What is the Caribbean Court of Justice?
The Caribbean Court of Justice has been designed to be more than a court
of last resort for Member States of the Caribbean Community. For, in
addition to replacing the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council,
the CCJ will be vested with an original jurisdiction in respect of the
interpretation and application of the Treaty Establishing the Caribbean
Community. In effect, the CCJ would exercise both an appellate and an
original jurisdiction.
The proposed
CCJ is intended to be a hybrid institution � a municipal court of last
resort and an international court with compulsory and exclusive
jurisdiction in respect of the interpretation and application of the
Treaty.
How the CCJ decisions would be enforced:
Member States signing on to the agreement Establishing the CCJ would
agree to enforce its decisions in their respective jurisdictions like
decisions of their own superior courts. Additionally decisions of a
regional, original jurisdiction could be enforced by the Caricom through
some new method of compliance such as a regional police of some kind.
The norms applied by the CCJ in the exercise of its original jurisdiction
would normally be rules of international law. In the exercise of its
appellate jurisdiction, the CCJ would apply the norms peculiar to common
law jurisdictions as distinct from civil law jurisdictions.
The CCJ can also be considered a good place for international maritime
law and extend authority and jurisdiction to the Caribbean Sea outside
territorial waters.