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Audio reveals his informal tone and he speaks without raising his voice It is the only known recording of him speaking informally and in private In the clip - which you can hear below - he speaks about his dismay over tank production A secret recording of Adolf Hitler talking privately with a military leader in 1942 uncovers the Nazi leader's normal speaking voice for the first time.

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National youth groups : Italian fascists

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The 20th Century has seen the rise of two basic types of boys uniformed youth groups. The Scouts have been the most important. Totalitarian political movements in the 1920s, however, sought to cretate their own scout-like groups that they could use to indoctrinate virtually all young Italians in the principles of Fascism.

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Mussolini in a way "brain washed" young children to obey him and show loyalty to him while they're young and when they're older.

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The economy of Italy under fascism refers to the economy in the Kingdom of Italy between 1922 and 1943, when it was controlled by fascism. Italy had emerged from World War I in a poor and weakened condition and, after the war, suffered inflation, massive debts and an extended depression. By 1920, the economy was in a massive convulsion, with mass unemployment, food shortages, strikes and so on. That conflagration of viewpoints can be exemplified by the so-called Biennio Rosso (Two Red Years).

There were some economic problems in Europe like inflation in the aftermath of the war. The consumer price index in Italy continued to increase after 1920 but Italy did not experience hyperinflation on the level of Austria, Poland, Hungary, Russia and Germany. The costs of the war and postwar reconstruction contributed to inflationary pressure. The changing political attitudes of the post-war period and rise of a working class was also a factor and Italy was one of several countries where there was a disagreement about the tax burden.

Benito Mussolini came to power in 1922 under a parliamentary coalition until the National Fascist Party seized control and ushered in a one-party dictatorship by early 1925. The growth in Mussolini's popularity to the extent of becoming a national leader was gradual as would be expected for a leader of any fascist movement. The doctrine only succeeded in Italy because the public was just as enthusiastic for change as much as Mussolini was committed to doing away with the liberal doctrines and Marxism in the country. Therefore, he would later write (with the help of Giovanni Gentile) and distribute The Doctrine of Fascism to the Italian society, which ended up being the basis of the Fascist agenda throughout Mussolini's dictatorship. Mussolini did not simply thrust himself into the dictatorship position, but rather rose gradually based on his understanding of the existing support for his ideas in the country.

Before the dictatorship era, Mussolini tried to transform the country's economy along fascist ideology, at least on paper. In fact, he was not an economic radical, nor did he seek a free-hand in the economy. The Fascist Party held a minority faction of only three positions in the cabinet, excluding Mussolini; and providing other political parties more independence. During the coalition period, Mussolini appointed a classical liberal economist, Alberto De Stefani, originally a stalwart leader in the Center Party as Italy's Minister of Finance, who advanced economic liberalism, along with minor privatization. Before his dismissal in 1925, Stefani "simplified the tax code, cut taxes, curbed spending, liberalized trade restrictions and abolished rent controls", where the Italian economy grew more than 20 percent, and unemployment fell 77 percent, under his influence.

To proponents of the first view, Mussolini did have a clear economic agenda, both long and short-term, from the beginning of his rule. The government had two main objectives-to modernize the economy and to remedy the country's lack of strategic resources. Before the removal of Stefani, Mussolini's administration pushed the modern capitalistic sector in the service of the state, intervening directly as needed to create a collaboration between the industrialists, the workers and the state. The government moved toward resolving class conflicts in favour of corporatism. In the short term, the government worked to reform the widely abused tax system, dispose of inefficient state-owned industry, cut government costs and introduce tariffs to protect the new industries. However, these policies ended after Mussolini took dictatorial controls and terminated the coalition.

The lack of industrial resources, especially the key ingredients of the Industrial Revolution, was countered by the intensive development of the available domestic sources and by aggressive commercial policies-searching for particular raw material trade deals, or attempting strategic colonization. In order to promote trade, Mussolini pushed the Italian parliament to ratify an "Italo-Soviet political and economic agreement" by early 1923. This agreement assisted Mussolini's effort to have the Soviet Union officially recognized by Italy in 1924, the first Western nation to do so. With the signing of the 1933 Treaty of Friendship, Nonaggression, and Neutrality with the Soviet Union, Fascist Italy became a major trading partner with Joseph Stalin's Russia, exchanging natural resources from Soviet Russia for technical assistance from Italy, which included the fields of aviation, automobile and naval technology.

