The ICJ, Racial Discrimination, and the Protection of Cultural Heritage

This article examines the protection of cultural heritage in the jurisprudence of the International Court of Justice (ICJ, or Court) under the 1965 International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination (CERD). It analyses all the cases before the ICJ in which the issue has arisen to date, with a particular focus on the key order on provisional measures in Armenia v. Azerbaijan, issued in 2021. The main argument is that this decision, although to some extent controversial, has set a precedent for other cultural heritage protection cases before the Court. However, in light of further ICJ jurisprudence, states will still have to meet a heavy burden of proof in order to make real use of this precedent, in particular to redress actual collective harm to affected communities.