, demonstrates the ultimate absurd ity of the Applicant’s essential argument on
jurisdiction.
17. But there is another dimension to the App licant’s jurisdictional argument. A week ago,
in a previous evolutionary phase, in which the Applicant still argued that the “except for” phrase
meant something, it told you that its claim did not require you to resolve the dispute over the name,
nor, indeed, “to express any view on the matter”. On this side of the aisle we assumed this meant
that if the Applicant’s claim did require the Court to do that, the case would fail for want of
jurisdiction. And that is precisely what happens he re. Even if one were to accept the Applicant’s
invention and were to interpolate words into Article 21 so as to make the “except for” phrase read
7
CR 2011/11 p. 38, para. 7.
8Ibid,, p. 39, para. 7. - 20 -
as if the Parties designed it only to limit jurisdiction for actions which could resolve the name issue,
the application would still fall outside the Court’s jurisdiction.
18. Why? Because if the Court took jurisdic tion and acceded to the Applicant’s prayer, it
will have, ipso facto , effectively decided the name issue, putting an end to any incentive the
Applicant might have had to negotiate resolution of the difference as required by the Interim
Accord and the Security Council. Finding ju risdiction with the Applicant’s theory would
effectively resolve the name difference in favour of the Applicant.
19. Mr. President, for all the elephants the opposing counsel have imagined tramping
through the Great Hall, why, we wonder, have they never mentioned the most imposing of the
pachyderms, the one who outranks all the others, none other than their own President Crvenkovski?
Last week, my colleagues and I brought him centre st age and so as not to quote him out of context,
displayed a large part of his speech to Parliament . President Crvenkovski himself revealed that the
Applicant’s long-secret strategy on the name issu e was to avoid negotiating in good faith, as
required by resolution817; to persuade as many other States as possible to support its campaign
for its preferred name; and, using the provisiona l name required by the Security Council and the
Interim Accord, only to win admission to internationa l organizations; and then to use, for all other
purposes, the name whose use the Interim Accord and resolution817 precludes. This case is an
extension of the Applicant’s strategy to circumvent the provisional arrangement and, by fait
accompli, to resolve the difference over the name in the way the Applicant wants.
20. Bad faith is key to what is transpiring here, but instead of acknowledging, if not
explaining the barrenness of 15years of negotia tion in the light of PresidentCrvenkovski’s
admission, the Applicant invokes the routine assuran ces of the mediator. Now, on this seasoned
Bench of international lawyers, many I am sure ha ve served as international mediators; and they
know that the mediator who stated that one of the Parties was acting in bad faith would
immediately cease to be the mediator. You do no t need Mr. Nimetz’s formulaic statements when
you have the confession of the highest official of the Applicant with respect to the secret strategy. - 21 -
21. The legal trick in the judicial phase of this strategy is the Applicant’s radical
reconstruction of operative paragraph 2 of resolution 817.
[Slide 9 display but not read]
“Recommends to the General Assembly that the State whose application is
contained in document S/25147 be admitted to membership in the United Nations, this
State being provisionally referred to for all purposes within the United Nations as ‘the
former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia’ pe nding settlement of the difference that
has arisen over the name.”
22. The Applicant was admitted to the United Nations on the condition that it be
“provisionally referred to for all purposes within the United Nations as ‘the former Yugoslav
Republic of Macedonia’” (emphasis added). That condition was to continue “pending settlement of
the difference that has arisen over the name”. [Slide 10]
23. In 2005, the Applicant indicated its conviction that resolution817 was “contrary to the
Charter”. Now, in furtherance of that assault it avoids focusing on the text, relying instead on
counter-textual “recollections” of non-particip ants, still defending the unacceptable methodology
on Monday, and oblivious to the fact that it exposes the lack of sincerity with which it purported to
defend the stability of agreements in its criticism of Greece’s exceptio arguments.
24. The Court is familiar with the Applican t’s understanding of resolution 817, from public
statements, behaviour, assertions made on Monday ⎯ its conception of resolution 817 really means
that the State whose application is contained in document S/25147 “be admitted to membership in
the United Nations . . . as ‘the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia’ and thereafter be referred
to for all purposes as the Republic of Macedonia” [slide 13].
25. Wholly aside from good faith, what, in the light of this reading of resolution 817, is left
to negotiate? The Applicant’s name plaque at the United Nations? Does ev en that issue survive
the Applicant’s dual formula? Confronted with this violation of resolution 817 the one defence left
to Greece is the safeguard clause in Article11(1). And that clause is, of course, the Applicant’s
target in this case: if it hits it, the Applicant w ill have gotten everything it wishes, totally obviating
its obligation to negotiate resolution of the name issue. To accept jurisdiction and to proceed will
give the Applicant everything to which it is not entitled under the Interim Accord. So, in so far as
the Applicant itself concedes that Article 21 does not accord jurisdiction for resolution of the name
issue, this case is without jurisdiction. - 22 -
Admissibility issues: the absence of the consent of indispensable third
parties
26. Mr.President, in the time remaining, I tu rn to some of the reasons militating against
admissibility. As Professor Pellet explained last week, at the heart of the Applicant’s grievance is a
collective decision process, taken unanimously by NATO’s members, to defer the Applicant’s
invitation for membership pending resolution of the difference over the name. I emphasize the
words collective and unanimous. Now, Greece was certainly a pa rticipant in that consultative
process. [Slide 14 displayed without reading]
“This Interim Accord is not directed against any other State or entity and it does
not infringe on the rights and duties resulting from bilateral and multilateral
agreements already in force that the parties have concluded with other states or
international organizations.”
27. And Article22 of the Accord anticipated that it was entitled to exercise its rights and
duties under prior treaties and that if such an exercise infringed obligations arising under the
Interim Accord, the rights and duties arising under the prior treaty, in this case, the North Atlantic
Treaty, would prevail. [Slide 15]
28. The fact that the decision which is cen tral to the Applicant’s case was collective,
undertaken by a large number of other States, none of whom consented to jurisdiction, precludes
the Court from exercising a jurisdiction which it might otherwise have. This is a venerable
jurisdictional rule, from Monetary Gold to East Timor and we submit it is not affected in this case
by your holdings in Nauru or Congo v. Uganda, cases whose facts obviously differ in material
ways from the case at Bar.
29. In the Memorial and Reply, the factual pr edicate of the Applicant’s case was that “The
Respondent’s objection prevented the Applicant from receiving an invitation to proceed with
membership of NATO.” 9 To avoid the consequences of Monetary Gold, the Applicant, in its
Reply, also insisted that “the Applicant does not invite the Court to express any view on the legality
or propriety of the NATO Bucharest Summit Decision ” 10. Thereafter, the Applicant stated “the
11
Applicant has never suggested that NATO might be in breach of any obligation” . On Monday,
Professor Murphy also tried his hand at insulating the Applicant’s claim from NATO. He said:
9Memorial, para. 1.1.
10
Reply, para. 3.31.
1Ibid., para. 3.32. - 23 -
“The decision reached by NATO at Bucharest is simply not at issue before this
Court. This case concerns exclusivel y the legality of the Respondent’s conduct
in2007 to 2008 under the Interim Accord; th at conduct is either lawful or unlawful
regardless of the positions taken by other States.” 12
30. But the issue is not whether the Applicant or is not inviting the Court to express a view
on NATO. The point is how can the Court assess this without making judgments about NATO, its
membership procedures and actions of NATO members who participated in the consensus? In a
telling sentence in its Reply, the Applicant stated [s lide 16]: “the Applicant does not ask that the
Court express any view on the legality of any acts of NATO or any of its [other] Members by
13
reference to the standards established by the Interim Accord” .
The Applicant here misstates the Court’s conundrum. The problem case posed by Monetary
Gold is not that the Court, were it to take jurisdiction, would have to judge NATO and its members
under the standards of the Interim Accord . It is, rather, that, if the Court were to take jurisdiction,
it could not avoid judging NATO and its members under the standards of NATO itself. [Slide 17]
31. The Court cannot make a finding with r espect to the lawfulness, under the Interim
Accord, of the actions alleged to have been ta ken by Greece under the authority afforded it by
Article22, without a finding of the lawfulness or unlawfulness of the NATO decisions. This is
because the determination of the lawfulness of th e alleged action of Greece, under Article22, is
inseparably linked to the lawfulness of NATO’s collective decision at Bucharest. Moreover, it
necessarily implicates the other NATO collective decisions. Greece, as a NATO member,
participated in all of those other decisions which reached the same conclusion.
32. If NATO’s Bucharest Declaration deferring the Applicant’s membership application was
a lawful, intra vires decision of NATO, it follows that any action which Greece had taken in its role
as a member of NATO would have been within Inte rim Accord Article 22’s parameters of “rights
and duties resulting from. . . multilateral agreement s”; as such, Greece’s actions would not be in
contravention of the Interim Accord. Moreover, inasmuch as the substance of the Bucharest
Declaration was reiterated, without alle gations that Greece had motivated it ⎯ as the Applicant
alleges with respect to Bucharest ⎯ a response by the Court to a claim that Greece’s alleged
actions at Bucharest were in violation of the Interim Accord and not insulated by Article 22 would
12
CR 2011/11, p. 32, para. 36.
1Reply, para. 3.31. - 24 -
perforce involve a judgment about the lawfulness and intra vires character of NATO’s decisions
and the actions of all the other NATO members who pa rticipated in the consensus. But this would
be a matter beyond the Court’s jurisdiction.
33. Conversely, if Greece’s alleged action at Bucharest were not concordant with its rights
and duties under NATO, those actions would also not be covered by Interim Accord Article22.
One cannot escape the fact that the decision at Bu charest was collective and subsequent identical
14
decisions were not the result of Greece’s action alone . Hence a hypothetical finding by the Court
that Greece’s action was not covered by Article 22 would necessarily include a judgment about the
lawfulness of the action of other members of NATO and NATO itself. Such a judgment would
necessarily be taken, not on the basis of the Interi m Accord, but on the basis of the legal standards
of NATO. This, too, would be a matter beyond the Court’s jurisdiction.
34. I thank the Court, Mr.President and Memb ers of the Court, for its attention and if it
please the Court, I ask that my colleague, Professor Crawford, be recognized to speak.
The PRESIDENT: I thank Professor Michael Reisman for his statement and now I
invite Professor James Crawford to take the floor.
CMRr. WFORD:
Articles 11 and 22 of the Interim Accord
The structure of Articles 11 (1)
1. Mr.President, Members of the Court, in a status quo agreement, an interim settlement,
State A, promises State B not to do x, but reserves the right to do x if and to the extent that an
interim situation, which I will call “y”, is not main tained. Y is a situation which it is within the
power of State B to maintain or not. Let us ca ll this combination of circumstances, symbolically,
not x if and to the extent that y . Now the promise not to do x matters a lot to State B, whereas
maintaining the situation matters a great deal to St ate A. This presents several legal issues. In
these circumstances, does State B have an obligation not to procure the collapse of the interim
14
Reply, para. 6.10. - 25 -
situation, y? That interim situation refl ects and represents the object and purpose of the
agreement ⎯ which is to maintain the status quo pending a resolution of the underlying problem, a
resolution the two States have prom ised to negotiate. Does State B ⎯ I say again ⎯ have an
obligation not to procure the collapse of the inte rim situation, y? Well, not in terms of the
agreement ⎯ not x if and to the extent that y does not in terms oblige State B to guarantee y. It is
just that State B will not be entitled to the perform ance of the promise, unless situation y persists.
It may be that under the governing law of the agreement there is an implied obligation not to defeat
15
its object and purpose, as you held in Nicaragua . If so, the obligation might be regarded as
existing under the law and not under the agreement. One might also recall the finding in the
Samoan Claims arbitration, concerning the obligation to maintain a status quo in the period before
a final settlement. The Arbitrator said: “Pending instruction from the three Treaty Powers...
those Powers were bound upon principles of intern ational good faith to maintain the situation
thereby created until by common accord, [until] they had otherwise decided.” 16
2. Mr. President, Members of the Court, I would note certain features of the situation. In one
respect it is automatic ⎯ that is to say, as regards the incidence of legal obligations. If y does not
obtain then there is no obligation on State A not to do x. There is no requirement of notice; the
agreement remains in force. There is no requir ement of motive. We have simply reached the
limits of State A’s obligation. In another respect the situation is not automatic ⎯ that is to say, in
relation to the consequence of y not obtaining. State A has the right to do x, but no obligation to do
it or not to do it. Barring a clearly implied waiver , a right is not lost merely because it is not used
on a given occasion or on several occasions.
3. Now we reach the interpretative problem. In this situation where the interests of the two
States are entitled to equal weight, how are the predicate terms x and y, as set out in the agreement,
to be interpreted? There is in international law no presumption of restrictive interpretation of
treaties; it all depends on the context and on the considerations referred to in the Vienna
Convention. But what is clear is that there is no basis for interpreting x broadly, so that State A is
15
Military and Paramilitary Activities in and against Nicaragua (Nicaragua v United States of America), Merits,
Judgment, I.C.J. Reports 1986, pp. 270-272, paras. 135-136.
1Decision given by His Majesty Oscar II, King of Sweden and Norway, as Arbitrator, 14 October 1902, Samoan
Claims (Germany, Great Britain, United States), Reports of International Arbitral Awards, Vol. IX, p. 25. - 26 -
tightly constrained, yet interpreting y narrowly, so that State B is free to subvert the interim
situation. That is what the Applicant here does. It wants you to adopt a broad, flexible
interpretation of x, and a narrow formalistic interp retation of y. There is no warrant for favouring
one party to the Interim Accord over the other in this way. Other things being equal, that
interpretation of the Accord should be adopted that maintains the interim ba rgain. The Applicant’s
interpretation does not do so.
4. How does the Applicant seek to avoid this in consistency in its interpretive approach? It
argues that the interim situation preserved by the Interim Accord is exclusively a matter for the
international organization concerned. All that is required is that the organization call the Applicant
the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia; the Applicant can call itself what it likes and so can
anyone else.
5. There are at least five difficulties with this interpretation. I mentioned these on Friday and
expected them to be dealt with in the reply. For the most part Professo r Murphy, on whom this
burden fell, failed to discuss them. I will return to what he did say shortly. But first, let me
enumerate the difficulties ever so briefly.