Although a disciple of the French Marxist Georges Sorel and the main leader of the Italian Socialist Party in his early years, Mussolini abandoned the theory of class struggle for class collaboration. Some fascist syndicalists turned to economic collaboration of the classes to create a "productivist" posture where "a proletariat of producers" would be critical to the "conception of revolutionary politics" and social revolution. However, most fascist syndicalists instead followed the lead of Edmondo Rossoni, who favored combining nationalism with class struggle, often displaying a hostile attitude towards capitalists. This anti-capitalist hostility was so contentious that in 1926 Rossoni denounced industrialists as "vampires" and "profiteers".

Since Italy's economy was generally undeveloped with little industrialization, fascists and revolutionary syndicalists, such as Angelo Oliviero Olivetti, argued that the Italian working class could not have the requisite numbers or consciousness "to make revolution". They instead followed Karl Marx's admonition that a nation required "full maturation of capitalism as the precondition for socialist realization". Under this interpretation, especially as expounded by Sergio Panunzio, a major theoretician of Italian fascism, "[s]yndicalists were productivists, rather than distributionists". Fascist intellectuals were determined to foster economic development to enable a syndicalist economy to "attain its productive maximum", which they identified as crucial to "socialist revolution".

Structural deficit, public works and social welfare

Referring to the economics of John Maynard Keynes as "useful introduction to fascist economics", Mussolini spent Italy into a structural deficit that grew exponentially. In Mussolini's first year as Prime Minister in 1922, Italy's national debt stood at 93 billion lire. By 1934, Italian historian Gaetano Salvemini, estimated Italy's national debt had risen to 149 billion lire. In 1943, The New York Times put Italy's national debt as 406 billion lire.

A former school teacher, Mussolini's spending on the public sector, schools and infrastructure was considered extravagant. Mussolini "instituted a programme of public works hitherto unrivaled in modern Europe. Bridges, canals and roads were built, hospitals and schools, railway stations and orphanages; swamps were drained and land reclaimed, forests were planted and universities were endowed". As for the scope and spending on social welfare programs, Italian fascism "compared favorably with the more advanced European nations and in some respect was more progressive". When New York city politician Grover Aloysius Whalen asked Mussolini about the meaning behind Italian fascism in 1939, the reply was: "It is like your New Deal!".

By 1925, the Fascist government had "embarked upon an elaborate program" that included food supplementary assistance, infant care, maternity assistance, general healthcare, wage supplements, paid vacations, unemployment benefits, illness insurance, occupational disease insurance, general family assistance, public housing and old age and disability insurance. As for public works, the Mussolini's administration "devoted 400 million lire of public monies" for school construction between 1922 and 1942, compared to only 60 million lire between 1862 and 1922.

The Fascist government began its reign in an insecure position. Coming to power in 1922 after the March on Rome, it was a minority government until the 1923 Acerbo Law and the 1924 elections and it took until 1925, after the assassination of Giacomo Matteotti, to establish itself securely as a dictatorship.

Economic policy in the first few years was largely classical liberal, with the Ministry of Finance controlled by the old liberal Alberto De Stefani. The multiparty coalition government undertook a low-key laissez-faire program-the tax system was restructured (February 1925 law, 23 June 1927 decree-law and so on), there were attempts to attract foreign investment and establish trade agreements and efforts were made to balance the budget and cut subsidies. The 10% tax on capital invested in banking and industrial sectors was repealed while the tax on directors and administrators of anonymous companies (SA) was cut down by half. All foreign capital was exonerated of taxes while the luxury tax was also repealed. Mussolini also opposed municipalization of enterprises.

The 19 April 1923 law transferred life insurance to private enterprise, repealing a 1912 law that created a State Institute for insurances, which had envisioned construction of state monopoly ten years later. Furthermore, a 19 November 1922 decree suppressed the Commission on war profits while the 20 August 1923 law suppressed the inheritance tax inside the family circle.

There was a general emphasis on what has been called productivism -national economic growth as a means of social regeneration and wider assertion of national importance.

