JUDICIAL INDEPENDENCE IN INTERNATIONAL COURTS

Lavinia Andreea CODREA Institutul de Cercetări Economice și Sociale „Gh. Zane”, Academia Română – Filiala Iași

Rezumat

The issue of the defining elements of a truly fair justice system has become a constant and consistent concern of
international and/or regional political and legal organisations. Given the scale of the phenomenon of establishing and
resorting to international courts and tribunals, reflecting, among others, the preference and availability of international
actors for settling their disputes by independent and impartial decision-makers, the principles and values of the international
judiciary have been subjected to discussions in an increasingly elaborate manner. Among these, judicial independence
occupies a special position, being tightly connected to the issue of the legitimacy of such institutions, as an essential
factor in ensuring voluntary compliance to the internationally adopted decisions.
In this context, the present paper addresses the independence of the judiciary in international courts, both in terms of
the fundamental theoretical contributions and from a practical perspective, by following the institutional provisions and
guarantees for ensuring an independent and impartial judiciary in the statutes of two of the most relevant international
courts, namely the International Court of Justice and the International Criminal Court.
Keywords: principles and values of justice, International Court of Justice, International Criminal Court, judicial
independence, international judges, formal guarantees of independence, de facto independence.