Genocide: Is "Never Again" Never Correct?

 With the 99^th anniversary of the Armenian genocide commemoration less than a month away let us look at whether mankind has learnt from one of the most brutal forms of crimes against humanity. 

The turn of the millennium marked the end of a truly bloody and horrific 20th century, with attempts of mass extermination in Asia Minor and the Middle East, south-east Asia and even at the EU’s doorstep. From the Armenians, Assyrians and Greeks at the start of the 20^th century to to the Tutsis in Rwanda and the Bosnians in ex-Yugoslavia. International courts have been set up to deal with these particular types of crime in order to make sure that these never happen again, but is this enough to ensure that genocide remains confined to history? 

As mass murder continues to this day in the Darfur region, mistreatment of minorities still occurs in modern day Turkey and persecutions of Roma people remains all too topical in Europe, the answer sadly appears to be no.  In a distressing pattern, the unpunished crimes of the past century have given others incentive to believe that they will get away with acts against humanity. At the risk of exhausting an already much quoted phrase, Hitler once said “Who after all speaks today of the annihilation of the Armenians?" (Hitler, August 22^nd, 1939). 

 Unaccounted crimes – a threat to regional security

The fact that the first genocide of the 20^th century still remains unpunished and unaccounted for, not only acts as a threat for regional security in concerned areas it also encourages political whitewashing. The Yugoslavian conflict is a clear reminder as to what happens when whitewashing occurs – the Croatians long denied atrocities against Serbs in past Balkan Wars creating a hostile environment which reached its climax in the 90s. In contrast, the German example highlights how recognition and apologies for past crimes can lead to healthy diplomatic relations with neighbouring countries and previous victims.

With regards to Turkey, the current instability in the region makes deniability of past attempts of mass extinction all the more worrying. Yet nowadays, people are imprisoned or exiled for speaking out against the country’s past crimes, bad-mouthing Ataturk can be highly punishable, and Turkey’s slate is far from clean when it comes to the treatment of minorities today. More shocking is Rwanda’s Hutus not being held accountable for their brutal slaughter of the Tutsis and returning to live alongside them, resulting in cases of Tutsis having the murderer of a family member or friend as a neighbour! Rwanda is a tough reminder of the absurdness of colonial-based borders, and a clear demonstration that the creation of a new state (or several) does not necessarily happen following genocide.  Nor is it the solution for ethnic conflicts as the ongoing violence following the partition of Sudan illustrates. 

It is foolish to think that whitewashing and the brushing aside of crimes against humanity is something that is strictly bound to the 3^rd world or less economically developed regions. Europe’s current treatment of the Roma gipsy (ghettoization, persecution – sometimes violent) which eerily resembles that of the Jews prior to the Holocaust, brings back the sad reality that we have learnt little to nothing from the past. 

The failure of the Genocide Convention

In terms of preventing genocide, the fault ultimately lies within the Genocide Convention and its failure to actually give meaning to the words “never again”. The problem with the Convention firstly comes from the terminology. The Convention states that it is the responsibility of all states to recognise genocide and to prevent them from being committed. This ambiguous legislation does not specify who should be punishing these governments or what preventing genocide would entail. Most states however interpret this as involving intervention. The definition of genocide itself (a term coined by Raphael Lemkin) is also not without its flaws, nor its loopholes. As it stands the definition currently reads as: ‘the intent to destroy of all or in part of a racial, ethnic, religious or national group’ (Genocide Watch). On top of much confusion as to what can be qualified as genocide, the international community’s reluctance to intervene has often ‘delayed’ the labelling of conflicts as genocide (Darfur). More alarming though is the lack of international intervention in cases where a consensus has been reached concerning conflicts being recognised as genocidal. The result: more ‘Rwanda’-like cases where the international community watches from afar the massacre taking place. 

A New Dawn?

On the 9^th of July 2011, when South Sudan officially proclaimed its independence, Barrack Obama declared that “today is a reminder that after the darkness of war, the light of a new dawn is possible”. As much as this new dawn is possible it has not been achieved. 

The war is still raging in South Sudan and every time ethnic cleansing goes unpunished the words “never again” bare less and less meaning. Genocide Watch’s 2012 report identifies nine countries whose people are at risk of extermination (stage 7) and 11 countries which are at the ‘preparation’ level of a potential genocide (stage 6). These are unsurprising figures if we consider the amount of impunity instigators of genocide such as Pol Pot and Idi Amin have had. Also unsurprising is the ignorance of many concerning the existence of such crimes, even when it is part of their own history. Ataturk is a figure of much respect and admiration in Turkey and Mao Tse-Tung still enjoys a god-like status in China even though he is considered as one of the biggest murderers of the 20^th century.

Genocide Watch also reminds us that stage 8, denial, is among the surest indicators of further genocidal massacres. Given this fact it is hard to envisage genocide not happening again and disappearing completely within the next decade or even century.

For further information

“Screamers (of genocide)”, featuring System of a Down – a critically acclaimed documentary explaining why genocide keeps occurring

"The Devil Came On Horseback" - award-winning film film on Darfur