'Jus cogens' means:

Question

In its second preliminary objection, Myanmar submits that The Gambia’s Application is inadmissible because The Gambia lacks standing to bring this case before the Court. In particular, Myanmar considers that only “injured States”, which Myanmar defines as States “adversely affected by an internationally wrongful act”, have standing to present a claim before the Court. In Myanmar’s view, The Gambia is not an “injured State” (a term that Myanmar appears to use interchangeably with the term “specially affected State”) and has failed to demonstrate an individual legal interest. Therefore, according to Myanmar, The Gambia lacks standing under Article IX of the Genocide Convention.
Myanmar draws a distinction between the right to invoke State responsibility under general international law and standing before the Court. It argues that, even if it were established that a “non-injured” Contracting Party to the Genocide Convention has the right to invoke another State’s responsibility for violations of the Convention, this would not necessarily entail the right to bring a case before the Court. To this end, Myanmar contends that there exists a difference between the common interest in the accomplishment of the purposes of the Genocide Convention and a State’s individual legal interest that may be enforce through the institution of proceedings before the Court. In Myanmar’s view, only States “specially affected” by an internationally wrongful act have standing to bring a claim before the Court.
Myanmar further submits that The Gambia’s claims are inadmissible in so far as they are not brought before the Court in accordance with the rule concerning the nationality of claims which, according to Myanmar, is reflected in Article 44 (a) of the International Law Commission’s Articles on the Responsibility of States for Internationally Wrongful Acts. Myanmar asserts that the rule concerning the nationality of claims applies to the invocation of responsibility by both “injured” and “non injured” States and irrespective of whether the obligation breached is an erga omnes partes or erga omnes obligation. Consequently, in Myanmar’s view, The Gambia lacks standing to invoke Myanmar’s responsibility.

Answer 1

One good way to identify jus cogens is to remember what happens if a treaty conflicts with it: under Article 53 of the Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties, such a treaty is void. That consequence only makes sense if the underlying norm cannot be derogated from.

Norms: is far too broad, plenty of international norms can be changed or opted out of by agreement between states, which is not true of jus cogens.
Negotiable norms: is actually the reverse of the concept, jus cogens norms bind states regardless of consent or treaty terms, they cannot be negotiated away.
Non-derogable norms: fits because jus cogens rules, such as the prohibition on genocide or slavery, apply to every state and cannot be overridden even by mutual agreement, any treaty that tries to do so is void.
Legal norms: again is too generic, it does not explain why a conflicting treaty would be void, only the non-derogable character of jus cogens explains that.

The correct answer is Non-derogable norms, since jus cogens describes peremptory rules of international law that no state can contract out of.

'Jus cogens' means:

The Correct Option is C

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