Francisco José Urrutia

Francisco José Urrutia Olano

Francisco José Urrutia Olano (born  April 12, 1870 in Popayán , †  August 6, 1950 in Bogotá ) was a Colombian lawyer , diplomat and politician . In 1908/1909 and 1913/1914 he served as Foreign Minister of his home country and from 1931 to 1945 as a judge at the Permanent International Court of Justice . In resolving international disputes, he practiced an academic approach characterized by diligence and detailed study of legal issues. In addition, he was seen as a representative of what was known as l'esprit de Genève (Spirit of Geneva) and was characterized by an internationalist and humanitarian attitude and a positive attitude towards the League of Nations .

Life

Francisco José Urrutia was born in Popayán in 1870 and entered the diplomatic service in his home country after studying law and political science at the Universidad de Quito , which he completed with a doctorate in 1893 . From 1900 he acted as Secretary of Legation , from 1906 as State Secretary for Foreign Affairs and in 1908/1909 as Colombian Foreign Minister . In 1911 he was elected to the House of Representatives of the Colombian Congress , and a year later he was appointed envoy of Colombia to Brazil . After his return he took over the office of Foreign Minister again in 1913/1914. A year later he was appointed senator and in 1918 President of the Senate. In the same year he was accredited as envoy of his home country in Spain and Switzerland .

After the end of the First World War he represented Colombia between 1920 and 1930 at all meetings of the assembly and between 1926 and 1928 also in the council of the newly founded League of Nations . In May and June 1928 he chaired the meeting of the League Council. In addition, he took part in various international conferences as a delegate from his home country. From 1927 he was a member of the Permanent Court of Arbitration in The Hague . A year later he taught as a lecturer at the Hague Academy of International Law .

On September 25, 1930, he was elected Judge at the Permanent International Court of Justice . He served at the court from the beginning of 1931 and, since the judges' elections planned for 1939 did not take place due to the start of the war, like the other judges in office at that time, he remained in office beyond the regular end of his term of office. In January 1942 he resigned for reasons of age and health.

From 1921 Francisco José Urrutia belonged to the Institut de Droit international . He was married from 1909 and the father of two sons and two daughters. His wife Elena Holguín Arboleda served, among other things, as President of the Colombian Red Cross, his son Francisco José Urrutia Holguín also became a diplomat and acted from 1953 to 1957 as the permanent representative of his home country at the United Nations and in one case as an ad hoc judge at the International Court of Justice in The Hague . Francisco José Urrutia died in Bogotá in 1950 .

Works (selection)

• Páginas de historia diplomática de Estados Unidos de América y las Repúblicas hispanoamericanas de 1810 a 1830.Bogotá 1917
• The evolution of the principio de arbitraje en America. Madrid 1920
• La Corte permanente de justicia internacional. Bogotá 1934
• Política internacional de la Gran Colombia. Bogotá 1941

literature

• Alan T. Leonhard: Urrutia, Francisco José. In: Warren F. Kuehl (Ed.): Biographical Dictionary of Internationalists. Greenwood Press, Westport 1983, ISBN 0-31-322129-4 , pp. 734/735
• Biographical Notes concerning the Judges and Deputy-Judges. Francisco José Urrutia, Judge. In: Seventh Annual Report of the Permanent Court of International Justice. AW Sijthoff's Publishing, Leiden 1931, pp. 31/32

Web links

• Francisco José Urrutia in the online version of the Reich Chancellery Edition Files. Weimar Republic