The indictment against Serbia: What is genocide and what are the cases so far?

Genocide is understood by many as the worst crime against humanity.

It is defined as mass extermination of a particular group of people, for example, by the Nazis who tried to eliminate the Jewish population in the 1940 ' s.

However, behind the simple definition there is a big confusion of legal concepts about what genocide constitutes and when the term must be applied.

The term genocide was first used in 1943 by the Jewish-Palch lawyer Raphael Lemkin, which combined words “genos” [racs or tribes] and the Latin word “%x3>, which means “kill”.

After seeing Holocaust horrors, in which each member of his family except his brother was killed, Dr. Lemkin made activism for genocide to be known as a crime in international law, reports Periscope.

His efforts paved the way for the adoption of the UN Genocide Convention in December 1948, which took effect in January 1951.

Article two of the convention defines genocide as “any action carried out in order to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnic, racial or religious group:

- Killing members of the group;

-cause serious bodily or mental injuries to members of the group;

-The deliberate deterioration of life conditions in order to destroy the group physically or in part;

-Setting measures aimed at preventing births within the group;

-binding the transfer of children to another group;

The Convention also places a general task on states that have signed it to prevent and punish the genocide”.

But this definition of genocide by the UN has been constantly criticised as too narrow and that cannot be applied for certain cases. Others have criticised that the term has been depreciated by its overuse.

Some analysts say the definition of genocide is so narrow that none of the mass killings committed since the treaty was adopted would constitute the genocit.

How many genocides have occurred?

Some say that there was only one genocide in the 20th century - the Holocaust.

Others say there have been at least three genocides defined by the earthquake of the above - mentioned 1948 convention:

-The mass murder of Armenians by Ottoman Turks between 1915-1920, a charge Turkey denies;

The Holocaust, during which more than 6 million Jews were killed;

Ruanda, where about 800 thousand Tutsi and a few Hutu were killed in 1994.

But in recent years, several more cases have been added to the list. In Bosnia, the 1995 Srebrenica massacre is set to be called genocide by the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia. [ Footnote] ICTY].

Other cases include hunger in Ukraine caused by the Soviet regime [1932-33], the Invasion of East Timor [1975], and the killings in Cambodia in the 1970s, where 1.7 million Cambodians were believed to have died of execution, hunger or forced labour.

The last case is March 2016, when the US accused the Islamic jihadist group I The SIS was committing genocide against Christian minorities, jazid and rain in Iraq and Syria. /Periscope