Posted on 02/09/2004 1:18:52 PM PST by yonif
Referred to by one international law expert as "the best international lawyer in the world," James Crawford will pose a difficult challenge for the Israeli legal team at the upcoming hearing on the security fence at the International Court of Justice in The Hague.
Crawford is chairman of the Faculty of Law at Cambridge University and the former director of the Lauterpacht Research Center for International Law. The latter is now headed by Israel's counsel, Cambridge law professor Daniel Bethlehem, who will square off against Crawford at the February 23 ICJ hearing.
Crawford, said to be very committed to the Palestinian cause, has represented several Arab and Muslim countries in past hearings before the ICJ. He was described by one legal journal as a "leading silk" in public international law.
Another journal said he is "recognized for the vibrancy of his argument... brilliant at thinking laterally... one of the most creative public international law lawyers around".
Speaking to The Jerusalem Post by phone from Cambridge, Crawford denies personally sympathizing with the Palestinians in this case, and said that as a lawyer he is able to differentiate between personal opinions and those of the client.
"Each case is separate. You are representing a party and not expressing a personal opinion," Crawford said. "I am not pro anyone. I am a lawyer."
According to one international law attorney close to the ICJ, Israel's counsel will face a tough challenge since he does not have the experience or the political savvy and connections that Crawford brings with him.
Crawford, who represented Jordan during the 1994 peace talks with Israel, said that he and Bethlehem are good friends and that there is no conflict of interest in two colleagues arguing against one another before the ICJ. "The ethics of the bar are such that you deal with cases separately and on other cases you work together," he said.
Crawford represented Iran in a lawsuit filed against the United States over the destruction of an Iran-Air civilian jet by two US cruise missiles and the consequent deaths of the 290 passengers aboard in July 1988. The case was discontinued after both sides informed the court that they had reached a settlement.
Muin Shreim, an official at the Palestinian Mission to the United Nations told the Post that the Palestinian Authority chose Crawford since "he is a very qualified international lawyer and well established, and we wanted to have the best."
In a 2003 interview to Lumen, a publication of the University of Adelaide, Crawford asked about calls that Prime Minister Ariel Sharon should be tried for his actions in Lebanon in 1982, said that world leaders should be held accountable for their actions when they are suspected of war crimes.
"We have to move to a system of general accountability of leaders for their actions, where they are credibly suspected of war crimes and the like," he told the magazine.
Crawford told the Post that he was not speaking only of Ariel Sharon's actions but of all world leaders. "I am a strong proponent of the International Criminal Court and believe that all leaders should be held accountable for their actions," he said.
In a letter sent to Downing Street and published in The Guardian in March 2003, Crawford, together with other international law professors called on British Prime Minister Tony Blair to not attack Iraq.
"There is no justification under international law for the use of military force against Iraq," the letter said.
The leading lawyers declared that the UN Security Council's resolutions on Iraq, passed unanimously in November to force Saddam Hussein to dismantle weapons of mass destruction, failed to provide grounds for war.
Only because he's completely booked.
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