1. We have been asked to consider whether Guatemala can validly question the
sovereignty of Belize over the whole or any part of its territory . We can state our conclusion immediately and without qualification. The answer is "No". Belize possesses a good title to the whole of the territory, including the islands, that it presently administers, within the limits set by the Convention of 30 April 1859 between Britain and Guatemala relative to the boundary of British Honduras ("the 1859 Convention").

I. PRELIMINARY POINTS
A. GEOGRAPHICAL SCOPE OF THE CLAIM BY GUATEMALA

2. We should at the outset observe that the geographical scope of the claim by
Guatemala to sovereignty over the territory of Belize varied between (a) a claim to the whole of the territory of Belize falling within the boundaries delimited in 1859 and (b) a claim restricted to the southern portion of Belize, from the River Sibun southwards to the River Sarstoon. It now appears from the latest diplomatic exchanges that Guatemala has committed itself to the lesser claim embracing only the southern portion of Belize.

3. Consequently, in this Opinion we focus principally on that southern area though what we have to say necessarily embraces also the northern portion. Additionally, the logic of our analysis also covers the islands presently under the administration or control of Belize. We refer to them specifically in Part Two below. The northern boundary of Belize, between it and Mexico, is not a subject of dispute and we refer to it only incidentally.

B. CHANGES IN GUATEMALA'S POSITION

4. We note that there has been some variation over the years in the scope of the legal claim advanced by Guatemala in its diplomatic correspondence. Initially, Guatemala's complaint against Britain was limited to the assertion that Britain had not fulfilled its obligations under Article VII of the 1859 Convention (which related to the building of a cart road from Guatemala City to Guatemala's Atlantic Coast). In 1884 this assertion was expanded into one that Britain's breach of the 1859 Convention entitled Guatemala to terminate that treaty and thus recover the whole of the territory of British Honduras. Indeed, in its letter to the Facilitators of 24 January 2001 Guatemala asserts expressly that it denounced the Treaty in 1884. But subsequently, in the course of even more recent diplomatic exchanges, Guatemala has turned again to the terms of the 1859 Convention as pertinent to the consideration of the present tensions between Guatemala and Belize. Guatemala has also changed its position regarding the date of its claimed termination of the 1859 Convention. The reference made on 24 January 2001 to the denunciation of the Convention in 1884 was replaced in Guatemala's Replication to the Facilitators of 5 May 2001 by the statement that "Guatemala decreed in 1946 the caducity of the said Treaty". However, we do not find it necessary to enter into the details of these changes of position since, in our view, in so far as the case is controlled by treaties, the Exchange of Notes concluded between Britain and Guatemala in 1931 manifestly treats the 1859 Convention as valid and effective. As will be fully developed below, this agreement of 1931 has never been denounced, cannot be denounced, and unquestionably remains in force.

C. THE TEMPORAL ELEMENT

5. We approach the problem as it would, in our understanding, be viewed by an
international tribunal at the present time. There are no doubt many interesting questions that can be discussed by reference to the position at various junctures in the past, but we do not see such a debate as really assisting in resolving the issue as it stands at present. We shall, in Part Two of this Opinion, and in the Appendices, have occasion to deal specifically with some matters from the past that figure in the arguments presented by Guatemala, such as the doctrine of uti possidetis, the meaning and effect of Article VII of the 1859 Convention, the effect of any breach of that Article on, in particular, the continuing validity of that Convention, and the timing and effect of Guatemala's allegations of breach of the Convention. But in Part One of this Opinion we limit ourselves to what we see as the essential basis of Britain's, and now Belize's, title to the territory of British Honduras, now Belize.

II GUATEMALA'S CASE
6. At the outset, it is necessary to emphasise that there is a major difference between the approach that we adopt in the present Opinion and the argument presented by Guatemala.

7. In summary, Guatemala's position involves the following assertions:

(i) the area of Belize was originally included within the domains of Spain;

(ii) within those domains, Belize formed part of the Province of Verapaz within the Captaincy-General of Guatemala;

(iii) during that period, extending until the acquisition of independence in 1821 by the United Provinces of Central America (which included Guatemala), the only rights that Britain acquired in the area were those granted by the Anglo-Spanish Treaties of 1783 and 1786. Those rights were limited to the area north of the Sibun River and were restricted in their scope;

(iv) upon the acquisition of independence the United Provinces of Central America, and subsequently Guatemala, succeeded to the sovereignty of Spain by operation of the principle of uti possidetis juris, subject to the treaty rights of Britain;

(v) the limitations in the Treaties precluded Britain from acquiring sovereignty over any part of Belize;

(vi) therefore the 1859 Convention between Britain and Guatemala operated as a cession of territory from Guatemala to Britain and not as a treaty establishing a boundary between the two territories;

(vii) the 1859 Convention contains a provision (Article VII) for the construction of a cart road from Guatemala City to the nearest point on the Guatemalan coast, to which Britain was required to contribute;

(viii) Britain's non-performance of its obligations under this Article entitled Guatemala unilaterally to terminate this Convention;

(ix) Guatemala has done so, the treaty is at an end and, as a result, the cession of the territory of Belize is no longer operative and it has reverted to Guatemala.

III. THE APPROACH OF THE PRESENT OPINION

8. We have given careful consideration to the various presentations by Guatemala of its position. We believe that they are in a number of crucial respects so wrong as to make the Guatemalan case unsustainable. However, we do not respond to each of these contentions individually within the main body of the present Opinion. For reasons which we set out immediately below, such a discussion would be largely irrelevant to the considerations which at the present time control the question of sovereignty. So we reserve a number of these points for separate examination in the Appendices.

9. The real point in the present controversy is that the Guatemalan propositions do not address the two principal sets of considerations that in our view today control the issue of title to Belize. We discuss these considerations in the order in which the sources of international law to be applied by the ICJ are set out in Article 38(1) of its Statute: first, treaties - "international conventions, whether general or particular, establishing rules expressly recognised by the contesting States"; second, customary international law - "international custom, as evidence of a general practice accepted as law". Each set of considerations is independent of the other and each is by itself quite sufficient to lead to the conclusion that we have already expressed, namely, that Guatemala's claims to the territory of Belize are legally unsustainable.

10. We must also refer to the support accorded to the legal position of Belize by the repeated discussion of its status at length and in depth in the United Nations. That body has been fully apprised of the claims of Guatemala as well as the position of Britain and Belize. But the General Assembly, notwithstanding its knowledge of Guatemala's claims, has concluded that the "inviolability" and "territorial integrity" "of all of Belize" must be preserved and has repeated the substance of this holding in no less than six resolutions from 1975 to 1980. In 1981 Belize became independent and was admitted to membership of the United Nations, against the express objection of Guatemala based on its claim that Belize formed part of its territory. The vote was 144-1 (Guatemala), with no abstentions. This was preceded by a unanimously adopted recommendation of the Security Council. This remarkable unanimity of international recognition of the status of Belize, of the exercise of its right of self-determination and of the entitlement of Belize to the preservation of its territorial integrity in its entirety is an important additional factor confirming the present title of Belize to the whole of its territory.

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