The decision of the International Court of Justice of 13 December 1999 in the dispute between Botswana and Namibia concerning the island known to the former as Sedudu and the latter as Kasikili is the latest in a line of cases dealing with the identification of colonial boundaries,1 including the two Eritrea/Yemen arbitration awards, the second of which (on Maritime Delimitation) was delivered four days after the Kasikili/Sedudu Island judgment itself.2 While not as wide-ranging in either the geographical or legal senses as some of the preceding decisions on territorial issues, the decision of the Court in this case nevertheless raises some interesting and important questions.

Under Part XV of the 1982 United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, any dispute concerning the interpretation or application of the Convention which cannot be settled by the consensual means set out in section 1 of that Part, may be referred by any party to the dispute for compulsory settlement under section 2. There are four possible fora for such settlement—the International Court of Justice, the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea (hereafter ITLOS), an arbitral tribunal constituted in accordance with Annex VII of the Convention, and a special arbitral tribunal constituted in accordance with Annex VIII. If the parties to a dispute have made a declaration under Article 287 (which is optional) specifying their choice of forum, and their choices coincide, that body will be the forum for the settlement of the dispute. If their choices do not coincide or if not all parties have made a declaration, the forum for settlement will be an Annex VII arbitral tribunal.1