471
SEPARATE OPINION OF JUDGE ABRAHAM
[Translation]
Jurisdiction of the Court to entertain that part of Belgium’s claim r▯elating to
obligations arising from customary international law — Existence of a dispute in
that connection on the day of delivery of the Judgment — Lack of any rule of
customary international law requiring Senegal to prosecute Mr. Hissène Habré
before its courts for war crimes, crimes against humanity and the crime ▯of
genocide — Belgium’s claim in that regard unfounded.
1. In this Judgment, the Court rules on the merits of only one part of
Belgium’s submissions, namely that relating to Senegal’s breach ofv its
obligations under Article 6, paragraph 2, and Article 7, paragraph 1, of
the United Nations Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhu -
man or Degrading Treatment or Punishment of 10 December 1984 (here -
inafter “the Convention”). After upholding its jurisdiction over vthat part
of the Application (point 1 of the operative clause) and declaring the
Application admissible in that regard (point 3 of the operative clause), the
Court finds that Senegal has breached its conventional obligations
(points 4 and 5 of the operative clause) and draws the appropriate conclu -
sions, namely that Senegal must, without further delay, submit the case v
of Mr. Hissène Habré to its competent authorities for the purpose of
prosecution, if it does not extradite him (point 6 of the operative clause).
2. I have voted in favour of all of those points of the operative clause.
I approve not only of the conclusions reached by the Court on those vari-
ous issues but also of the essence of the reasoning followed to reach
them, even though I think that the Judgment’s reasoning, in respect of a
number of the points considered, would have benefited from being less v
succinct.
3. However, Belgium did not confine itself to reproaching Senegal with
having breached its conventional obligations. The Applicant also con -
tended that Senegal was required to prosecute Mr. Hissène Habré before
its courts — unless it extradited him — for acts which could be character -
ized as war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide and which do
not come within the scope ratione materiae of the Convention against
Torture. In support of that claim, Belgium invoked customary interna -
tional law, which, it argued, required Senegal to “prosecute or extravdite”
any person suspected of having committed acts coming within the catego -
ries thus defined.
4. The Court has declared that it lacks jurisdiction to hear that part of
Belgium’s Application, despite the fact that the Applicant, in order vto
found the jurisdiction of the Court, invoked not only Article 30 of the
Convention — which could clearly only constitute a valid basis for the
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Court’s jurisdiction in respect of those submissions relating to the valleged
breach of conventional obligations — but also the optional declarations
made by the two Parties under Article 36, paragraph 2, of the Statute of
the Court, which are general in scope. Hence the Judgment makes no
substantive ruling on Belgium’s claims relating to Senegal’s allegved breach
of its obligations under customary international law.
5. It is on this point that I have regretfully been obliged to dissociate
myself from the majority of my colleagues.
In my view, the Court should have ruled that it has jurisdiction to
entertain the Applicant’s submissions relating to customary internativonal
law (I). However, I do not think that the Court should have upheld thovse
submissions on the merits ; in my opinion, it should have dismissed them
as unfounded (II).
I. The Court Should Have Rulevd that It Has Jurisdictiovn
to Entertain the Applicanvt’s Submissions Based
on Customary Internatvional Law
6. In point 2 of the operative clause, the Court
“Finds that it has no jurisdiction to entertain the claims of the King-
dom of Belgium relating to alleged breaches, by the Republic of
Senegal, of obligations under customary international law.”
I cannot support that finding, for the reasons which I set out below.
7. The reason why the Court thus declined jurisdiction is set forth in
paragraph 55 of the Judgment : “[A]t the time of the filing of the Applica -
tion, the dispute between the Parties did not relate to breaches of oblivga-
tions under customary international law.” The conclusion the Court
draws is that it has no jurisdiction to decide on the claim set out by Bvel -
gium in point 1 (b) of its final submissions (cited in paragraph 14 of the
Judgment), because that claim refers to Senegal’s alleged obligationvs
under customary international law concerning the criminal proceedings
which the latter should bring against Mr. Hissène Habré, if it does not
extradite him. Since the obligations which Senegal is accused of having
breached do not derive from the Convention but from customary inter-
national law, the Court can only have jurisdiction over that issue on
the basis of the Optional Clause declarations made by the Parties under
Article 36, paragraph 2, of the Statute of the Court. However, this pro-
vision confers jurisdiction upon the Court over “legal disputes” bvetween
States that have recognized its jurisdiction as compulsory. Accordingly,v
the absence of a dispute on a specific issue leaves the Court without vjuris-
diction over that issue, and, from the Court’s point of view, that isv the
case here.
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8. I do not dispute the validity of several of the elements of this reason-
ing.
Firstly, it is clear that “the existence of a dispute is a condition vof its
jurisdiction under both bases of jurisdiction invoked by Belgium”, asv
indicated in paragraph 45. Only one of those two bases of jurisdiction
is relevant to the question which concerns us here (the other being
Article 30 of the Convention against Torture, which is clearly inappli-
cable — and Belgium has not suggested otherwise — to that part of the
Applicant’s submissions which relates to Senegal’s alleged breach vof cus-
tomary international law).
9. Secondly, if there is no dispute between the parties before the Court
(in respect of all or some of the issues which form the subject-matter of
the Application), the Court has no jurisdiction to hear the case — or that
part of the case over which no dispute exists. In actual fact, it might valso
be argued that an application concerning a question over which there is
no dispute, and over which there was no dispute on the date when the
Application was filed, would stand to fail on the ground of inadmissibvility
rather than lack of jurisdiction. However, in its decisions the Court havs,
for a very long time, clearly and consistently ruled lack of jurisdictiovn —
though this makes little difference in practice — and it would not have
been appropriate for it to depart from its case law.
10. Finally, I can also concur with the finding that, on the date when
the Application was filed by Belgium, that is to say, 19 February 2009,
there was no dispute between the Parties over Senegal’s alleged failuvre to
comply with the rules of customary international law supposedly requir -
ing it to initiate proceedings against Mr. Habré, if it does not extradite
him. Paragraph 54 of the Judgment describes at some length the diplo -
matic exchanges which preceded the filing of the Application. It emergves
that at no time during those preliminary exchanges did Belgium reproach
Senegal with violating customary international law. Belgium confined
itself to emphasizing the obligation under the Convention against Tor -
ture, and in particular Article 7, paragraph 1, thereof, to prosecute any
person who is suspected of having committed acts of torture, or of com -
plicity in torture, before the courts of the State in whose territory he is
present, if he is not extradited to another State having jurisdiction tov try
him for the same acts.
11. My disagreement with the Judgment centres on the fact that the
Court confines itself to the situation that prevailed “at the time vof the
filing of the Application” and refuses to take account of the presevnt
situation, as it emerges from the exchanges between the Parties during tvhe
judicial proceedings.
12. However, it is quite certain that, on the date of the present Judg -
ment, a dispute does indeed exist between the Parties regarding the applvi-
cation of customary international law in the present case. Belgium has
argued that Senegal has breached its obligation under customary interna -
tional law to prosecute Mr. Habré before its courts, not only for acts of
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torture, but also for “war crimes, crimes against humanity and the crvime
of genocide alleged against him” (final submissions, 1 (b)). Senegal, for
its part, without formally denying the existence of such an obligation, vhas
argued that its conduct to date entails no breach by it of that obligativon,
for essentially the same reasons as those advanced by it to assert that vit
was not in breach of its conventional obligations : it has already taken
several measures with a view to the trial, and has not hitherto had the v
means at its disposal that it would have needed to do more.
There is therefore no doubt that there does exist today a dispute
between the Parties relating to the implementation of customary interna -
tional law, just as there exists, and for the same reasons, a dispute bevtween
them concerning Senegal’s compliance with its conventional obligationvs.
The difference between these two aspects of the case is that the dispuvte
relating to conventional law was revealed by the exchanges between the
Parties even before the Application was introduced, whereas the dispute v
relating to customary law only became apparent during their exchanges
before the Court.
13. It follows from the above that the crucial question is which date is
to be taken in order to determine the existence of a dispute between thev
Parties.
14. As a general rule, the conditions governing the jurisdiction of the
Court must be fulfilled on the date when the Application is filed. Hvow -
ever, the Court has, for a very long time, shown reasonable flexibilitvy by
accepting that a condition that was initially lacking could be met in the
course of the proceedings, and that if not all the conditions for its juvris -
diction were fulfilled at the start of the proceedings, the Court shouvld
therefore ascertain whether they had been fulfilled on the date of its Judg -
ment. This line of case law, which began with the celebrated Mavromma -
tis Palestine Concessions case, was confirmed and even extended by the
obligation to state reasons, which was adopted as a matter of principle vin
the Judgment on the Preliminary Objections in the Croatia v. Serbia case,
in which the Court stated :
“What matters is that, at the latest by the date when the Court
decides on its jurisdiction, the applicant must be entitled, if it so
wishes, to bring fresh proceedings in which the initially unmet condi -
tion would be fulfilled. In such a situation, it is not in the interesvts of
the sound administration of justice to compel the applicant to begin
the proceedings anew — or to initiate fresh proceedings — and it is
preferable, except in special circumstances, to conclude that the con -
dition has, from that point on, been fulfilled.” (Application of the
Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide
(Croatia v. Serbia), Preliminary Objections, Judgment, I.C.J. Reports
2008, p. 441, para. 85.)
15. It is true that, more recently, in its Judgment in the Georgia v. Rus -
sian Federation case, the Court referred to the date when the Application
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was filed in order to determine whether the condition relating to the vexis-
tence of a dispute had been met. However, in that case it found that the
condition had indeed been met on the date in question (Application of the
International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Dis -
crimination (Georgia v. Russian Federation), Preliminary Objections,
Judgment, I.C.J. Reports 2011 (I), p. 120, para. 113).
16. The Court therefore had no need, in that case, to settle the ques -
tion of which solution it should have adopted if the dispute, which had
not existed on the date when the Application was filed, had been clearvly
constituted on the date of the Judgment. In my opinion, the Georgia v.
Russian Federation precedent does not therefore represent a departure
from the former jurisprudence of the Court.
