Dec 7/91: Lil'Wat v. France & others

LIL'WAT V. FRANCE AND OTHERS


LETTER FROM BRUCE CLARK

The President of the Court
c/o The Registrar
The International Court of Justice
Peace Palace 2517 KJ The Hague
The Netherlands

re: LiL'Wat v. France and others

Dear Mr. President:

At the suggestion of Mr. Justice Lachs, I am writing to you in your capacity as chief administrative officer of the Court. The Lil'Wat Application Instituting Proceedings dated September 10, 1991, has been filed with the Court, but not yet distributed to interested parties in accordance with the mandatory provisions of the Statute and the Rules of the Court. My purpose in writing is to persuade you to give the appropriate directions and instructions to expedite the distribution.

The reticence of the Registrar's office to distribute the application apparently arose from a suggestion made by Lachs J to the Deputy Registrar to the effect that Lil'Wat was not a "State". When I drew to the attention of Lachs J two facts he guided me to write this letter. Since, under the Statute and the Rules of the Court, the decision on locus standi goes to jurisdiction it is a judicial rather than an administrative function. As such , the decision to decline jurisdiction must attend upon the fundamental principles of justice governing the exercise of juridical power. In short, the Application legally must be distributed so that interested parties can be identified and heard upon the merits of the issue, so the judges themselves can not only decide on a basis that is not per incuriam.

The second fact is that I am in a position as counsel conclusively to establish that the administrative rejection of the Lil'Wat Application was not only ultra vires, but based upon an untenable assumption of law. The precendents, statutes and conventions that rebut the assumption have been identified by me on the basis of some twenty years preparation. For this reason, I suggest that I am qualified to offer you my own legal opinion on the jurisdiction issue, as an expert within the meaning of Statute article 38(2). My legal opinion is that Lil'Wat is juristically sovereign in respect of the Lil'Wat territory, and furthermore that juristic independence is sufficient to constitute a "State" within the meaning of the jurisdiction sections of the Statute.

Enclosures elaborate. These may also assist you philosophically in appreciating the reason your reaction to this letter is crucial to the global integrity and growth in influence of the rule of law. The sections of the Statute and the Rules of the Court that establish the separation of the administrative and judicial functions are set out with particularity on the face of the LiL'Wat Application Istituting Proceedings.

Sincerely

Bruce Clark


REPLY FROM INTERNATIONAL COURT OF JUSTICE

COUR INTERNATIONALE DE JUSTICE - INTERNATIONAL COURT OF JUSTICE (85879)

13 January 1992 (received 28 Jan.1992 B.Clark)

Dear Sir,

The President of the Court has received your letter of 7 December 1991, and has directed me to draw your attention to Article 26, paragraph 1 (a), of the Rules of the Court, and to reply further as follows.

It appears to be your contention that if an individual asserts that a particular entity or group, for whom he claims to be acting, is a "State" within the meaning of the Statute of the Court, ansd submits a document which he characterizes as a "written application" purporting to institute proceedings, this is sufficient to raise a question of legal status requiring a judicial decision of the Court. This is not the case.

In view of the terms of Articles 34 and 40 of the statute, of which you are aware, any unilateral attempt to seise the Court of a dispute can not be deemed to be a "written application" unless it emanates from an existing State. Only a valid seisin of the Court by a State gives rise to the obligations of the Registrar under the Statute, and the point is thus one to be examined initially by him. In the present case, the Deputy -Registrar was undoubtedly right to take the view that your clients do not constitute a State and that the successive "applications" presented by you on behalf of "Lil'Wat" are therefore wholly ineffective in terms of the law and procedure of the Court. No further correspondence on the matter can be entertained.

Yours faithfully,

Eduardo Valencia-Ospina
Registrar


REPLY FROM BRUCE CLARK

Sir Robert Yewdall Jennings
President of the International Court of Justice
c/o The Registrar, Peace Palace
2517 KJ The Hague, The Netherlands

Re: Lil'Wat v. Canada and Europe

Dear Mr. President:

The holocaust against the indigenous peoples of the rainforests is ongoing. Existing international law requires that it cease. The International Court has jurisdiction to implement that law. The preliminary legal issue is whether my client has legal status to invoke that jurisdiction. The resolution of that preliminary legal issue depends upon whether my client can satisfy the legal precondition to gaining access to the Court. To do this, it must establish as a matter of existing law that it is a "State" within the meaning of the Statute of the International Court of Justice.

