British international lawyer Dapo Akande has been elected to the International Court of Justice, restoring a British presence on the United Nations' highest court after nearly a decade.
Akande won his seat on Tuesday alongside France's Francois Alabrune, Singapore's Rena Lee, Jordan's Mahmoud Daifallah Hmoud and Kenya's Phoebe Okowa, with nine candidates competing for five seats. Their nine-year terms begin on 6 February 2027. Hmoud and Okowa, who were already serving after being elected to fill vacancies, secured full terms.
Akande is Oxford's Chichele Professor of Public International Law and a member of the UN International Law Commission. He will be the first British judge on the court since 2018. British Foreign Secretary Ed Miliband welcomed the result as "a victory for the UK's commitment to the rule of law and our ability to stand up for our values on the world stage".
As a lawyer and scholar, Akande has helped advance arguments on proving genocide and on the illegality of annexing Palestinian territory. He is expected to sit on the bench as the court decides the ongoing case brought by South Africa accusing Israel of violating the Genocide Convention in Gaza.
Akande describes himself as a "generalist public international lawyer" whose work spans armed conflict, international criminal law, human rights, international organisations and the settlement of disputes between states. Janina Dill, his co-director at the Oxford Institute for Ethics, Law, and Armed Conflict, called him "a careful, nuanced jurist and a precise and effective communicator", adding: "As a colleague I have most admired his even keel and wisdom. I am glad the court can benefit from these qualities at this moment in time."
Candidates needed an absolute majority in separate votes in the General Assembly and Security Council, 97 votes and eight votes respectively, and the council's permanent members have no veto in judicial elections. The court's judges serve independently of their governments. Based in The Hague, the ICJ settles disputes between states and issues advisory opinions, determining state responsibility rather than prosecuting individuals as the International Criminal Court does. Its judgments are binding, though enforcement can depend on states and a politically divided Security Council.
Akande's election comes as the court prepares to deliver judgment on 19 November in The Gambia's genocide case against Myanmar over atrocities against the predominantly Muslim Rohingya minority. Akande served as counsel for Britain in that case, in which the UK intervened jointly with Canada, Denmark, France, Germany and the Netherlands to argue against making proof of genocidal intent so demanding that findings become practically impossible. The case has become a focus of US criticism of the court, with US ambassador to the UN Mike Waltz warning last month that Washington would be "watching the ICJ's handling of these proceedings very closely".
Akande has also appeared before the court on Israel's occupation of Palestinian territory, representing Japan during advisory opinion proceedings. He argued that a state could not evade the ban on taking land by force simply by never formally announcing annexation, and that moving populations, seizing land, evicting residents, building long-term infrastructure and exploiting resources such as water could amount to annexation in practice. "Permanent annexation can never be a proportionate response to an armed attack," he said.
Despite British backing for his candidacy, Akande has repeatedly challenged London's legal positions. In the 2018 Chagos Islands hearings he appeared for Zambia against the UK, telling judges: "This case is about the international law obligations regarding decolonisation." In an April 2018 opinion he rejected the government's justification for air strikes on Syria's Assad government as "significantly flawed", concluding the action "was not in accordance with the United Nations Charter and international law". In 2010 he led academics in a submission to the Iraq Inquiry that called the revived-authorisation argument for the 2003 invasion "an untenable interpretation of the UN Charter".
In his candidacy statement, Akande stressed legal rigour, cooperation across legal traditions and judicial independence, writing: "If elected, I will decide cases on the basis of a faithful and impartial application of the law having listened carefully to the arguments of participants in the proceedings."
