Britain’s only judge at the international court of justice is facing a battle for re-election at the UN general assembly on Thursday in a vote that may reflect the UK’s shifting status in the world.

Sir Christopher Greenwood QC, who provided controversial legal advice to the UK government before the 2003 invasion of Iraq, is one of six candidates competing for five positions at the UN-backed court in The Hague.

He has already served one nine-year term and has reapplied to serve a second. There has been a British judge on the court since it was established in 1946.

In a separate vote at the UN general assembly in June the UK Foreign Office was humiliated when a Mauritian-backed resolution questioning the legal status of Chagos Islands was referred to the ICJ by 94 votes to 15.

Many EU members decided to abstain in that vote after Britain’s decision a year earlier to leave the bloc. The general assembly vote was seen as a blow to the UK’s international prestige and demonstrated the limited diplomatic influence wielded by the British foreign secretary, Boris Johnson, at the UN.

There has already been heavy lobbying at the UN in New York by the Foreign Office in favour of Greenwood’s reappointment to the ICJ.

Along with Greenwood, four other candidates are incumbents: Ronny Abraham (France), president of the court; Abdulqawi Ahmed Yusuf (Somalia), vice-president; Antônio Augusto Cançado Trindade (Brazil); and Dalveer Bhandari (India). The sixth candidate is Nawaf Salam, who is the permanent representative of Lebanon to the UN.

A human rights lawyer who declined to be identified told the Guardian: “For the UK to fail to get their candidate elected would be extraordinary but then the vote on referring Chagos to the ICJ was extraordinary and unexpected. There has always been a British judge on the court. Greenwood was very controversial because of his Iraq war advice.”

To be elected, any candidate must obtain a majority of 97 votes or more in the UN general assembly and also a majority of eight votes in the security council. Voting will continue until five candidates have obtained the required majority.



Greenwood, who is in his early sixties, was previously professor of international law at the London School of Economics. His most controversial public role was in the run-up to the invasion of Iraq. He was instructed by the then attorney general, Lord Goldsmith, to examine the arguments over the legality of using force against Saddam Hussein.

In 2008, Mark Durkan, then MP and leader of the SDLP, tabled a parliamentary motion opposing Greenwood’s initial appointment to the court on the grounds that he provided legal backing for the invasion.

At the time, Durkan said: “He provided the government and parliament with the flawed and untenable argument that war with Iraq was justified on the grounds that the UN security council had authorised the use of force.”



Greenwood was nonetheless elected by a large majority at the UN in 2008. Critics have suggested that he will not find his reappointment so easy on this occasion.



The ICJ in The Hague declined to comment on the judicial selection process. A number of human rights groups and lawyers declined to comment because they did not want to be seen to be influencing that process.

The Foreign Office also declined to comment.

Greenwood taught law at the University of Cambridge for more than 20 years and appeared in many high-profile international law cases, including those involving the Lockerbie bombing, General Pinochet and Guantánamo Bay.



At the time of his appointment in 2008, the then foreign secretary, David Miliband, described Greenwood as being “highly respected within the international legal community, and an outstanding academic and practitioner of international law”.

