Protecting vulnerable populations from genocide

Abstract

When the atrocities committed by Nazi Germany became apparent after the Second World War, the consensus within the world community was that the United Nations Charter did not go far enough in defining the rights to which it referred, and that those rights should be defined and enshrined in a new body of international law. The United Nations was determined to ensure that the terrible crimes of the Second World War would never be repeated. It was in fulfilment of this commitment that, one day before the adoption of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights on 9 December 1948, the General Assembly adopted the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide. The adoption of the Convention was full of symbolism and reaffirmed the gravity of the crime it addressed. But it went beyond that. It demonstrated the commitment of the international community to ensure both the prevention of genocide and the punishment of its perpetrators when the crime could not be prevented. The Convention defined genocide as any particular offense committed with “intent to destroy, in whole or part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group.”