6. First, what I will call for convenience the institutional interpreta tion of the safeguard
clause ignores the actual words of the clause, in particular the phrase “to the extent”. This is
inconsistent with the idea that the safeguard clause is satisfied once and for all at the time of
admission to the organization.
7. Secondly, the use of the future tense in Article 11 (1) ⎯ “is to be referred to”. This is not
confined to the date of admission but extends to later dates.
8. Third, the use of the passive voice, and the phrase “for all purposes”; if the reference had
been to admission alone it would have been easy to say so.
9. Fourth, the travaux of Article 11, which I took you through the other day.
10. Fifth, the fact that the Applicant’s pr eferred interpretation gives no protection to the
Respondent, despite the clear indication in the Interim Accord that it would be protected to a
significant degree. - 27 -
11. For these five reasons, the Applicant’s pref erred interpretation of the safeguard clause
should be rejected. The logic of the conditional obligation central to Article11(1) ⎯ and to the
Interim Accord as a whole ⎯ should prevail.
The Applicant’s reply arguments
12. In their reply on Monday, counsel for th e Applicant, led by Professor Murphy, while
disregarding much of what I said last week, including the five points made above, did make some
additional points. And I thought there were five of them.
13. First, Professor Murphy said that Greece never invoked the safeguard clause. Our real
concern was the non-resolution of the dispute concerning the name. He said that ⎯ it is in
17
paragraph24 of the speech. I will not r ead the passage, the Court will remember it . The first
observation to be made about this first point is that it entails a confusion between the legal basis for
an action and the motives a State might have to take the action or not. If the legal basis exists, then,
generally speaking, motive is irrelevant: responsibility is normally objective, and so, short of abuse
of right, is the absence of responsibility. In respect of Article11(1), the legal basis for an
objection is simply that the specified condition was satisfied. The question is not what the
Respondent’s putative objection was “based upon”, but whether the condition was satisfied at the
time the Respondent allegedly objected.
14. Another observation is that this is subsidia ry to the Applicant’s constricted interpretation
of the scope of the safeguard clause. If the in stitutional interpretation is correct, then it would
follow that there is only one factual consideration relevant to whether the safeguard clause can be
invoked ⎯ namely, the practice of the organization ⎯ and any other consideration ⎯ for example,
the Applicant’s attitude toward the negotiations, would be irrelevant. ProfessorMurphy’s first
point is also subsidiary to the contention that the Respondent could invoke the safeguard clause, if,
and only if, it adopted a contemporaneous declarati on, including a statement of the reasons for the
17
CR 2011/11, p. 27, para. 24 (Murphy); internal citations omitted. - 28 -
invocation: it assumes that invocation of the safeguard clause was conditional upon declaring that
it was to be invoked, but this is not what Artic le11(1) says. We are not dealing with the
termination of a treaty, we are not dealing with the suspension of a treaty, we are dealing with
action in accordance of the terms of a treaty.
15. Secondly, Professor Murphy relied heavily on what he took to be the meaning of
resolution817. Under resolution817 he stressed that the Applicant is free to use the name of its
choice. If the Applicant is entitled to refer to itself by the name of its choice, the same must be true
under Article11(1) of the Interim Agreement wh ich uses essentially the same language. And he
said this at paragraph 25 of his speech 18. The Applicant is insistent in its denial that resolution 817
stipulates a designation by which it is to be called for all purposes. It returns to a number of its old
arguments but adds one or two ne w ones. I have dealt with the old ones and I will not repeat
19
myself . As for new arguments, we are told that, fo r the Security Council to address an obligation
to a State, it must say expressly that the State is the obligee. That this at least seems to be what the
20
Applicant meant, when it referred to the Kosovo Advisory Opinion . There however you were
21
considering, not whether resolution1244(1999) was addressed to a State or States ⎯ it
obviously was ⎯ but whether it was addressed to the author s of a declaration of independence, in
circumstances where, by definition, those authors were not ⎯ or not yet ⎯ constituting a State.
The analysis of resolution 1244 is completely ina pposite to the obligations of the Applicant under
resolution817(1993), a resolution of which the Applicant is not just one, but the principal
addressee. The Applicant’s reliance on such analogies ⎯ forced as they are ⎯ suggests a certain
degree of desperation in its defence of the narrow interpretation of resolution817 ⎯ a defence
which relies on sundry materials but never addresse s the plain text of the resolution applying the
provisional reference “for all purposes”.
18
CR 2011/11, pp. 27-28, para. 25 (Murphy).
19
Ibid., pp. 14-15, para. 4 (Sands); p. 30, para. 33 (Murphy).
20Ibid., p.28, para.26 (Murphy), citinAccordance with International Law of the Unilateral Declaration of
Independence in Respect of Kosovo, Advisory Opinion of 22 July 2010, paras. 114-118.
21Security Council resolution 1244 (1999), 10 June 1999. - 29 -
16. But Mr.President, Members of the Court, even if the Applicant’s interpretation of
resolution 817 were correct, this would not necessar ily be determinative of the interpretation of
Article 11 (1), which is the provision of the Interim Accord that is in question. It is worth noting
that the use to which Security Council resolution 817 is put, under Article 11 (1), what it provides
is the provisional reference ⎯ an incorporation by reference of the reference, you might say.
Article11(1) imposes its own obligation, which is not part of resolution817 ⎯ it exists
independently, has a different scope, applies to a different range of organizations. It has different
travaux, it was adopted at a different time, by different parties and addressed to a different
audience. It cannot simply be equated in scope to resolution 817.
17. The Applicant relied on a statement of Morocco, as evidence of the interpretation of
Security Council resolution817(1993). The statement said, inter alia , that the then-draft
resolution “is not a matter of imposing a name on the new state... but it merely concerns the
22
manner in which it will be provi sionally referred to . . .” . To this extent, the statement of
Morocco is correct. It is correct that the Secur ity Council did not impose a name on the Applicant.
Instead, it established a provisional name or, if you like, designation. The word “provisional”
means something. It means the reference is not permanent. It is to be replaced, eventually ⎯ it
was hoped soon. Article 5 (1) of the Interim Accord says how it is to be replaced. The provisional
reference is to be replaced by the Parties through negotiations conducted in good faith. It is vital to
be clear about this. This obligation was freely chosen by the Applicant. It was the central
concession on the Applicant’s side of a hugely beneficial bargain.
18. Third, having reached his interpretation of the scope of the safeguard clause b
y
transposing onto Article 11 (1) his interpretation of the scope of resolution 817, Professor Murphy
stood steadfastly by his earlier contention that the Applicant was under no obligation not to use its
23
preferred name under the safeguard clause ⎯ and this is paragraph45 of his speech . But to
identify the question as being whether or not the Applicant has an obligation under the safeguard
clause misses the point. The saf eguard clause defines a condition limiting the scope of Greece’s
obligation “not to object”. It is not necessary th at any breach have occurred for the condition to be
22
CR 2011/11, p. 29, para. 30 (Murphy); quoting Applicant’s Reply, para. 4.42 and Ann. 12.
23
CR 2011/6, p. 34, para. 45 (Murphy). - 30 -
satisfied. A breach of one of its obligations unde r the Interim Accord could be relevant to the
question whether the condition has been satisfi ed, but the condition is satisfied, or not,
independently. Professor Murphy examined at length the practice under Security Council
resolution817, seeking to prove that it did not oblige the Applicant to refer to itself by the
provisional reference. That practice is irrelevant to the safeguard clause condition. Even if the
Applicant were correct that it has no obligation to use the Security Council designation, the
safeguard clause operates on its own terms: “if and to the extent that”. I made this point on Friday,
commenting that “counsel opposite had considerable difficulty in grasping the character of a
condition” 2. I am afraid their grasp did not improve over the weekend, a weekend that seems to
have been divided between the works of Shakespeare and Broadway musicals.
19. From this they emerged no doubt more cultured but no less confused. For on Monday
they went on repeating, erroneously, that Greece’ s interpretation and application of the safeguard
clause depends upon an assertion that the clause gene rates new legal obligations for the Applicant
and/or third States. Professor Murphy said on Tuesday that Greece “is reading a lot into a
relatively simple phrase, especially given the basic legal principle that international agreements do
not create obligations... for third States without their consent” 25. On Monday this week, he
repeated the same error. He argued, at length, that resolution 817 establishes no obligation on the
Applicant to use the provisional reference 26. The Respondent stands by its position on this point ⎯
but repeats that it is not necessary for the proper a pplication of the safeguard clause that there be
any obligation upon the Applicant at all. So when Professor Murphy said that “The Security
Council did not send the [Applicant’s] letters to the Secretary-General, chastising him for passing
them along” he missed the point entirely. Th e Applicant referred to “unlawful and deviant
practice” for the purpose of responding to our po sition as to the safeguard clause. But nothing
“unlawful” or “deviant” is needed to establish the safeguard clause condition, under which Greece
is no longer constrained by the obligation “not to object.” The existence of unlawful conduct may
be probative, but is not necessary.
2CR 2011/9, pp. 21-22, para. 4 (Crawford), citing CR 2011/6, p. 35, para. 46 (Murphy).
25
CR 2011/6, p. 35, para. 46 (Murphy) (internal citation omitted).
2CR 2011/11, pp. 27-32, paras. 25-34 (Murphy). - 31 -
20. Fourth, Professor Murphy relied on practice in the United Nations and other international
organizations as determining the “institutional interpretation” of the safeguard clause ⎯ he did this
27
at paragraph 34 of his presentation . That further illustrates the point that the safeguard clause
expresses a condition was lost. It also misses th e point that the campaign by the Applicant to
entrench its preferred name has had effects direct ly relevant to the application of the safeguard
clause. As the preferred name spreads in use, the situation arises in which, inevitably, that will be
the name used, for all purposes, in organizations. The purpose of the safeguard clause is to allow
Greece to act in that situation.
21. Fifth, and now as Professor Sands said that the A pplicant continues to act in good faith:
“the Applicant plainly is not in breach of Article 5 and has consistently negotiated in good faith
28
with the Respondent” . The reliance on Ambassador Nimetz for this purpose has already been
referred to by Professor Riesman. Professor Pellet, who follows me, will deal with this issue in
more detail.
22. While the Applicant grasps for third-party ev idence that it has acted in good faith in the
negotiations over the name, it says next to not hing about its avowed strategy to accord the
negotiations no more than lip service. Last week, I recalled the policy declaration by the
Applicant’s President of 2008. The President explained that, from around 2004 onwards, the
Applicant had resolved to reject any formula for the name besides its own chosen one; this was
part and parcel of its plan to continue to attend negotiations while si multaneously undermining
them. The Applicant ignored its President’s statement almost completely. Professor Sands blandly
refers to “a public statement by the Applicant’s President” 29 and says it came too late to be
30
relevant . But the President admitted that the Applicant’s plan had been put into effect some years
before, and that it was yielding results ⎯ results which Greece could act upon at the Bucharest
Summit, for the creeping entrenchment of the App licant’s preferred name and its intransigence at
the negotiating table were already clear well before April 2008.
27CR 2011/11, pp. 31-32, para. 34 (Murphy).
28
Ibid., pp. 17-18, para. 9 (Sands).
29
Ibid., p. 50, para. 10 (Sands).
30Ibid., pp. 50-51, para. 10 (Sands). - 32 -
23. Professor Murphy says that the declaration and the argument we based upon it is a
figment of our imagination. He said that th e Respondent “conjures up in some dramatic way a
change that occurred in the mid-2000s ⎯ a devious plot that was hatched...” 31 But the charge
was not “conjured up” by Greece. Professor Murphy, last Monday, had specifically observed that a
change had taken place in the mid-2000s 32! He left it to Greece to note that this corresponded
precisely with the President’s “ strategy which, due to understandable reasons, was never publicly
33 34
announced” but which for several years had been producing “exceptionally successful” results
bilaterally and multilaterally. That is a bold rejection of the Applicant’s freely-chosen obligation to
negotiate a solution to the name difference. Greece put it in evidence in Annex104 of the
Counter-Memorial, quoted extensively in the Rejoinder 35, and explained its significance in the first
round of oral pleadings 3. Now after a Memorial, a Reply, and its own oral pleadings over the
course of the last two weeks, the Applicant still has declined to address it. It stands unanswered.
24. The key point about Article5 is that it entails an agreement by the Applicant not to
exercise its prerogative of determining its name for itself. I note in passing that even if the Court
had been given jurisdiction to determine the name, it is very hard to see how it could have done so.
The only rule of general international law is that it is for each State to determine its own name, just
as it is to determine its own flag, or its national anthem. The national song of Poland, I might say,
begins with the words “O, Lithuania”, but no one has ever complained! The Court is no more
capable of determining the name of a State, than of determining its flag, or its national anthem. To
both name and flag, the relevant jurisdiction could only be jurisdiction ex aequo et bono , and the
relevant maxim, I think, would be de gustibus non est disputandum. This is another reason why the
exclusion of jurisdiction in Article 21 (2) cannot be limited to the question what is the name, since
that is not a question that the Court could decide substantively in any even t. On the other hand,
even if the question of the name or flag or anth em of a State is in principle within the reserved
31CR 2011/11., p. 20, para. 2 (Murphy)
32
CR 2011/5, p. 43, para. 20.
33
Stenography notes from the 7th sequel of the 27th sessi on of the Parliament of the Republic of Macedonia, held
on 3 Nov. 2008 (emphasis added), pp 27-7/10 and 27-7/11: Counter-Memorial, Ann. 104.
34Ibid.
35Rejoinder, para. 7.62.
36E.g., CR 2011/9, pp. 54-57, paras. 22-29 (Crawford). - 33 -
domain ⎯ like nationality in the Nationality Decrees Opinion 37⎯ as soon as it becomes the
subject of a treaty commitment, that situation changes. The rule applicable to the Applicant’s name
now is the rule contained in Article 5 of the Interim Accord, which was freely agreed. It is that rule
the Applicant is seeking to subvert.
