Kosovo before the International Court of Justice: The advisory opinion of 22 july 2010

Abstract

The relevance of the Advisory Opinion of the International Court of Justice of 22 July 2010 rests in its affirmation that the principle of territorial integrity is applicable only to relations between States, and therefore is not applicable to internal situations such as the secession of part of a State. The International Court of Justice considers that the illegality of declarations of independence thus stemmed not from the unilateral character of these declarations as such, but from the fact that they were, or would have been, connected with the unlawful use of force or other egregious norms of general international law, in particular those of a peremptory character (jus cogens). This circumstance has to be appreciated by the Security Council of the United Nations. Taking into account the political character of the body which made that appraisal, and the possible practice of the right of veto of its permanent members, that means that states who have problems of separatism could have been left unprotected.