In my letter to you dated December 7, 1991, I stated that the precedents , statutes and conventions identified by the Schedule of Law accompanying my client's Application Instituting Proceedings achieve this. But in your reply to me dated January 13, 1992, you have blatantly misrepresented my position - for I have never contended that a bald assertion of state status is sufficient to invoke the jurisdicition of the Court. Rather, my contention all along unambiguously has been that my client is constituted a "State" for purposes of assessing the jurisdiction of the Court precisely in virtue of the precedents, statutes and conventions identified in the Schedule. By inventing a patently ridiculous position, by falsely attributing that position to me, and then by discrediting that position, you are abusing the administrative power entrusted to the office of the President.

Having misrepresented my position, on this fraudulent basis you preceeded in your letter to usurp the Court's statutory duty to resolve the preliminary jurisdictional issue itself. When the Court does address it, as in due course it must and will, the issue then can be resolved upon the basis of law - which is all my client's Application seeks; not upon the basis of an a priori assumption - that is, upon the basis of anti-law - which is what your letter constitutes. The big lie techninque employed by you in your letter will fool some people: those who are prepared passively to make themselves your accomplices by engaing in willing suspension of disbelief or appeasement. Others, I hope and pray, will be persuaded positively to respond to my call for your impeachment and removal from office. Even so, I have no doubt but that you are confident that your are politically immune from being held accountable, due to the fact that the criminals perpetrating the holocaust wield power and influence, while the victims do not. All they have with which to defend themselves is the rule of law.

Since in the circumstances of the 1492-1992 holocaust in the Americas your abuse of due process is genocidal, I believe that each judge on the Court shold have the opportunity to disassociate himself from your contempt of the honourable rule they are legally obliged to promote. For this reason, I request that you circulate a copy of this letter, and of the enclosed resolution calling for your impeachment and removal from office. For posterity a record must be maintained of those judges, if any, who would prefer to address the law allowing them presently to prevent horrifying crimes against humanity and nature.

Sincerely,

Bruce Clark


FURTHER REPLY FROM ICJ

COUR INTERNATIONALE DE JUSTICE - INTERNATIONAL COURT OF JUSTICE (86357)

9 March 1992

Dear Sir,

I refer to the document dated 14 February 1992 which you have addressed to the Court and styled as an application instituting proceedings.

You will understand from earlier correspondence that in the circumstances I do not consider your characterization of the document, or of the entity whose agent you claim to be in sending it, as sufficient to raise a question of status requiring a judicial decision by the Court or a fortiori, to constitute a valid seisin. I am therefore obliged to refrain from taking any action in this matter.

No further correspondence on the matter will be entertained.

Yours faithfully

Eduardo Valencia-Ospina
Registrar


FURTHER REPLY FROM BRUCE CLARK

Mr. Eduardo Valencia-Ospina

re: Amazonia v. Holland and others and re: Lil'Wat v. France and others

Dear Mr. Registrar:

For the reasons that follow, your letter to me dated March 9, 1992 perfects your complicity in genocide contrary to Article III (e) of the Covenant on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, 1948. By Resolution 9 (1946), the Security Council of the United Nations reposed in the Judges of the International Court of Justice a legal duty thenceforth to hear cases brought before the Court by States not being parties to the Statute of the International Court of Justice. The legislative intent is unambiguous: to foster the rule of law as the peaceful alternative, worldwide, to violent confrontation, by treating the Court as an open house rather than an exclusive club.

The wording of Resolution 9 (1946) is straightforward: all that is required to give rise to the duty is the filing of a declaration in which a given non-member State undertakes to abide by the Court's decision. Accordingly, as stipulated by Articles 1, 2 and 3 of Resolution 9 (1946) Amazonia, not being a party to the Statute of the International Court of Justice, but purporting to act in the capacity of "State", deposited a general declaration accepting as compulsory the jurisdiction of the Court. Since Resolution 9 (1946) itself has never been rescinded or amended as allowed by its 4th Article, the filing of that declaration by Amazonia by operation of law automatically brought into operation Article 5. That particular article enacts that "All questions as to the validity or effect fo a declaration made under the terms of this resolution shall be decided by the Court".