25. The Applicant says that Greece is making a “claim that the only acceptable name for the
38
Applicant or anybody else to use is ‘the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia’” , but again this
misconstrues Greece’s position; just as it misconstrues the position under the Interim Accord. The
provisional reference is the only acceptable refe rence, until a negotiated solution to the name
difference is achieved ⎯ and negotiation is the stipulated way of achieving that solution. The
manner in which the Applicant describes the provisional reference ⎯ as an involuntary burden
imposed by Greece ⎯ is telling. It further illustrates that it does not accept the negotiation process
to which it agreed in the Interim Accord. Gr eece, under Article11(1), agreed to a commitment,
but that commitment was not to exist in perpet uity irrespective of how the Applicant sought to
establish its final name.
The Applicant’s failed search for NATO evidence of “objection”
26. Mr.President, Members of the Court, I move from the second limb of Article11, the
safeguard clause, to the first limb, the obligation not to object. It is incontestable that Greece,
applying NATO criteria and requirements, was not in a position to support the Applicant’s
candidacy for membership of NATO in 2008. Greece made its views known. But the Applicant
notably is still at a loss to furnish a NATO r ecord of the act which it says establishes Greece’s
international responsibility under Artic le11, first limb. To be clear, this is the putative act of
objection which allegedly resulted in the Applican t being declined an invitation at Bucharest.
Expression of views, even strong views, in the corridors is not the operative act which had that
result. ProfessorMurphy referred to your merits decision in Nicaragua where various statements
by senior members of the executiv e branch of the United States Government were taken to have
37
Nationality Decrees Issued in Tunis and Morocco, Advisory Opinion, 1923, P.C.I.J., Series B, No. 4, p. 24.
3CR 2011/11, p. 19, para. 10 (Sands). - 34 -
39
proved Nicaragua’s claim . He says that it was enough that these statements were made in a
“national political forum”, and that Greece is wrong when we say that a statement in a national
political forum is not enough to prove a breach 40. But Nicaragua’s claim was that the United States
had intended to coerce Nicaragua. It was a case about the use of force. ProfessorMurphy says,
“you have never required evidence of a State’s ma lfeasance to be recorded in some particular
41
documentary form when finding an international violation” . That is true. But nor have you ever
been asked to say that the formal act of pa rticipating in a decision-making process of an
international organization constituted a violation of a bilateral treaty. The fact that States have used
or threatened force outside the formal authorizations of an international organization is why claims
like Nicaragua’s can arise. The Applicant’s clai m, by contrast, is that Greece objected to the
Applicant’s application to NATO, an act it specifi cally identifies as having resulted in the deferral
42
of its candidacy . Its future concern, too, is that the Respondent’s position will “cast[ing]
implications not just for the Applicant’s entry into NATO, but the European Union as well” 43. The
Applicant’s claim is a claim about an act in an organizationa l framework; it is unintelligible if the
terms, rules and procedures of the framework are ignored.
27. The Applicant then says that its failure to provide NATO documentation of the breach is
irrelevant, because “Article11(1) is concerned with the Respondent’s ‘objection’ not that of
NATO” 44. But this is to confuse the question of at tribution with the content of the underlying
obligation which the Applicant says was breached. The deficiency in the Applicant’s documentary
evidence says nothing about attribution: whether, as Greece maintains, NATO alone is responsible
for the decision to defer the invitation, or whether Greece somehow holds that responsibility jointly
with the organization. In respect of either situa tion, obviously the Applicant claims the breach of a
specific obligation. It must advance evidence to prove it, whether the responsibility is joint or
39
CR 2011/11, p.25, para.16, note35, quoting, inter alia, Military and Paramilitary Activities in and Against
Nicaragua (Nicaragua v. United States of America), Merits, Judgment, I.C.J. Reports 1986, pp. 21, 92, paras. 20, 170.
40
Ibid., quoting CR 2011/9, pp. 49-50, para. 10 (Crawford).
41
Ibid., para. 17 (Murphy).
42Application of 13 Nov.2008, p.9, para.20: “This di spute concerns the Respondent 's actions to prevent the
Applicant from proceeding to be invited to join NATO, in clear violation of its obligations under the Interim Accord.”
43CR 2011/11, p. 34, para. 41 (Murphy).
44Ibid., p. 25, para. 17 (Murphy); emphasis in original. - 35 -
several. It is Greece’s position that the only evid ence that would establish that there has been an
objection in the sense of Article 11 (1) has not been adduced in these proceedings.
28. ProfessorMurphy says that the Applican t “took you through several examples of the
45
extensive evidence of the Respondent’s opposition” . Note the choice of term: opposition.
ProfessorMurphy’s spoken remarks cover ten pa ragraphs on the subject of “opposition” to
46
admission . This is a further example of the Applicant’s tendency to reformulate the Interim
Accord to suit its argument. But when it come s to draw a link between the evidence of Greece’s
alleged opposition and the obligation “not to object”, the Applicant simply asserts, without any
47
analysis whatever, that it “deliberately and unequivocally violated” Article 11 .
29. Mr.President, Members of the Court, the Respondent was not supposed to support the
Applicant’s candidacy, and this in conformity with NATO’s criteria and requirements. The
question however is not one of degrees of enthusiasm, or lack of enthusiasm, but whether the
Respondent objected in the sense of Article 11 (1) and in the sense specified by the Applicant when
it instituted these proceedings. The main example which Professor Murphy referred to on Monday
was a press briefing by a NATO spokesman on 3 Ap ril 2008. He picked two lines from the press
briefing, and said that they are decisive evidence of objection 48. This is what the press spokesman
said: “the Greek delegation made it very clear th at until the name issue is resolved, it has not yet
been resolved, that will not be possible” 49and “[t]he Greek government has been very clear,
including in this evening’s discussions, that until and unless the name issue is resolved, there
cannot be consensus on an invitation for the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia to begin
accession talks” 50. But ProfessorMurphy did not quote what came before or what came
immediately after. This was not a NATO decision. The press spokesman, when prefacing his
remarks, made this clear. He had just been coming from dinner with the NATO Summit
45CR 2011/11, p. 23, para. 11 (Murphy).
46
Ibid., pp. 23-26, paras. 11-20 (Murphy).
47
Ibid., p. 26, para. 21 (Murphy).
48Ibid., para. 19.
49Ibid., p. 25, para. 18 (Murphy), quoting Counter-Memorial, Ann. 30, pp. 1-2.
50Ibid., quoting Counter-Memorial, Ann. 30, p. 3. - 36 -
participants. He told the reporters that: “Final decisions . . . will take place tomorrow.” 51 This was
the day before the final decision. At the opening of the remarks, he said “[l]et me stress that this
52
was an informal meeting . . .” . And after the remarks which ProfessorMurphy said decisively
established that NATO was “singling out... the Respondent” 53, the spokesman concluded, “So
54
that is where we stand on the name issue” . Not “where Greece stands”. Not “Greece vetoed”.
Not “Greece objected”. But “that is where we” ⎯ meaning the Alliance ⎯ “stand”.
30. In this context I cannot resist remarki ng the tendency of counsel opposite to accuse
Greece of dishonesty, cowardice, and similar faili ngs. My friends on Monday were “full of sound
and fury”, but let us make an end of Shakespearean analogies. The fact is that Greece was open in
the view it took about the position of the applican t State prior to Bucharest, just as it was open
afterwards. The question whether its position amo unted to an objection within the meaning of
Article 11 (1) is of course a matter for you and it is a matter of law.
Article 22
31. My third subject is Article22. On Monday, counsel for the Applicant turned again to
Article 22 55. They challenge our interpretation of Article 22 56, and they say, in any event, that the
Applicant met the requirements for accession to NATO 57, and so Article 22 on any interpretation is
58
inapplicable: “Article 22 does not assist the Respondent”, as Professor Sands put it .
32. To take their argument about interpretation first, if Article22 means what we say, the
first clause of Article 11 (1) would have no effect 59; and, for example, the European Union clauses
60
in the Interim Accord would be surplus to requirements . The Respondent already has set out the
5Counter-Memorial, Ann. 30, p. 1.
5Ibid.
53
CR 2011/11, p. 26, para. 20 (Murphy).
54
Counter-Memorial, Ann. 30, p. 2; emphasis added.
55
CR 2011/11, pp. 45-51, paras. 2-11 (Sands).
5Ibid.
5CR 2011/11, pp. 20, 32-33, paras. 4, 37 (Murphy); p. 58, para. 7 (Dimitrov).
5Ibid., p. 51, para. 11 (Sands).
59
Ibid., pp. 49-51, paras. 8-11 (Sands).
60
Ibid., pp. 48-49, para. 7 (Sands). - 37 -
61
bases for its interpretation of Article 22, and I will not repeat them here . I will simply focus on
what was said on Monday.
33. The first point to make is that Article22 is part of the Final Clauses and applies to the
whole of the Interim Accord. The conjuncti on between Article11 and Article22, on which
Professor Reisman insisted, derives from the general applicability of Article 22 to the Accord as a
whole. It exists by force of the logic of Article 22 as a Final Clause 62. In other words, Article 22 is
already conjoined to Article11(1) as it is to each other article which may be relevant. Although
the Applicant said that “[t]here are similar provi sions to Article22 in many other international
agreements” 63, it offered no analysis of any of them; and said nothing about Article 8 of the North
64
Atlantic Treaty, notwithstanding the clear relevance of that provision to Article 22 .
34. As for the European Union clauses, counsel for the Applicant says that Articles15, 16
and 17 also deal with European Union subjects, and then notes that the drafters neglected to
65
incorporate European Uni on clauses into these articles . Taking Article15, for example,
ProfessorSands says, “it is hard to think of an area in respect of which the European Economic
Community had more exclusive competence than this one, but it includes no proviso” 66. But that
ignores the direct consequence that would follow under his argument, because Article 15 contains
no proviso specific to European Union obligations, then it is capable of “‘infring[ing] upon the
67
exclusive competences assigned to the European Commission in [that] field . . .’” . Of course, this
is not what Greece agreed. This is the reason why the Interim Accord includes Article22 under
Final Clauses, with general application to each provision which precedes it. The pitfalls of denying
its general application are clear on the Applicant’s own examples.
35. The Applicant’s next tack is to raise alarm over the effectiveness of Article11.
Professor Sands referred to the absurdity of the situation where:
61CR2011/9, pp.39-46, paras.1-21 (Reism an); Rejoinder, pp.78-88, para s.5.4-5.18; Counter-Memorial,
pp. 134-145, paras. 7.26-7.56.
62
CR 2011/11, p. 49, para. 8 (Sands).
63
Ibid., p. 47, para. 3 (Sands).
64
CR 2011/9, pp. 41-42, para. 11 (Reisman).
65CR 2011/11, p. 49, para. 7 (Sands).
66Ibid.
67
Ibid., quoting CR 2011/9, p. 41, para. 10 (Reisman). - 38 -
“the Respondent has a right to object in a ll international organizations at which its
objection may have an effect . . .
the effect of his argument is devastating for the Interim Accord and the stability that it
68
was intended to create” .
But there is no problem of stability here at all. Article11(1) still performs the function it was
intended to perform, and it does so by imposing a particular obligation on Greece. Greece is
obliged “not to object”, subject to the membership criteria of each organization.
36. The Applicant consistently ignores those criteria or denies them when the consequences
are not to its liking. That is what leads it to misunderstand the relation between Article22 and
Article11(1). The Respondent indeed “has a right to object in all international organizations at
which its objection may have an effect ⎯ closed organizations” ⎯ but if, and only if, the rules and
criteria of those organizations require objection in the light of the circumstances of the application
for admission. Your Advisory Opinion on Conditions of Admission was clear that a State is not
permitted to add criteria which are not stipulat ed as part of the rul es or practice of the
organization 69. If Greece were to object, because it reached the judgmen t under the rules that an
objection was required, then the objection is valid ⎯ both under the rules of the organization and
under Article 11 (1), as informed by Article 22. But if Greece were to object in breach of the rules
of the organization, then it would have breached an obligation to the fellow members or to the
organization itself and, by way of Article 11, to the Applicant too. Article11(1) in conjunction
with Article22 protects the Applicant by making Greece’s obligations to apply the membership
rules of the organization obligations not just to the organization but to the Applicant as well.
37. The Applicant says: “Article 22 was not intended to restore the situation which pertained
before that concession was granted. Article 11 eith er does or does not limit the right, it either was
70
or was not a major concession.” We agree with that: the situation after the adoption of
Article11(1) is indeed different from the situa tion before. The Applicant, a third party, has
acquired a legal interest in our proper application of the membership rules of closed multilateral
organizations. By operation of Article22, those rules do not change; but by operation of
68
CR 2011/11, p. 50, paras. 9-10 (Sands).
69
Conditions of Admission of a State to Membership in thUnited Nations (Article4 of the Charter), Advisory
Opinion, 1948, I.C.J. Reports 1947-1948, pp. 57, 63.
70CR 2011/11, p. 51, para. 11 (Sands). - 39 -
Article11(1), Greece’s potential responsibility fo r their breach has expanded. Thus Greece’s
freedom of action toward the Applicant as member ship candidate is cons tricted but it is not
eliminated.
38. I said a moment ago that the Applicant ignores or denies the membership criteria of
international organizations as an element in the proper interpretation of Articles 11 (1) and 22. It is
important to be clear what criteria NATO has articul ated in relation to the Applicant’s candidacy.
We have recited these again and again, with references to the authoritative NATO documents; but
because the Applicant denies they exist, I am afraid, Mr. President, Members of the Court, I have to
refer to them once again.
39. The Applicant is categorical that there was no NATO criterion which would have
required a deferral of its candidacy in April 2008. Professor Murphy said:
“[T]here is simply nothing in the record ⎯ no evidence of any kind ⎯ stating
that NATO adopted as a criterion for accession that the name difference be resolved,
nor that any requirement for ‘good neighbo urly relations’ meant that the name
difference must first be resolved; there is nothing in the record to establish that.” 71
40. From the early stages of the Applicant’s relationship with NATO however, NATO said
that the settlement of differences was a requirement. Not just a requirement for the Applicant, it is
a requirement for other States. For example, the NATO Secretary General in 1997 said “[t]he
possibility of NATO membership has already given many nations of Central and Eastern Europe an
incentive to put to an end old quarrels, border disputes or other unreso lved security-related
issues” 72. In January2008, the NATO Secretary General directly connected the name issue with
good neighbourly relations. He said, “Euro-Atlantic integration of course also demands and
requires good neighbourly relations and it is crystal clear that there were a lot of pleas from around
73
the table to find a solution for the name issue, which is not a NATO affair” . Unless the Secretary
General had been speaking in non sequiturs, the connection between good neighbourly relations
and the “pleas... to find a solution for the name issue” was “crystal clear”. The Riga Summit
Declaration of 29November2006 required, inter alia, “good-neighbourly relations, and working
7CR 2011/11, p. 32, para. 37.
