- 39 CERD would never satisfy the preconditions for States to seise the Court. Ukraine considers that
the placement of Article 22 within Part III of CERD, while the CERD Committee procedures are
governed by Part II, indicates that Article 22 was not intended to make the procedures before the
CERD Committee a necessary precondition for seising the Court. According to the Applicant, as
the preamble indicates that CERD was intended to be an effective instrument to eliminate racial
discrimination promptly, it would be inconsistent with the object and purpose of CERD if
Article 22 delayed the settlement of disputes by imposing cumulative procedural preconditions.
104. Although Ukraine expresses the view that recourse to supplementary means of
interpretation is not necessary, it argues that, should recourse be had to the drafting history of
CERD, it would not assist the Russian Federation’s case. According to Ukraine, the late addition,
by the Three-Power amendment, of a reference to “the procedures expressly provided for in this
Convention” to the compromissory clause of CERD merely aimed to clarify that the
CERD Committee procedure was one of the options available before States referred their disputes
to the Court. Ukraine also supports this view by reference to the statement that Ghana made as a
sponsor of the Three-Power amendment, according to which the amendment was
“self-explanatory” and contained a “simple refer[ence] to the procedures provided for in the
Convention”.
105. Ukraine further maintains that the Russian Federation’s reliance on the compromissory
clauses in other human rights treaties (see paragraph 101 above) is misplaced, as such treaties
contain compromissory clauses which are different from Article 22 of CERD.
*
*
106. Pursuant to Article 22 of CERD, the Court has jurisdiction to decide a dispute brought
under the Convention provided that such a dispute is “not settled by negotiation or by the
procedures expressly provided for in this Convention”. In the case concerning Application of the
International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination (Georgia v.
Russian Federation), the Court found that
“in their ordinary meaning, the terms of Article 22 of CERD, namely ‘[a]ny
dispute . . . which is not settled by negotiation or by the procedures expressly provided
for in this Convention’, establish preconditions to be fulfilled before the seisin of the
Court” (Preliminary Objections, Judgment, I.C.J. Reports 2011 (I), p. 128, para. 141;
see also ibid., pp. 129–130, para. 147).
In that case, the Court did not determine whether the preconditions set out in Article 22 of CERD
are alternative or cumulative. In order to make this determination, the Court will apply the rules of
customary international law on treaty interpretation as reflected in Articles 31 to 33 of the Vienna
Convention (Question of the Delimitation of the Continental Shelf between Nicaragua and
Colombia beyond 200 Nautical Miles from the Nicaraguan Coast (Nicaragua v. Colombia),
Preliminary Objections, Judgment, I.C.J. Reports 2016 (I), p. 116, para. 33).