Moreover, the Court, very prudently, indicated in its statement of rea -
sons, before moving on to consider specifically the exchanges between v
Georgia and the Russian Federation, that “[t]he dispute must in principle
exist at the time the Application is submitted to the Court” (ibid., p. 85,
para. 30; emphasis added).
17. It is also true that in the same case, in order to assess whether the
requirement for the Parties to attempt a negotiated settlement of the divs -
pute had been met, the Court referred to the date of its seisin (ibid.,
p. 128, para. 141). However, this in fact had no bearing on the solution,
since in the opinion of the Court’s majority — which I did not share —
Georgia had never attempted to engage in negotiations with Russia with
a view to resolving their dispute concerning the application of the Intevr -
national Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrim -
ination, and that assessment would undoubtedly have been the same for
the periods before and after the seisin of the Court.
18. In the present Judgment, the Court goes a particularly clear step
further in the formalistic approach to the condition relating to the exivs -
tence of a dispute : this is the first time in the Court’s entire jurisprudence
that it has declined to hear one part of a case on the basis of the lackv of
a dispute between the Parties, even though the dispute clearly exists onv
the date of the Court’s Judgment and was apparent in the proceedings v
before the Court. One may wonder what the extent now is of the position v
of principle set out by the Court in the Judgment on Preliminary Objec -
tions in the Croatia v. Serbia case. I regret to note that the series of recent
Judgments does not convey a great impression of consistency.
19. Let me mention one additional factor which distinguishes the pres -
ent case from the Georgia v. Russian Federation precedent and which
makes the extremely formalistic solution adopted here by the Court even v
more surprising. Whereas the Russian Federation had explicitly invoked, v
as grounds of inadmissibility, the lack of a dispute between the Partiesv
crystallized on the date when the Application was filed, Senegal has done
nothing of the kind in the present case. It did indeed assert that therev was
no justiciable dispute before the Court, but not at all for the reasons v
adopted by the Court in support of point 2 of the operative clause.
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Senegal’s argument was, in substance, that there was no dispute betweven
it and Belgium in respect of any aspect of the Applicant’s submissions —
whether that part relating to conventional obligations or that part based
on customary law — for the reason (which applies to the case as a whole)
that the Parties did not disagree on the existence and scope of the oblivga-
tions that were invoked and that the Respondent was making every pos -
sible effort to perform those obligations. This argument has no weightv, as
the Court has found in respect of that part of the submissions relating to
conventional law; it should also have been rejected in respect of that part
relating to customary law. Thus, the Court has raised ex officio the
ground that the dispute relating to compliance with customary obliga -
tions did not exist on the date when the Application was filed, since vBel -
gium had failed to address this issue in its previous diplomatic exchangves
with Senegal.
20. I do not think that I need address here the procedural question of
whether the Court could raise such a ground ex officio — without even
notifying Belgium beforehand. For the reasons discussed above, I believev
that the Court should simply have noted that a dispute between the Par -
ties as regards compliance with customary international law existed on
the date of its Judgment.
* * *
II. The Court Should Have Dismvissed as Ill-Founded
the Applicant’s Submissionvs relating to the Allegved Breach
of Obligations under Custovmary International Lavw
21. Although I disagree with the Judgment in respect of the issue of
jurisdiction, as I have just described, I do not believe that the Court
should have upheld Belgium’s claims based on customary law. Indeed, ivn
my opinion, there is no rule of customary international law requiring
Senegal to prosecute Mr. Habré before its courts, either for the acts of
torture, or complicity in torture, that are alleged against him — in that
connection, there is indeed an obligation, but it is purely conventionalv —
or for war crimes, crimes against humanity and the crime of genocide,
which do not come within the scope ratione materiae of the Convention
against Torture — in that regard there is, at present, no obligation under
international law.
22. It is true that neither in the written proceedings nor in its oral argu
ment did Senegal dispute the existence of an obligation which, under cusv-
tomary international law, would require it to prosecute Mr. Habré for
criminal acts in the above-mentioned categories.
But it is clear that if the Court had also accepted jurisdiction over this
part of the case — as I believe it should have done — it would have been
obliged to rule ex officio on the existence of the rules of customary lvaw
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which Belgium claimed had been breached. As these are rules which, if
they existed, would have universal scope, it stands to reason that it isv not
sufficient for the two parties before the Court to agree on the existenvce of
those rules, and, where appropriate, their scope, for the Court to register
that agreement and to apply the alleged rules in question. It is for thev
Court alone to say what the law is and to do so, if necessary, ex officvio —
even if it is, in fact, somewhat unusual for it to find itself in suchv a situa
tion.
23. In the present case, the Court found itself in a situation where it
could have performed that function, as a result of one of the very many v
questions put by judges to the Parties at the end of the first round ovf oral
argument.
24. The question was put by my esteemed colleague Judge Greenwood,
who, in essence, asked Belgium to demonstrate : (i) that there is State
practice in respect of the jurisdiction of domestic courts over war crimves
and crimes against humanity when the alleged offence occurred outside v
the territory of the State in question and when neither the alleged offender
nor the victims were nationals of that State ; and (ii) that States consider
that they are required, in such cases, to prosecute the alleged perpetravtor
of the offence before their own courts, or to extradite him.
25. The responses given by Belgium, initially during the second round
of oral argument and later in a written document, do not come close to
establishing the existence of a general practice and an opinio juris which
might give rise to a customary obligation upon a country such as Senegalv
to prosecute a former foreign leader before its courts for crimes such avs
those of which Mr. Hissène Habré stands accused, unless it extradites
him.
26. Let me begin by clarifying the subject-matter of the question that
was before the Court in the present case, by distinguishing it from thosve
which the Court, in any event, was not called upon to decide.
27. The Court was not called upon to determine whether the prohibi -
tion on acts of torture and other “international crimes” (a phrase I use
for convenience, although I doubt its legal relevance), as laid down inv the
Convention against Torture and in various other multilateral treaties, ivs
of a customary nature and accordingly applies even outside any conven -
tional obligations. The answer is certainly in the affirmative, but that is
not the question directly posed by Belgium’s claim in the present casve :
Senegal has never been reproached with having committed, encouraged
or facilitated such crimes. With regard to the prohibition on torture, tvhe
Judgment states (para. 99) that it is part of customary law and that it has
even become a peremptory norm (jus cogens), but that is clearly a mere
obiter dictum, which the Court could have omitted without depriving its
reasoning of any vital element.
28. Nor did the Court have to decide whether customary law requires a
State to prosecute individuals suspected of having committed crimes of tvhe
kind that are alleged here when those persons have the nationality of thve
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State concerned, or when those crimes have been committed in that State’vs
territory. Mr. Hissène Habré is not Senegalese, and the crimes of which he
is suspected were not committed in Senegal. Thus the question of whetherv
there exists in customary law an obligation upon States to exercise “vterri-
torial” jurisdiction or “active personal” jurisdiction for the vpurposes of
punishing “international crimes” did not arise in the present casev.
29. Nor did the Court have to determine whether there exists a cus -
tomary obligation for a State to give its courts “passive personal juvrisdic-
tion”, that is to say, a title of jurisdiction enabling them to try tvhe alleged
perpetrators of “international crimes” when the victim has the natvionality
of the State concerned. The reply is very probably negative : even the
Convention against Torture does not require States parties to give them -
selves such “passive personal jurisdiction”, since Article 5 (1) (c) only
provides for such jurisdiction where the State party “considers it appro -
priate”. But in any event, the question did not arise in the present vcase.
30. Finally, and this point deserves particular mention, the present case
did not require the Court to determine — in any event not directly —
whether customary international law enables States to provide their courvts
with universal jurisdiction over war crimes, crimes against humanity andv
the crime of genocide. In that regard, it may be contrasted with theDRC v.
Belgium precedent, in which that issue was raised by the Applicant before
subsequently being dropped (case concerning the Arrest Warrant of
11 April 2000 (Democratic Republic of the Congo v. Belgium), Judgment,
I.C.J. Reports 2002, p. 3). In fact, Belgium does not reproach Senegal with
exercising universal criminal jurisdiction, but on the contrary with faivling to
exercise it, whereas, according to the Applicant, international law requvires
it do so. Consequently, the controversial issue of the legality of univevrsal
jurisdiction in international law (see on this point, in particular, the sepa -
rate opinion of President Guillaume appended to the Judgment in the casev
concerning the Arrest Warrant of 11 April 2000 (Democratic Republic of the
Congo v. Belgium), Judgment, I.C.J. Reports 2002, p. 35) did not arise
directly in the present case. Only if the Court had found that internativonal
law required States to establish universal criminal jurisdiction over thve cat -
egories of offences in question would it have ruled, a fortiori, in respect of
the legality of such jurisdiction. If, however, while examining the merits of
the case, the Court had found that there is no rule of customary law reqvuir -
ing States to give themselves universal criminal jurisdiction, such a fivnding
would have left entirely open the (separate) question of the legality vof uni -
versal jurisdiction.
31. The question which the Court could not have avoided answering
directly, had it accepted jurisdiction as I believe it should have done,v is
therefore the following : is there sufficient evidence, based on State prac -
tice and opinio juris, of a customary obligation for States to prosecute
before their domestic courts individuals suspected of war crimes or crimves
against humanity (which presupposes that they have provided their courtvs
with the necessary jurisdiction), when there is no connecting link betwveen
the alleged offence and the forum State, that is to say, when the offvence
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was committed outside the territory of that State and neither the offevnder
nor the victim were nationals of that State ?
32. In my opinion, the answer to that question is very clearly and
indisputably no, regardless of whether or not the suspect is present in vthe
territory of the State in question.
33. Belgium, in response to the question put by the Court, did indeed
endeavour to demonstrate that such an obligation exists. However, it fell
far short of doing so.
34. In a written document produced in reply to the above-mentioned
question, Belgium supplied a list of States having incorporated into thevir
domestic law provisions giving their courts “universal jurisdiction”v to try
war crimes committed in the course of a non-international conflict, which
is the case of the crimes of which Mr. Habré is accused, and crimes against
humanity (or certain of those crimes). It found a total of 51. Among
those States, some of them make the exercise of such jurisdiction subjecvt
to the presence of the suspect in their territory, while others do not, vbut
the list draws no distinction between the two cases.