72
Rejoinder, Ann. 52, quoted at Rejoinder, pp. 108-109, para. 6.4.
7Counter-Memorial, Ann. 26, quoted at Rejoinder, p 110, para. 6.8. - 40 -
74
towards mutually acceptable so lutions to outstanding issues” ; and the Brussels Declaration of
75
2December2007 referred to “mutually acceptabl e, timely solutions to outstanding issues” .
There is no purpose here in reciting the later statements of NATO confirming that “a mutually
76
acceptable solution to the name issue” is a requirement for the Applicant’s admission .
41. Mr.President, Members of the Court, the Applicant has accused the Respondent of
having a “semi-detached relationship to the evidence” 77. In many cases there is so much evidence
before the Court that you might be forgiven for appreciating a “semi-detached” attitude to the
evidence. But the evidence here is not large and we are not “semi-detached” about it. The
Respondent has acknowledged the facts ⎯ and the facts which I assume concern the Applicant the
most ⎯ those concerning Greece’s position concerning the Applicant’s application to NATO ⎯
Greece has acknowledged them openly. Greece has said already that the facts that matter are those
of the NATO enlargement process. The Applicant, after multiple rounds of written and oral
proceedings, still denies that.
42. Instead of crediting the statements of th e Alliance as to its own membership criteria,
counsel for the Applicant says that what really happened was that “NATO members were pleading
78
with the Respondent in this time period to stick to its obligations under the Interim Accord” . But
the one “plea” mentioned in NATO statements wa s that the name issue be settled before the
79
Applicant could be invited ! The Applicant’s assertion is not only without evidentiary foundation;
it contradicts the evidence actually on the record. It is NATO’s own statements that matter when
you are asking what were NATO’s requirements for enlargement.
43. Counsel for the Applicant would have the Court believe that it takes an “extraordinary
connect-the-dots attitude” ⎯ that is to say that the Respondent takes an extraordinary
connect-the-dots attitude ⎯ “divining all sorts of hidden meanings and sudden innuendo” 80 to
74
Counter-Memorial, Ann. 23, quoted at Rejoinder, p. 112, para. 6.9.
75
Ibid., Ann. 25, quoted at Rejoinder, p. 112, para. 6.9.
76Final Communiqué, Brussels, 3 Dec. 2008, para. 17: Count er-Memorial, Ann. 32, quoted at Rejoinder, p. 113,
para.6.10. See also, Strasbourg-Kehl, Declaration, 4 Apr. 2009; Counter-Memorial, Ann.35, quoted at Rejoinder,
p. 113, para. 6.10.
77
CR 2011/11, p. 14, para. 4 (Sands).
78Ibid., p. 33, para. 37 (Murphy).
79Counter-Memorial, Ann. 26, quoted at Rejoinder, p. 110, para. 6.8.
80
CR 2011/11, p. 33, para. 37 (Murphy). - 41 -
understand that NATO considered settlement of the name issue as a decisive factor. This is a
striking assertion in face of the evidence of multiple NATO statements; all the more so, when the
Applicant implies, without any meaningful evidence, that NATO before the Bucharest Summit was
admonishing Greece about the interpretation of the Interim Accord. There was an outstanding
regional difference; it was not settled in April 200 8. It was the name issue, and NATO was clear
as to the difficulty it posed for the Applicant’s candidacy.
44. The Applicant invites the Court to concl ude that resolution of the name difference was
not a NATO requirement but a unilateral impos ition of Greece. It refers to an aide mémoire of the
Respondent, to suggest that “satisfactory conclusion of the negotiations” was not a NATO criterion
81
or, for that matter, a valid consideration . Regrettably, its treatment of the text requires some
caution. Counsel for the Applicant read from the aide mémoire. He reported that the aide mémoire
said as follows: [slide]
“in addition to any accession criteria... [t]he satisfactory conclusion of the [name]
negotiations is a sine qua non in order to enable Greece to continue to support the
Euro-Atlantic aspirations of Skopje” . 82
But the phrase “in addition to any accession criteria” was not even in the same paragraph as the
phrase following the ellipses. What did “in additi on to any accession criteria” actually refer to in
the original text? It referred to the “cardinal importance that the overall levels of security, military
or political, be properly served by any enlarg ement process”. But serving the overall security
purposes of the Alliance has always been a re quirement in the enlargement process. The aide
mémoire was not adducing any additional accession criteria at all. As for the “satisfactory
conclusion of the [name] negotiations”, this was already a NATO requirement. That Greece agreed
it was important did not change the requirement. Nowhere does Greece say that “satisfactory
conclusion of the [name] negotiations” was its own invention or otherwise superadditive to
NATO’s membership criteria.
45. The Applicant’s counsel asserts that the Applicant in early 2008 was approaching the
final stage of the NATO admission process 83. Indeed, it affirms that it was fully qualified for
8CR 2011/11, p. 24, para. 14 (Murphy).
82
Ibid., quoting Memorial, Ann. 129, p. 3.
8CR 2011/5, p. 18, para. 7 (Miloshoski). - 42 -
84
accession to NATO . Now, whether it was or not is a question for the NATO members. It is well
beyond the interpretative jurisdiction of the Court. But in any event, I would refer to the words of
the Applicant’s Prime Minister, Mr. Gruevski: “the issue that has to be solved [he was referring to
NATO] is the name issue with Greece” 8.
Mr.President, Members of the Court, thank you for your careful attention to this rather
dense presentation. Mr. President, I would ask you to call on Professor Alain Pellet but probably
best to separate it by caffeine.
The PRESIDENT: Thank you, Professor James Crawford, for your statement. I am going to
call ProfessorAlainPellet but perhaps it is appropr iate to have a short co ffee break before I ask
ProfessorAlainPellet to take the floor. So, I d eclare that the Court will have a short break of
ten minutes until 4.40 p.m.
The Court adjourned from 4.30 p.m. to 4.45 p.m.
The PRESIDENT: Please be seated. The Court resumes its session and now I invite
Professor Pellet to take the floor
M. PELLET : Thank you Mr. President, although I’m quite sure I didn’t need café.
LES VIOLATIONS DE L ’ACCORD PAR LE DEMANDEUR
L ES MOYENS DE DÉFENSE DE LA GRÈCE
LES REMÈDES
1. Monsieur le président, Mesdames et Messieurs les juges, la Cour n’a pas compétence pour
se prononcer sur la requête dont l’a saisie l’ex-Ré publique yougoslave de Macédoine. Et si, par
impossible, vous étiez d’un avis contraire, force vous serait de constater que la Grèce ne peut être
tenue pour responsable d’un manquement à l’articl e11 de l’accord intérimaire. «Game over»
comme le dit peut-être un peu trop tr iomphalement le professeurMurphy 86(contrairement aux
siens, mes fils me disent d’ailleurs que l’expression «game over» s’affiche plutôt quand on a
84
CR 2011/5 p. 54, para. 56 (Murphy).
85Joint Press Point with NATO Secretary General, Jde Hoop Scheffer, and the Prime Minister of the
FYROM, Nikola Gruevski, 23 Jan. 2008: Counter-Memorial, Ann. 26.
86CR 2011/11, p. 26, par. 19 (Murphy). - 43 -
perdu…) ⎯mais, de toute façon, une affaire devant la Cour n’est pas un jeu électronique, fût-ce
sur une console Nintendo… (je le dis, Monsieur le président, sans que cette remarque implique la
moindre critique de cette réussite incontestable de la technologie nippone !). En tout état de cause,
c’est sur «continue» qu’il faut appuyer car ⎯le fils de M.Murphy lui expliquera ⎯ une partie
n’est terminée que lorsque tous les niveaux ont ét é «complétés». C’est du franglais. Le niveau
suivant (si l’ARYM l’atteignait sans que la Cour déclare la fin de la partie) serait celui de savoir si
en dehors du système clos dans le cadre duquel rais onne le demandeur, il n’y a pas d’autres motifs
de suspension des obligations pesant sur la Grèce en vertu de l’accord intérimaire.
2. Ma tâche cet après-midi est de redire que lques mots sur les obligations découlant de cet
accord, que l’ARYM a violées(I) et les conséquences qui découlent de ces manquements(II),
avant de faire de très brèves remarques sur les «remèdes» requis par l’Etat demandeur (III).
I.L ES VIOLATIONS DE L ’ACCORD INTÉRIMAIRE ATTRIBUABLES AU DEMANDEUR
3. Monsieur le président, l’Etat requérant veut apparaître comme la victime d’un voisin
vindicatif qui accumulerait des accusations vétilleuses et «triviales» ⎯il persiste et signe dans
l’adjectif87⎯ pour l’empêcher indûment d’entrer à l’OTAN. L’accusation est curieuse, venant
d’une Partie qui présente avec application l’affaire qu’elle a soumise à la Cour comme «un petit cas
tout simple d’application de pacta sunt servanda» («a simple and narrow case of pacta sunt
88
servanda» ). S’il ne fait aucun doute que l’accord inté rimaire est un traité qui est en vigueur et
qui lie les Parties, il les lie toutes les deux et sa violation par le demandeur doit avoir les
conséquences qui en découlent tant sur le te rrain du droit des traités que sur celui de la
responsabilité. Mais les faits internationalement illicites d’abord.
4. Donc, Monsieur le président, les violations que nous reprochons à l’ARYM seraient
«triviales». Triviales,
⎯ le jet de «cailloux» sur lequel a ironisé le pr ofesseurSands. L’incident a pour origine une
marche anti-hellénique de 10000 personnes contre le bureau de liaison grec à Skopje et s’est
tout de même soldé par neuf blessés parmi les policiers (envoyés en nombre insuffisant), dont
87
Voir CR 2011/7, p. 23-24, par. 58 (Sands) ; voir aussi : CR 2011/11, p. 54, par. 18 (Sands).
88CR2011/5, p.21, par.14 (Miloshoski); voir aussibid., p. 28, par. 12 (Sands) et CR 2011/11, p. 55, par. 20
(Sands). - 44 -
89
un gravement selon l’agence d’information macédonienne ; et, quand bien même on
minimiserait ces incidents, leur répétition n’en est pas moins fort inquiétante: notre
contre-mémoire contient une vingtaine d’exem ples de notes verbales par lesquelles le bureau
de liaison de la Grèce à Skopje se plaint des a ttaques répétées contre ses prémisses et de la
faiblesse de la protection dont elle bénéficie 90 ;
⎯ est-il vraiment si trivial que cela que l’Etat demandeur finance des partis et associations qui
promeuvent ouvertement des politiques irrédentistes 91 et que son premier ministre cautionne
par sa présence et son silence de s propos tendant clairement à porter atteinte à l’intégrité
territoriale de la Grèce 92 ?
5. Suffit-il de qualifier des obligations du demandeur de négocier que nous invoquons de
«triviales» pour les…disqualifier? Oh je sais bien: comme durant le premier tour de ses
plaidoiries 93, le demandeur s’est, lundi dernier, prévalu du brevet de bonne conduite que lui aurait
94
décerné l’ambassadeur Nimetz . Mais c’est son seul argument et avec tout le respect que j’ai pour
mes honorables contradicteurs, il n’est pas très série ux comme l’a relevé le professeur Reisman : à
moins de vouloir torpiller la médiation dont il est chargé, on voit mal le représentant spécial du
Secrétaire général critiquer véhémentement les Parties. Je relève en outre que si cette déclaration a
bien été faite le 9février2011 comme les avocat s du demandeur y ont lourdement insisté, cette
évaluation ⎯pour laquelle le demandeur nous a donné une référence qui n’existe qu’en
slavo-macédonien (j’indique au passage que les ha bitants ne l’ARYM ne parlent pas une langue
héritée de celle de Philippe et d’Alexa ndre de Macédoine, mais une langue slave) ⎯ cette
évaluation disais-je, portait sur la rencontre des de ux premiers ministres qui remonte à plus d’un
an: «There is a positive attitude for so lving the problem, saidNimetz, assessing last year’s
meetings of Greek and Macedonian Prime Ministers Gruevski and Papandreou as progress in the
89MIA, Skopje, February 28, 2001, «Nine policemen injured in incidents after peaceful protest at «Pela» square»,
disponible sur: www.mia.com.mk/default.aspx?vId=37185105&lId=2 ; voir contre-mémoire, annexe 47.
90Contre-mémoire, annexes 41 à 53, 55 à 61 et 65.
91
Voir ibid., p. 41-42, par. 4.23-4.24, ou CR 2011/10, p. 14, par. 7 (Telalian).
92
Voir contre-mémoire, annexe 124.
93CR 2011/5, p. 20, par. 11 (Miloshoski), CR 2011/7, p. 19, par. 48 (Sands)
94CR 2011/11, p. 18, par. 9 (Sands) et ibid., p. 57, par. 5 (Dimitrov). - 45 -
95
effort to reach a solution.» Et, quand bien même M. Nimetz aurait chaussé des lunettes roses, ou
eût été abusé par les protestati ons de bonne foi de l’ARYM, son satisfecit tardif (qui s’adresse
d’ailleurs aux deux Parties) ne saurait faire oublier que, depuis seizeans, l’ARYM s’emploie à
96
saborder les négociations comme je l’ai montré vendredi dernier sans être démenti :
⎯ sauf par le faux-semblant de mars2008 97, le demandeur n’a jamais fait le moindre pas en
direction d’un compromis quelconque ;
⎯ en cherchant à imposer un fait accompli à travers sa reconnaissance sous le nom qui est l’objet
de la négociation à laquelle il s’est engagé, il s’ emploie très sciemment et délibérément à faire
en sorte d’exclure que cette négociation puisse «parvenir à régler le différend» sur son nom au
mépris des dispositions de l’article 5 de l’accord intérimaire ; et
⎯ en s’accrochant à la «double formule» (la dual formula), il exclut du champ de la négociation
ce qui constitue son objet même : la recherche d’une solution globale sur «la divergence qui a
surgi au sujet de son nom».
o
[Projection n 1 ⎯ Ajouter successivement chacune des citations correspondant à un tiret.]
