1954 International Court of Justice judges election

Last updated January 22, 2024

The 1954 International Court of Justice election took place on 7 October 1954 at the Headquarters of the United Nations in New York. In the set of triennial elections, the General Assembly and the Security Council concurrently elect five judges to the Court for nine-year terms, in this case beginning on 6 February 1955. In this particular case, a sixth vacancy was to be filled due to the death of one of the judges.

Background

The International Court of Justice (ICJ), based in The Hague, is one of the principal organs of the United Nations. Also known as the World Court, it adjudicates legal disputes between states, and provides advisory opinions on legal questions submitted by other UN organs or agencies.

The court consists of 15 judges, with five judges elected every three years. (In the case of death or other vacancy, a judge is elected for the remainder of the term.) Judges are required to be independent and impartial; they may not exercise any political or administrative function, and do not act as a representative of their home state.

Elections of members of the Court are governed by articles 2 through 15 of the Statute of the International Court of Justice.

The previous full election was held in 1951.

On 27 November 1953, an election was held in order to fill the occasional vacancy following the resignation of the Soviet judge Sergei Golunsky. In a nearly unanimous vote, Fyodor Kozhevnikov, also of USSR, was elected for the remainder of Golunsky's term.^[1]^[2]

On 30 November 1953, the Indian judge B.N. Rau died. The election to fill this occasional vacancy was scheduled to coincide with the regular 1954 election of five members.

The composition of the Court prior to the 1954 elections was thus as follows:

Judge	Term starts / renewed	Term ends
Vacancy - Benegal Narsing Rau (India)	1952	1961; died 1953
Alejandro Álvarez (Chile)	1946	1955
Jules Basdevant (France)	1946	1955
Jose Gustavo Guerrero (El Salvador)	1946	1955
Arnold McNair (United Kingdom)	1946	1955
Levi Carneiro (Brazil)	1952 ^[3]	1955
Abdel Hamid Badawi Pasha (Egypt)	1946, 1949	1958
Hsu Mo (Republic of China)^[4]	1946, 1949	1958
John Read (Canada)	1946, 1949	1958
Bohdan Winiarski (Poland)	1946, 1949	1958
Milovan Zoričić (Yugoslavia)	1946, 1949	1958
Enrique Armand-Ugón (Uruguay)	1952	1961
Green Hackworth (United States)	1946, 1952	1961
Helge Klæstad (Norway)	1946, 1952	1961
Fyodor Ivanovich Kozhevnikov (USSR)	1953 ^[3]	1961

Accordingly, the 1954 election saw the seat of the deceased Judge Rau to be filled as an occasional vacancy for the remainder of his term, and, technically in a separate election, the seats of Judges Álvarez, Basdevant, Guerrero, McNair and Carneiro were to be contested.

Election procedure

The General Assembly and the Security Council proceed, independently of one another, to elect five members of the Court (or one member, if the election is held in order to fill an occasional vacancy).

To be elected, a candidate must obtain an absolute majority of votes both in the General Assembly and in the Security Council. At the time, 32 votes constituted an absolute majority in the General Assembly and 6 votes constituted an absolute majority in the Security Council (with no distinction being made between permanent and non-permanent members of the Security Council).

When five candidates have obtained the required majority in one of the organs, the president of that organ notifies the president of the other organ of the names of the five candidates. The president of the latter does not communicate such names to the members of that organ until that organ itself has given five candidates the required majority of votes.

After both the General Assembly and the Security Council have produced a list of five names that received an absolute majority of the votes, the two lists are compared. Any candidate appearing on both lists is elected. But if fewer than five candidates have been thus elected, the two organs proceed, again independently of one another, at a second meeting and, if necessary, a third meeting to elect candidates by further ballots for seats remaining vacant, the results again being compared after the required number of candidates have obtained an absolute majority in each organ.

If after the third meeting, one or more seats still remain unfilled, the General Assembly and the Security Council may form a joint conference consisting of six members, three appointed by each organ, in order to elect a candidate to fill the remaining seat(s). This option had never been used prior to the 1954 elections, and would never be used up to now.

Candidates

Qualifications

Article 2 of the Statute of the International Court of Justice provides that judges shall be elected "from among persons of high moral character, who possess the qualifications required in their respective countries for appointment to the highest judicial offices, or are jurisconsults of recognized competence in international law".