35. Nevertheless, the information thus provided is quite insufficient to
establish the existence of a customary obligation to prosecute the perpev -
trators of such crimes on the basis of universal jurisdiction, even whenv
limited to the case where the suspect is present in the territory of thev State
concerned.
And this is for three reasons.
36. In the first place, the States in question represent only a minority
within the international community, which is in any event insufficient vto
establish the existence of a universal customary rule.
37. Secondly, some of those States may have adopted such legislation
on the basis of a particular interpretation of their conventional obliga -
tions, for example those under conventions of international humanitarianv
law regarding war crimes. Apart from the fact that such an interpretatiovn
is not universally shared, since other States parties to the same convenv -
tions have not taken similar action, such an approach does not demon -
strate the existence of an opinio juris, that is to say, a belief that there
exists an obligation to establish “universal jurisdiction” outsidev of any
conventional obligations.
38. Thirdly and finally, certain States among the 51 — and probably
many of them — may have decided to extend the jurisdiction of their
courts over the crimes in question on the basis of a purely unilateral
choice and sovereign decision, without in any sense believing that they v
were required to do so by some international obligation, whether conven -
tional or customary — but solely in the belief that international law
entitled them to do so. Here again, the “opinio juris” is lacking.
39. Let me take France, for example, which is included in the “List of
51”, and with which I am well acquainted. In the area which interestsv us
here, France has only given its courts “universal” jurisdiction, tvhat is to
say, without any link to where the crime was committed or to the nation -
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ality of the perpetrator or the victim, in three instances : (1) for acts of
torture; (2) for crimes covered by the jurisdiction of the International
Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) and the Interna -
tional Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) ; and (3) for crimes within
the jurisdiction of the International Criminal Court (ICC) if the allevged
offender usually resides in France. In the first case, France acted vin accor -
dance with its conventional obligations deriving from its status as partvy
to the Convention against Torture. In the other two cases it adopted
those provisions of its own free and sovereign choice, without considerivng
as far as it was itself concerned — or asserting in relation to others —
that States were required to do so.
The presence of France on the list prepared by Belgium, while not
erroneous, is thus not an argument for the recognition of a customary
international obligation, and doubtless the same could be said for many v
of the other States on the list.
40. Belgium itself at present no longer claims that it exercises universal
jurisdiction, as a general rule, over “international crimes”. Since the pro -
visions of its Code of Criminal Procedure relating to the jurisdiction ovf its
courts were radically modified by the Law of 5 August 2003, Belgium no
longer provides those courts with jurisdiction over war crimes and crimevs
against humanity, except in those cases where it is required to do so unvder
an international legal obligation ; in principle, it requires a territorial or
personal connection between the alleged crime and itself, a link which
must normally exist on the date of the crime or, at the very least, thatv the
suspect should have his principal residence in the territory of the Kingv -
dom. The reason why the Belgian courts continue to investigate the com -
plaints against Mr. Hissène Habré regarding acts other than those which
could be characterized as acts of torture is that those complaints were v
made at a time when Belgian legislation did provide for universal jurisdvic -
tion, and because of the transitional provisions of the Law of
5 August 2003 ; while withdrawing universal jurisdiction almost com -
pletely for the future, the latter provided that certain pending proceedvings
which had been instituted on the basis of the previous legislation wouldv
not be affected by that withdrawal.
*
* *
41. In conclusion, I am sure that the claims submitted to the Court by
Belgium on the basis of customary international law were, in any event, v
bound to fail.
The Court’s refusal to find that it has jurisdiction in that regardv has
therefore not deprived Belgium of a success which, in any case, it couldv
not have obtained.
(Signed) Ronny Abraham.
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471
OPINION INDIVIDUELLE DE M. LE JUGE ABRAHAM
Compétence de la Cour pour connaître de la partie de la demande be▯lge relative
à des obligations relevant du droit international coutumier — Existence d’un
différend à ce propos au jour du prononcé de l’arrêt de la Cour — Absence de toute
règle de droit international coutumier obligeant le Sénégal à▯ poursuivre
M. Hissène Habré devant ses tribunaux à raison des crimes de guerre, crimes
contre l’humanité ou crime de génocide — Demande de la Belgique sur cet aspect
non fondée.
1. Dans le présent arrêt, la Cour statue au fond sur une partie seulev -
ment des conclusions de la Belgique : celle qui est relative à la violation
par le Sénégal de ses obligations au titre des articles 6, paragraphe 2,
et 7, paragraphe 1, de la convention des Nations Unies contre la torture
et autres peines ou traitements cruels, inhumains ou dégradants du
10 décembre 1984 (ci-après la «convention»). Après avoir retenu sa com -
pétence pour connaître de cette partie de la requête (point 1 du dispositif)
et déclaré la requête recevable à cet égard (point 3 du dispositif), la Cour
déclare que le Sénégal a manqué à ses obligations conventvionnelles
(points 4 et 5 du dispositif) et en tire les conséquences, à savoir que le
Sénégal doit soumettre sans délai le cas de M. Hissène Habré à ses auto -
rités compétentes pour l’exercice de l’action pénale, àv moins qu’il ne l’ex-
trade (point 6 du dispositif).
2. J’ai voté en faveur de tous ces points du dispositif. J’approuve non
seulement les conclusions auxquelles la Cour est parvenue sur ces diffvé -
rentes questions, mais aussi l’essentiel du raisonnement suivi pour y par -
venir, même si je pense que la motivation de l’arrêt aurait gagné, sur
plusieurs des aspects traités, à être moins elliptique.
3. Mais la Belgique ne se bornait pas à reprocher au Sénégal de mévcon -
naître ses obligations conventionnelles. La demanderesse soutenait auvssi
que le Sénégal était tenu de poursuivre M. Hissène Habré devant ses juri -
dictions — sauf s’il l’extradait — à raison de faits susceptibles d’être quali-
fiés de crimes de guerre, de crimes contre l’humanité ou de gvénocide, et
n’entrant pas dans le champ d’application ratione materiae de la conven -
tion contre la torture. Au soutien de cette prétention, la Belgique ivnvoquait
le droit international coutumier, qui, à l’en croire, imposait au Sénégal une
telle obligation de « poursuivre ou extrader » toute personne soupçonnée
d’avoir commis des faits entrant dans les catégories ainsi défivnies.
4. La Cour a décliné sa compétence pour connaître de cette partvie de la
requête de la Belgique, alors même que la demanderesse invoquait, vpour
fonder la compétence de la Cour, non seulement l’article 30 de la conven -
tion — qui à l’évidence ne pouvait constituer une base de compétencve
53
6 CIJ1033.indb 102 28/11/13 12:50 471
SEPARATE OPINION OF JUDGE ABRAHAM
[Translation]
Jurisdiction of the Court to entertain that part of Belgium’s claim r▯elating to
obligations arising from customary international law — Existence of a dispute in
that connection on the day of delivery of the Judgment — Lack of any rule of
customary international law requiring Senegal to prosecute Mr. Hissène Habré
before its courts for war crimes, crimes against humanity and the crime ▯of
genocide — Belgium’s claim in that regard unfounded.
1. In this Judgment, the Court rules on the merits of only one part of
Belgium’s submissions, namely that relating to Senegal’s breach ofv its
obligations under Article 6, paragraph 2, and Article 7, paragraph 1, of
the United Nations Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhu -
man or Degrading Treatment or Punishment of 10 December 1984 (here -
inafter “the Convention”). After upholding its jurisdiction over vthat part
of the Application (point 1 of the operative clause) and declaring the
Application admissible in that regard (point 3 of the operative clause), the
Court finds that Senegal has breached its conventional obligations
(points 4 and 5 of the operative clause) and draws the appropriate conclu -
sions, namely that Senegal must, without further delay, submit the case v
of Mr. Hissène Habré to its competent authorities for the purpose of
prosecution, if it does not extradite him (point 6 of the operative clause).
2. I have voted in favour of all of those points of the operative clause.
I approve not only of the conclusions reached by the Court on those vari-
ous issues but also of the essence of the reasoning followed to reach
them, even though I think that the Judgment’s reasoning, in respect of a
number of the points considered, would have benefited from being less v
succinct.
3. However, Belgium did not confine itself to reproaching Senegal with
having breached its conventional obligations. The Applicant also con -
tended that Senegal was required to prosecute Mr. Hissène Habré before
its courts — unless it extradited him — for acts which could be character -
ized as war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide and which do
not come within the scope ratione materiae of the Convention against
Torture. In support of that claim, Belgium invoked customary interna -
tional law, which, it argued, required Senegal to “prosecute or extravdite”
any person suspected of having committed acts coming within the catego -
ries thus defined.
4. The Court has declared that it lacks jurisdiction to hear that part of
Belgium’s Application, despite the fact that the Applicant, in order vto
found the jurisdiction of the Court, invoked not only Article 30 of the
Convention — which could clearly only constitute a valid basis for the
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6 CIJ1033.indb 103 28/11/13 12:50 472 obligation de poursuivvre ou d’extrader (op. invd. abraham)
valide que pour celles des conclusions qui étaient relatives à la vviolation
alléguée des obligations conventionnelles — mais aussi les déclarations
facultatives faites par les deux Parties en application de l’article 36, para -
graphe 2, du Statut de la Cour, lesquelles ont une portée générale. En
conséquence, l’arrêt ne se prononce pas au fond sur les prétventions de la
Belgique relatives au manquement supposé du Sénégal à des obvligations
que lui imposerait le droit international coutumier.
5. C’est sur ce point que j’ai dû, à regret, me dissocier de lav majorité de
mes collègues.
J’estime en effet que la Cour aurait dû retenir sa compétencev pour
connaître des conclusions de la demanderesse relatives au droit inter-
national coutumier (I). Mais je ne pense pas pour autant que la Cour
aurait dû accueillir au fond ces conclusions : à mon avis, elle aurait dû les
rejeter comme mal fondées (II).
I. La Cour aurait dû retenvir sa compétence
pour connaître des convclusions de la demandevresse fondées
sur le droit internatvional coutumier
6. Dans le point 2 du dispositif, la Cour
«Dit qu’elle n’a pas compétence pour connaître des demandes du
Royaume de Belgique relatives à des manquements allégués, par lva
République du Sénégal, à des obligations relevant du droit ivnterna -
tional coutumier. »
Je ne peux pas adhérer à cette affirmation pour les motifs suivanvts.
