A contingent of 9 Belizean Journalists are in the Hague, Netherlands. It's a media tour to the seat of the International Court of Justice - and our News Director Jules Vasquez is there. He tells us what it's about:..
Tomorrow, the delegation is scheduled to visit the Peace Palace which is the headquarters for the ICJ. Today was spent speaking to senior diplomats and international lawyers who have appeared before the ICJ. None of them wished to appear on camera, or to speak on the record - not wishing to appear to be taking sides, or to offend Guatemala. What stood out though was that all the experienced persons we spoke to agreed on two things: that it is unusual for the ICJ to hear a claim for entirely half of another country, or more - as Guatemala is expected to claim of Belize, and, second, that taking such a case to the court will cost upwards of 10 million US dollars over 3 to 5 years. Chile's recent case - which took 5 years to be completed - is reported to have cost 24 million US dollars. None of the experts wanted to give an opinion of the comparative merits of Belize's case.
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