Nomination procedure

All States parties to the Statute of the ICJ had the right to propose candidates. Nominations of candidates for election to the ICJ are made by a group consisting of the members of the Permanent Court of Arbitration (PCA), designated by that State. For this purpose, members of the PCA act in "national groups" (i.e. all the PCA members from any individual state). (In the case of UN member states not represented in the PCA, the state in question may select up to four individuals to be its "national group" for the purpose of nominating candidates to the ICJ). Every such "national group" may nominate up to four candidates, not more than two of whom shall be of their own nationality. Before making these nominations, each "national group" is recommended to consult its highest court of justice, its legal faculties and schools of law, and its national academies and national sections of international academies devoted to the study of law.

1954 nominees

For the occasional vacancy

The following candidates were nominated for the election in order to fill the seat of the deceased Judge Rau of India: ^[5]

Candidates	Nominating national groups
Ernst S.B. Colov (Denmark)	Denmark
Ramón Ernesto Cruz Uclés (Honduras)	Honduras
Thomas Frølund (Denmark)	Denmark
Luis Garrido Díaz [es] (Mexico)	Honduras
Fernando Lara Bustamante [es] (Costa Rica)	Costa Rica
Juan Bautista de Lavalle y García [es] (Peru)	Peru
Ahmad Matin-Daftari (Iran)	Iran
Edgar Odio González (Costa Rica)	Costa Rica
Radhabinod Pal (India)	Bolivia, Ecuador, Egypt, India, Liechtenstein, Mexico, Peru, Switzerland, United Kingdom, United States, Yugoslavia
Myint Thein (Burma)	Yugoslavia; withdrew
Charles de Visscher (Belgium)	Egypt, France, Luxembourg, Mexico, Netherlands, Norway, Yugoslavia
Muhammad Zafarullah Khan (Pakistan)	United States

For the five regular seats

The following candidates were nominated for the election: ^[6]

Candidates	Nominating national groups
Hildebrando Pompeu Pinto Accioli (Brazil)	Brazil
Ricardo J. Alfaro (Panama)	Bolivia, Brazil, Cuba, Haiti, Panama, Peru
Jules Basdevant (France)	Belgium, Brazil, Canada, France, Egypt, Greece, Japan, Lebanon, Liechtenstein, Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Pakistan, Switzerland, United Kingdom, United States, Yugoslavia
Choucri Cardahi [fr]	Lebanon
Ramon Carmona (Venezuela)	Venezuela
Ernst S.B. Colov (Denmark)	Denmark
Roberto Córdova (Mexico)	Argentina, Brazil, Republic of China, Cuba, Ecuador, Egypt, Haiti, Honduras, Mexico, Netherlands, Nicaragua, Panama, Peru, Philippines, Sweden, Thailand, Turkey, Venezuela, Yugoslavia
Thomas Frølund (Denmark)	Denmark
Jose Gustavo Guerrero (El Salvador)	Republic of China, Cuba, El Salvador, Greece, Haiti, Honduras, Japan, Liechtenstein, Mexico, New Zealand, Nicaragua, Paraguay, Thailand, Turkey, United Kingdom, United States
Shigeru Kuriyama [jp] (Japan)	Republic of China, Iran, Japan, United States
Hersch Lauterpacht (United Kingdom)	Belgium, Canada, New Zealand, United Kingdom, United States
George Maridakis [gr] (Greece)	Greece
Ahmad Matin-Daftari (Iran)	Iran
Arnold McNair (United Kingdom)	France, Japan, Lebanon, Liechtenstein, Netherlands, Norway, Sweden, Switzerland, Yugoslavia; withdrew
Lucio Moreno Quintana (Argentina)	Argentina, Bolivia, Republic of China, Ecuador, Egypt, Haiti, Honduras, Mexico, Nicaragua, Paraguay, Peru, Venezuela, Yugoslavia
Ricardo Paras	Philippines
Sture Petrén [sv] [de] (Sweden)	Sweden
Eduardo Plaza (Venezuela)	Venezuela
Seni Pramoj (Thailand)	Thailand
Henri Rolin (Belgium)	Denmark, Iran, Panama
Raúl Sapena Pastor (Paraguay)	Argentina, Bolivia, Ecuador, El Salvador, Honduras, Paraguay, Peru
Georges Sausser-Hall (Switzerland)	Belgium, France, Liechtenstein, Sweden, Switzerland
Jean Spiropoulos (Greece)	Greece
Phya Ladpli Thamaprakhan (Thailand)	Thailand
Pedro Tuason (Philippines)	Philippines
Modesto Valle (Nicaragua)	Nicaragua
Jan Hendrik Willem Verzijl [nl] (Netherlands)	Netherlands
Charles de Visscher (Belgium)	Belgium, Canada, Denmark, France, New Zealand, Norway, Switzerland, United Kingdom
Homero Viteri Lafronte (Ecuador)	Ecuador
Muhammad Zafarullah Khan (Pakistan)	Canada, Egypt, Lebanon, Pakistan

Results

Filling the occasional vacancy

Candidates that did not receive a single vote in either the General Assembly or the Security Council are not listed.

