Context: Recently, the International Court of Justice (ICJ) refused an appeal by Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, and the United Arab Emirates (UAE) which challenged the authority of the International Civil Aviation Organisation (ICAO) to adjudicate on the legality of the Qatar blockade.

• ICJ is the top united nations court and ICAO is the international aviation agency of the UN.
• UAE, Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, and Qatar are located in the Persian Gulf Region and are the members of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC).

Key Points
Qatar Blockade:

• In June 2017, Qatar’s neighboring Arab nations of Saudi Arabia, UAE, Bahrain and Egypt shut off shipping routes and air space with Qatar for its alleged support for terrorism and its ties with Iran.
• It severed their diplomatic and economic ties with Qatar.
• However, Qatar denied supporting Islamic extremism and has openly condemned its isolation as a clear attack on its sovereignty.
• All four neighbors issued a 13-point list of demands for Doha (capital of Qatar) to comply with in order to restore erstwhile relations.
• Some of the demands included Qatar closing down news outlets such as Al-Jazeera, end ties with radical Islamist groups like the Muslim Brotherhood, scale down ties with Shia-majority Iran and remove Turkish troops stationed in the country.

Since 2017, the blockade of Qatar has included:

• Closing of its only land border with Saudi Arabia.
• Stopping Qatari ships from entering ports anywhere in the Saudi coalition.
• Blocking Qatari planes from flying in their airspace.
• Expelling Qatari citizens from these countries as part of the measures.

The dispute at the ICJ

• Qatar approached the ICAO, alleging that its rights of free passage under the 1944 Convention on Civil Aviation were violated by the blockade.
• Saudi Arabia and its allies argued that the ICJ should have the authority to settle the dispute instead of the ICAO because the dispute goes beyond the aviation matters.
• In 2018, the ICAO ruled against the Saudi coalition, holding that it did have jurisdiction to hear the case and its ruling was recently backed by the ICJ too.
• The blockade still remains in force and the ICAO is expected to deliver its verdict in 2021. The ruling will be in Qatar’s favour and will be a major win for the country and its national carrier Qatar Airways.

About International Civil Aviation Organisation

• It is a UN specialized agency under UN Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC).
• It was established by the Convention on International Civil Aviation which was signed on 7th December 1944 in Chicago.
• It laid for the foundation for the standards and procedures for peaceful global air navigation and established the core principles permitting international transport by air.
• Objective: To foster the planning and development of international air transport so as to ensure the safe and orderly growth of international civil aviation throughout the world.
• It is headquartered at Montreal, Canada.
• It has total 196 member countries including India.
• Every year 7 December is celebrated as international civil aviation day by ICAO.

About International Court of Justice

• It is the principal judicial organ of the United Nations (UN).
• It was established in June 1945 by the Charter of the United Nations and began work in 1946.
• The Court is located at Hague (Netherlands). Of the six principal organs of the United Nations, it is the only one not located in New York (United States of America).
• All 193 UN members are automatically parties to the Court’s statute. Non-UN members may also become parties to the Court’s statute.
• Its judgments have binding force and are without appeal for the parties concerned. Though there is no way ICJ can enforce its decisions. However, United Nations Security Council can compel the states to follow the ICJ’s ruling.
• The President and Vice-President are elected by the Members of the Court every three years by secret ballot.

Composition

• The Court is composed of 15 judges, who are elected for nine years.
• 15 judges are distributed as per the regions: three from Africa, two from Latin America and Caribbean, three from Asia, five from Western Europe and other states and two from Eastern Europe.

Role of the court

• To settle legal disputes submitted to it by States and to give advisory opinions on legal questions referred to it by authorized United Nations organs.
• It has no jurisdiction to deal with applications from individuals, non-governmental organizations, corporations or any other private entity. It or help them in their dealings with national authorities.
• ICJ is not a supreme court to which national courts can turn. It is not an appeal court for any international tribunal.

Who nominates the ICJ judge candidates?

• Every country, party to the UN Charter, designates a group who propose candidates for the office of ICJ judges. This group includes four members/jurists of the Permanent Court of Arbitration, two of whom could be of their nationality. After that, voting in UN General Assembly and the UN Security Council occurs to select judges.

What differentiates the ICJ from the International Criminal Court and the ad hoc international criminal tribunals?

• ICJ has no jurisdiction to try individuals accused of war crimes or crimes against humanity.
• This task of hearing proceedings of war crimes is done by national courts, the ad hoc criminal tribunals established by the United Nations (such as the International Residual Mechanism for Criminal Tribunals (IRMCT) to take over residual functions from the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) and Rwanda (ICTR)).

How does the International Court of Justice differ from other international courts?

• The ICJ differs from the Court of Justice of the European Union (based in Luxembourg), whose role is to interpret European Community legislation uniformly and also differ from the Inter-American Court of Human Rights (in Costa Rica), which deal with allegations of violations of the human rights conventions under which they were set up.
• The jurisdiction of the ICJ is general and thereby differs from that of specialist international tribunals, such as the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea (ITLOS).