I.C.J. bill: twenty million dollars

Going to the I.C.J. on the other hand, will cost much more: as much as twenty million dollars. To settle that bill, G.O.B. will attempt to get financing from the U.N., but that is if the matter even reaches the Netherlands. There is no telling what will happen once it is brought up in the Guatemalan congress or when both countries go to a referendum. If by some miracle the green light is given in those stages, Ambassador Fred Martinez says it will still be another five to six years before the claim is laid to rest.

Fred Martinez
“Lets say the people from both sides agree. Thirty days after the referenda, you notify the registrar general of the I.C.J. that you have started proceedings and so many months after that notification, Guatemala will present its case in writing. Then Belize has its equal amount of time, let’s say twelve months, to present its reply. Then Guatemala has another six months to rebut that reply, then Belize has another six months to rebut that rebuttal. It’s a long procedure because of handling of documentation. That is a written procedure; that’s three years we are talking about. Then the court convenes into the oral procedures and that is when both sides go in front of the judge to argue their case with the presentations of all the legal battalions. So that’s another while. So after that the court takes time to deliberate and to find more information amongst themselves. We are talking easily five, six years. We don’t know what their claim in front of the I.C.J. will be because they have to consider carefully what documentation they have, what evidence they have to substantiate their claim. Can you go to the I.C.J. and claim that all of Belize is yours when you have recognised it as a sovereign state? Do you know how to make a state disappear? Can you go and ask only for a small piece? I can’t judge for them, they will have to be the ones to put their claim but we are ready for whatever side they come.”