7. La raison pour laquelle la Cour décline ainsi sa compétence est
énoncée au paragraphe 55 de l’arrêt: «Au moment du dépôt de la requête,
le différend qui opposait les Parties n’était pas relatif àv des manquements
à des obligations relevant du droit international coutumier », est-il écrit.
La conséquence qu’en tire la Cour est qu’elle n’est pas compvétente pour
statuer sur la demande énoncée par la Belgique au point 1 b) de ses
conclusions finales (citées au paragraphe 14 de l’arrêt), en tant que cette
demande vise les obligations que le droit international coutumier imposev -
rait au Sénégal en ce qui concerne les poursuites pénales que cvelui-ci
devrait engager contre M. Habré, à défaut de l’extrader. En effet, dès lors
que les obligations que le Sénégal est ici accusé d’avoir mévconnues ne
découlent pas de la convention mais du droit international coutumier,v la
Cour ne pourrait être compétente pour en connaître que sur la bvase des
déclarations facultatives faites par les Parties en vertu du paragrapvhe 2 de
l’article 36 du Statut. Or, cette disposition confère à la Cour compétencve
pour connaître des «différends d’ordre juridique» survenus entre les Etats
ayant reconnu sa juridiction comme obligatoire. En conséquence, l’vab -
sence de différend sur une question déterminée entraîne l’vincompétence de
la Cour pour connaître de cette question, et tel est le cas, du pointv de vue
de la Cour, en la présente espèce.
54
6 CIJ1033.indb 104 28/11/13 12:50 obligation to prosecuvte or extradite (sep. opv. abraham) 472
Court’s jurisdiction in respect of those submissions relating to the valleged
breach of conventional obligations — but also the optional declarations
made by the two Parties under Article 36, paragraph 2, of the Statute of
the Court, which are general in scope. Hence the Judgment makes no
substantive ruling on Belgium’s claims relating to Senegal’s allegved breach
of its obligations under customary international law.
5. It is on this point that I have regretfully been obliged to dissociate
myself from the majority of my colleagues.
In my view, the Court should have ruled that it has jurisdiction to
entertain the Applicant’s submissions relating to customary internativonal
law (I). However, I do not think that the Court should have upheld thovse
submissions on the merits ; in my opinion, it should have dismissed them
as unfounded (II).
I. The Court Should Have Rulevd that It Has Jurisdictiovn
to Entertain the Applicanvt’s Submissions Based
on Customary Internatvional Law
6. In point 2 of the operative clause, the Court
“Finds that it has no jurisdiction to entertain the claims of the King-
dom of Belgium relating to alleged breaches, by the Republic of
Senegal, of obligations under customary international law.”
I cannot support that finding, for the reasons which I set out below.
7. The reason why the Court thus declined jurisdiction is set forth in
paragraph 55 of the Judgment : “[A]t the time of the filing of the Applica -
tion, the dispute between the Parties did not relate to breaches of oblivga-
tions under customary international law.” The conclusion the Court
draws is that it has no jurisdiction to decide on the claim set out by Bvel -
gium in point 1 (b) of its final submissions (cited in paragraph 14 of the
Judgment), because that claim refers to Senegal’s alleged obligationvs
under customary international law concerning the criminal proceedings
which the latter should bring against Mr. Hissène Habré, if it does not
extradite him. Since the obligations which Senegal is accused of having
breached do not derive from the Convention but from customary inter-
national law, the Court can only have jurisdiction over that issue on
the basis of the Optional Clause declarations made by the Parties under
Article 36, paragraph 2, of the Statute of the Court. However, this pro-
vision confers jurisdiction upon the Court over “legal disputes” bvetween
States that have recognized its jurisdiction as compulsory. Accordingly,v
the absence of a dispute on a specific issue leaves the Court without vjuris-
diction over that issue, and, from the Court’s point of view, that isv the
case here.
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6 CIJ1033.indb 105 28/11/13 12:50 473 obligation de poursuivvre ou d’extrader (op. invd. abraham)
8. Je ne conteste pas le bien-fondé de plusieurs des éléments de cve
raisonnement.
En premier lieu, il est clair que « l’existence d’un différend est une
condition énoncée dans les deux bases de compétence que la Belgvique a
invoquées», comme le dit le paragraphe 45. De ces deux bases, une seule
est pertinente pour la question qui nous occupe ici (l’autre étanvt l’ar -
ticle 30 de la convention contre la torture, qui est manifestement inappli -
cable — et la Belgique n’a pas prétendu le contraire — à la partie des
conclusions de la demanderesse qui est relative à la prétendue viovlation
par le Sénégal du droit international coutumier).
9. En deuxième lieu, si aucun différend n’oppose les parties quiv se pré-
sentent devant la Cour (sur tout ou partie des questions qui font l’vobjet
de la requête), la Cour n’est pas compétente pour connaîtrev de l’af -
faire — ou de la partie de l’affaire sur laquelle il n’existe aucun diffvérend.
A vrai dire, on pourrait tout aussi bien soutenir qu’une demande portvant
sur une question à propos de laquelle il n’existe, et n’existaivt déjà à la date
d’introduction de la requête, aucun différend se heurte à vun motif d’irre-
cevabilité plutôt qu’elle ne correspond à un cas d’incompétence. Mais la
jurisprudence est clairement, et de très longue date, fixée dansv le sens
de l’incompétence — ce qui d’ailleurs ne change pas grand-chose en pra -
tique — et il n’eût pas été opportun que la Cour s’en écartâvt.
10. Enfin, je peux aussi me rallier à l’affirmation selon laquelle vil n’exi-
tait pas entre les Parties, à la date de l’introduction de la requvête par la
Belgique — soit le 19 février 2009 —, de différend apparu entre les Parties
au sujet du prétendu non-respect par le Sénégal de règles dev droit inter-
national coutumier qui l’obligeraient à engager des poursuites convtre
M. Habré à défaut de l’extrader. Le paragraphe 54 de l’arrêt décrit de
façon assez détaillée les échanges diplomatiques qui ont prévcédé l’intro -
duction de la requête. Il en résulte qu’à aucun moment, au cvours de ces
échanges préalables, la Belgique n’avait reproché au Sénégal de violer le
droit international coutumier. Elle s’était bornée à faire vvaloir l’obliga -
tion résultant de la convention contre la torture, et tout particulièvrement
de son article 7, paragraphe 1, de poursuivre, devant les tribunaux de
l’Etat sur le territoire duquel elle se trouve, toute personne contrev laquelle
il existe des raisons de penser qu’elle a pu commettre des actes de tvorture,
ou s’en rendre complice, à moins qu’elle ne soit extradée vevrs un autre
Etat compétent pour la juger pour les mêmes actes.
11. Ma divergence avec l’arrêt porte sur le fait que la Cour s’en tient
strictement à la situation qui existait «au moment du dépôt de la requête»
et refuse de prendre en compte la situation présente, telle qu’ellve résulte
des échanges entre les Parties au cours de la procédure judiciairev.
12. Or, il est tout à fait certain que, à la date du présent arrêt, il existe
bel et bien un différend qui s’est manifesté entre les Partievs en ce qui
concerne l’application du droit international coutumier au cas d’espèce.
La Belgique a soutenu que le Sénégal a méconnu l’obligation vque lui
impose le droit international coutumier de poursuivre M. Habré devant
ses tribunaux, non seulement pour les actes de torture, mais aussi pour vles
55
6 CIJ1033.indb 106 28/11/13 12:50 obligation to prosecuvte or extradite (sep. opv. abraham) 473
8. I do not dispute the validity of several of the elements of this reason-
ing.
Firstly, it is clear that “the existence of a dispute is a condition vof its
jurisdiction under both bases of jurisdiction invoked by Belgium”, asv
indicated in paragraph 45. Only one of those two bases of jurisdiction
is relevant to the question which concerns us here (the other being
Article 30 of the Convention against Torture, which is clearly inappli-
cable — and Belgium has not suggested otherwise — to that part of the
Applicant’s submissions which relates to Senegal’s alleged breach vof cus-
tomary international law).
9. Secondly, if there is no dispute between the parties before the Court
(in respect of all or some of the issues which form the subject-matter of
the Application), the Court has no jurisdiction to hear the case — or that
part of the case over which no dispute exists. In actual fact, it might valso
be argued that an application concerning a question over which there is
no dispute, and over which there was no dispute on the date when the
Application was filed, would stand to fail on the ground of inadmissibvility
rather than lack of jurisdiction. However, in its decisions the Court havs,
for a very long time, clearly and consistently ruled lack of jurisdictiovn —
though this makes little difference in practice — and it would not have
been appropriate for it to depart from its case law.
10. Finally, I can also concur with the finding that, on the date when
the Application was filed by Belgium, that is to say, 19 February 2009,
there was no dispute between the Parties over Senegal’s alleged failuvre to
comply with the rules of customary international law supposedly requir -
ing it to initiate proceedings against Mr. Habré, if it does not extradite
him. Paragraph 54 of the Judgment describes at some length the diplo -
matic exchanges which preceded the filing of the Application. It emergves
that at no time during those preliminary exchanges did Belgium reproach
Senegal with violating customary international law. Belgium confined
itself to emphasizing the obligation under the Convention against Tor -
ture, and in particular Article 7, paragraph 1, thereof, to prosecute any
person who is suspected of having committed acts of torture, or of com -
plicity in torture, before the courts of the State in whose territory he is
present, if he is not extradited to another State having jurisdiction tov try
him for the same acts.
11. My disagreement with the Judgment centres on the fact that the
Court confines itself to the situation that prevailed “at the time vof the
filing of the Application” and refuses to take account of the presevnt
situation, as it emerges from the exchanges between the Parties during tvhe
judicial proceedings.