Candidates	General Assembly^[7] majority = 33		Security Council^[8] majority = 6
Radhabinod Pal (India)	32	29	5
Muhammad Zafarullah Khan (Pakistan)	30	33	6

Zafarullah Khan was thus elected to fill the seat that became vacant due to the death of B.N.Rau. This was a departure from the experience of the two previous elections held in order to fill occasional vacancies, whereby the seats were filled by judges of the same nationality as the one of the judge having deceased or resigned. On the other hand, the informal rule was confirmed to the effect that the vacant seat is to be filled by a judge at least from the same region as the one who had vacated the seat (note the large number of candidates from outside Asia who received zero votes at the election).

Filling regular seats

Candidates that did not receive a single vote in either the General Assembly or the Security Council are not listed.

Candidates	General Assembly^[9] majority = 33	Security Council^[10] majority = 6
Hildebrando Pompeu Pinto Accioli (Brazil)	0	0
Ricardo J. Alfaro (Panama)	21	1
Jules Basdevant (France)	40	10
Choucri Cardahi [fr]	1	0
Ramon Carmona (Venezuela)	1	0
Ernst S.B. Colov (Denmark)	0	0
Roberto Córdova (Mexico)	41	8
Thomas Frølund (Denmark)	0	0
Jose Gustavo Guerrero (El Salvador)	41	7
Shigeru Kuriyama [jp] (Japan)	16	2
Hersch Lauterpacht (United Kingdom)	39	9
George Maridakis [gr] (Greece)	0	0
Ahmad Matin-Daftari (Iran)	2	0
Arnold McNair (United Kingdom)	1	0
Lucio Moreno Quintana (Argentina)	36	7
Ricardo Paras	2	0
Sture Petrén [sv] [de] (Sweden)	0	0
Eduardo Plaza (Venezuela)	0	0
Seni Pramoj (Thailand)	1	0
Henri Rolin (Belgium)	5	0
Raúl Sapena Pastor (Paraguay)	21	1
Georges Sausser-Hall (Switzerland)	10	1
Jean Spiropoulos (Greece)	0	0
Phya Ladpli Thamaprakhan (Thailand)	1	0
Pedro Tuason (Philippines)	1	0
Modesto Valle (Nicaragua)	0	0
Jan Hendrik Willem Verzijl [nl] (Netherlands)	0	0
Charles de Visscher (Belgium)	19	6
Homero Viteri Lafronte (Ecuador)	2	0
Muhammad Zafarullah Khan (Pakistan)	-	-

Despite a large number of candidates (which still was lower than at any previous election), the election was relatively uneventful: the same five candidates obtained an absolute majority of votes in the first round of voting in both the General Assembly and the Security Council. They were declared elected to the Court, without a need for further rounds of voting.

Aftermath

The composition of the Court following the election was as follows:

Judge	Term starts / renewed	Term ends
Abdel Hamid Badawi Pasha (Egypt)	1946, 1949	1958
Hsu Mo (Republic of China)^[4]	1946, 1949	1958
John Read (Canada)	1946, 1949	1958
Bohdan Winiarski (Poland)	1946, 1949	1958
Milovan Zoričić (Yugoslavia)	1946, 1949	1958
Enrique Armand-Ugón (Uruguay)	1952	1961
Green Hackworth (United States)	1946, 1952	1961
Helge Klæstad (Norway)	1946, 1952	1961
Fyodor Ivanovich Kozhevnikov (USSR)	1953^[3]	1961
Muhammad Zafarullah Khan (Pakistan)	1954^[3]	1961
Jules Basdevant (France)	1946, 1955	1964
Jose Gustavo Guerrero (El Salvador)	1946, 1955	1964
Lucio Moreno Quintana (Argentina)	1955	1964
Hersch Lauterpacht (United Kingdom)	1955	1964
Roberto Córdova (Mexico)	1955	1964

The seats of Judges Badawi Pasha, Hsu, Read, Winiarski and Zoričić were to be contested at the 1957 election. However, following the death of Judge Hsu in June 1956, an election to fill the occasional vacancy was held in December 1956.

Related Research Articles

Abdul Gadire Koroma is a Sierra Leonean jurist. He was the ambassador of Sierra Leone to the United Nations between 1981 and 1985. He served two terms as judge at the International Court of Justice.