6. Il faut croire que l’accusation de la Grèce sur ce point n’est pas si triviale: pas une fois
⎯ pas une seule fois, Monsieur le président ⎯ le demandeur n’a abordé la question ⎯ qu’il avait
déjà complètement esquivée dans ses écritures et sur laquelle il n’a pas dit le moindre mot durant
les quelque dixheures de ses plaidoiries orales. C’est un silence plus qu’éloquent ⎯ criant, on
pourrait dire «barrissant» puisque nos contradicteu rs et amis aiment les éléphants! Je ne peux
98
donc que le répéter , la décision arrêtée sine qua non de s’en tenir à la double formule entraîne
inévitablement le blocage des négociations ⎯ au mépris de l’engagement de négocier de bonne foi
sur son nom qui pèse sur l’ARYM en vertu de l’article 5. Quelques citations à l’appui :
⎯ «we consider that the appellation Republika Makedonija-Skopje may serve only as a basis for
constructive talks aimed at finding a formula for bilateral communication between the Republic
95Balkan Insight, No Breakthrough After Greece, Macedonia Name Talks , 10February2011; les italiques sont
de nous (onglet n 3 du dossier de plaidoiries).
96CR 2011/9, p. 64-68, par. 19-26 (Pellet).
97Ibid., p. 65-66, par. 22 (Pellet).
98
Voir contre-mémoire, p. 30-31, par. 3.47 ; p. 34-35, par.4.8-4.9 ; ou., p. 183-104, par. 8.39 ; duplique, p. 15-16,
par. 1.10, p. 27-38, par. 3.5, p. 74-75, par. 4.25-4.26, p. 167-173, par. 7.54-7.63 ; CR 2011/8, p. 15-16, par. 15-16 (Pellet),
p. 54, par. 28 (Reisman) ; CR 2011/9, p. 64-65, par. 20-23 (Pellet). - 46 -
of Macedonia and the Hellenic Republic » (FYROM’s Minister of Foreign Affairs,
April 2005) 99;
⎯ «we cannot discuss» the point in the document of the mediator «that says that the Republic of
Macedonia should accept a name different from its constitutional one for international use»
(FYROM’s Prime Minister in November 2007) 10;
⎯ «There is a red line we cannot cross» said Ambassador Dimitrov, present in this Hall of Justice,
in March2008 by stressing that Skopje would use «its constitutional name «Republic of
Macedonia» on the international stage and agreed to adopt a mutually acceptable name strictly
101
for relations with Greece» ;
⎯ since the signature of the Interim accord of 1995 the FYROM politicians «continually repeated
that the maximum Macedonia must concede is that it will use the dual formula, which means
the use of one name in its relations with Gr eece and the use of its constitutional name
internationally, and that in no circumstances we cross that red line» (FYROM’s
102
Prime Minister, November 2008) .
Alors que négocier si l’on ne peut discuter du nom du demandeur (de « son nom»), seul objet des
négociations prévues à l’article5 de l’accord intéri maire? Refuser de négocier sur l’objet agréé,
c’est une violation patente ⎯ et certainement pas triviale ⎯ de l’accord intérimaire.
[Fin de la projection 1.]
7. A vrai dire, Monsieur le président, aucun de ces manquements n’est trivial, qu’il s’agisse
de la persistance des menaces irrédentistes ⎯ et, en tout cas, de l’inertie complaisante des autorités
de l’ARYM à l’égard de ces revendications ⎯ du refus de négocier de bonne foi, que traduisent la
volonté systématique du demandeur de faire traîner indéfiniment les négociations ou son parti pris
99 o
Déclaration du ministre des affaires étrangères, note verbale 63/2005 en date du 15avril2005 adressée à
toutes les missions permanente s par la mission permanente de l’ERYM auprès de l’Orga nisation des NationsUnies,
duplique, annexe 21 ; les italiques sont de nous ; voir aussi duplique, p. 170-172, par. 7.60-7.62.
100
Prime Minister Gruevski’s statement on Ni metz’s draft-frame work of understanding, Macedonian
Information Agency (2novembre2007) available at: http://www.mia.com.mk/default.aspx?vId+29113595&lId=2,
contre-mémoire, annexe 128 (non traduite).
101
NATO Urges Macedonia solution [L’OTAN insiste pour une solution concernant la Macédoine],
BalkanInsight.com (3 mars 2008), réplique, annexe 98 (non traduite) ; les italiques sont de nous.
102
Déclaration du premier ministre, M.Gruevski, Stenography notes from th e 7th sequel of the 27th session of
the Parliament of the Republic of Macedonia, held on 3 November2008 27-7/17, contre-mémoire, annexe104; les
italiques sont de nous ; voir aussi contre-mémoire, p. 34-35, par. 4.8-4.9. - 47 -
de les vider de toute substance. Ce sont d’ailleurs ces atermoiements, à la longue insupportables,
qui ont conduit l’OTAN à différer l’invitation au demandeur de la joindre ⎯car c’est bien
l’absence de résultat des négociations sur la question du nom qui est à l’origine de la décision prise
par le sommet de Bucarest.
o
[Projection n 2 ⎯ Paragraphe 1 de l’article 11 et paragraphe 2 de la résolution 817 (1993).]
8. Quant aux violations découlant de l’en gagement résultant du premier paragraphede
l’article 11 et du paragraphe 2 de la résolution 817 (1993) du Conseil de sécurité, elles ne sont pas
davantage triviales ⎯ et elles perdurent : depuis 1993, malgré le renvoi fait par les articles 5 et 11
de l’accord intérimaire à cet instrument, le demandeur s’obstine à se nommer lui-même par le nom
même par lequel il s’est engagé à ne pas être dési gné dans les organisations au sein desquelles il
aura été admis grâce à la non-objection de la Grèc e («dans ces organisations» et «à toutes fins
utiles» ⎯ «in such organization» and «for all purposes»). Monsieur le président, comme je prends
la suite du professeur Crawford qui a expliqué à ju ste titre, je crois, que la première phrase de
l’article 11 n’imposerait pas d’ob ligation au demandeur mais posait une condition à son admission
dans certaines organisations internationales, vous pourriez penser que je le contredis lorsque
j’affirme que l’ARYM a violé cette disposition et celle de la résolution 817. Honni soit qui mal y
pense, il n’en est rien. M. Crawford raisonnait en amont avant l’admission ; je me situe en aval une
fois que l’admission est acquise. Il ne s’agit plus de condition, le non-respect de la condition à
laquelle cette admission est subordonnée est une violation. Certes, Monsieur le président, le
demandeur a déniché quelques témoignages qui l’ absolvent du respect de cette obligation et
quelques documents préparatoires dont le texte pe ut, non sans quelque artifice, être interprété
comme neutralisant cette objection ⎯mais, que je sache, «la» règle générale d’interprétation des
traités c’est qu’ils doivent être interprétés de bonne foi suivant le sens ordinaire à attribuer à leurs
termes dans leur contexte et à la lumière de leur objet et de leur but. Or le texte de cette disposition
est parfaitement clair ⎯vous le connaissez sans doute par cŒur, Mesdames et Messieurs de la
Cour, je ne le relis pas. J’ajoute seulement que cette disposition serait vidée de toute substance
⎯on pourrait dire ces dispositions ⎯ si l’on devait adopter l’interprétation du demandeur:
l’accord intérimaire ne peut imposer aucune obligation à quiconque sinon aux Parties; comme il
est peu vraisemblable que la Grèce elle-même ait voulu s’obliger à ne désigner le demandeur que - 48 -
sous son appellation provisoire et que ceci ait été la volonté de l’ARYM, il faut croire que
l’obligation s’applique à celle-ci et que c’est e lle qui est, juridiquement et conventionnellement,
tenue de ne pas se doter d’une appellation différente ; sinon, la seconde phrase du premier
paragraphe de l’article 11 serait une coquille vide et ne lierait personne.
9. Et le fait que l’ARYM n’ait pas respecté cet engagement pendant treizeans, comme elle
s’en vante, ne l’exonère nullement de sa viola tion mais constitue au contraire une circonstance
aggravante : elle reconnaît que, pendant toutes ces a nnées, elle n’a pas respecté l’obligation qu’elle
avait acceptée en concluant l’accord intérimaire et que lui impose (et à elle seule) le premier
paragraphede l’article11 de cet instrument. Et cela me conduit à deux autres remarques qui
concernent d’ailleurs l’ensemble des violations.
o
[Fin de la projection n 2.]
10. La première concerne le facteur temps. Autant il n’est pas anormal que, dans les années
qui ont précédé et immédiatement suivi l’adoption de l’accord intérimaire, il y ait eu un peu de
battement, autant plus de quinze ans plus tard , ces palinodies apparaissent pour ce qu’elles sont:
des violations substantielles et continues dont on ne voit pas comment le temps aurait pu les
effacer: d’abord, il n’est pas certain que le dr oit international connaisse la notion de prescription
extinctive 103; ensuite s’il la connaît, le délai qui s’ est écoulé depuis la signature de l’accord
intérimaire ne serait sûrement pas suffisant pour qu’elle puisse jouer; enfin et surtout, les
protestations nombreuses et fermes du défendeur eussent, de toute manière, empêché le temps de
faire son Œuvre.
11. Dès lors, je pense, par exemple, qu’il vaut mieux laisser tranquilles l’avis de la
commission Badinter de1992 ou les comporteme nts initiaux des Parties lors de l’entrée de
l’ARYM aux NationsUnies ou dans d’autres organisations internationales: ils remontent à une
époque antérieure aux engagements conventionnels pris par le demandeur dans l’accord intérimaire
qu’ils ne sauraient par conséquent ni violer ni aider à interpréter. Et la Grèce, qui s’est, pour sa
part, acquittée de ses propres obligations en vertu de l’accord, n’avait pas de raison de douter à ce
moment-là que l’ARYM tiendrait les siens: l’in strument, négocié pied à pied, mot à mot,
103
Voir Ile de Kasikili/Sedudu (Botswana/Namibie), arrêt, C.I.J. Recueil 1999 (II), p. 1101-1103, par. 90-94. - 49 -
établissait un équilibre satisfaisant des sacrifices c onsentis de part et d’autre et des avantages
obtenus réciproquement par chaque Partie.
12. Au surplus, Monsieur le président ⎯ et c’est ma seconde remarque générale ⎯, malgré
l’assurance épatante avec laquelle nos contradicteurs affirment le contraire, la Grèce a protesté avec
constance et vigueur contre ces violations répétées.
13. Mon admiration ⎯ah, ce n’est pas tout à fait le mot… mon ébahissement ⎯ face à
l’aplomb de nos contradicteurs a atteint son apogée lorsque j’ai consulté le tableau, assez vide de
sens, que le professeur Sands a inséré sous l’onglet n o13 (il pensait sans doute que le chiffre porte
bonheur) du dossier des juges du demandeur: il y a là une collection de neuf notes verbales
⎯extraites d’une série de vingt ⎯ qui montrent le climat d’host ilité antigrecque continuant de
régner à Skopje après la conclusion de l’accord intérimaire et après comme avant le sommet de
Bucarest ; la fonction de ces annexes au contre-mémoi re était de décrire une situation de tension et
ces documents n’avaient aucune raison particulière de mentionner tel ou tel article de l’accord et
sûrement pas ceux relatifs au nom de la «seconde Partie», à son obligation de négocier ou à son
appellation au sein des organisations internationales. En revanche , le demandeur ne fait aucune
allusion aux très nombreuses protestations de la Grèce au sujet de la violation de ces obligations.
14. Nous en avons établi une liste ⎯très probablement non exhaustive ⎯ qui recense pas
moins de vingt-trois protestations faites par la Gr èce à l’encontre de l’utilisation par le demandeur
du nom qu’il persiste à se donner, malgré les dispositions de l’accord intérimaire et malgré les
décisions l’admettant dans les diverses organisations internationales concernées. Tous ces
documents émanent d’autorités officielles habilitées à parler au nom de la Grèce et témoignent de
leur vigilance, de plus en plus sourcilleuse à mesure que le temps passait et que la violation
devenait de plus en plus flagrante. Les documents que je vais citer sont reproduits à l’onglet n o 2
de votre dossier, avec d’autres d’ailleurs.
15. Je note par exemple que, dès décembre 1993, après donc l’admission de l’ARYM aux
Nations Unies, mais avant la signature de l’accord intérimaire, le conseiller juridique du ministère
grec des affaires étrangères, a protesté au sein de la Sixième Commission de l’Assemblée générale, - 50 -
«contre l’utilisation du nom de République de Macédoine par le représentant de
l’ex-République yougoslave de Macédoine, qui viole outrageusement les résolutions
du Conseil de sécurité et de l’Assemblée générale relatives à la question, en vertu
desquelles la République de Skopje a été admise provisoirement à l’ONU sous le nom
d’ex-République yougoslave de Macédoine qui doit être utilisé à l’ONU sans aucune
exception, limitation, réserve ni nuance, et ce jusqu’au règlement du différend qui
oppose la Grèce à la République de Skopje et qui porte précisément sur le nom de
cette république» 104.
