South Africa and International Law

This study aims to review South Africa’s multilateral response to the Russia-Ukraine war concerning the discourse of international law and South Africa’s national interests. The response was met with significant backlash. However, it elucidates several imperatives, notably, the power politics of international law, South Africa’s advocacy of multilateralism, and its obligation to the BRICS bloc. This research adopts a qualitative research approach and uses the theory of Realism. Recent 2023 developments in South Africa concerning International law and the Russia-Ukraine war have sparked huge debates across international relations and academia. Topics of war crime, alliance, BRICS summit, and international law have continued dominating the mist surrounding these events and their impact. Arguably, in international relations, post-economic crisis tends to compel states to adopt a realist attitude towards their foreign policy to see through their national interests. However, due to the geopolitical and global economic crisis, protectionism in the international space has become contemporaneous, where every country enforces Realism in their foreign policy using their sovereign capacity and influence in the international space. However, such creates a beggar-thy-neighbour effect on their counterparts. South Africa finds itself being affected by these foreign protectionist policies. When the International Criminal Court (ICC) issued a warrant of arrest to South Africa against the President of Russia, this was followed by debates on notions of law and litigation; however, at the center of these debates is the South African dilemma between international law and economic cooperation with the BRICS bloc. The arguments following the dilemma have alluded to South Africa hosting a successful BRICS summit, and the execution of the warrant as South Africa remains a signatory of the Rome statute. In assessing the justification of this warrant was the relevance of international law to South Africa.