United Nations Security Council Resolution 1926, adopted unanimously on June 2, 2010, after noting the resignation of International Court of Justice (ICJ) judge Thomas Buergenthal with effect from September 6, 2010. The Council decided that the election to fill the vacancy would take place on September 9, 2010 at a meeting of the Security Council and at a meeting of the General Assembly.

Joan E. Donoghue is an American lawyer, international legal scholar, former U.S. State Department official, and the current president of the International Court of Justice (ICJ). She was first elected to the court in 2010, re-elected in 2014, and elected by the ICJ judges to be president of the ICJ in 2021. She is the third woman to be elected to the ICJ and the first American woman elected as president of the Court.

The 2011 United Nations Security Council election was held on 21 and 24 October 2011 during the Sixty-sixth session of the United Nations General Assembly, held at United Nations Headquarters in New York City. The General Assembly elected Azerbaijan, Guatemala, Morocco, Pakistan, and Togo, as the five new non-permanent members of the UN Security Council for two-year mandates commencing on 1 January 2012. Azerbaijan was elected after 17 rounds on 24 October, while the other four new members were chosen on 21 October.

Julia Sebutinde is a Ugandan judge serving her second term on the International Court of Justice following her re-election on November 12, 2020. She also is the current chancellor of Muteesa I Royal University, a university owned by Buganda kingdom. She has been a judge on the court since March 2012. She is the first African woman to sit on the ICJ. Before being elected to the ICJ, Sebutinde was a judge of the Special Court for Sierra Leone. She was appointed to that position in 2007.

The 1997 United Nations Security Council election was held on 14 October 1997 at United Nations Headquarters in New York City during the 52nd session of the United Nations General Assembly. The General Assembly elected five non-permanent members of the UN Security Council for two-year terms commencing on 1 January 1998.

The 2011 International Court of Justice election began on 10 November 2011 at United Nations Headquarters in New York City. In the set of triennial elections, the General Assembly and the Security Council concurrently elect five judges to the Court for nine-year terms, in this case beginning on 6 February 2012. From the eight candidates, the five winners were Giorgio Gaja (Italy), Hisashi Owada (Japan), Peter Tomka (Slovakia), Xue Hanqin (China) and Julia Sebutinde (Uganda).

The 1999 United Nations Security Council election was held on 14 October 1999 during the Fifty-fourth session of the United Nations General Assembly, held at United Nations Headquarters in New York City. The General Assembly elected Bangladesh, Jamaica, Mali, Tunisia, and Ukraine, as the five new non-permanent members of the UN Security Council for two-year mandates commencing on 1 January 2000. Notably, Ukraine was elected to the Council for the first time as an independent nation.

The 1979 United Nations Security Council election was held from 26 October 1979 to 7 January 1980 during the Thirty-fourth session of the United Nations General Assembly, held at United Nations Headquarters in New York City. The General Assembly elected East Germany, Mexico, Niger, the Philippines, and Tunisia, as the five new non-permanent members of the UN Security Council for two-year mandates commencing January 1980. Taking 155 rounds of voting to resolve, it remains the longest Security Council election in history. Additionally, this was the first time Niger was elected and the only time East Germany was elected member of the Council.

The 2014 International Court of Justice election began on 6 November 2014 at United Nations Headquarters in New York City. In the set of triennial elections, the General Assembly and the Security Council concurrently elect five judges to the Court for nine-year terms, in this case beginning on 6 February 2015.

The 1963 United Nations Security Council election was held on 18 October, 30 October, and 1 November during the eighteenth session of the United Nations General Assembly, held at United Nations Headquarters in New York City. The General Assembly elected four members through consultation of the president, as non-permanent members of the UN Security Council for two-year mandates commencing on 1 January 1964.

The 2017 International Court of Justice election took place from 9 to 20 November 2017 at the United Nations Headquarters in New York City. In the set of triennial elections, the General Assembly and the Security Council concurrently elect five judges to the Court for nine-year terms, in this case beginning on 6 February 2018. From the seven candidates, the five winners were Abdulqawi Yusuf (Somalia), Antônio Augusto Cançado Trindade (Brazil), Nawaf Salam (Lebanon), Ronny Abraham (France) and Dalveer Bhandari (India).

