Colombian-Peruvian Asylum Case (Colombia v Peru)
A state relying on a regional or local custom must prove that it is established in such a manner that it has become binding on the other party, and Colombia had not done so.
Facts
After a failed rebellion in Peru, one of its leaders, Victor Raúl Haya de la Torre, was granted asylum in the Colombian embassy in Lima. Colombia claimed that it was entitled to qualify the offence unilaterally as political, so that Peru was bound to grant him safe conduct to leave the country, relying on a regional custom of Latin American states regarding diplomatic asylum.
Legal principle
The International Court of Justice held that Colombia had not established the existence of such a custom. The court said that the party which relies on a custom must prove that it is established in such a manner that it has become binding on the other party, and that the rule invoked is in accordance with a constant and uniform usage practised by the states in question. The evidence showed so much uncertainty and contradiction, and so much fluctuation and discrepancy in the exercise of diplomatic asylum, that it was not possible to discern any constant and uniform usage accepted as law. In any event, Peru had repudiated the alleged custom by refusing to ratify the relevant conventions.
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