Use Of Force Cases
Exceptions to the Prohibition of the USE OF FORCE
Corfu Channel Case 1949
ICJ Superpower interventions Nicaragua Case 1986
The Nicaragua (Merits) case gave the ICJ an unprecedented opportunity to explore the law governing the use of armed force and intervention by states and to do so in the area in which it was most in need for clarification, namely that in which State A gives assistance to rebels seeking to overthrow the government of State D or, conversely, the government of State D to defeat rebels against it.
INDIRECT USE OF FORCE
The case confirms that the giving of assistance to rebels may be an indirect use of force contrary to customary IN law. Everything turns upon the kind of assistance.
The Court held that the US had infringed the rule prohibiting the threat or use of force by ‘the arming and training of the contras’, but that it had not done so by ‘the mere supply of funds’.
Since the whole of the Setion on the Principle of the Use of Force in the 1970 Declaration was accepted by the Court as amplifying the customary rule other forms of assistance within that Section’s very general language can probably be taken to have been understood by it as involving the illegal use of force too.
Thus the establishment, organisation or control (there comes a point where the intervening state’s control over a rebel force is so complete that the latter becomes an arm of the former so that its acts are imputable to that state) of a rebel force or the giving of material support (e.g. logistic support, bases) would also qualify.
Whereas financial assistance is not a direct use of force, it is nonetheless contrary to IN law as intervention in another state’s affairs.
Humanitarian intervention, however, whether financial or otherwise (blankets, foods, etc.) is perfectly lawful – provided that it is given equally to rebels and others in the community in need.
In the case, the Court did consider and reject the idea that there was a right of intervention (to the level
Corfu Channel Case 1949
ICJ Superpower interventions Nicaragua Case 1986
The Nicaragua (Merits) case gave the ICJ an unprecedented opportunity to explore the law governing the use of armed force and intervention by states and to do so in the area in which it was most in need for clarification, namely that in which State A gives assistance to rebels seeking to overthrow the government of State D or, conversely, the government of State D to defeat rebels against it.
INDIRECT USE OF FORCE
The case confirms that the giving of assistance to rebels may be an indirect use of force contrary to customary IN law. Everything turns upon the kind of assistance.
The Court held that the US had infringed the rule prohibiting the threat or use of force by ‘the arming and training of the contras’, but that it had not done so by ‘the mere supply of funds’.
Since the whole of the Setion on the Principle of the Use of Force in the 1970 Declaration was accepted by the Court as amplifying the customary rule other forms of assistance within that Section’s very general language can probably be taken to have been understood by it as involving the illegal use of force too.
Thus the establishment, organisation or control (there comes a point where the intervening state’s control over a rebel force is so complete that the latter becomes an arm of the former so that its acts are imputable to that state) of a rebel force or the giving of material support (e.g. logistic support, bases) would also qualify.
Whereas financial assistance is not a direct use of force, it is nonetheless contrary to IN law as intervention in another state’s affairs.
Humanitarian intervention, however, whether financial or otherwise (blankets, foods, etc.) is perfectly lawful – provided that it is given equally to rebels and others in the community in need.
In the case, the Court did consider and reject the idea that there was a right of intervention (to the level