FM Nyanti Urges Judiciary to Help Secure Liberia’s First ICJ Judge

Published: October 26, 2026

MONROVIA — Liberia’s foreign minister is asking the country’s judiciary to help put the first Liberian on the International Court of Justice, a court no Liberian has served on in the 81 years since Liberia signed the United Nations Charter.

By Alphanso G. Kalama

“I want to challenge our judicial sector work with us, let’s partner, to get a judge at the ICJ,” Foreign Minister Sara Beysolow Nyanti said Monday at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Monrovia, where the government marked United Nations Day with diplomats and foreign partners.

Liberia was one of four African countries to sign the U.N. Charter in 1945. Nyanti said that membership in the U.N. makes Liberia a party to the court, but it has never had a seat on the bench.

“Liberia is a member by virtue of our participation in the UN, but we have never, ever had a judge on that court of justice,” she said.

She said winning a seat will require grooming jurists with strong credentials in international law and building sustained diplomatic support within the African Group and beyond.

The International Court of Justice, based in The Hague, is the U.N.’s principal judicial organ. It settles legal disputes between states and gives advisory opinions on legal questions. Its 15 judges are elected to nine-year terms by the General Assembly and the Security Council.

Nyanti made the call while walking the audience through the U.N.’s six principal organs and Liberia’s record in each. She said Liberia has been a member of the General Assembly since 1945. It held a one-year seat on the Security Council in 1961 after a deadlock in the election of a nonpermanent member, she said, and it served on the Economic and Social Council in 1982 and 2021. The Trusteeship Council, which oversaw 11 trust territories including Somalia and Cameroon, has been inactive since 1994.

She cited Liberia’s record at the Secretariat as evidence that Liberians can reach senior U.N. posts. She said three Liberians have served as assistant secretaries-general: former President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, Ambassador Winston Tubman and Nyanti herself.

Liberia has appeared before the court as a party. From 1960 to 1966, Liberia and Ethiopia pursued cases at the ICJ against apartheid South Africa over its rule of South West Africa, now Namibia.

In 1969, Liberian Angie Brooks Randolph became president of the 24th U.N. General Assembly. She was the second woman and the first African woman to hold the post.

Nyanti’s appeal comes as Liberia serves its 2026-2027 term on the Security Council. Liberia won 181 votes out of 187 in the June 2025 election, took its seat Jan. 1 and is due to assume the council presidency Dec. 1.