Bogotá Summit was an important new chapter in Global South diplomacy

Daily Maverick

2 days ago

Last week the Emergency Conference to Halt Genocide in Gaza was held in Bogotá, Colombia. Convened by The Hague Group, and co-hosted by Colombia and South Africa, the meeting was attended by 32 countries. Although the meeting was widely covered in the international media, it was, bizarrely, largely ignored in the South African media.
The Hague Group was formed in January this year as an alliance of Global South countries working together to uphold international law and challenge impunity, especially in the context of Israel's actions in Gaza. The group rejects selective enforcement of international law and affirms that legal norms must apply equally to all states. It has served as a platform for coordinated legal and diplomatic action aimed at reinforcing rulings by the International Court of Justice (ICJ) and the International Criminal Court (ICC). The nine countries that formed the group were Belize, Bolivia, Colombia, Cuba, Honduras, Malaysia, Namibia, Senegal and South Africa. Belize later withdrew.
The Bogotá meeting was convened in response to growing frustration with the failure of powerful states of the Global North to enforce existing international legal rulings on Israel's conduct in Gaza. This time 32 countries attended the meeting, including Spain, Ireland and Slovenia from the periphery of the Global North.
The concrete measures announced in Bogotá were far reaching. Signatory states committed to preventing arms transfers, fuel and dual-use equipment from reaching Israel; banning vessels carrying military material from docking or being serviced in their ports; reviewing public contracts to ensure no state-linked resources are financing occupation; and reaffirming their commitment to universal jurisdiction, enabling legal action for international crimes regardless of where they occur. Crucially, they pledged to uphold ICC and ICJ obligations, including arrest warrants and provisional measures, and to take coordinated diplomatic and legal steps to end the era of impunity.
Twelve countries formally adopted these measures: Bolivia, Colombia, Cuba, Indonesia, Iraq, Libya, Malaysia, Namibia, Nicaragua, Oman, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, and South Africa. An additional eighteen attendees expressed interest but held off formal endorsement pending domestic consultations. A number of other countries that did not have representatives in Bogotá are considering endorsing the measures.
Outcomes welcomed
Palestinian organisations — both in the occupied territories and across the diaspora — widely welcomed the outcomes of the Bogotá summit. The declaration was described by a spokesperson for the Palestinian BDS National Committee as a 'breakthrough in coordinated Global South action against Israeli impunity'. Across Palestinian civil society, the measures announced were viewed as long overdue and a powerful signal that solidarity was being transformed into concrete, enforceable policy.
UN Special Rapporteur Francesca Albanese, herself sanctioned by the US for pro‑Palestinian advocacy, called the summit 'the most significant political development in the past 20 months'.
Al Jazeera characterised the Bogotá outcome as 'the most ambitious, multilateral plan since the beginning of Israel's war in Gaza 21 months ago'. Middle East Eye described it as a declaration of 'unprecedented measures to halt the Gaza genocide'.
Inevitably the US responded with hostility. The US State Department spokesperson condemned what it referred to as 'efforts by so‑called 'multilateral blocs' to weaponise international law as a tool to advance radical anti‑Western agendas', and urged countries not to undermine Israel or US allies through coordinated 'legal and diplomatic warfare'.
Israel's foreign ministry dismissed the conference as a 'show of hostility' and accused participating states of 'coordinated lawfare' designed to delegitimise Israel's right to self-defence. Both governments characterised the measures endorsed at the summit — including arms embargoes and support for ICC arrest warrants — as biased and legally unfounded.
The essence of The Hague Group's position is that international law should apply to all without fear or favour. The fact that the US and Israel can condemn this position is a crystal-clear demonstration that they openly seek impunity from international law. For years the most powerful countries in the West told us that they guaranteed a 'rules-based international order'. It could not be more clear that for the US and Israel, as well as their backers in countries like the UK and Germany, these 'rules' were never intended to apply to the dominant powers in the West.
Huge step forward
The Bogotá meeting will not stop the genocide. Israel's ongoing war crimes and its genocide continue to enjoy the full support of the US and countries like the UK and Germany. Shamefully Israel continues to buy coal from South Africa via Glencore and Patrice Motsepe. The Bogotá meeting is, though, a huge step forward for Global South-led diplomacy and for building a growing consensus that international law must apply to all states without exception. If, as expected, many more countries join The Hague Group and sign on to its measures, and if more countries in the Global North break ranks with the US, UK and Germany and ally themselves with the majority of humanity, Israel will start to reach the point at which it can no longer fuel and arm its genocide or assume that its impunity will be permanent.
South Africa's decision to take Israel to the ICJ in late 2023 was warmly welcomed across the bulk of South African society, including by the mass-based organisations of the poor and the working class, including Abahlali baseMjondolo, which is now unequivocally the leading force on the South African left as it is the only mass-based left organisation to directly stand up to the fascism of Operation Dudula.
However, the decision to take Israel to the ICJ was aggressively condemned by the US and the now rapidly weakening pro-West bloc strung across the media, NGOs and the academy at home. Inevitably various baseless conspiracy theories were floated about South Africa having been paid by Iran to become 'the legal arm of Hamas'. Naledi Pandor, one of the most principled people in our politics, was gratuitously slandered.
But while the case against Israel at the ICJ was widely supported at home, the alliance between the pro-West bloc here and US power did pose a real threat to South Africa — a threat that went beyond Trump's attacks on X. The US has massive power and has the capacity to do serious economic damage to South Africa. For this reason, South Africa cannot afford to be isolated on the international stage.
In this context the formation of The Hague Group was a diplomatic masterstroke. South Africa is no longer isolated and if the group can be further strengthened it will be the chief backers of Israel's genocide— the US, the UK and Germany — that are isolated.
Principled leadership
It is necessary to denounce the ANC government's failings at home — from endemic corruption to service delivery collapse — but that critique should not blind us to South Africa's principled leadership on the global stage. Nor should it obscure the strategy underpinning that leadership: the transition from moral witness at the ICJ to coordinated diplomatic action. South Africa's partnership with the progressive government in Colombia, and its growing alliances across Latin America, the Middle East, Africa and Asia, show that international solidarity can turn principles into power.
The Bogotá summit set a deadline of 20 September for additional states to sign on to the six agreed measures, aligning with the UN General Assembly. South Africa and Namibia have already begun integrating arms embargo protocols into their domestic regulations. Governments are now considering national investigations under universal jurisdiction. States that support ICC arrest warrants for Netanyahu and Gallant are developing legal strategies to enforce them.
Of course, limitations remain. Implementation will require ongoing political will. Smaller economies may face economic retaliation or diplomatic pressure. But even so, the Bogotá summit is a massive step forward in the work of building a principled global alliance in support of the universal applicability of international law.
In time the Bogotá summit may be understood to have marked the beginning of a new era in Global South diplomacy. While we must condemn the ANC's many failures at home, we can be hugely proud of what it is achieving on the global stage. DM