Up until 1925, the country enjoyed modest growth, but structural weaknesses increased inflation and the currency slowly fell (1922 L90 to £1, 1925 G135 to £1). In 1925, there was a great increase in speculation and short runs against the lira. The levels of capital movement became so great the government attempted to intervene. De Stefani was sacked, his program side-tracked and the Fascist government became more involved in the economy in step with the increased security of their power.

In 1925, the Italian state abandoned its monopoly on telephone infrastructure while the state production of matches was handed over to a private "Consortium of matches' productors".

Furthermore, various banking and industrial companies were financially supported by the state. One of Mussolini's first acts was to fund the metallurgical trust Ansaldo to the height of 400 million lire. Following a deflation crisis that started in 1926, banks such as the Banco di Roma, the Banco di Napoli and Banco di Sicilia were also assisted by the state. In 1924, the Unione Radiofonica Italiana (URI) was formed by private entrepreneurs and part of the Marconi group and granted the same year a monopoly of radio broadcasts. URI became the RAI after the war.

The lira continued to decline into 1926. It can be argued that this was not a bad thing for Italy since it resulted in cheaper and more competitive exports and more expensive imports. However, the declining lira was disliked politically. Mussolini apparently saw it as "a virility issue" and the decline was an attack on his prestige. In the Pesaro Speech of 18 August 1926, he began the " Battle for the Lira". Mussolini made a number of strong pronouncements and set his position of returning the lira to its 1922 level, " Quota 90". This policy was implemented through an extended deflation of the economy as the country rejoined the gold standard, the money supply was reduced and interest rates were raised. This action produced a sharp recession, which Mussolini took up as a sign of his assertion of power over "troublesome elements"-a slap to both capitalist speculators and trade unions.

On a wider scale, the Fascist economic policy pushed the country towards the corporative state, an effort that lasted well into the war. The idea was to create a national community where the interests of all parts of the economy were integrated into a class-transcending unity. Some see the move to corporatism in two phases. First, the workers were brought to heel over 1925-1927. Initially, the non-fascist trade unions and later (less forcefully) the fascist trade unions were nationalized by Mussolini's administration and placed under state ownership, conforming to Vladimir Lenin's earlier policies to eliminate independent labor unions in the Soviet Union. Under this labor policy, Fascist Italy enacted laws to make union membership compulsory for all workers. This was a difficult stage as the trade unions were a significant component of Italian fascism from its radical syndicalist roots and they were also a major force in Italian industry. The changes were embodied in two key developments. The Pact of the Vidoni Palace in 1925 brought the fascist trade unions and major industries together, creating an agreement for the industrialists to only recognise certain unions and so marginalise the non-fascist and socialist trade unions. The Syndical Laws of 1926 (sometimes called the Rocco Laws after Alfredo Rocco) took this agreement a step further as in each industrial sector there could be only one trade union and employers organisation. Labour had previously been united under Edmondo Rossoni and his General Confederation of Fascist Syndical Corporations, giving him a substantial amount of power even after the syndical laws, causing both the industrialists and Mussolini himself to resent him. Thereby, he was dismissed in 1928 and Mussolini took over his position as well.

Only these syndicates could negotiate agreements, with the government acting as an "umpire". The laws made both strikes and lock-outs illegal and took the final step of outlawing non-fascist trade unions. Despite strict regimentation, the labour syndicates had the power to negotiate collective contracts (uniform wages and benefits for all firms within an entire economic sector). Firms that broke contracts usually got away with it due to the enormous bureaucracy and difficulty in solving labour disputes, primarily due to the significant influence the industrialists had over labour affairs.

Employer syndicates had a considerable amount of power as well. Membership within these associations was compulsory and the leaders had the power to control and regulate production practices, distribution, expansion and other factors with their members. The controls generally favoured larger enterprises over small producers, who were dismayed that they had lost a significant amount of individual autonomy.

Since the syndical laws kept capital and labour separate, Mussolini and other party members continued to reassure the public that this was merely a stop-gap and that all associations would be integrated into the corporate state at a later stage.