Un peu plus tard ⎯et cette fois après la conclusion de l’accord intérimaire, le représentant
permanent de la Grèce aux Nations Unies a également protesté, par deux lettres des 24 novembre et
er
1 décembre1995 (qui se trouvent dans vos dossiers) , contre des violations similaires de la
résolution 817 (1993) et il a ajouté :
«En outre, l’article5 de l’accord intérimaire…stipule que les deux parties
reconnaissent leur désaccord au sujet du nom de [l’ex-République yougoslave de
Macédoine] et conviennent de poursuivre les négociations sous les auspices du
Secrétaire général de l’Organisation des Nations Unies, comme suite à la
résolution845(1993) du Conseil de sécurité, en vue de parvenir à un accord sur le
sujet de discorde dont il est fait état dans ladite résolution et dans la
résolution 817 (1993) du Conseil.» 105
Je saute une dizaine d’années (mais elles sont bien représentées dans notre tableau) pour citer une
troisième caractéristique ⎯au Conseil de l’Europe cette fois, au sein duquel le représentant
permanent de la Grèce a vigoureusement protesté, par une lettre adressée le 23 décembre 2004 au
Secrétaire général de cette organisation, cont re une note émanant de l’ARYM, au sujet d’une
tentative «to forcefully prejudice the final outco me of negotiations on the matter and thus render
the Interim Accord of the 13thSeptember, 1995 (A rticle5), which our two countries signed, null
106
and void in practice» .
16. La liste ⎯ illustrée par les tableaux insérés sous l’onglet nº 1 du dossier des juges ⎯ (je
pense que je me suis trompé en vous disant que l es documents figuraient dans le dossier des juges,
ils sont annexés à la duplique), la liste donc qui est illustrée par les tableaux qui, eux, sont bien
insérés sous l’onglet nº1 du dossier des juges est longue, mais ces exemples sont parlants et
suffisent : sauf pour l’esbroufe, il est tout simplement impossible de prétendre que la Grèce n’a pas
104Nations Unies, Documents officiels de l’Assemblée générale, quarante-huitième session, Sixième Commission,
compte rendu analytique de la 22séance, doc. A/C.6/48/SR.22, 7 décembre, p. 12, duplique, annexe 2.
105Lettre en date du 1rdécembre 1995 adressée au Secrétaire général par le représentant permanent de la Grèce
auprès de l’Organisation des Nations Unies, doc. S/1995/1005, 1écembre 1995, p. 3, duplique, annexe 10.
106Letter of the Permanent Representative of Greece to the Council of Europe, addressed to the Secretary
General, Ref. : F.6705B/169/AS1148, dated 23 December 2004, duplique, annexe 46. - 51 -
protesté contre les manquements répétés du dema ndeur à ses engagements conventionnels, qu’ils
concernent l’utilisation de son nom au sein des or ganisations internationales et l’obligation de
o
négocier (ceci est établi par le sec ond tableau inclus dans l’onglet n 1) ou les violations des
articles 6 et 7 (ce que montre notamment le premier tableau). Monsieur le président, on dit parfois
qu’«impossible n’est pas français» ; en tout cas, «impossible n’est pas «philippe sandsien»» : mon
fougueux contradicteur n’hésite pas en effet à prétendre qu’il n’y a pas eu de protestation ⎯ sans
doute a-t-il oublié les sages conseils qu’il nous a prodigués et que je rappelle :
«It is apparent that in these cases we have to know the whole dossier, we have
to read everything ⎯ every document ⎯ precisely to avoid making statements that get
us into difficulty» 107; Professor Sands’s remarks cause me «to enquire how familiar
108
counsel might actually be with the evidence before the Court . . .» .
17. Conclusion, Monsieur le président: le demandeur a manqué, gravement, massivement,
systématiquement, aux obligations conventionne lles qui lui incombent en vertu de l’accord
intérimaire ⎯obligations qui, je le rappelle, sont la contrepartie de celles assumées par le
défendeur en vertu du même accord ; et le défe ndeur, pour sa part, a protesté très constamment et
très vigoureusement contre ces violations.
II. LES DÉFENSES DE LA G RÈCE
18. Monsieur le président, Mesdames et Messi eurs les juges, de tels manquements ont des
conséquences sur le terrain du droit de la responsabilité aussi bien que sur celui du droit des traités :
la responsabilité de l’ARYM s’en trouve engagée et la Grèce eût été en droit de prendre l’initiative
de dénoncer ou de suspendre l’accord de1995. Elle ne l’a pas fait ⎯pour des raisons qui n’ont
109
rien de mystérieux, que nous avons déjà indiquées et que MmeTelalian a, une fois de plus,
rappelé tout à l’heure: le défe ndeur souhaite qu’une solution défi nitive soit apportée à l’entêtant
différend sur le nom et que les deux Parties soie nt enfin à même «de développer leurs relations
mutuelles et de jeter des bases solides en vue de l’instauration de relations pacifiques et d’un climat
de compréhension» conformément à l’objectif fixé par le préambule de l’accord intérimaire. Mais
la Grèce eût lâché la proie pour l’ombre et laissé le champ libre aux passions irrédentistes et à la
107
CR 2011/11, p. 54, par. 18 (Sands).
108
Ibid.
109Contre-mémoire, p. 163, par. 8.2 ; duplique, p. 187, par. 8.3 ; CR 2011/10, p. 33, par. 26 (Pellet). - 52 -
consolidation du fait accompli recherché par le demandeur en se déliant et, du même coup, en le
déliant, du régime équilibré de droits et d’obligations mutuels réalisé par l’accord.
19. Et c’est là, Monsieur le président, qu’intervient cette exceptio sur laquelle le
professeurSands exerce (bien à tort) la verve ta lentueuse qu’on lui connaît. Contrairement à ce
qu’il semble croire, nous n’invoquons pas l’ exceptio non adimpleti contractus comme une sorte de
«super circonstance excluant l’illicéité» ou comme un motif alternatif pour suspendre telle ou telle
obligation du traité. Nous disons seulement que, en vertu de ce principe général, lorsque certaines
circonstances sont réunies, l’Etat victime de manquements à des engagements conventionnels d’un
autre Etat peut y répondre en suspendant ( ou en mettant fin) unilatéralement à ses propres
obligations corrélatives, sans pour autant se retirer du traité. Les conditions nécessaires à sa mise
en Œuvre sont remplies en l’espèce. Pour mener à bien cette démonstration, je postulerai ⎯ sans le
concéder ⎯ que la Grèce aurait, effectivement, violé ses obligations en vertu de l’accord
intérimaire ⎯ quod non ; mon compère James Crawford l’a établi.
20. Monsieur le président, j’ai juste l’âge que les Beatles célébraient ou redoutaient dans leur
magnifique chanson When I’m 64. Mais c’est When I’m minus 9 que le professeur Sands voudrait
110
que je lui chante ⎯l’âge que j’avais l’année de l’arrêt des Prises d’eau à la Meuse et des
opinions personnelles de DionisioAnzilotti et de ManleyHudson. Rassurez-vous, Monsieur le
président, je ne vais pas pousser la chansonnette. Il reste qu’il y a des chansons indémodables,
comme il y a des principes inusables, et que c’est le cas en effet de ce principe «si juste, si
équitable, si universellement reconnu» (Prises d’eau à la Meuse, arrêt, 1937, opinion dissidente de
M. Anzilotti, C.P.J.I. sérieA/B n o 70, p.50) selon lequel «quand deux parties ont assumé une
obligation identique ou réciproque, une partie qui , de manière continue, n’exécute pas cette
obligation, ne devrait pas être autorisée à tirer avantage d’une non-observation analogue de cette
obligation par l’autre partie» ( Prises d’eau à la Meuse, arrêt, 1937, opinion individuelle de
M. Hudson, C.P.J.I. série A/B n o 70, p. 77).
110
Voir CR 2011/11, p. 51, par. 13. - 53 -
21. Ce principe doit trouver application ici : l’obligation assumée par la Grèce de ne pas
objecter à l’admission de l’ARYM dans les organi sations internationales dont elle est membre a
pour contrepartie celle du demandeur de se fair e appeler par sa dénomination provisoire en
attendant que la question de son nom soit réglée par des négociations auxquelles il s’est engagé à
participer de bonne foi. Il n’a respecté ni l’une ni l’autre de ces obligations ⎯ ni d’autres encore.
Mais cela ne l’a pas empêché de saisir la Cour de céans d’une violation ⎯ unique ⎯ qu’il impute à
la Grèce. C’est ici qu’intervient l’ exceptio : bien que le défendeur eût, à maintes reprises, protesté
111
contre les multiples violations de l’accord par l’ARYM , bien qu’il l’eût avertie des conséquences
que pourrait avoir sa persistance dans l’illicéité 112, celle-ci a voulu «passer en force» et tenter
d’obtenir de la Cour ce que l’OTAN lui a refusé. Devant la Cour, la Grèce est d’autant plus en
113
droit de se prévaloir de l’exceptio que, comme je l’ai montré vendredi , il n’est même pas besoin
de se prononcer sur la question de savoir si l’ exceptio pourrait permettre d’assouplir les conditions
auxquelles l’invocation de l’article 60 de la convention de Vienne sur le droit des traités ou des
règles applicables aux contre-mesures sont subordonnées: elles sont, de toute façon, remplies en
l’espèce et, au fond, l’avocat du demandeur ne l’a pas sérieusement contesté 114. Juste pour rappel :
22. Si l’on se place sur le terrain des contre-mesures, force est de constater que :
⎯ les violations de l’accord intérimaire commises par l’ARYM sont graves ;
⎯ l’attitude que le demandeur prête à la Grèce constitue une riposte plus que proportionnée ;
⎯ la mesure alléguée est limitée à l’inexécution te mporaire de l’obligation pesant sur la Grèce de
ne pas objecter à l’admission de l’ARYM à l’OTAN et permet évidemment la reprise de
l’exécution de l’obligation en question ;
⎯ elle ne porte aucune atteinte à une norme impérative du droit international général ;
⎯ le demandeur a été informé à maintes reprises des positions de la Grèce ; et,
111
Voir supra, par. 14-16.
112Statement of Foreign Minister of Greece, MsDora Bakoyannis, regarding statements made by FYROM
o
President Mr. Crvenkovski, 13 Sep. 2007 ; contre-mémoire, annexe 127 (dossier de plaidoiries, onglet n
113CR 2011/10, p. 25-29, par. 7-16 (Pellet).
114CR 2011/11, p. 53-55, par. 18-19. - 54 -
⎯ de toute manière, si l’OTAN n’avait pas adopté la décision contestée, le défendeur aurait pu
objecter à l’invitation faite à l’ARYM de rejoindre l’Alliance: ceci était la seule possibilité
pour lui de préserver ses droits puisque, une fois l’admission acquise, il n’aurait plus eu aucun
115
moyen de les faire respecter .
23. Et si l’on se place sur le terrain du droit des traités, le constat est le même. Le principe
posé à l’article60 de la convention de Vienne trouve pleinement à s’appliquer ⎯et j’indique en
passant que le manuel qu’a cité avec insistance le professeur Sands 116 (qui a décidément
d’excellentes lectures) rattache expressément cette disposition à l’ exceptio et renvoie à l’opinion
d’Anzilotti écrite when I was minus 9 117 :
⎯ les violations de l’accord commises par l’ARYM sont substantielles prises isolément ; elles le
sont de manière plus manifeste encore considérées ensemble ;
⎯ elles justifient la suspension partielle de l’accord par la Grèce (comme elles eussent justifié sa
terminaison) ;
⎯ la notification prévue au paragraphe premier de l’article 65 n’avait pas lieu d’être faite ex ante
dès lors que, dans la droite ligne de l’exceptio, conformément au principe posé au paragraphe 5
de cette même disposition, un Etat n’est pas em pêché «de faire cette modification en réponse à
une autre partie qui demande l’exécution du traité ou qui allègue sa violation».
[Projection n° 3 ⎯ Convention de Vienne de 1969, art. 65, par. 5, et 45 (F et E).]
24. Ce dernier point est le seul que le professeur Sands ait honoré d’un début de discussion
juridique. En effet, a-t-il dit, il résulte du renvoi que fait l’article65, paragraphe5, à l’article45
(convention de Vienne) que cette dernière disposition «prevents a State from invoking a ground for
suspending the operation of a treaty under Article 60 if, after becoming aware of the facts, it has
118
«expressly agreed that the treaty is valid or remains in force or continues in operation»» . J’ai un
115
Voir les articles 49 à 53 des Articles de la CDI sur laresponsabilité de l’Etat pour fait internationalement
illicite.
116CR 2011/11, p. 51-52, par. 13 (Sands).
117Patrick Daillier, Mathias Forteau et Alain Pellet, Droit international public (Nguyen Quoc Dinh) , 8 édition,
Paris, 2009, p. 339-340, par. 199.1.
118CR 2011/11, p. 53, par. 14 (Sands). - 55 -
peu de mal à suivre mon contradicteur, Monsieur le président. L’article 45 dit que «après avoir eu
connaissance des faits», un Etat ne peut suspendre l’application d’un traité si, « b) [il] doit, à raison
de sa conduite, être considéré comme ayant acquiescé…à son maintien en vigueur ou en
application». En l’espèce, la Grèce n’y a pas acquiescé.
[Fin de la projection n° 3.]
25. Je ne sais pas, Monsieur le président, si j’ajouterai à la prochaine édition de notre
manuel, de longs développements sur l’ exceptio inadimpleti contractus ; cela dépendra d’abord de
votre arrêt, car c’est vous qui donnez le la au dialo gue fécond de la jurisprudence et de la doctrine.
Mais, ce que je sais, c’est qu’en réfléchissant sur cette affaire, j’ai compris au moins les mérites
«explicatifs» de ce principe généra l à la postérité féconde: il évite la perpétuation de situations
injustes et répond à d’éviden tes nécessités pratiques ⎯de la vertu de navigu er à la fois dans le
monde universitaire et dans celui de la pratique («of navigating the worlds of academia and
119
professional practice» ): ils sont sources d’enrichissement mutuel et la compréhension des
mécanismes juridiques s’en trouve approfondie. Ceci étant, point n’est besoin de trop disserter : en
la présente espèce, l’exceptio permet de justifier les institutions juridiques plus précises que sont les
règles relatives aux contre-mesures d’une part et celles applicables à la suspension des traités
d’autre part ; mais il n’est guère utile de se demander, en l’espèce, si elle peut en outre produire des
effets spécifiques: les conditions de l’applicati on de l’un comme de l’autr e de ces deux corps de
règles sont remplies et il n’est pas indispensable de se demander si le principe posé par la Cour
dans Gabčíkovo-Nagymaros 120 est susceptible d’aménagement dans certains cas spéciaux.
