The US government is considering whether the mass displacements and killings in western Sudans Darfur region constitute genocide, according to US Secretary of State Colin Powell.
Asked whether the term genocide was more appropriate than ethnic cleansing, Powell said the matter was being discussed “inter-agency” and that lawyers and policy officials were also looking into it. – I do not think they have -… come to a conclusion yet as to whether all of the criteria that are used to make a determination of genocide have been met yet… But I do know there is a review under way, he said in an interview with the New York Times on Friday.
– You know these turn out to be almost legal matters of definition, and I am not prepared to say what is the correct legal term for what is happening. All I know is that there are at least a million people who are desperately in need, and many of them will die if we can not get the international community mobilised and if we can not get the Sudanese to cooperate with the international community. And it will not make a whole lot of difference after the fact what you have called it, he continued.
The Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide – to which the US is a signatory – obliges the United Nations to act to prevent genocide. The convention defines genocide as acts “committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnic, racial or religious group”. Such acts include killing; causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of a group; and deliberately inflicting conditions of life calculated to bring about the physical destruction of a group in whole or in part.
Ten years ago, the Clinton administration was criticised because it failed to recognise the Rwandan genocide as such, while at least 800.000 Tutsis and moderate Hutus were being slaughtered.
Kilde: FN-bureauet IRINnews
