Argentina and Uruguay Await ICJ Provisional Measures Judgment

[NOTE to Opinio Juris Readers: Although we will continue to host John Bellinger as a guest blogger today, I thought I’d resume normal programming and start posting on other topics. But please stick around for future posts by John as well.]

The International Court of Justice will issue its decision today (around 10 a.m. Hague time, GMT +1, which is about four hours from the time this post goes up) on Uruguay’s request for provisional measures in its ongoing dispute with Argentina over the construction of pulp mills on the River Uruguay. Argentina’s own request for provisional measures was rejected by the ICJ last July, and Uruguay filed its own request for provisional measures this past November alleging groups of Argentine citizens are blockading a bridge necessary to the construction of the disputed mills.

The ICJ has been operating at lightning speed in these cases, at least with respect to provisional measure judgments: Uruguay’s request was officially submitted on November 29, 2006. Hearings were held on December 18, 2006 and a decision is being released about a month later.

I could be proven wrong, but my guess is that the speedy decision here is probably bad news for Uruguay on the theory that drafting an opinion saying no in a case like this is a lot easier than drafting than one saying yes. Still, I plan to be sleeping when the judgment is released so I’ll have to rely on some of our Europe or Asia-based readers to update this post with the actual judgment.