12. However, it is quite certain that, on the date of the present Judg -
ment, a dispute does indeed exist between the Parties regarding the applvi-
cation of customary international law in the present case. Belgium has
argued that Senegal has breached its obligation under customary interna -
tional law to prosecute Mr. Habré before its courts, not only for acts of
55
6 CIJ1033.indb 107 28/11/13 12:50 474 obligation de poursuivvre ou d’extrader (op. invd. abraham)
«crimes de guerre, crimes contre l’humanité et crime de génocidev qui lui
sont imputés » (conclusions finales, 1 b)). Le Sénégal, quant à lui, sans
nier formellement l’existence d’une telle obligation, a soutenu quve son
comportement jusqu’à présent ne traduit nulle violation de ladivte obliga-
tion de sa part, essentiellement pour les mêmes raisons que celles quv’il a
avancées pour affirmer qu’il ne violait pas ses obligations convevntion -
nelles: il a pris d’ores et déjà diverses mesures en vue du procèsv, et n’a pas
disposé jusqu’à ce jour des moyens qui lui eussent été névcessaires pour en
faire davantage.
Il n’est donc pas douteux qu’il existe aujourd’hui un différend entre les
Parties relativement à la mise en œuvre du droit international coutumier,
tout autant, et pour les mêmes raisons, qu’il existe un diffévrend entre elles
concernant le respect par le Sénégal de ses obligations conventionvnelles.
La différence entre les deux volets de l’affaire réside en vceci que le diffé -
rend relatif au droit conventionnel s’était manifesté, par les véchanges
entre les Parties, avant même l’introduction de la requête, tanvdis que le
différend relatif au droit coutumier ne s’est manifesté que pvar leurs
échanges devant la Cour.
13. Il découle de ce qui précède que la question décisive est cevlle de
savoir à quelle date il convient de se placer pour apprécier l’vexistence d’un
différend entre les Parties.
14. En règle générale, les conditions qui commandent la compétenvce de
la Cour doivent être remplies à la date d’introduction de la revquête. Tou -
tefois, depuis fort longtemps, la Cour a fait preuve d’une raisonnablve sou -
plesse, en acceptant qu’une condition qui faisait initialement défvaut puisse
être remplie en cours d’instance, et qu’il y avait donc lieu povur la Cour,
faute que toutes les conditions de sa compétence aient été rempvlies dès
l’engagement de la procédure, de rechercher si elles le sont à vla date de
sa décision. Cette jurisprudence, inaugurée dans la fameuse affairev des
Concessions Mavrommatis en Palestine, a été confirmée et même élargie
par la motivation de principe retenue dans l’arrêt sur les exceptivons préli -
minaires en l’affaire Croatie c. Serbie, dans lequel la Cour s’est exprimée
ainsi :
«ce qui importe, c’est que, au plus tard à la date à laquelle lav Cour
statue sur sa compétence, le demandeur soit en droit, s’il le souhvaite,
d’introduire une nouvelle instance dans le cadre de laquelle la condi -
tion qui faisait initialement défaut serait remplie. En pareil cas, cvela
ne servirait pas l’intérêt d’une bonne administration de la vjustice
d’obliger le demandeur à recommencer la procédure — ou à en com -
mencer une nouvelle — et il est préférable, sauf circonstances
spéciales, de constater que la condition est désormais remplie. »
(Application de la convention pour la prévention et la répression du
crime de génocide (Croatie c. Serbie), exceptions préliminaires, arrêt,
C.I.J. Recueil 2008, p. 441, par. 85.)
15. Il est vrai que, plus récemment, dans son arrêt rendu en l’affvaire
Géorgie c. Fédération de Russie, la Cour s’est placée à la date d’introduc -
56
6 CIJ1033.indb 108 28/11/13 12:50 obligation to prosecuvte or extradite (sep. opv. abraham) 474
torture, but also for “war crimes, crimes against humanity and the crvime
of genocide alleged against him” (final submissions, 1 (b)). Senegal, for
its part, without formally denying the existence of such an obligation, vhas
argued that its conduct to date entails no breach by it of that obligativon,
for essentially the same reasons as those advanced by it to assert that vit
was not in breach of its conventional obligations : it has already taken
several measures with a view to the trial, and has not hitherto had the v
means at its disposal that it would have needed to do more.
There is therefore no doubt that there does exist today a dispute
between the Parties relating to the implementation of customary interna -
tional law, just as there exists, and for the same reasons, a dispute bevtween
them concerning Senegal’s compliance with its conventional obligationvs.
The difference between these two aspects of the case is that the dispuvte
relating to conventional law was revealed by the exchanges between the
Parties even before the Application was introduced, whereas the dispute v
relating to customary law only became apparent during their exchanges
before the Court.
13. It follows from the above that the crucial question is which date is
to be taken in order to determine the existence of a dispute between thev
Parties.
14. As a general rule, the conditions governing the jurisdiction of the
Court must be fulfilled on the date when the Application is filed. Hvow -
ever, the Court has, for a very long time, shown reasonable flexibilitvy by
accepting that a condition that was initially lacking could be met in the
course of the proceedings, and that if not all the conditions for its juvris -
diction were fulfilled at the start of the proceedings, the Court shouvld
therefore ascertain whether they had been fulfilled on the date of its Judg -
ment. This line of case law, which began with the celebrated Mavromma -
tis Palestine Concessions case, was confirmed and even extended by the
obligation to state reasons, which was adopted as a matter of principle vin
the Judgment on the Preliminary Objections in the Croatia v. Serbia case,
in which the Court stated :
“What matters is that, at the latest by the date when the Court
decides on its jurisdiction, the applicant must be entitled, if it so
wishes, to bring fresh proceedings in which the initially unmet condi -
tion would be fulfilled. In such a situation, it is not in the interesvts of
the sound administration of justice to compel the applicant to begin
the proceedings anew — or to initiate fresh proceedings — and it is
preferable, except in special circumstances, to conclude that the con -
dition has, from that point on, been fulfilled.” (Application of the
Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide
(Croatia v. Serbia), Preliminary Objections, Judgment, I.C.J. Reports
2008, p. 441, para. 85.)
15. It is true that, more recently, in its Judgment in the Georgia v. Rus -
sian Federation case, the Court referred to the date when the Application
56
6 CIJ1033.indb 109 28/11/13 12:50 475 obligation de poursuivvre ou d’extrader (op. invd. abraham)
tion de la requête pour rechercher si la condition relative à l’existence
d’un différend était remplie. Mais dans cette affaire elle va conclu que la
condition était bel et bien remplie à la date en cause (Application de la
convention internationale sur l’élimination de toutes les formes d▯e discrimi -
nation raciale (Géorgie c. Fédération de Russie), exceptions préliminaires,
arrêt, C.I.J. Recueil 2011 (I), p. 120, par. 113).
16. La Cour n’a donc pas eu besoin, au cas particulier, de trancher la
question de savoir quelle solution elle aurait dû adopter si le diffvérend,
inexistant à la date d’introduction de la requête, avait étév clairement
constitué à la date de son arrêt. Le précédent Géorgie c. Russie ne repré -
sente donc pas, à mes yeux, un revirement par rapport à la jurisprvudence
antérieure.
D’ailleurs, fort prudemment, la Cour indiquait dans sa motivation
générale, avant de passer à l’examen concret des échangesv entre la Géor -
gie et la Russie, que, « [e]n principe, le différend doit exister au moment
où la requête est soumise à la Cour » (ibid., p. 85, par. 30, les italiques
sont de moi).
17. Il est vrai aussi que dans la même affaire, pour apprécier la réalisa -
tion de la condition relative à la tentative de règlement négocvié, la Cour
s’est placée à la date de sa saisine (ibid., p. 128, par. 141). Mais c’était, en
réalité, sans incidence sur la solution puisque, de l’avis de lva majorité de
la Cour — qui n’était pas le mien —, la Géorgie n’avait jamais tenté d’en -
gager des négociations avec la Russie en vue de régler leur diffvérend relatif
à l’application de la convention pour l’élimination de toutevs les formes
de discrimination raciale, et cette appréciation eût été sans nvul doute la
même pour la période antérieure et pour la période postérvieure à la sai -
sine de la Cour.
18. Dans le présent arrêt, la Cour franchit donc un pas supplémen -
taire, et particulièrement net, dans l’approche formaliste de la cvondition
tenant à l’existence d’un différend : c’est la première fois dans toute sa
jurisprudence qu’elle refuse de connaître d’une partie d’unev affaire en se
fondant sur l’absence de différend entre les Parties, et alors qvue, de façon
patente, le différend existe à la date de la décision de la Cvour et a été
exprimé dans le prétoire. On se demande, en outre, quelle est encovre la
portée de la position de principe énoncée par la Cour dans l’varrêt relatif
aux exceptions préliminaires en l’affaire Croatie c. Serbie. Je regrette de
constater que la succession des arrêts récents ne donne pas une grvande
impression de cohérence.
19. J’ajoute un élément supplémentaire qui distingue la présente affaire
du précédent Géorgie c. Russie et rend plus surprenante encore la solution
extrêmement formaliste adoptée ici par la Cour. Alors que la Russive avait
explicitement invoqué, comme fin de non-recevoir, l’absence de dvifférend
entre les Parties cristallisé à la date de l’introduction de la requête, le
Sénégal n’a rien fait de tel en l’espèce. Il a certes prévtendu qu’il n’existait
entre les Parties aucun différend justiciable de la Cour, mais pas du tout
pour les raisons que la Cour a retenues au soutien du point 2 du disposi -
tif. L’argument du Sénégal, en substance, était qu’il n’vexistait aucun diffé -
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6 CIJ1033.indb 110 28/11/13 12:50 obligation to prosecuvte or extradite (sep. opv. abraham) 475
was filed in order to determine whether the condition relating to the vexis-
tence of a dispute had been met. However, in that case it found that the
condition had indeed been met on the date in question (Application of the
International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Dis -
crimination (Georgia v. Russian Federation), Preliminary Objections,
Judgment, I.C.J. Reports 2011 (I), p. 120, para. 113).
16. The Court therefore had no need, in that case, to settle the ques -
tion of which solution it should have adopted if the dispute, which had
not existed on the date when the Application was filed, had been clearvly
constituted on the date of the Judgment. In my opinion, the Georgia v.
Russian Federation precedent does not therefore represent a departure
from the former jurisprudence of the Court.
Moreover, the Court, very prudently, indicated in its statement of rea -
sons, before moving on to consider specifically the exchanges between v
Georgia and the Russian Federation, that “[t]he dispute must in principle
exist at the time the Application is submitted to the Court” (ibid., p. 85,
para. 30; emphasis added).