The 2020 International Court of Justice election were held on 11 and 12 November 2020 at the United Nations Headquarters in New York City. In the set of triennial elections, the General Assembly and the Security Council concurrently elect five judges to the Court for nine-year terms, in this case beginning on 6 February 2021. From the eight candidates, Yuji Iwasawa (Japan), Xue Hanqin (China), Peter Tomka (Slovakia), Julia Sebutinde (Uganda), and Georg Nolte (Germany) have been elected members of the International Court of Justice for a term of office of nine years, as both the Security Council and the General Assembly have agreed on the same candidates.

The 2018 International Court of Justice election was held on 22 June 2018 at the United Nations Headquarters in New York City. The General Assembly and the Security Council concurrently elected Yuji Iwasawa (Japan) to the International Court of Justice until 5 February 2021. He served the remainder of the nine-year term of office that had been held by Hisashi Owada (Japan), whose resignation from the Court took effect on 7 June 2018.

The 2021 International Court of Justice election was held on 5 November 2021 at the United Nations Headquarters in New York City. The General Assembly and the Security Council concurrently elected Hilary Charlesworth (Australia) to the International Court of Justice for remainder of the nine-year term of office that had been held by Judge James Crawford (Australia).

The 2022 International Court of Justice election was held on 4 November 2022 at the United Nations Headquarters in New York City. The General Assembly and the Security Council concurrently elected Leonardo Nemer Caldeira Brant for remainder of the nine-year term of office that had been held by Judge Antônio Cançado Trindade, who died in May, 2022.

The 2023 International Court of Justice election was held on 9 November 2023 at the United Nations Headquarters in New York City. In the set of triennial elections, the General Assembly and the Security Council concurrently elect five judges to the Court for nine-year terms.

The 1946 International Court of Justice election took place on 6 February 1946 in Westminster Central Hall, London. This was the first ever election of Judges of the Court, one the six "principal organs" of the newly created United Nations. All 15 seats were to be filled.

The 1948 International Court of Justice election took place on 22 October 1948 in the Palais de Chaillot, Paris. This was the second ever election of Judges of the Court, one the six "principal organs" of the United Nations, and the first one to be held in order to fill five judges' seats. It thus launched the pattern of triennial elections whereby the General Assembly and the Security Council concurrently elect five judges to the Court for nine-year terms, in this case beginning on 6 February 1949.

The 1951 International Court of Justice election took place on 6 December 1951 at the Palais de Chaillot, Paris. This was the third election of Judges of the Court, one the six "principal organs", and the second one to be held in order to fill five judges' seats. It thus continued the pattern of triennial elections whereby the General Assembly and the Security Council concurrently elect five judges to the Court for nine-year terms, in this case beginning on 6 February 1952.

References

↑ "UN document A/PV.458. General Assembly. 458th plenary meeting". United Nations.
↑ "UN document S/PV.644. Security Council. Official records. 644th meeting". United Nations.
1 2 3 4 Elected to fill an occasional vacancy
1 2 The Chinese seat at the UN was at the time occupied by the Taiwan-based Republic of China. For details, see here
↑ "UN document A/2668-S/3270. Election of a member of the International Court of Justice: list of candidates nominated by the national groups". United Nations.
↑ "UN document A/2695-S/3281. Election of members of the International Court of Justice: list of candidates nominated by the national groups". United Nations.
↑ "UN document A/PV.493. General Assembly. 493rd plenary meeting". United Nations.
↑ "UN document S/PV.681. Security Council. Official records. 681st meeting". United Nations.
↑ "UN document A/PV.493. General Assembly. 493rd plenary meeting". United Nations.
↑ "UN document S/PV.681. Security Council. Official records. 681st meeting". United Nations.

This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.

[1] "UN document A/PV.458. General Assembly. 458th plenary meeting". United Nations.

[2] "UN document S/PV.644. Security Council. Official records. 644th meeting". United Nations.

[Occasional-3] 1 2 3 4 Elected to fill an occasional vacancy

[China-4] 1 2 The Chinese seat at the UN was at the time occupied by the Taiwan-based Republic of China. For details, see here

[5] "UN document A/2668-S/3270. Election of a member of the International Court of Justice: list of candidates nominated by the national groups". United Nations.

[6] "UN document A/2695-S/3281. Election of members of the International Court of Justice: list of candidates nominated by the national groups". United Nations.

[7] "UN document A/PV.493. General Assembly. 493rd plenary meeting". United Nations.

[8] "UN document S/PV.681. Security Council. Official records. 681st meeting". United Nations.

[9] "UN document A/PV.493. General Assembly. 493rd plenary meeting". United Nations.

[10] "UN document S/PV.681. Security Council. Official records. 681st meeting". United Nations.

[1]

[2]

[3]

[4]

[5]

[6]

[7]

[8]

[9]

[10]