Genocide

The origin of the word genocide
Bones from victims of the Armenian Genocide (1915).
A Japanese soldier with victims of the Nanjing Massacre (1937 or 1938)
Skulls at a memorial site about the Rwandan genocide (1994)
Victims of the Srebrenica massacre (1995) are exhumed

During a genocide, a group (often a government, army, or paramilitary) tries to destroy another group because of their ethnicity, race, nationality or religion. Genocide is always an intentional act - never an accident.

In a genocide, the targeted (victim) group is killed in large numbers. However, genocide also involves other methods. These include preventing the group from being able to survive (for example, by starving them); forcing them to assimilate; destroying their culture or religion; and/or stopping them from having children.

Genocide is often motivated by hatred or fear of the targeted group, like racism or antisemitism. Other genocides happen for political reasons.

Etymology

The word genocide was created by Raphael Lemkin, a Polish Jew, in 1944. It combined the words genos (Greek for "family, tribe or race") and -cide (from the Latin occidere, "to kill").

In 1933 Lemkin spoke at a League of Nations conference on international criminal law in Madrid. He delivered an essay called the Crime of Barbarity. On 11 August 1933, a group of Assyrians were massacred in Iraq. This reminded Lemkin of the Armenian Genocide during World War I. In his essay, Lemkin described genocide and called it a crime against international law.

Examples

Early 20th century

Several major genocides happened in the early 20th century.

In the Herero and Namaqua Genocide (1904-1907), soldiers of the German Empire killed thousands of Bantu and Khoisan peoples in German South West Africa (now Namibia).

Between 1915-1917, the Young Turks in the Ottoman Empire committed the Armenian Genocide. During this genocide, most Armenians were deported, assimilated, forced to convert to Islam, and/or killed.

World War II

The word genocide was first used to describe the Holocaust, when Nazis killed 6 million Jews and millions of others during World War II.

The Ustase of Croatia also committed genocide during World War II. They killed about a million Serbs in death camps, especially Jasenovac.

In the 1937-1938 Nanjing Massacre, the Imperial Japanese Army attacked, raped, tortured and murdered hundreds of thousands of people in Nanjing, China during the Second Sino-Japanese War.

After World War II

Between 1975 and 1979, the Khmer Rouge (led by Pol Pot) killed 1.5 million to 2 million ethnic minorities and religious groups in the Cambodian Genocide. This was a quarter of Cambodia's 1975 population.

The 1994 Rwandan Genocide is another well-known example. In a short time, Hutu people killed about a million Tutsi people (along with Hutus who were against the genocide).

During the Bosnian Genocide in 1992-1995, The Bosnian Serb Forces killed around 100,000 ethnic Bosniaks in Bosnia and Herzegovina. The largest killing happened in the village of Srebrenica, in what is called the Srebrenica massacre. Over 8,000 were killed in that massacre alone.

The Darfur conflict began in Sudan in 2003. The United States government and many others have described it as a genocide.

Laws today

In 1948 the United Nations passed the Genocide Convention, which defined genocide and made it a crime against international law.

Today, the International Criminal Court has the power to judge anyone who has participated in a genocide.

References

  1. 1 2 3 "How the Court Works". International Criminal Court. Retrieved September 26, 2024.
  2. 1 2 3 Irvin-Erickson, Douglas (2017). Raphael Lemkin and the Concept of Genocide. University of Pennsylvania Press. ISBN 978-0-8122-4864-7. JSTOR j.ctv2t4ds5.
  3. 1 2 Raphael Lemkin - EuropeWorld, 22/6/2001
  4. ↑ Olusoga, David; Erichsen, Casper W. (2010). The Kaiser's Holocaust: Germany's forgotten genocide and the colonial roots of Nazism (1. publ ed.). London: Faber and Faber. ISBN 978-0-571-23141-6.
  5. ↑ Bevan, Robert (2006). "Cultural Cleansing: Who Remembers The Armenians". The Destruction of Memory. London: Reaction Books. pp. 25-60.
  6. ↑ "Holocaust | Definition, Concentration Camps, History, & Facts". Encyclopedia Britannica. 2024-09-25. Retrieved 2024-09-26.
  7. ↑ "Ustaša | Fascist Regime, Genocide & War Crimes | Britannica". Encyclopedia Britannica. Retrieved 2024-09-26.
  8. ↑ Chang, Iris (1998). The Rape of Nanking: The Forgotten Holocaust of World War II. A Penguin book history. London: Penguin Books. ISBN 978-0-14-027744-9.
  9. ↑ Chandler, David (2018). A History of Cambodia. Routledge. ISBN 978-0-429-96406-0.
  10. ↑ Dallaire, Roméo; Beardsley, Brent (2004). Shake Hands with the Devil: The Failure of Humanity in Rwanda. London: Arrow Books. ISBN 978-0-09-947893-5.
  11. ↑ Holocaust Encyclopedia. "Bosnia and Herzegovina". United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. Retrieved 2024-09-26.
  12. 1 2 United Nations (January 30, 2015). "Appeal Judgement Summary for Popović et al" (PDF). International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia. The Hague. Retrieved September 26, 2024.
  13. ↑ "Genocide In Darfur - Holocaust Museum Houston". hmh.org. 2023-08-02. Retrieved 2024-09-26.
  14. ↑ Holocaust Encyclopedia. "Darfur". United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. Retrieved 2024-09-26.
  15. ↑ Hagan, John; Rymond-Richmond, Wenona; Palloni, Alberto (August 2009). "Racial Targeting of Sexual Violence in Darfur". American Journal of Public Health. 99 (8): 1386–1392. doi:10.2105/AJPH.2008.141119. ISSN 0090-0036. PMC 2707480. PMID 19542043.
  16. ↑ "Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide (PDF)" (PDF). United Nations Audiovisual Library of International Law. 1946.