17. It is also true that in the same case, in order to assess whether the
requirement for the Parties to attempt a negotiated settlement of the divs -
pute had been met, the Court referred to the date of its seisin (ibid.,
p. 128, para. 141). However, this in fact had no bearing on the solution,
since in the opinion of the Court’s majority — which I did not share —
Georgia had never attempted to engage in negotiations with Russia with
a view to resolving their dispute concerning the application of the Intevr -
national Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrim -
ination, and that assessment would undoubtedly have been the same for
the periods before and after the seisin of the Court.
18. In the present Judgment, the Court goes a particularly clear step
further in the formalistic approach to the condition relating to the exivs -
tence of a dispute : this is the first time in the Court’s entire jurisprudence
that it has declined to hear one part of a case on the basis of the lackv of
a dispute between the Parties, even though the dispute clearly exists onv
the date of the Court’s Judgment and was apparent in the proceedings v
before the Court. One may wonder what the extent now is of the position v
of principle set out by the Court in the Judgment on Preliminary Objec -
tions in the Croatia v. Serbia case. I regret to note that the series of recent
Judgments does not convey a great impression of consistency.
19. Let me mention one additional factor which distinguishes the pres -
ent case from the Georgia v. Russian Federation precedent and which
makes the extremely formalistic solution adopted here by the Court even v
more surprising. Whereas the Russian Federation had explicitly invoked, v
as grounds of inadmissibility, the lack of a dispute between the Partiesv
crystallized on the date when the Application was filed, Senegal has done
nothing of the kind in the present case. It did indeed assert that therev was
no justiciable dispute before the Court, but not at all for the reasons v
adopted by the Court in support of point 2 of the operative clause.
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6 CIJ1033.indb 111 28/11/13 12:50 476 obligation de poursuivvre ou d’extrader (op. invd. abraham)
rend entre lui et la Belgique, sur aucun des volets des conclusions de lva
demanderesse — pas plus celui ayant trait aux obligations convention -
nelles que celui fondé sur le droit coutumier —, pour la raison (commune
à l’ensemble de l’affaire) que les Parties n’étaient pas en désaccord sur
l’existence et la portée des obligations invoquées et que le dévfendeur fai -
sait tout son possible pour exécuter lesdites obligations. Cet argumevnt est
sans valeur, comme la Cour l’a constaté en ce qui concerne la partvie des
conclusions ayant trait au droit conventionnel ; il aurait dû être écarté de
même pour la partie ayant trait au droit coutumier. C’est donc d’office
que la Cour a soulevé le motif tiré de ce que le différend revlatif au respect
des obligations coutumières n’existait pas à la date de l’invtroduction de la
requête, faute pour la Belgique d’avoir abordé cette question dvans ses
échanges diplomatiques préalables avec le Sénégal.
20. Je n’estime pas devoir examiner ici la question procédurale de
savoir si la Cour pouvait soulever ex officio un tel motif — sans même
l’avoir communiqué préalablement à la Belgique. Pour les raivsons expo -
sées plus haut, je pense que la Cour aurait dû simplement constatevr l’exis -
tence d’un différend entre les Parties, sur le respect du droit vinternational
coutumier, à la date de son arrêt.
* * *
II. La Cour aurait dû rejevter comme mal fondéesv
les conclusions de lav demanderesse relativves à la prétendue
violation d’obligatiovns de droit internatiovnal coutumier
21. Malgré mon désaccord avec l’arrêt sur la question de compévtence
que je viens d’exposer, je ne suis pas d’avis que la Cour aurait dvû accueil -
lir les prétentions de la Belgique fondées sur le droit coutumier. Je pense,
en effet, qu’il n’existe nulle règle de droit international cvoutumier faisant
obligation au Sénégal de poursuivre M. Habré devant ses tribunaux, ni à
raison des actes de torture, ou de complicité de torture, qui lui sonvt impu -
tés — à cet égard, il existe bien une obligation, mais elle est purementv
conventionnelle —, ni à raison des crimes de guerre, crimes contre l’hu -
manité ou crime de génocide n’entrant pas dans le champ ratione materiae
de la convention contre la torture — à cet égard il n’existe, en l’état actuel,
aucune obligation juridique internationale.
22. Il est vrai que ni dans la procédure écrite, ni dans ses plaidoirives, le
Sénégal n’a contesté l’existence d’une obligation que vmettrait à sa charge
le droit international coutumier de poursuivre M. Habré pour des faits
criminels appartenant aux catégories susmentionnées.
Mais il est évident que, si la Cour avait retenu sa compétence pour
connaître aussi de cette partie de l’affaire — comme je crois qu’elle aurait
dû le faire —, elle se serait trouvée dans l’obligation de se prononcer d’of -
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6 CIJ1033.indb 112 28/11/13 12:50 obligation to prosecuvte or extradite (sep. opv. abraham) 476
Senegal’s argument was, in substance, that there was no dispute betweven
it and Belgium in respect of any aspect of the Applicant’s submissions —
whether that part relating to conventional obligations or that part based
on customary law — for the reason (which applies to the case as a whole)
that the Parties did not disagree on the existence and scope of the oblivga-
tions that were invoked and that the Respondent was making every pos -
sible effort to perform those obligations. This argument has no weightv, as
the Court has found in respect of that part of the submissions relating to
conventional law; it should also have been rejected in respect of that part
relating to customary law. Thus, the Court has raised ex officio the
ground that the dispute relating to compliance with customary obliga -
tions did not exist on the date when the Application was filed, since vBel -
gium had failed to address this issue in its previous diplomatic exchangves
with Senegal.
20. I do not think that I need address here the procedural question of
whether the Court could raise such a ground ex officio — without even
notifying Belgium beforehand. For the reasons discussed above, I believev
that the Court should simply have noted that a dispute between the Par -
ties as regards compliance with customary international law existed on
the date of its Judgment.
* * *
II. The Court Should Have Dismvissed as Ill-Founded
the Applicant’s Submissionvs relating to the Allegved Breach
of Obligations under Custovmary International Lavw
21. Although I disagree with the Judgment in respect of the issue of
jurisdiction, as I have just described, I do not believe that the Court
should have upheld Belgium’s claims based on customary law. Indeed, ivn
my opinion, there is no rule of customary international law requiring
Senegal to prosecute Mr. Habré before its courts, either for the acts of
torture, or complicity in torture, that are alleged against him — in that
connection, there is indeed an obligation, but it is purely conventionalv —
or for war crimes, crimes against humanity and the crime of genocide,
which do not come within the scope ratione materiae of the Convention
against Torture — in that regard there is, at present, no obligation under
international law.
22. It is true that neither in the written proceedings nor in its oral argu
ment did Senegal dispute the existence of an obligation which, under cusv-
tomary international law, would require it to prosecute Mr. Habré for
criminal acts in the above-mentioned categories.
But it is clear that if the Court had also accepted jurisdiction over this
part of the case — as I believe it should have done — it would have been
obliged to rule ex officio on the existence of the rules of customary lvaw
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6 CIJ1033.indb 113 28/11/13 12:50 477 obligation de poursuivvre ou d’extrader (op. invd. abraham)
fice sur l’existence des règles de droit coutumier dont la violavtion était
invoquée par la Belgique. S’agissant de règles qui, si elles exvistaient,
auraient une portée universelle, il tombe sous le sens qu’il ne suvffit pas que
les deux parties présentes devant la Cour soient d’accord sur leur exis -
tence et, le cas échéant, sur leur portée pour que la Cour enregistre cet
accord et fasse application des prétendues règles en cause. C’evst toujours
à la Cour de dire ce qu’est le droit et de le faire, au besoin, d’voffice — même
s’il est assez rare, en fait, qu’elle se trouve placée en pareivlle situation.
23. Dans notre affaire, la Cour avait été mise dans des conditions
propices à l’exercice de cette fonction par l’une des questionsv, d’ailleurs
exceptionnellement nombreuses, posées par les juges aux Parties au tevrme
du premier tour des audiences.
24. Il s’agit de la question posée par mon estimé collègue le juvge
Greenwood, qui a demandé à la Belgique, en substance, de démontvrer :
i) qu’il existe une pratique des Etats dans le sens d’une compétenvce des
juridictions nationales pour connaître de crimes de guerre et de crimves
contre l’humanité lorsque le crime allégué a eu lieu hors des frontières de
l’Etat considéré et que ni son auteur présumé ni ses victimes ne sont des
ressortissants de cet Etat ; ii) que les Etats s’estiment tenus, en pareils cas,
de poursuivre l’auteur présumé du crime devant leurs propres trvibunaux
ou de l’extrader.
25. Les réponses fournies par la Belgique, d’abord lors du second tourv
de plaidoiries puis dans un document écrit, sont loin d’établirv l’existence
d’une pratique générale et d’une opinio juris de nature à donner naissance
à une obligation coutumière, à la charge d’un pays tel que le Sénégal, de
poursuivre devant ses tribunaux, à moins qu’il ne l’extrade, unv ancien
dirigeant étranger pour des crimes tels que ceux dont M. Hissène Habré
est accusé.
26. Qu’il me soit d’abord permis de préciser l’objet de la questvion qui
se posait à la Cour dans la présente affaire, en la distinguant vde celles que
la Cour, en tout état de cause, n’était pas appelée à travncher.
27. Il ne s’agissait pas de savoir si la prohibition des actes de torturev et
des autres « crimes internationaux » (formule que j’emploie par commo -
dité bien que je doute de sa pertinence juridique), affirmée parv la conven-
tion contre la torture et divers autres traités multilatéraux, possède un
caractère coutumier, et s’impose donc même en dehors de tout envgage -
ment conventionnel. La réponse est certainement affirmative, mais cev
n’est pas la question qui était directement posée par la demande de la
Belgique en l’espèce : il n’a jamais été reproché au Sénégal d’avoir comv -
mis, encouragé ou facilité de tels crimes. A propos de l’interdviction de la
torture, l’arrêt affirme (par. 99) qu’elle relève du droit coutumier et qu’elle
a même acquis le caractère d’une norme de jus cogens, mais c’est à l’évi -
dence un simple obiter dictum, dont la Cour aurait pu se passer sans pri -
ver son raisonnement d’aucun élément indispensable.
