Contents
“Genocide,” or the “crime of crimes,” as defined by the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda in 1998, emerged from the context of World War II. As historian and Holocaust expert Yehuda Bauer noted, it was the first time a systematic process was launched with the goal of “identifying, registering, marking, isolating from their environment, dispossessing, humiliating, concentrating, transporting, and murdering every member of an ethnic group.”
How and when did the term “genocide” originate?
Raphael Lemkin, a Polish Jewish scholar who fled his homeland during the Holocaust, published his book Axis Rule in Occupied Europe in 1944, documenting Hitler’s atrocities against the Jewish people. In this work, Lemkin coined the term “genocide,” combining the Greek word genos (meaning “race or people”) and the Latin suffix cide (meaning “to kill”).
The term first appeared in international law in the indictment of the Nuremberg Trials, which described the crime as: “Deliberate and systematic genocide through the extermination of ethnic and national groups committed against civilian populations in occupied territories, with the intent to destroy ethnic, religious, and national groups.”
Which international laws prohibit and punish genocide?
The key treaty defining how genocide must be prevented and punished is the 1948 United Nations Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide. In compliance with this, Spain incorporated the crime of genocide into its Penal Code in 1971.
Born from the horrors of the Nazi Holocaust and the Nuremberg Trials, this treaty established genocide as an international crime, whether committed in peacetime or wartime. Decades later, international court statutes—such as the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court and those of the tribunals for the former Yugoslavia and Rwanda—adopted the Convention’s definition.
Which courts can prosecute genocide?
Although the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (1993) and the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (1994) were important precedents, it wasn’t until 1998—with the adoption of the Rome Statute—that a permanent court was created to address the four core international crimes: genocide, war crimes, crimes against humanity, and the crime of aggression. This was the International Criminal Court (ICC), based in The Hague, which began operations on July 1, 2002. The ICC is a permanent, independent court (not part of the UN structure) that acts complementarily to national jurisdictions.
Additionally, under the principle of universal jurisdiction, many countries’ legal systems allow prosecution of genocide even if it occurred outside their borders. Spain long served as a leader in combating impunity for grave crimes, investigating serious human rights violations in countries like Chile, Argentina, Guatemala, China, Rwanda, and Western Sahara. However, a 2014 fast-tracked reform of Spain’s Judiciary Organic Law severely limited this principle, restricting Spanish courts’ authority to investigate genocide, crimes against humanity, or war crimes unless the suspect is Spanish, a foreigner residing in Spain, or someone whose extradition Spain has denied. The reform also applied retroactively to ongoing investigations.
What acts constitute genocide under international law?
The Rome Statute of the ICC adopts the definition from the UN Genocide Convention, binding on all states regardless of ratification. Article 6 specifies that genocide involves acts committed with the intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnic, racial, or religious group.
These acts include:
- Killing members of the group: causing death to individuals of a targeted group to destroy it partially or entirely.
- Causing serious bodily or mental harm: including torture, inhumane acts, sexual violence, rape, and other actions inflicting severe physical or psychological damage.
- Deliberately imposing living conditions calculated to bring about the group’s physical destruction: such as denying access to food, medicine, or forcibly displacing people from their homes.
- Measures to prevent births within the group: including forced sterilization, separation of men and women, and forced abortions.
- Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group: applying to minors under 18, often through threats, intimidation, detention, or coercion.
The key distinction from crimes against humanity is the specific intent to destroy a protected group.
Who can be prosecuted for genocide?
The ICC has jurisdiction over individuals, based on the principle of individual responsibility in the Rome Statute, not over states. It can prosecute anyone suspected of genocide, regardless of rank—even heads of state—without allowing immunity claims. Beyond direct perpetrators, superiors may also be held accountable. Individuals cannot escape liability by claiming they were following orders.
Does genocide have a statute of limitations?
Like crimes against humanity and war crimes, genocide is imprescriptible. There is no time limit for investigation or prosecution, as established by the 1968 Convention on the Non-Applicability of Statutory Limitations to War Crimes and Crimes against Humanity.