From 1927, these legal and structural changes led into the second phase, the corporative phase. The Labour Charter of 1927 confirmed the importance of private initiative in organising the economy while still reserving the right for state intervention, most notably in the supposedly complete fascist control of worker hiring. In 1930, the National Council of Corporations was established and it was for representatives of all levels of the twenty-two key elements of the economy to meet and resolve problems. In practice, it was an enormous bureaucracy of committees that while consolidating the potential powers of the state resulted in a cumbersome and inefficient system of patronage and obstructionism. One consequence of the Council was the fact that trade unions held little to no representation whereas organized business, specifically organized industry (CGII), was able to gain a foothold over its competitors.

A key effect that the Council had on the economy was the rapid increase in cartels, especially the law passed in 1932, allowing the government to mandate cartelization. The dispute was sparked when several industrial firms refused CGII orders to cartelize, prompting the government to step in. Since the corporations cut across all sectors of production, mutual agreements and cartelization was a natural reaction. Hence in 1937, over two-thirds of cartels authorized by the state, many of which crossed sectors of the economy, had started after the founding of the Council, resulting in the noticeable increase in commercial-industrial cartelization. Cartels generally undermined the corporative agencies that were meant to ensure they operated according to Fascist principles and in the national interest, but the heads were able to show that cartel representatives had total control over the individual firms in the distribution of resources, prices, salaries and construction. Businessmen usually argued in favour of "collective self-regulation" being within Fascist ideological lines when forming cartels, subtly undermining corporative principles.

Government intervention in industry was very uneven as large programs started, but with little overarching direction. Intervention began with the " Battle of the Grain" in 1925 when the government intervened following the poor harvest to subsidise domestic growers and limit foreign imports by increasing taxes. This reduced competition and created, or sustained, widespread inefficiencies. According to historian Denis Mack Smith (1981), "[s]uccess in this battle was [...] another illusory propaganda victory won at the expense of the Italian economy in general and consumers in particular", continuing that "[t]hose who gained were the owners of the Latifondia and the propertied classes in general [...] his policy conferred a heavy subsidy on the Latifondisti".

Larger programs began in the 1930s with the Bonifica Integrale land reclamation program (or so-called " Battle for Land"), which was employing over 78,000 people by 1933; the Mezzogiorno policies to modernise southern Italy and attack the Mafia as per capita income in the south was still 40% below that of the north; the electrification of the railways and similar transport programs; hydroelectrical projects; and the chemical industry, automobiles and steel. There was also limited takeover of strategic areas, notably oil with the creation of Agip ( Azienda Generale Italiana Petroli -General Italian Oil Company).

The worldwide depression of the early 1930s hit Italy very hard starting in 1931. As industries came close to failure they were bought out by the banks in a largely illusionary bail-out-the assets used to fund the purchases were largely worthless. This led to a financial crisis peaking in 1932 and major government intervention. After the bankruptcy of the Austrian Kredit Anstalt in May 1931, Italian banks followed, with the bankruptcy of the Banco di Milano, the Credito Italiano and the Banca Commerciale. To support them, the state created three institutions funded by the Italian Treasure, with the first being the Sofindit in October 1931 (with a capital of 500 million liras), which bought back all the industrial shares owned by the Banca Commerciale and other establishments in trouble. In November 1931 the IMI (capital of 500 million liras) was also created and it issued five and one-half billion liras in state obligations as reimbursables in a period of ten years. This new capital was lent to private industry for a maximum period of ten years.

Finally, the Institute for Industrial Reconstruction (IRI) formed in January 1933 and took control of the bank-owned companies, suddenly giving Italy the largest industrial sector in Europe that used government-linked companies (GLC). At the end of 1933, it saved the Hydroelectric Society of Piemont, whose shares had fallen from 250 liras to 20 liras-while in September 1934, the Ansaldo trust was again reconstituted under the authority of the IRI, with a capital of 750 million liras. Despite this taking of control of private companies through (GLC), the Fascist state did not nationalize any company.

Not long after the creation of the Institute for Industrial Reconstruction, Mussolini boasted in a 1934 speech to his Chamber of Deputies: "Three-quarters of the Italian economy, industrial and agricultural, is in the hands of the state". As Italy continued to nationalize its economy, the IRI "became the owner not only of the three most important Italian banks, which were clearly too big to fail, but also of the lion's share of the Italian industries".

