In its 1996 Advisory Opinion (AO), the ICJ famously held that the threat or use of nuclear weapons would generally be contrary to the principles and rules of international law applicable in armed conflict, but that with the law and facts at its disposal, it could not conclude definitively on the lawfulness or unlawfulness of such threat or use “in an extreme circumstance of self-defence in which the very survival of the State would be at stake”. How have the facts and the law on threat and use advanced since 1996? If it is extremely doubtful that threat or use could ever be lawful under principles and rules of IHL, is it ever lawful to use nuclear weapons in self-defence? Can jus ad bellum ever override jus in bello? If deterrence practices imply a threat to use nuclear weapons, under what conditions can deterrence be considered legal?

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Featured Speakers

Opening Remarks – Dr. Deepshikha K. Vijh, Executive Director, The Lawyers Committee on Nuclear Policy

Jus ad bellum and jus in bello in the 1996 ICJ AO and today: separation or conflation? – Dr. Jasmine Moussa, Member of the Permanent Court of Arbitration

Can the right of self-defence ever release a State from its obligations under international law? – Marcelo Kohen, Professor Emeritus, Geneva Graduate Institute

How nuclear deterrence policies hold up to international law in the 1996 ICJ AO and today – Kimiaki Kawai, Vice Director and Professor, Research Centre for Nuclear Weapons Abolition, University of Nagasaki

The legality of self-defence with nuclear weapons in the new global order – Professor Antony Anghie, National University of Singapore Faculty of Law, and University of Utah S.J. Quinney College of Law

The Lex Mundi Nova Webinar Series explores the impact of the 1996 ICJ ruling and thirty years of advancements in international law and norms relevant to the legality of nuclear weapons, set against growing scientific evidence of their catastrophic impacts. It assesses progress and setbacks in fulfilling the ICJ’s unanimous ruling with respect to States’ obligations on disarmament, revisits the unresolved, critical question of the lawfulness of threat or use of nuclear weapons in extreme circumstances of self-defense, and examines emerging legal risks posed by new technologies including AI in nuclear command, control and communications systems and the placement of nuclear weapons in outer space. It is presented in partnership with the Geneva Graduate Institute, the University of Johannesburg, the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (ICAN), International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War (IPPNW), Lawyers Committee for Nuclear Policy (LCNP), and the African International Law Society (AfILS).