III. BRÈVES REMARQUES SUR LES « REMÈDES »
26. Mesdames et Messieurs les juges, dès lo rs que la Cour n’est pas compétente, qu’aucun
manquement à l’article 11 ne peut être attribué à la Grèce et que, si manquement il y avait, celui-ci
serait «excusé» en vertu du principe non inadimpleti contractus conçu de la manière la plus stricte,
119
CR 2011/11, p. 52, par. 13.
120Voir ibid. , p. 16, par. 7 (Sands), citant Projet Gab číkovo-Nagymaros (Hongrie/Slovaquie), arrêt,
C.I.J. Recueil 1997, p. 62-63, par. 100. - 56 -
il n’y a pas lieu de s’arrêter à la question des remè des. Et, dans toute la mesure où le demandeur
s’en est tenu aux conclusions de ses écritures, nous vous prions de bien vouloir vous reporter à ce
121 122
que nous en avons dit dans notre contre-mémoire et dans notre duplique .
27. Je souhaite cependant ajouter quelques mots très brefs sur une remarque de dernière
minute faite par un avocat du demandeur et rela yée par son agent juste avant la lecture des
conclusions de l’ARYM: «Yet our request extends beyond just NATO; by its conduct, the
Respondent has demonstrated a conviction about Article11(1) that implicates the Applicant’s
position with respect to other international organizations, including most crucially the European
Union.» 123 Même si ceci n’a pas conduit le demandeur à procéder formellement à une
modification de ses conclusions, voici qui revient à ressusciter la «réserve de droits» dont on nous
avait expliqué lors du premier tour qu’elle n’était plus de saison 124.
28. Tout en ayant l’intention d’être très bref sur ce point, je voudrais l’aborder par une
remarque personnelle et je vous prie de bien vouloir m’en excu ser. Au paragraphe6.26 de sa
réplique, l’ARYM affirme que « Reservations of rights form an ordinary and usual part of
submissions to the International Court of Ju stice, and their inclusion in memorials and
applications to the Court is now routine» . C’est malheureusement exact, mais je considère ceci
comme tout à fait regrettable et, pour tout dire, assez exaspérant : de plus en plus souvent les Etats
proclament qu’ils ont des «droits», dont ils esqui ssent vaguement les contours et dont ils menacent
d’exciper à un moment indéterminé des plaidoiries ⎯ écrites ou orales ⎯ avec l’espoir sans doute
que la Cour acceptera l’amalgame avec l’affaire faisant l’objet de la requête.
29. En l’espèce, je constate que les «droits» que le demandeur prétendait «réserver», et qu’il
réaffirme au fond dans ses plaidoiries orales, sont sans rapport avec l’objet de la requête (qui porte
sur la prétendue opposition de la Grèce à l’admission de l’ARYM au sein de l’OTAN) ; et qu’il en
résulte que si la Cour devait se prononcer sur le fo nd de l’affaire que l’Etat requérant lui a soumise
⎯je veux dire la «vraie» affaire dans toute s on ampleur, y compris les pans que le demandeur
121Chap. 9 : Remedies, p. 196-201.
122
Ibid., p. 205-215.
123CR 2011/11, p. 33, par. 38 (Murphy) ; voir aussi p. 69, para. 11 (Dimitrov).
124Cf. CR 2011/6, p. 12, par. 1 (Klein) et CR 2011/7, p. 26, par. 4 (Bastid-Burdeau). - 57 -
tentent d’occulter ⎯ mais pas une affaire future et hypothétique qui pourrait résulter de la
non-admission de l’ARYM au sein de l’Union européenne qui, de toute façon, pose d’autres
questions et appellerait un examen attentif des c onditions dans lesquelles cette situation aurait pu
survenir.
30. Pour le reste, je pense qu’il su ffit de rappeler que, dès lors qu’aucun fait
internationalement illicite ne peut être attribué à l’Etat défendeur, la question ne se pose pas. Par
conséquent, la Cour n’a pas à accéder à la demande d’un jugement déclaratoire, qui constituerait
une satisfaction appropriée, formulée dans la conclusionii) du demandeur. Il en va a fortiori de
même des demandes de cessation et de garantie de non-répétition reflétées par la conclusioniii).
Pas de responsabilité, pas de réparation. Par a illeurs, pour autant que ces demandes concernent
l’admission de l’ARYM à l’OTAN, cette organisation est régie par ses règles propres ⎯ qui
s’imposent à la Grèce et que l’article22 de l’accord intérimaire préserve ⎯ et l’invitation de la
joindre adressée au demandeur a été expressément subordonnée par le sommet de Bucarest au
règlement de la divergence sur le nom. Outre qu’il est douteux que la haute juridiction bénéficie
d’un pouvoir d’injonction comme l’autr e Partie semble le penser, tout «ordre», «order», que la
Cour pourrait adresser à la Grèce à ce sujet serait dépourvu d’effet utile.
31. Ceci étant, Mesdames et Messieurs de la Cour, nous ne pensons pas que vous aurez à
vous pencher sur ces questions: vous n’avez pas compétence pour vous prononcer sur ces
demandes et, entreprendriez-vous d’exercer votre…(in)compétence, vous ne pourriez que rejeter
la requête au fond.
Je vous remercie très vivement de votre écout e attentive. Et je vous prie, Monsieur le
président, de bien vouloir donner la parole au professeurAbi-Saab qui va, très brièvement,
récapituler les idées-force de notre argumentation, avant les conclusions de l’agent.
The PRESIDENT: I thank Professor Alain Pellet for his statement. I now invite Professor
Georges Abi-Saab to take the floor. - 58 -
M. ABI-SAAB: Thank you Mr. Président.
Points marquants de l’affaire
1. Monsieur le président, Mesdames et Messieurs de la Cour, après les exposés de mes
collègues qui ont couvert les différents aspects du litige, il m’incombe de récapituler quelques
thèmes idées-force qui sous-tendent l’ensemble de nos positions, ou des points qui ont été soulevés
de manière récurrente par nos contradicteurs.
2. Je commencerai par un de ces derniers points qui tourne autour de la question de preuve,
de la pratique, de leurs usages et de leur interprétation.
A travers son univers enchanteur, habité de my thes, de contes de fées, de files indiennes de
pachydermes, le professeurSands nous accuse, à ré pétition, de ne pas fournir de preuves pour
étayer nos positions. Le professeurPellet vient de démontrer, par exemple, que ce qu’il disait à
o
propos des protestations en fournissant dans l’onglet n 13 du dossier des juges une liste de sept ou
neuf notes verbales de protestation tout en les écartant «No allegation» voulait dire que ces notes ne
spécifient pas l’article de l’accord intérimaire dont la note allègue la violation.
3. Monsieur le président, dans une de mes vies antérieures d’économiste, on nous mettait en
garde contre ce qu’on appelait en statistique «data fishing», concocter l’échantillon qui vous
convient, au mépris de la totalité de l’ensemble de la population recensée.
Comme l’a très bien démontré le professeur Pellet, ces notes verbales sont prises des annexes
du contre-mémoire grec et peut-être avaient-elles d’autres raisons plus urgentes que de souligner la
violation de l’accord intérimaire. Mais aurait-il je té un coup d’Œil aux anne xes de la réplique, il
aurait trouvé abondamment ce qu’il cherchait ailleurs en vain.
Est-ce par inattention ou par mépris de ce qui pouvait être gênant ?
4. De même, on nous dit que beaucoup de no s notes de protestation grecques n’étaient pas
adressées au demandeur, mais à l’ONU ou à d’autres organisations et instances internationales.
Mais là aussi, on oublie qu’il s’agit essentiellement de protestations contre des violations ou bien
de la résolution817 du Conseil de sécurité ou bien de l’article11, paragraphe1, concernant la
non-utilisation du nom ou de la désignation pr ovisoire au sein de ces mêmes organisations - 59 -
internationales. Il était donc normal d’attirer l’ attention de l’Organisation, et par ce truchement,
tous les membres, y compris le défendeur, sur ce type de violation.
5. Plus sérieux encore, le professeur Sands accuse la Grèce d’entretenir ce qu’il a qualifié de
«semi-detached relation to evidence», en citant ce qu’a déclaré l’ambassadeurNimetz en1995:
«there is no requirement for [the Applicant] to use a name they don’t accept» (CR 2011/11, p. 15,
par.5). Mais si nous remontons à la déclaration originale de Nimetz, nous trouvons un texte un
peu différent: «the people from that country, when they talk about themselves, use their
constitutional name ... there is no requirement for th em to use a name they don’t accept» (réplique,
annexe87). A la place de «people from that country», le professeurSands a substitué «the
Applicant». Cela a un nom en anglais, c’est «doctoring documents». Car il y a une immense
différence entre «le peuple de ce pays», les gens marchant dans les rues de Skopje ou ailleurs,
auxquels on ne peut évidemment pas imposer l’usage d’un nom quelconque, et «le demandeur», the
Applicant, c’est-à-dire le gouvernement du pays qui a été admis à l’ONU à condition d’être désigné
(«referred to», la voie passive signifie par tout le monde) exclusivement «for all purposes» par le
nom provisoire au sein de l’Organisation. N’est-ce pas un bon exemple d’entretenir un
«semi-detached relation to evidence» ?
6. Finalement l’autre exemple qui a été donné par mon collègue, le professeurPellet,
concernant la pratique du demandeur d’utiliser son nom préféré dans les organisations
internationales, le professeur Sands déclare :
«let me simply note that in the period between1995 and April2008 the Respondent
never ⎯ not once ⎯ asserted that such practice by the Applicant was wrongful so as
to justify an objection by the Respondent under the Interim Agreement as a violation
of the Treaty» (CR/2011/5, p. 35, par. 25).
Grosse erreur, ou plutôt, pour utiliser un terme qu’affectionne le professeuS rands,
«grossmisrepresentation». Car les notes verbales de protestation contre cet usage abondent et le
professeur Pellet a indiqué l’endroit où on peut les trouver. Tout au long de cette période, il y a des
notes qui protestent exactement cette pratique.
8. Pour finir avec cette première série de th èmes soulevés par nos contradicteurs, j’aimerais
commenter brièvement une remarque faite lundi par mon ami le professeur Klein. Dans ses efforts
pour détacher le différend devant vous du différend sur le nom, il cite ma plaidoirie du jeudi 24, où - 60 -
j’ai distingué trois catégories de dispositions de l’accord intérimaire, dont la première recouvre les
dispositions concernant l’obligatio n de régler le différend relatif au nom, et les modalités de ce
règlement, et qui se réduisent à deux: l’article5, paragraphe1, et la partie de l’article21,
paragraphe2, qui y renvoie. Il conclut qu’il n’y a «aucune mention ⎯ et pour cause ⎯ de
l’article 11» (CR 2011/8, p. 39, par. 7).
J’aurais attendu que le professeur Klein lise le para graphe qu’il cite jusqu’à la fin. Il aurait
mieux saisi la logique de cette classification, qui est de souligner le caractère exclusif du mode ou
processus du règlement du différend sur le nom, prescr it à l’article5, paragraphe1, «excluding
even its judicial settlement by this August Court ⎯ whether directly or indirectly ⎯; and a fortiori
by unilateral act or conduct, in order to create a fait accompli, pre-empting the outcome of any
meaningful negotiations» (CR 2011/8, p. 35, para. 15).
Et c’est précisément la position de la Grèce, comme l’ont présentée les professeurs Reisman
et Pellet, à savoir qu’une décision de la Cour en faveur de la demande ne pourrait que préjuger de
manière significative la solution du différend sur le nom.
Par ailleurs, comme l’ont démontré mes collè gues, la Grèce maintient que le demandeur
poursuit, derrière l’écran de l’article 11, paragraphe 1, une politique unilatérale de fait accompli, en
violation des obligations et de l’objet et du but de l’accord intérimaire, en vue de vider de sa
substance son obligation sous l’article 5, paragraphe 1.
9. Monsieur le président, Mesdames et Messieurs de la Cour, les efforts frénétiques du
professeurKlein et de ses collègues pour «détacher » la présente affaire du différend sur le nom,
m’amènent à ma seconde partie de ces brèves remar ques, soulignant quelques thèmes essentiels de
la position juridique de la Grèce.
10. Le premier de ces thèmes est précisément que, quoi que disent nos contradicteurs et quel
que soit l’angle sous lequel on l’envisage, la présente affaire tourne autour du problème du nom. Il
suffit de compter combien de fois ce problème est mentionné dans les écritures et les plaidoiries
orales de chacune des Parties.
Et peut-on évoquer l’article11, paragraphe1, et le nom pr ovisoire qu’il prescrit, sans se
rappeler qu’il s’agit toujours du nom ; mais d’un palliatif, un succéd ané, provisoire, en attendant la
solution définitive de ce différend, à travers des négociations sérieuses et de bonne foi; et se - 61 -
rappeler que la manière dont ce succédané est utilisé ou abusé, ne peut qu’affecter le processus et le
produit final éventuel de cette négociation ? Peut-on examiner n’importe quel aspect de la présente
affaire sans arriver très rapidement au problème du nom, ou trancher cet aspect en faisant
totalement abstraction du différend sur le nom ?
Ce serait, en empruntant à la langue de Shakespeare qu’affectionne mon ami Philippe Sands,
«playing Hamlet without the Prince». Or, le différend sur le nom est exclu de la compétence de la
Cour.
11. Le deuxième point que j’aimerais sou ligner est que nous sommes tout à fait d’accord
avec nos amis de l’autre côté de la barre sur ce point, c’est que la présente affaire tourne autour du
principe pacta sunt servanda (a pacta sunt servanda case), comme ils l’ont dit. Après tout, ce
principe est l’épitome de tout le droit des traités. Oui, les engagements doivent être tenus, et les
accords respectés, y compris l’accord intérimaire. Mais ce principe doit embrasser et servir de
socle à l’ensemble du traité ou de l’édifice conven tionnel, et non pas de manière sélective, comme
si on le regardait à travers le trou d’une serrure, pour ne voir qu’un petit coin de cet édifice.
Et cela d’autant plus qu’il s’agit de mettr e en Œuvre un accord synallagmatique, imposant
aux Parties des obligations réciproques et indissociables.