Major genocides in history
The Holocaust
As previously noted, the Holocaust marked a turning point in human history, prompting the need for a term to describe such extreme inhumanity. Beyond the Nazi regime’s atrocities during WWII, the term refers to Hitler’s “Final Solution”—the planned extermination of the Jewish people and other groups deemed “inferior” by Nazism.
After the Nazis rose to power, their method involved identifying, persecuting, kidnapping, and mass imprisonment of millions of Jews in extermination camps, later expanded to include communists, homosexuals, disabled individuals, and prisoners of war. The most infamous camp was Auschwitz in Poland, where approximately 5,000 people were killed daily—over one million in total—through gas chambers, shootings, hangings, beatings, and horrific medical experiments.
An estimated six million people were murdered during the Holocaust.
The 1994 Rwandan Genocide
On April 7, 1994, after years of ethnic tension between Tutsis and Hutus—rooted in Belgium’s colonial caste system—radical Hutus seized power and launched a mass extermination of Tutsis and moderate Hutus.
This massacre lasted only 100 days but claimed 800,000 lives—75% of the Tutsi population. Thousands more were tortured, raped, and subjected to sexual violence. The International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda was established later that year and has since convicted over 700 people, including 28 for genocide.
Historic convictions:
- Jean-Paul Akayesu, mayor of Taba: first person convicted of genocide by an international court (1998).
- Théoneste Bagosora, commander of the Interahamwe militia: sentenced to life in 2008 for genocide.
The Cambodian Genocide: Pol Pot and the Khmer Rouge
In 1975, after a brutal civil war, the Khmer Rouge, led by Pol Pot and backed by China’s Communist Party, took control of Cambodia under Democratic Kampuchea. Their goal was a Maoist-Stalinist regime based on an agrarian society and a “purification” of the population akin to Nazi ideology. They launched mass killings, torture, forced labor, and starvation against anyone deemed an enemy of the state.
Over four years—ending with Vietnam’s invasion—more than 1.5 million people died—about a quarter of Cambodia’s population.
Historic convictions:
- Kaing Guek Eav (alias Duch), Khmer Rouge leader: sentenced to life in 2012 for genocide; died in prison in 2020.
- Nuon Chea and Khieu Samphan, top Khmer Rouge officials: both sentenced to life in 2018 for genocide, over 40 years after the crimes.
The Bosnian Genocide: The Srebrenica Massacre
Following Yugoslavia’s breakup in 1991, a devastating war erupted in Bosnia (1992–1995), marked by numerous human rights violations, including genocide. In 1995, Serbian forces and paramilitaries killed around 8,000 Bosnian Muslim men and boys in Srebrenica in a campaign of ethnic cleansing.
Some courts argue Srebrenica was not the only genocide during the war. In 1997, German courts convicted Nikola Jorgić, a Serbian paramilitary leader, of genocide in other regions of Bosnia and Herzegovina.
Historic convictions:
- Radovan Karadžić, former Bosnian Serb leader: convicted of genocide for the Srebrenica massacre and found responsible for crimes against humanity and war crimes—including torture, rape, and deaths in custody.
- Ratko Mladić, former chief of the Army of Republika Srpska, known as the “Butcher of Srebrenica”: sentenced to life in 2017 for genocide, crimes against humanity, and war crimes.
21st-Century Genocides: Yazidis and Rohingyas
The 21st century has not been free of genocide. The first case occurred when ISIS attacked the Yazidi population in Iraq. In 2014, ISIS seized Sinjar, killing thousands of men, women, children, and elderly. An estimated 11,000 women and girls were abducted and sold into sexual slavery. While many Yazidis fled to mountains, others died from hunger and thirst due to lack of supplies.
The most recent case occurred in 2017 in Myanmar, where segments of the civilian population, police, and military—mostly Buddhist—persecuted the Muslim Rohingya minority, resulting in mass killings, rapes, home burnings, and destroyed crops. Once again, the goal was the complete eradication of the Rohingya. This triggered a mass exodus of around 700,000 refugees to neighboring Bangladesh, creating a severe humanitarian crisis.
