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For disputes involving a treaty such as the Genocide Convention, both states must be parties. Only states and international organizations can bring a case to the ICJ.
When a state such as Yugoslavia breaks apart, the newly created states may accept or reject treaties approved by the former government. In the 1960s most of the newly independent states in Africa and Asia succeeded to all the treaties of their former colonial rulers.
When a state accedes to a treaty for the first time, that treaty's provisions govern when it takes effect. Under Article XIII, the Genocide Convention takes effect on the "ninetieth day following the deposit of the instrument."
Since the Nuremberg prosecution, the prohibition on genocide has been considered binding on all states as a peremptory norm of customary law whether or not the government has ratified the 1948 Convention.
