Election of Judges to the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea (ITLOS)
On 14 June 2017, the States Parties to the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) elected seven out of the 13 Judges nominated to the ITLOS. ITLOS is composed of 21 judges and the elections for seven judges are held every three years. These judges will serve for a nine year term as stipulated in Article 5(1) of the ITLOS Statute from 2017-2026.
The States Parties re-elected two judges currently on the ITLOS bench: Judge Boualem Bouguetaia (Algeria) and Judge Jose Luis Jesus (Cabo Verde). The five new judges taking up their seats on the 1st of October 2017 will be: Mr. Oscar Cabello Sarubbi (Paraguay), Dr. Neeru Chadha (India), Mr. Kriangsak Kittichaisaree (Thailand), Mr. Roman Kolodkin (Russian Federation), and Ms. Liesbeth Lijnzaad (The Netherlands).
It is pertinent to mention that out of these elected judges two of them belong to the Member States of the Asian-African Legal Consultative Organization (AALCO) namely: India and Thailand. Dr. Neeru Chadha, has had a very long association with AALCO, in various capacities and she was also elected President of the Fifty-Second Annual Session of AALCO, which was held in New Delhi (Headquarters) in September 2013. In addition Algeria and the Russian Federation are Observer States that participate in AALCO’s Annual Sessions.
On behalf of the AALCO Member States and his own behalf, H.E. Prof. Dr. Kennedy Gastorn, extends his congratulations to all the elected Judges, in particular the judges from AALCO.