28. Il ne s’agissait pas non plus de savoir si le droit coutumier oblige vun
Etat à poursuivre les personnes soupçonnées d’avoir commis des crimes de
la nature de ceux qui sont ici allégués lorsque ces personnes ont la nationa -
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6 CIJ1033.indb 114 28/11/13 12:50 obligation to prosecuvte or extradite (sep. opv. abraham) 477
which Belgium claimed had been breached. As these are rules which, if
they existed, would have universal scope, it stands to reason that it isv not
sufficient for the two parties before the Court to agree on the existenvce of
those rules, and, where appropriate, their scope, for the Court to register
that agreement and to apply the alleged rules in question. It is for thev
Court alone to say what the law is and to do so, if necessary, ex officvio —
even if it is, in fact, somewhat unusual for it to find itself in suchv a situa
tion.
23. In the present case, the Court found itself in a situation where it
could have performed that function, as a result of one of the very many v
questions put by judges to the Parties at the end of the first round ovf oral
argument.
24. The question was put by my esteemed colleague Judge Greenwood,
who, in essence, asked Belgium to demonstrate : (i) that there is State
practice in respect of the jurisdiction of domestic courts over war crimves
and crimes against humanity when the alleged offence occurred outside v
the territory of the State in question and when neither the alleged offender
nor the victims were nationals of that State ; and (ii) that States consider
that they are required, in such cases, to prosecute the alleged perpetravtor
of the offence before their own courts, or to extradite him.
25. The responses given by Belgium, initially during the second round
of oral argument and later in a written document, do not come close to
establishing the existence of a general practice and an opinio juris which
might give rise to a customary obligation upon a country such as Senegalv
to prosecute a former foreign leader before its courts for crimes such avs
those of which Mr. Hissène Habré stands accused, unless it extradites
him.
26. Let me begin by clarifying the subject-matter of the question that
was before the Court in the present case, by distinguishing it from thosve
which the Court, in any event, was not called upon to decide.
27. The Court was not called upon to determine whether the prohibi -
tion on acts of torture and other “international crimes” (a phrase I use
for convenience, although I doubt its legal relevance), as laid down inv the
Convention against Torture and in various other multilateral treaties, ivs
of a customary nature and accordingly applies even outside any conven -
tional obligations. The answer is certainly in the affirmative, but that is
not the question directly posed by Belgium’s claim in the present casve :
Senegal has never been reproached with having committed, encouraged
or facilitated such crimes. With regard to the prohibition on torture, tvhe
Judgment states (para. 99) that it is part of customary law and that it has
even become a peremptory norm (jus cogens), but that is clearly a mere
obiter dictum, which the Court could have omitted without depriving its
reasoning of any vital element.
28. Nor did the Court have to decide whether customary law requires a
State to prosecute individuals suspected of having committed crimes of tvhe
kind that are alleged here when those persons have the nationality of thve
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6 CIJ1033.indb 115 28/11/13 12:50 478 obligation de poursuivvre ou d’extrader (op. invd. abraham)
lité de l’Etat en cause ou lorsque ces crimes ont été commisv sur le territoire
de cet Etat. M. Hissène Habré n’est pas sénégalais, et les crimes dont il est
soupçonné n’ont pas été commis au Sénégal. La questvion de l’existence en
droit coutumier d’une obligation faite aux Etats d’exercer une comvpétence
«territoriale» ou une compétence «personnelle active» aux fins de la répres-
sion des «crimes internationaux» n’était donc pas posée en l’espèce.
29. Pas davantage ne s’agissait-il de déterminer s’il existe une obvliga -
tion coutumière pour un Etat de conférer à ses juridictions unev « compé-
tence personnelle passive », c’est-à-dire un titre de compétence pour juger
les auteurs présumés de « crimes internationaux » lorsque la victime a la
nationalité de l’Etat en cause. La réponse est très probablevment négative:
même la convention contre la torture n’oblige pas les Etats partievs à se
doter d’une telle compétence, puisque l’article 5, paragraphe 1 c), ne pré -
voit son établissement que quand l’Etat partie « le juge approprié». Mais,
de toute façon, la question n’a pas été posée en l’espvèce.
30. Enfin, et ce point mérite particulièrement d’être souligné, la présente
affaire ne mettait pas la Cour dans la position d’avoir à décvider — en tout
cas pas directement — si le droit international coutumier permet à un Etat
de doter ses tribunaux d’une compétence universelle pour connaître de
crimes de guerre, de crimes contre l’humanité ou du crime de gévnocide. En
ce sens, elle se distingue du précédent RDC c. Belgique, dans lequel cette
question avait été soulevée par la demanderesse avant d’êvtre abandonnée
(affaire relative au Mandat d’arrêt du 11 avril 2000 (République démocratique
du Congo c. Belgique), arrêt, C.I.J. Recueil 2002, p. 3). En effet, la Belgique
ne reproche pas au Sénégal d’exercer une compétence pénalve universelle,
mais tout au contraire de ne pas l’exercer, alors que, selon la demanderesse,
il y serait tenu par le droit international. En conséquence, la questvion contro
versée de la licéité de la compétence universelle en droit ivnternational (voir
sur ce point, notamment, l’opinion individuelle du président Guillaume
jointe à l’arrêt en l’affaire du Mandat d’arrêt du 11 avril 2000 (République
démocratique du Congo c. Belgique), arrêt, C.I.J. Recueil 2002, p. 35) n’était
pas directement posée par la présente affaire. C’est seulemenvt si la Cour
avait conclu que le droit international obligeait les Etats à étabvlir leur com
pétence pénale universelle pour les catégories de crimes en quevstion qu’elle
aurait, a fortiori, statué dans le sens de la licéité d’une telle compétencve. En
revanche, si la Cour avait — examinant la question au fond — conclu
qu’aucune règle de droit coutumier n’oblige les Etats à se dvoter d’une com -
pétence pénale universelle, une telle conclusion eût laissé entière la question
(distincte) de la licéité de la compétence universelle.
31. La question à laquelle la Cour n’aurait pas pu éviter de répvondre
directement, eût-elle retenu sa compétence comme à mon avis ellve aurait
dû le faire, est donc la suivante : existe-t-il suffisamment d’éléments, tirés
de la pratique étatique et de l’opinio juris, permettant d’établir qu’il existe
à l’heure actuelle une obligation coutumière pour les Etats de poursuivre
devant leurs juridictions internes les personnes soupçonnées de crvimes de
guerre ou de crimes contre l’humanité (ce qui suppose qu’ils avient doté
leurs tribunaux de la compétence nécessaire à cette fin) lorvsqu’il n’existe
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State concerned, or when those crimes have been committed in that State’vs
territory. Mr. Hissène Habré is not Senegalese, and the crimes of which he
is suspected were not committed in Senegal. Thus the question of whetherv
there exists in customary law an obligation upon States to exercise “vterri-
torial” jurisdiction or “active personal” jurisdiction for the vpurposes of
punishing “international crimes” did not arise in the present casev.
29. Nor did the Court have to determine whether there exists a cus -
tomary obligation for a State to give its courts “passive personal juvrisdic-
tion”, that is to say, a title of jurisdiction enabling them to try tvhe alleged
perpetrators of “international crimes” when the victim has the natvionality
of the State concerned. The reply is very probably negative : even the
Convention against Torture does not require States parties to give them -
selves such “passive personal jurisdiction”, since Article 5 (1) (c) only
provides for such jurisdiction where the State party “considers it appro -
priate”. But in any event, the question did not arise in the present vcase.
30. Finally, and this point deserves particular mention, the present case
did not require the Court to determine — in any event not directly —
whether customary international law enables States to provide their courvts
with universal jurisdiction over war crimes, crimes against humanity andv
the crime of genocide. In that regard, it may be contrasted with theDRC v.
Belgium precedent, in which that issue was raised by the Applicant before
subsequently being dropped (case concerning the Arrest Warrant of
11 April 2000 (Democratic Republic of the Congo v. Belgium), Judgment,
I.C.J. Reports 2002, p. 3). In fact, Belgium does not reproach Senegal with
exercising universal criminal jurisdiction, but on the contrary with faivling to
exercise it, whereas, according to the Applicant, international law requvires
it do so. Consequently, the controversial issue of the legality of univevrsal
jurisdiction in international law (see on this point, in particular, the sepa -
rate opinion of President Guillaume appended to the Judgment in the casev
concerning the Arrest Warrant of 11 April 2000 (Democratic Republic of the
Congo v. Belgium), Judgment, I.C.J. Reports 2002, p. 35) did not arise
directly in the present case. Only if the Court had found that internativonal
law required States to establish universal criminal jurisdiction over thve cat -
egories of offences in question would it have ruled, a fortiori, in respect of
the legality of such jurisdiction. If, however, while examining the merits of
the case, the Court had found that there is no rule of customary law reqvuir -
ing States to give themselves universal criminal jurisdiction, such a fivnding
would have left entirely open the (separate) question of the legality vof uni -
versal jurisdiction.
31. The question which the Court could not have avoided answering
directly, had it accepted jurisdiction as I believe it should have done,v is
therefore the following : is there sufficient evidence, based on State prac -
tice and opinio juris, of a customary obligation for States to prosecute
before their domestic courts individuals suspected of war crimes or crimves
against humanity (which presupposes that they have provided their courtvs
with the necessary jurisdiction), when there is no connecting link betwveen
the alleged offence and the forum State, that is to say, when the offvence
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6 CIJ1033.indb 117 28/11/13 12:50 479 obligation de poursuivvre ou d’extrader (op. invd. abraham)
aucun lien de rattachement entre le crime allégué et l’Etat du for, c’est-
à-dire lorsque le crime a été commis hors du territoire de cet vEtat et que
ni l’auteur supposé ni les victimes ne sont des ressortissants de vcet Etat?
32. A cette question, la réponse est à mes yeux clairement et indiscutva -
blement négative, que le suspect se trouve ou non sur le territoire de l’Etat
considéré.
33. La Belgique, en réponse à la question émanant de la Cour, a cervtes
essayé de démontrer l’existence d’une telle obligation. Mais elle est très
loin d’y être parvenue.