Mussolini's economic policies during this period would later be described as " economic dirigisme", an economic system where the state has the power to direct economic production and allocation of resources. The economic conditions in Italy, including institutions and corporations gave Mussolini sufficient power to engage with them as he could. Although there were economic issues in the country, the approaches used in addressing them in the fascist era included political intervention measures, which ultimately could not effectively solve the strife. An already bad situation ended up being worse since the solutions presented were largely intended to increase political power as opposed to helping the affected citizens. These measures played a critical role in aggravating the conditions of the great depression in Italy.

By 1939, Fascist Italy attained the highest rate of state ownership of an economy in the world other than the Soviet Union, where the Italian state "controlled over four-fifths of Italy's shipping and shipbuilding, three-quarters of its pig iron production and almost half that of steel". IRI also did rather well with its new responsibilities-restructuring, modernising and rationalising as much as it could. It was a significant factor in post-1945 development. However, it took the Italian economy until 1955 to recover the manufacturing levels of 1930-a position that was only 60% better than that of 1913.[citation needed ]

There is no evidence that Italy's standard of living, which is lowest of the major powers, has been raised one jot or tittle since Il Duce came to power.

As Mussolini's ambitions grew, domestic policy was subsumed by foreign policy, especially the push for autarky after the 1935 invasion of Abyssinia and the subsequent trade embargoes. The push for independence from foreign strategic materials was expensive, ineffective and wasteful. It was achieved by a massive increase in public debt, tight exchange controls and the exchange of economic dynamism for stability.

Recovery from the postwar slump had begun before Mussolini came to power, and later growth rates were comparatively weaker. From 1929 to 1939, the Italian economy grew by 16%, roughly half as fast as the earlier liberal period. Annual growth rates were 0.5% lower than prewar rates, and the annual rate of growth of value was 1% lower. Despite the efforts directed at industry, agriculture was still the largest sector of the economy in 1938, and only a third of total national income was derived from industry. Agriculture still employed 48% of the working population in 1936 (56% in 1921), industrial employment had grown only 4% over the period of fascist rule (24% in 1921 and 28% in 1936), and there was more growth in traditional than in modern industries. The rate of gross investment actually fell under Mussolini, and the move from consumer to investment goods was low compared to the other militaristic economies. Attempts to modernise agriculture were also ineffective. Land reclamation and the concentration on grains came at the expense of other crops, producing very expensive subsidised wheat while cutting more viable and economically rewarding efforts. Most evidence suggests that rural poverty and insecurity increased under fascism, and their efforts failed markedly to create a modern, rational agricultural system.

In the late 1930s, the economy was still too underdeveloped to sustain the demands of a modern militaristic regime. Production of raw materials too small, and finished military equipment was limited in quantity and too often in quality. Although at least 10% of GDP, almost a third of government expenditure, began to be directed towards the armed services in the 1930s, the country was "spectacularly weak". Notably, the investment in the early 1930s left the services, especially the army, obsolete by 1940. Expenditures on conflicts from 1935 (such as commitments to the Spanish Civil War in 1936 to 1939 as well as the Italy-Albania War in 1939) caused little stockpiling to occur for the much greater ( World War II in 1940-1945).

Mattesini, Fabrizio, and Beniamino Quintieri. "Italy and the Great Depression: An analysis of the Italian economy, 1929-1936." Explorations in Economic History (1997) 34#3 pp: 265-294.

Mattesini, Fabrizio and Beniamino Quintieri. "Does a reduction in the length of the working week reduce unemployment? Some evidence from the Italian economy during the Great Depression." Explorations in Economic History (2006) 43#3 pp: 413-437.

Zamagni, Vera. The economic history of Italy 1860-1990 (Oxford University Press, 1993).

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The economy of Italy under fascism refers to the economy in the Kingdom of Italy between 1922 and 1943, when it was controlled by fascism. Italy had emerged from World War I in a poor and weakened condition and, after the war, suffered inflation, massive debts and an extended depression.

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Genocide is the intentional destruction of a people - usually defined as an ethnic, national, racial, or religious group - in whole or in part. Raphael Lemkin coined the term in 1944, combining the Greek word ( genos, "race, people") with the Latin suffix -caedo ("act of killing").

In 1948, the United Nations Genocide Convention defined genocide as any of five "acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnic, racial or religious group, as such." These five acts were: killing members of the group, causing them serious bodily or mental harm, imposing living conditions intended to destroy the group, preventing births, and forcibly transferring children out of the group. Victims are targeted because of their real or perceived membership of a group, not randomly.

