Colombia told the International Court of Justice on 18 September 2026 that it had decided to withdraw the Article 63 declaration it lodged on 5 April 2024 in South Africa v. Israel, according to an ICJ press release republished by UNISPAL on 22 September 2026. On the public record available here, those two dates and the existence of the withdrawal notice are established. The same record does not disclose Colombia’s reasons for stepping back. 22 September 2026 ICJ press release via UNISPAL 5 April 2024 ICJ press release via UNISPAL
That matters for a narrow treaty reason, not because Colombia was itself a party to the underlying dispute. The April 2024 press material said Colombia relied on its status as a party to the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide. Both public records describe Article 63 as the route for a non-party State to intervene when a case concerns the construction of a convention, with the Court’s interpretation then equally binding on that intervening State. 5 April 2024 ICJ press release via UNISPAL 22 September 2026 ICJ press release via UNISPAL
What the sources do not show is almost as important as what they do. The 5 April 2024 release says South Africa and Israel were invited under Article 83 of the Rules of Court to submit written observations on Colombia’s declaration. But the source set for this article contains no later registry record showing whether those observations were filed, whether the Court issued any separate decision on Colombia’s declaration, or whether Colombia made further submissions before withdrawing. 5 April 2024 ICJ press release via UNISPAL 22 September 2026 ICJ press release via UNISPAL
Nor does the withdrawal notice, by itself, revise the Court’s earlier provisional-measures orders. The 22 September 2026 release recites three steps already taken in the case: an order of 26 January 2024, additional measures on 28 March 2024, and an order of 24 May 2024 that reaffirmed earlier measures and added new ones. That background shows the interim-measures track existed independently of Colombia’s intervention filing. Nothing in the public record cited here says those orders were reopened, stayed or withdrawn because Colombia withdrew. 22 September 2026 ICJ press release via UNISPAL
The same 22 September 2026 material also listed numerous other States that had filed Article 62 applications or Article 63 declarations in the case as of that publication date. That point matters procedurally because Colombia’s move changes only Colombia’s own position within a broader intervention landscape. It does not, on these sources, establish any wider contraction of third-State participation. Just as importantly, that list was current only as of 22 September 2026, not as of 29 October 2026. 22 September 2026 ICJ press release via UNISPAL
The safest conclusion is therefore limited. On the Court’s description, the distinctive consequence of Article 63 is equal binding force for any convention construction adopted in the eventual judgment. Colombia has now withdrawn the filing through which it sought that status. The careful inference is simply that the public record no longer shows Colombia asking to participate as an intervening State under Article 63 in this case. The materials do not separately define every legal consequence that follows from withdrawal. 5 April 2024 ICJ press release via UNISPAL 22 September 2026 ICJ press release via UNISPAL
For accountability reporting, the unresolved questions are specific: whether Colombia gave reasons to the Registry, whether any Article 83 observations were received, whether the Court issued a public procedural response, and whether later filings by other States altered the intervention map after 22 September 2026. Until a directly retrieved registry document answers those points, the defensible account remains narrower than the politics around the case: a declaration filed on 5 April 2024 was withdrawn on 18 September 2026. 5 April 2024 ICJ press release via UNISPAL 22 September 2026 ICJ press release via UNISPAL