12. Je ne voudrais pas revenir à ce que j’ai eu le plaisir et l’honneur de vous présenter la
semaine dernière, sauf pour rappeler brièvement les trois fonctions que l’accord intérimaire est
censé remplir simultanément, et qui constituent en même temps l’objet et le but du traité : ce sont,
en premier lieu, la fonction de modus vivendi, par le truchement de l’artifice du nom provisoire, qui
permet la normalisation des relations entre les Parties dans la mesure du possible, étant donné la
persistance du différend sur le nom. Et cela en at tendant, et pour fournir le temps nécessaire au
déploiement et à l’aboutissement de la deuxième fonction qui est celle du règlement de ce différend,
par le moyen exclusif de négociations sérieuses et de bonne foi.
Ces deux fonctions ne peuvent être remplies simultanément, et de manière coordonnée, sans
la troisième, celle d’arrangement ou de mesure conservatoire des positions juridiques des Parties,
conservant l’objet du litige, les conserver en «l’é tat», c’est-à-dire comme elles étaient tout au long
de la période intérimaire, à savoir du moment de l’entrée en vigueur de l’accord et jusqu’au
règlement définitif du litige. De telle sorte que l’application de l’accord lui-même ne porte pas - 62 -
préjudice à la position d’une Partie en favorisant celle de l’autre, ni n’admette une telle évolution
par le fait d’une Partie au détriment de l’autre.
13. Ces trois fonctions sont foncièrement in terdépendantes, indissociables, notamment la
dernière, la fonction de mesure conservatoire de protection, qui est une condition sine qua non et la
garantie du maintien de l’équilibre délicat entre les deux autres fonctions tout au long de la période
intérimaire.
La fonction de modus vivendi , permettant la normalisation des relations, est ce que le
demandeur voulait. Elle représente le prix que la Grèce a consenti en contrepartie de la deuxième
fonction du règlement du différend sur le nom, exclusivement par d es négociations sérieuses et de
bonne foi; avec la garantie de la troisième fonction conservatoire des droits et des positions des
Parties, jusqu’à l’aboutissement des négociations.
C’est là l’échange de prestations juri diques (exchange of considerations), le quid pro quo ,
constituant la transaction juridique qu’est l’accord intérimaire.
14. Monsieur le président, Mesdames et Messi eurs de la Cour, dans une telle transaction
juridique, les engagements et les obligations constituant chaque ensemble de prestations échangées
sont liés, par une communauté de destin juridique, aux engagements et obligations qui relèvent de
l’autre ensemble échangé.
On ne saurait extirper (carve out) et sanctuariser un engagement ou une obligation
individuelle quelconque, pour l’immuniser totalement contre les aléas de la vie du reste du traité et
les conséquences de la violation des obligations relevant de l’ensemble consenti en échange par
l’autre Partie.
15. Il ne s’agit pas, en envisageant ainsi l’acco rd intérimaire et la place de l’article11,
paragraphe1, dans son sein, de «complexifier» abusivement l’a ffaire, comme le prétendent nos
contradicteurs, mais simplement de lui donner sa vraie dimension et permettre à la Cour de
l’apprécier dans toute son ampleur.
Car, qu’est-ce qu’on observe depuis 1995 de la part du demandeur ? Une politique délibérée
de violations directes, en insistant à utiliser son nom préféré au sein des organisations
internationales, au mépris de la condition mise à son admission dans ces organisations; et une - 63 -
stratégie indirecte de violation qui a été décrite en des termes on ne peut plus clairs par le président
même de la République au Parlement.
Cette déclaration du président révèle encore une absence totale de volonté de négocier
sérieusement, tout en faisant semblant, et en attendant que la stratégie indirecte d’érosion de la
position du défendeur finisse, avec le temps, par leur donner raison.
16. Le temps, précisément, Monsieur le président, le temps est un facteur essentiel à prendre
en considération.
Nous ne sommes plus en1993 ou1995. Da ns un premier temps, comme l’a souligné le
professeur Pellet, la Grèce a eu confiance dans la loyauté de l’autre Partie. Mais avec le passage du
temps, l’accumulation des violations, et l’attit ude récalcitrante de l’autre Partie quant aux
négociations, elle a dû se rendre à l’évidence et agir plus fermement pour protég er ses droits. Mais
elle a toujours gardé l’espoir de ramener l’autre Partie au respect de ses engagements et vers la
table des négociations, préférant cela à venir devant vous et polariser davantage les positions.
Peut-on lui reprocher ce choix? Et peut-on lu i reprocher, en même temps, l’usage de tous
ses moyens juridiques de défense, une fois citée devant votre prétoire ?
Je vous remercie, Monsieur le président, Mesdam es et Messieurs de la Cour, et je vous prie
de donner la parole à l’ambassadeur Savvaides, l’agent de la République hellénique.
The PRESIDENT: I thank Professor Georges Ab i-Saab for his statement. I now invite
Ambassador Georges Savvaides, the Agent of Greece , to make his statement, final conclusion and
submission on behalf of Greece.
SMAr.VAIDES:
Conclusion and submissions
1. Mr. President, Members of the Court, it falls to me to conclude Greece’s reply. Allow me
to summarize:
2. Greece in its oral pleadings has demonstrated , first, that the Applicant’s claim is beyond
the Court’s jurisdiction as established by Article 21, paragraph 2, of the Interim Accord, whether it
is interpreted, as the Applicant originally proposed, as precluding any case which concerns - 64 -
“directly or indirectly” the name issue, or whet her, as the Applicant alternatively proposes, it is
read as precluding any case which would resolve the difference over the name. Greece has
demonstrated that the Applicant’s claim, in re quiring judgment of the lawfulness of actions by
NATO and by its individual members collectively, is inadmissible. Greece has also demonstrated
that the Applicant’s claim, in seeking a remedy which a judgment cannot provide, is beyond the
inherent competence of the Court.
3. Secondly, Greece has demonstrated that, properly read, the actions attributed to Greece by
the Applicant did not constitute an objection. This is not because Greece was supposed to support
the Applicant’s membership in NATO in 2008; for reasons stated at the time and in applying the
well known NATO criteria and requirements for member ship it was not. It is also because the
admission process to NATO is a consensus one based on consultation, with neither vote nor veto. I
note that the word “consultation” did not pass counsels’ lips last week or on Monday, not once.
The Bucharest decision was a collective one. Greece participated in the consultation process, and it
expressed its views. But this is something di fferent from objecting. In any case Greece was not
obliged by the Interim Accord to support the application of the country in question to join NATO,
but this appears not to be the point of dispute before the Court. Moreover, the onus is on the
Applicant to establish a breach of treaty; the Applicant has not proved that Greece objected.
4. I would stress in this regard the only official statement by NATO at Bucharest on
3April2008. That unchallenged statement, committing both the Alliance and its members
collectively, is the text of its Summit Declara tion which, in paragraph20, provides clearly and
unequivocally the terms and conditions for the App licant’s future membership of the Alliance.
This Declaration was repeated in all successive NATO Summit declarations and communiqués,
word by word. That was the Bucharest decision and it was not, of course, dictated by Greece.
Clearly we could not have been in a situation to impose such a diktat.
5. Thirdly, even if Greece had objected, the Applicant’s constant strategy ⎯ acknowledged
by PresidentCrvenkovski in 2008 ⎯ of seeking to undermine the interim situation created by the
Interim Accord, of failing to negotiate in the resolution of the name difference in good faith, as
well as other breaches of the Interim Accord, w ould have entitled Greece to “object”, whether on
the ground of: - 65 -
(a) the safeguard clause of Article 11, paragraph 1; and
(b) the law of treaties; or
(c) the law of countermeasures;
which both reflect the exceptio principle.
Furthermore, even if Greece were found to ha ve objected in contravention of Article11 of
the Interim Accord, it would have been entitled to do so under Article 22, in exercise of its rights
and duties arising under the North Atlantic Treaty.
6. The Applicant’s claim has put the Court in an awkward position. Both the Interim Accord
and the Security Council has resolved that the difference over the name disturbs regional peace and
should be resolved by negotiation under the auspices of the Secretary-General. The Applicant, in
bringing this case to the Court, is continuing its policy of seeking to subvert the procedure required
by the Interim Accord and to secure a de facto resolution of the difference over the name. The
Court should, accordingly, reject the Applicant’s claim both as to jurisdiction and the merits.
7. Mr.President, Members of the Court, if you do either of these things, the issue of
remedies does not arise. But I would stress, out of a superabundance of caution, that the remedies
now sought by the Applicant go well beyond anything that the Court could award and amount to an
attempt of pre-emption by the Applicant. In e ffect the Applicant now seeks declarations of its
eligibility to join not only NATO but also the European Union. This is obviously not a matter for
the Court, which cannot ⎯ with the greatest of respect ⎯ decide on such matters. They involve
pre-eminently political decisions, which can onl y be made within the framework of each
organization and at the relevant time. The inci dence of the safeguard clause of Article11 also
depends on the situation prevailing at the time an application falls to be decided.
8. Mr. President, Members of the Court, please allow me now to make some brief remarks of
a more general character.
9. It is regrettable, but the fact is that the Interim Accord, despite its provisional character
and the intention that it was to be strictly tempor ary, continues to constitute even today, 16years
after its conclusion, the only substantial regulator y framework of our bilateral relations. The main
problem is still unresolved, as you know. - 66 -
10. In other words, the process that starte d in 1995 on the basis of Security Council
resolutions817 and 845 is still unfinished. But now the Applicant opts for the Court process
aiming for a short-cut solution, in the naïve belief th at all the rest will fall into place in an almost
automatic way.
11. Such an approach towards a vitally importa nt issue for my country is short sighted. It
risks serious consequences for the future. It is with great respect that I ask the Court to eschew
partial approaches for they would only minimize the prospects for the solution of the general
political issue with which the case before you is inextricably linked.
12. In 1995 Greece had a strategic choice to make; it made it and has honoured it since.
Greece committed itself to the negotiated resolution of the name issue pursuant to Security Council
resolutions 817 and 845 (1993). Since then, Greece has made many efforts and concessions, even
to accepting in 2007 a composite name, as a basis fo r a compromise solution, that would include
the term “Macedonia” with a geographical qualifier. That solution was rejected by the Applicant.
In these last years, the Applicant has brought these ne gotiations to a dead end, by insisting, as the
Court itself witnessed in the Agent’s statement, on the use of its contested name. He said,
summarily, that “it was not a choice”. But it is a choice, a choice to violate its international legal
commitments and to try to use the Court as a means for violating the Interim Accord. This is not
only inconsistent with Article5 of the Interim Accord, it also endangers regional security and the
maintenance of good neighbourly relations between the two countries and the region as a whole.
For these reasons we hope that your wisdom will c onduce to and not stand in the way of such a
resolution, and will assist the Parties to help themselves in ways quite other than those proposed by
the Applicant’s legal team last Monday.
13. Mr.President, Members of the Court, before I read the submissions, let me express my
thanks and that of my Government to the Registra r and his staff, as well as the interpreters; our
thanks to all counsel and our colleagues, and indeed our sincere appreciation to you, Mr. President,
Members of the Court, for the attention and care you have devoted to this case.
14. I will now read the submissions of Greece:
On the basis of the preceding evidence and legal arguments presented in its written and oral
pleadings, the Respondent, the Hellenic Republic, requests the Court to adjudge and declare: - 67 -
(i) that the case brought by the Applicant before the Court does not fall within the jurisdiction
of the Court and that the Applicant’s claims are inadmissible;
(ii) in the event that the Court finds that it h as jurisdiction and that the claims are admissible,
that the Applicant’s claims are unfounded.
Thank you, Mr. President, Members of the Court.
The PRESIDENT: I thank His Excellency, AmbassadorGeorgesSavvaides, the Agent of
Greece, for his presentation of the conclusion and submissions on behalf of Greece. The Court
takes note of the final submissions which the Ambassador has just read out on behalf of Greece, as
it took note on Monday 28March of the final subm issions of the former Yugoslav Republic of
Macedonia. I shall now give the floor to Judge Bennouna who has a question addressed to Greece.
Judge Bennouna, you have the floor.
M. le juge BENNOUNA: Je vous remercie, Mons ieur le président. Ma question, comme
vous venez de le rappeler, s’adresse à la Grèce et elle se lit comme suit :
Dans la période qui a précédé le sommet de l’OTAN tenu à Bucarest du 2 au 4 avril 2008 et
au cours de celui-ci, quelle a été la position exprimée par la
Grèce lors de ses contacts avec les
autres membres de cette organisation en ce qui concerne l’admission à celle-ci de l’ex-République
yougoslave de Macédoine ?
Monsieur le président, permettez-moi de présenter aussi cette question en anglais.
In English my question addressed to Greece reads as follows:
In the period preceding and during the NAT O Summit in Bucharest from 2-4April2008,
what was the position expressed by Greece in its contacts with the other members of the
organization as regards the admission of the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia?
Thank you, Mr. President.
The PRESIDENT: Thank you, JudgeBennouna. Th e text of this question will be sent to
Greece as soon as possible. Greece is invited to pr ovide its written reply to the question no later
than Thursday 7 April 2011. I would add that, of course, a copy of this question will be sent to the
other Party, namely, the former Yugoslav Repub lic of Macedonia for information. And any - 68 -
comment the former Yugoslav Republic of Maced onia may wish to make, in accordance with
Article 72 of the Rules of Court, on the Reply by Greece, must be submitted by Thursday 14 April
2011. This brings us to the end of the hearings in this case. I should like to thank the Agents,
counsel and advocates for their statements.
In accordance with the usual practice, I shall re quest both Agents to remain at the Court’s
disposal to provide any additiona l information it may require. W ith this proviso, I now declare
closed the oral proceedings in the case concerning Application of the Interim Accord of
13 September 1995 (the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia v. Greece). The Court now will
retire for deliberation. The Agents of the Parti es will be advised in due course as to the date on
which the Court will deliver its Judgment. As the Court has no other business before it today, the
sitting is now closed.
The Court rose at 6.05 p.m.
___________
Public sitting held on Wednesday 30 March 2011, at 3 p.m., at the Peace Palace, President Owada presiding, in the case concerning Application of the Interim Accord of 13 September 1995 (the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia v. Greece)