Can Genocide be Prevented? Essay

Genocide term had its origination in Armenian holocaust define by Raphael Lemkin in 1944. It is deliberately killing racial, ethnic or particular group as a whole with the intention of destruction. It was considered to be the first and the last mass murder of humans after Nazi’s holocaust incident but time decided another way for it. There have been many genocide incidences happened in the history. These are Armenian genocide, European genocide, Cambodia, Rwanda, Sudan and Rohingya massacre with 10,000 tolls. (Genocide watch, 1998) The paper gives insight into the theoretical and practical knowledge about the genocide and preventive campaigns by the peacemaker United Nations. The argument of genocide as preventable or unpreventable will discussed by the data.

The work on the prevention of genocidal incidence merged with the development of convention of 1948 on the prevention and execution of the genocidal criminals. The designed proposal contained the detail of genocide in relevance with legislation system of various countries to be implemented. It highlighted few things about genocide in the draft:

The article II of the convention declares any act as a crime with the intention to destroy or harm any specific group or ethnic group as:

1. The murder of any specific group.

2. Mental harm and body torture to any particular group.

3. any act of Intentionally destroying peace and life of the people.

4. Any limitations on birth within particular group

5. Migration of the people to another group.

The whole convention objective was made clear to be adopted for the civilizing and humanitarian mission, to protect the rights of the humans and their existence for now and for future generations. (Koko.Wordpress,2010)

Genocide prevention is possible, but for this, it has to be in a strategic way through knowledge of the genocide process. Genocide happens in the process of eight stages. The process starts with classification, symbolization of cultures and people to distinguish them. The prevention at these early stages requires one to understand the middle ground for prevention of genocide. The government should forbid specific tagging of people such as banning of yellow badges usage by the Jews as devised by the government to prevent the Nazi symbol for Jews to cause genocide.

The next stage is dehumanization that makes the group less human in the perspective of each other. The prevention of dehumanization can ensure through check on the hatred speeches delivered by the crowds, leader’s denunciation on the use of hatred strategies as culturally acceptable, reduction in propaganda and punishment for the creation of slaughters. Genocide happens with the involvement of military group’s with particular groups. The Prevention can bring forward through UN for the issuance of the ban on those specific people visas so that they cannot travel and be the source for propaganda in various other regions. A commission should be made to investigate the onset of genocide and violations on the state level.

Extremists group instigate hatred and differentiate propaganda among all classes. The government can ensure the ban on the social interaction with these groups, security protocols for the other people to be the victims of the extremists, and assists deprivation of the extremists to make them unsuccessful in their plans. Refuges camps and armed force intervention inaction should prepare by the UN Security Council. The order of regional forces as backup must plan also.at the stage of extermination. The responsibility should be on individual and state level to derive possible preventive strategies and efforts to secure the rights of every individual. (Stanton, H.G,2003)

Genocide is a violation of foreign law. It is a subject of foreign policy and UN invited dispute and agreed executives of the legislation for the treaty process. (Lawrence, 1991, p.4-5) Policy makers in UN have exclusive advisors for the genocide early warning signals that gather information’s form humanitarian right people and all open sources around the world. The special advisor addresses the public about the onset of war crimes or genocides with the aim to reduce the risk of it. Recommendations generations help up in bringing peace among people. The policy advisor can use a particular strategy such as ethnocentric that’ states all humans are brought up with different cultures, languages, etc. we all humans are same. And no one is allowed to dehumanize other. (Ulfelder, J, 2015)

There should be responsibility and inclusion of inter-religion leaders to deliver humanizing lectures and to promote compassion. It can eradicate ethnic genocide conflict among groups with shared ground culture thinking. The International criminal court is paying its responsibility to arrest all the impure persons spreading genocide. The judicial system must prevail without any political involvement to save the criminals. The ICC has the right to exercise jurisdiction in any state over genocide people. Special tribunals established such as ICTR Rwanda and ICTY. They keep people of severe genocides. This accountability system for genocide criminal can prevent genocide.

The rate of genocide has diminished from past century, the intensity of violation against civilians has dropped down. Progress on the reduction of genocide has resulted from the effort of UN genocidal policies and initiatives. (UN)

Genocide is preventable. The need for the prevention is to get the knowledge of the genocide and to develop models to assess the field. The United Nations has developed a proposal on genocide prevention and to strengthen the prevention of genocide. The work on prevention strategy is growing day by day, and it is possible.

References

Genocide watch. The International Alliance to End Genocide. 1998. http://www.genocidewatch.org/aboutgenocide/8stagesofgenocide.html. 1998.

Koko.Wordpress. Genocide: An Essay. 2010. https://kodiko.wordpress.com/2010/10/13/genocide-an-essay/.

Lawrence, J. L. “The United States and the genocide convention.” Lawrence, J. L. The United States, and the genocide convention. Duke University Press, 1991. 4-5. https://books.google.com.pk/books?id=H5KPAAAAMAAJ&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage&q&f=false.

Stanton, H.G. How can we prevent genocide ? 6 June 2003. https://www.hawaii.edu/powerkills/COMM.6.24.03.HTM. 2003.

Ulfelder, J. Genocide is Going Out of Fashion. 14 May 2015. http://foreignpolicy.com/2015/05/14/genocide-is-going-out-of-fashion/. 2015.

UN. Outreach Programme on the Rwanda Genocide And the United States. n.d. http://www.un.org/en/preventgenocide/rwanda/about/bgpreventgenocide.shtml.