The Worldwide Court docket of Justice (ICJ) has introduced that it’s going to maintain oral hearings in November to find out whether or not Guatemala shall be allowed to formally intervene within the ongoing territorial dispute between Belize and Honduras over the Sapodilla Cayes.
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In accordance with Belize’s Ministry of Overseas Affairs, the listening to is scheduled for November 24, 2025, on the Court docket’s seat in The Hague. The proceedings will focus solely on Guatemala’s December 2023 software to intervene, a transfer grounded in Article 62 of the ICJ’s Statute, which allows third-party intervention when a state believes it has a authorized curiosity that could possibly be affected by the end result of a case.
The dispute facilities on sovereignty over the Sapodilla Cayes, a cluster of small however strategically important islands in Belize’s southern maritime zone, close to the maritime boundary with Honduras. Belize initiated proceedings earlier than the ICJ on November 16, 2022, looking for a proper declaration that the territory belongs to Belize. The nation submitted its written memorial in Could 2023, and Honduras responded with a counter-memorial in December 2023. Each side agreed at that stage that additional written submissions wouldn’t be needed.
Nevertheless, Guatemala’s software complicates the method. Whereas Belize has not opposed Guatemala’s request to hitch the proceedings, Honduras has objected, arguing that Guatemala doesn’t have a direct authorized curiosity within the case. Guatemala, for its half, asserts that it maintains longstanding claims over the Sapodilla Cayes—claims it says are carefully tied to its personal territorial dispute with Belize, which can be pending earlier than the Court docket following nationwide referenda in each international locations.
In its software, Guatemala says its purpose is to “safeguard its rights and pursuits” over the realm and to help the Court docket by providing data on the “nature and extent” of its personal claims which may be affected by any determination within the Belize-Honduras matter.
Officers in Belmopan say the Workplace of the Agent will collaborate carefully with Belize’s worldwide authorized workforce to make sure that the nation’s sovereignty claims are robustly defended, each on this listening to and within the broader territorial case. A ruling on Guatemala’s intervention request is predicted earlier than the principle proceedings resume within the Belize-Honduras dispute.
The case has drawn regional consideration given the overlapping maritime claims within the Gulf of Honduras and the continuing ICJ arbitration between Belize and Guatemala—a matter stemming from a Nineteenth-century territorial declare that has but to be definitively resolved.