34. Elle a, dans son document écrit produit en réponse à la questiovn
susmentionnée, fourni une liste d’Etats ayant introduit dans leur vlégislation
des dispositions conférant à leurs tribunaux une «compétence universelle»
pour connaître de crimes de guerre commis dans le cadre d’un conflvit non
international, ce qui est le cas de ceux dont M. Hissène Habré est accusé, et
de crimes contre l’humanité (ou de certains de ces crimes). Ellev en a dénom -
bré cinquante et un. Parmi ces Etats, certains subordonnent l’exercice de
cette compétence à la présence du suspect sur le territoire, d’vautres non,
mais la liste fournie ne fait pas la distinction entre les uns et les auvtres.
35. Quoi qu’il en soit, les données ainsi fournies sont très insuffivsantes
pour établir l’existence d’une obligation coutumière de pourvsuivre les
auteurs des crimes sur la base d’une compétence universelle, mêvme limitée
au cas où le suspect est présent sur le territoire de l’Etat covnsidéré.
Et cela pour trois raisons.
36. En premier lieu, les Etats considérés ne représentent qu’unev mino -
rité dans la société internationale, ce qui est en tout étatv de cause insuffi -
sant pour établir l’existence d’une règle coutumière univverselle.
37. En deuxième lieu, certains de ces Etats peuvent avoir adopté de
telles législations sur la base d’une certaine interprétation dve leurs obliga -
tions conventionnelles, par exemple celles résultant des conventions vrela-
tives au droit international humanitaire en ce qui concerne les crimes dve
guerre. Outre que cette interprétation n’est pas universellement pvartagée,
puisque les autres Etats parties auxdites conventions n’en ont pas fait de
même, une telle approche ne démontre pas l’existence d’une opinio juris,
c’est-à-dire de la conviction qu’il existe une obligation d’vétablir une
«compétence universelle» en dehors de tout engagement conventionnel.
38. En troisième lieu et enfin, certains Etats parmi les cinquante et un —
et sans doute un grand nombre — ont pu élargir la compétence de leurs
juridictions pour les crimes considérés sur la base d’un choix vpurement uni -
latéral et d’une décision souveraine, sans avoir en rien la crovyance qu’ils y
étaient tenus par une obligation internationale quelconque, pas plus vconven -
tionnelle que coutumière — mais seulement en étant convaincus que le droit
international le leur permettait. Là encore, l’« opinio juris » fait défaut.
39. Je prends l’exemple de la France, qui figure dans la « Liste des 51»,
et que je connais assez bien. Dans le domaine qui nous intéresse, ce vpays
n’a conféré à ses juridictions de compétence « universelle», c’est-à-dire
sans lien de rattachement avec le lieu de commission du crime ni la natio -
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was committed outside the territory of that State and neither the offevnder
nor the victim were nationals of that State ?
32. In my opinion, the answer to that question is very clearly and
indisputably no, regardless of whether or not the suspect is present in vthe
territory of the State in question.
33. Belgium, in response to the question put by the Court, did indeed
endeavour to demonstrate that such an obligation exists. However, it fell
far short of doing so.
34. In a written document produced in reply to the above-mentioned
question, Belgium supplied a list of States having incorporated into thevir
domestic law provisions giving their courts “universal jurisdiction”v to try
war crimes committed in the course of a non-international conflict, which
is the case of the crimes of which Mr. Habré is accused, and crimes against
humanity (or certain of those crimes). It found a total of 51. Among
those States, some of them make the exercise of such jurisdiction subjecvt
to the presence of the suspect in their territory, while others do not, vbut
the list draws no distinction between the two cases.
35. Nevertheless, the information thus provided is quite insufficient to
establish the existence of a customary obligation to prosecute the perpev -
trators of such crimes on the basis of universal jurisdiction, even whenv
limited to the case where the suspect is present in the territory of thev State
concerned.
And this is for three reasons.
36. In the first place, the States in question represent only a minority
within the international community, which is in any event insufficient vto
establish the existence of a universal customary rule.
37. Secondly, some of those States may have adopted such legislation
on the basis of a particular interpretation of their conventional obliga -
tions, for example those under conventions of international humanitarianv
law regarding war crimes. Apart from the fact that such an interpretatiovn
is not universally shared, since other States parties to the same convenv -
tions have not taken similar action, such an approach does not demon -
strate the existence of an opinio juris, that is to say, a belief that there
exists an obligation to establish “universal jurisdiction” outsidev of any
conventional obligations.
38. Thirdly and finally, certain States among the 51 — and probably
many of them — may have decided to extend the jurisdiction of their
courts over the crimes in question on the basis of a purely unilateral
choice and sovereign decision, without in any sense believing that they v
were required to do so by some international obligation, whether conven -
tional or customary — but solely in the belief that international law
entitled them to do so. Here again, the “opinio juris” is lacking.
39. Let me take France, for example, which is included in the “List of
51”, and with which I am well acquainted. In the area which interestsv us
here, France has only given its courts “universal” jurisdiction, tvhat is to
say, without any link to where the crime was committed or to the nation -
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6 CIJ1033.indb 119 28/11/13 12:50 480 obligation de poursuivvre ou d’extrader (op. invd. abraham)
nalité de l’auteur et de la victime, que dans trois cas : 1) pour les actes de
torture; 2) pour les crimes entrant dans le champ de compétence du Tri -
bunal pénal international pour l’ex-Yougoslavie (TPIY) et du Trivbunal
pénal international pour le Rwanda (TPIR) ; 3) pour les crimes relevant
de la compétence de la Cour pénale internationale (CPI) si l’vauteur pré -
sumé réside habituellement en France. Dans le premier cas, la Franvce a
agi selon ses obligations conventionnelles découlant de sa qualité de par -
tie à la convention contre la torture. Dans les deux autres, elle a avdopté
ces dispositions par un choix souverain, sans penser pour elle-même — ni
affirmer pour les autres — que les Etats étaient tenus de faire ainsi.
Sa présence sur la liste dressée par la Belgique, sans être errvonée, ne
milite donc pas pour la reconnaissance d’une obligation coutumière inter -
nationale — et l’on pourrait en dire de même, sans nul doute, pour bien
d’autres Etats.
40. La Belgique elle-même, à l’heure actuelle, ne prétend plus evxercer, de
façon générale, une compétence universelle à l’égarvd des «crimes interna -
tionaux». Depuis que, par la loi du 5 août 2003, elle a profondément mod-i
fié les dispositions de son code de procédure pénale relatives à la compétence
de ses tribunaux, la Belgique ne confère plus à ceux-ci une compévtence uni -
verselle en matière de crimes de guerre et de crimes contre l’humavnité, en
dehors des cas où elle serait tenue de le faire par une obligation juridique
internationale; elle exige, en principe, un lien de rattachement territorial ou
personnel entre le crime allégué et elle-même, lien qui doit novrmalement
exister à la date du crime, ou, à tout le moins, que le suspect aivt sa résidence
principale sur le territoire du royaume. Si les juridictions belges continuent à
instruire les plaintes contre M. Hissène Habré à raison des faits autres que
ceux qui sont susceptibles d’être qualifiés d’actes de torvture, c’est parce que
ces plaintes ont été formées à une époque où la légvislation belge comportait
la compétence universelle, et en raison des dispositions transitoiresv de la loi
du 5 août 2003 qui, tout en supprimant presque entièrement pour l’avenir la
compétence universelle, a prévu que certaines des procédures env cours, enga -
gées sur la base de la législation antérieure, ne seraient pas vatteintes par cette
suppression.
*
* *
41. En conclusion, je suis convaincu que les demandes présentées à la
Cour par la Belgique sur la base du droit international coutumier étaient,
en tout état de cause, vouées à l’échec.
La Belgique n’a donc pas été privée, par le refus de la Courv d’admettre
sa compétence à cet égard, d’un succès qu’elle n’était de toute façon pas
en mesure de remporter.
(Signé) Ronny Abraham.
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6 CIJ1033.indb 120 28/11/13 12:50 obligation to prosecuvte or extradite (sep. opv. abraham) 480
ality of the perpetrator or the victim, in three instances : (1) for acts of
torture; (2) for crimes covered by the jurisdiction of the International
Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) and the Interna -
tional Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) ; and (3) for crimes within
the jurisdiction of the International Criminal Court (ICC) if the allevged
offender usually resides in France. In the first case, France acted vin accor -
dance with its conventional obligations deriving from its status as partvy
to the Convention against Torture. In the other two cases it adopted
those provisions of its own free and sovereign choice, without considerivng
as far as it was itself concerned — or asserting in relation to others —
that States were required to do so.
The presence of France on the list prepared by Belgium, while not
erroneous, is thus not an argument for the recognition of a customary
international obligation, and doubtless the same could be said for many v
of the other States on the list.
40. Belgium itself at present no longer claims that it exercises universal
jurisdiction, as a general rule, over “international crimes”. Since the pro -
visions of its Code of Criminal Procedure relating to the jurisdiction ovf its
courts were radically modified by the Law of 5 August 2003, Belgium no
longer provides those courts with jurisdiction over war crimes and crimevs
against humanity, except in those cases where it is required to do so unvder
an international legal obligation ; in principle, it requires a territorial or
personal connection between the alleged crime and itself, a link which
must normally exist on the date of the crime or, at the very least, thatv the
suspect should have his principal residence in the territory of the Kingv -
dom. The reason why the Belgian courts continue to investigate the com -
plaints against Mr. Hissène Habré regarding acts other than those which
could be characterized as acts of torture is that those complaints were v
made at a time when Belgian legislation did provide for universal jurisdvic -
tion, and because of the transitional provisions of the Law of
5 August 2003 ; while withdrawing universal jurisdiction almost com -
pletely for the future, the latter provided that certain pending proceedvings
which had been instituted on the basis of the previous legislation wouldv
not be affected by that withdrawal.
*
* *
41. In conclusion, I am sure that the claims submitted to the Court by
Belgium on the basis of customary international law were, in any event, v
bound to fail.
The Court’s refusal to find that it has jurisdiction in that regardv has
therefore not deprived Belgium of a success which, in any case, it couldv
not have obtained.
(Signed) Ronny Abraham.
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6 CIJ1033.indb 121 28/11/13 12:50
Separate opinion of Judge Abraham