The Court held that it could not accept the view that it has no jurisdiction because of the ‘political’ character of the question posed. The Court considers that because a legal question encompasses political aspects, this ‘does not suffice to deprive it of its character as a “legal question” and to “deprive the Court of a competence expressly conferred on it by its Statute”, and the Court cannot refuse to admit the legal character of a question which invites it to discharge an essentially judicial task’. Moreover, with regard to the argument concerning the discretionary power to decline to give an advisory opinion, the Court held that the request for an advisory opinion ‘represents its participation in the activities of the Organization, and, in principle, should not be refused’.

The disputed gold had been removed from Rome by Germany during World War II, but was subsequently found by an arbitrator to have belonged to Albania. Italy and the USA, however, each claimed the disputed gold on the basis of legal claims against Albania.

The Court found that, in order to determine the validity of Italy’s claim, it would have to ‘determine whether Albania has committed any international wrong against Italy, and thus to decide a dispute between Italy and Albania’. Nonetheless, Albania was not before the Court as a party to the proceedings and had not consented to the dispute being settled by the Court (p 32).