Furthermore, under Article 39 (6) of the Statute of the International Court of Justice "In the event of a dispute as to whether the Court has jurisdiction, the matter shall be settled by the decision of the Court." The legislative intent behind Articles 5 and 39 (6) is also unmistakable. The question upon which the jurisdiction of the Court turns, namely the legal status of the Applicant as a "State", is by these articles statutorily principles of fundamental justice is the requirement that the Applicant contending for "State" status have the opportunity to apprise the Court of the determinative facts and law bearing upon that legal status.

Your letter to me dated March 9, 1992, blatantly breaches this principle. In the first place you have usurped the Court's statutorily imposed exclusive jurisdiction to address the question of "State" status. Secondly, even if you were "the Court" (which manifestly you are not), your decision would be insupportable since you denied my client's fundamental right to apprise the Court of permitted, and indeed as required, by the applicable legislation. I believe I understand your criminal motive. Upon the basis of a demonstrably erroneous a priori assumption, for the last half century the International Court of Justice has made it a practice arbitrarily and peremptorily to turn aside Applications from native Americans. In the result the process of genocide, and correspondingly the ecological havoc that has complemented the genocide, continue unabated. You and your accomplices intend administratively to prevent the facts and the law that rebut the a priori assumption from being referred to in open court. Accordingly, you seek to forestall the public event by preempting the normal judicial process. By doing so, you not only cover up past transgressions that otherwise will be exposed. But you also ensure that the genocide will continue.

You achieve this specifically by thwarting the rule of law. That is, you breach the sacred trust imposed upon you to act as the guardians of the rule of law. I have previously alerted you, the Deputy Registrar, the President and Judge Lachs to the essential basis in law for my clients' "State" status and hence for the Courts' jurisdiction. I reapeat it. Since Amazonia, (like Lil'Wat) is situate in the Americas beyond the treaty frontier, as a matter of strict and existing law those particular members of the indigenous race of people, as distinguished from natives occupying territory in the Americas within the treaty frontier, can be shown still to be juristically sovereign. No case has ever before been presented to the Court upon the basis of being from beyond the treaty frontier, and yet you perversely are regarding the issue as being settled law - a legal impossibility.

Juristic sovereignty arguably constitutes the crucial legal feature of a "State" for the purposes of ascertaining the jurisdiction of the International Court of Justice. Indeed, it can cogently be contended that the Court has no greater or more crucial role to play than that of third party arbiter when two juristically sovereign and competing bodies politic have conflicting claims to "State" status in relation to the same or overlapping territory. By its enactment of Article 5 of Resolution 9 (1946) the Security Council relinquished or at least suspended its discretionary power of veto over access to the Court. Just two months later, on December 11, 1946, the General Assembly of the United Nations in its Resolution 96 (I) declared genocide a crime under international law. Two years after that, the Covenant on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, 1948 was promulgated.

In virtue of these several progressive steps the vow NEVER AGAIN passed from political aspiration to legal requirement, remarking a point of passage of profound significance in human history: the rule of law at last superseded political expediency in relation to the scourge of genocide. Your improper denial of access to the Court effectively throws my clients back upon appeal to world charity, rather than law, to stop the genocide threatening them.

While I plead with you to let the Court do its job, the citizens of Amazonia and Lil'Wat continue to be victimized. Most recently, on March 9, 1992, military forces of Suriname, financially and tactically supported by Holland, illegally and genocidally invaded Table Mountain, the place identified in paragraph 3 of Amazonia's Application. That invasion constitutes an act of war, one directly in violation of the Suriname Treaty, 1687, identified in paragraph 4 of the schedule of law appended to Amazonia's Application.

You have the habit of ending your letters "No further correspondence on the matter will be entertained." In response, I have to suggest that no person is above the law. Since in the present circumstances genocide is the direct consequence of your dereliction of duty, you are guilty of complicity contrary to Article III (e) of the Genocide Convention. You and your accomplices must answer to the law, regardless of your high station.

Sincerely,

Bruce Clark


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