The International Court of Justice, also known as the World Court, elected Judge Yuji Iwasawa as its new president to complete former president Nawaf Salam’s term that ends on February 5, 2027.
Salam resigned in January to become Lebanon’s prime minister.
The ICJ, the U.N.’s highest court and based in The Hague, was established in 1945 to resolve disputes between states.
Iwasawa, who is Japanese, has been a member of the World Court since 2018. Prior to joining the court, Iwasawa served as a professor of international law at the University of Tokyo and chairman of the U.N. Human Rights Committee. The 70-year-old became the second Japanese to have taken the court’s top post, following Hisashi Owada, the father of Empress Masako, from 2009 to 2012.
The 15-judge court is the main U.N. justice organ, tasked with helping resolve international disputes such as those involving borders and issuing advisory opinions at the request of the General Assembly and other U.N. entities.
It recently gained global attention in the ongoing case surrounding genocide accusations against Israel – which it has denied – in the Gaza war.
In July, the ICJ ruled that Israel’s occupation since the 1967 Middle East war of Palestinian territories and its settlements in the West Bank and East Jerusalem were illegal and that it must withdraw as soon as possible.
For Palestinians and most of the international community, the settlements are considered illegal. Israel disputes this, citing the Jewish people’s historical, biblical and political links to the area as well as security considerations.