The Political Instability Task Force estimated that 43 genocides occurred between 1956 and 2016, resulting in about 50 million deaths. The UNHCR estimated that a further 50 million had been displaced by such episodes of violence up to 2008. Genocide is widely considered to signify the epitome of human evil. As a label, it is contentious because it is moralizing, and has been used as a type of moral category since the late 1990s.

Before the term genocide was coined, there were various ways of describing such events. Some languages already had words for such killings, including German (Völkermord, lit. 'murder of a people') and Polish (ludobójstwo, lit. 'killing of a people or nation'). In 1941, when describing the "methodical, merciless butchery" of "scores of thousands" of Russians by Nazi troops during the German invasion of the Soviet Union, Winston Churchill spoke of "a crime without a name". In 1944, Raphael Lemkin coined the term genocide as a hybrid combination of the Ancient Greek word ( Latin génos) 'race, people' with the Axis Rule in Occupied Europe (1944) describes the implementation of caedere, 'to kill'; his book Nazi policies in occupied Europe and mentions earlier mass killings. After reading about the 1921 assassination of Talat Pasha, the main architect of the Armenian genocide, by Armenian Soghomon Tehlirian, Lemkin asked his professor why there was no law under which Talat could be charged. He later explained that "as a lawyer, I thought that a crime should not be punished by the victims, but should be punished by a court."

Lemkin defined genocide as follows:

New conceptions require new terms. By "genocide" we mean the destruction of a nation or of an ethnic group. This new word, coined by the author to denote an old practice in its modern development, is made from the ancient Greek word genos (race, tribe) and the Latin cide (killing), thus corresponding in its formation to such words as tyrannicide, homicide, infanticide, etc. Generally speaking, genocide does not necessarily mean the immediate destruction of a nation, except when accomplished by mass killings of all members of a nation. It is intended rather to signify a coordinated plan of different actions aiming at the destruction of essential foundations of the life of national groups, with the aim of annihilating the groups themselves. The objectives of such a plan would be disintegration of the political and social institutions, of culture, language, national feelings, religion, and the economic existence of national groups, and the destruction of the personal security, liberty, health, dignity, and even the lives of the individuals belonging to such groups. Genocide is directed against the national group as an entity, and the actions involved are directed against individuals, not in their individual capacity, but as members of the national group.

The preamble to the 1948 Genocide Convention (CPPCG) notes that instances of genocide have taken place throughout history; it was not until Lemkin coined the term and the prosecution of perpetrators of the Holocaust at the Nuremberg Trials that the United Nations defined the crime of genocide under international law in the Genocide Convention. It was several years before the term was widely adopted by the international community. When the Nuremberg trials revealed the inadequacy of phrases like "Germanization", "crimes against humanity" and "mass murder", scholars of international law reached agreement that Lemkin's work provided a conceptual framework for Nazi crimes. A 1946 headline in The New York Times announced that "Genocide Is the New Name for the Crime Fastened on the Nazi Leaders"; the word was used in indictments at the Nuremberg trials, held from 1945, but solely as a descriptive term, not yet as a formal legal term. The so-called Polish Genocide Trials of Arthur Greiser and Amon Leopold Goth in 1946 were the first trials in which judgments included the term.

Pre-criminalization view

Before genocide was made a crime against national law, it was considered a sovereign right. When Lemkin asked about a way to punish the perpetrators of the Armenian genocide, a law professor told him: "Consider the case of a farmer who owns a flock of chickens. He kills them and this is his business. If you interfere, you are trespassing." As late as 1959, many world leaders still "believed states had a right to commit genocide against people within their borders", according to political scientist Douglas Irvin-Erickson.

International law

After the Holocaust, which had been perpetrated by Nazi Germany prior to and during World War II, Lemkin successfully campaigned for the universal acceptance of international laws defining and forbidding genocides. In 1946, the first session of the United Nations General Assembly adopted a resolution that affirmed genocide was a crime under international law and enumerated examples of such events (but did not provide a full legal definition of the crime). In 1948, the UN General Assembly adopted the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide (CPPCG) which defined the crime of genocide for the first time.

Genocide is a denial of the right of existence of entire human groups, as homicide is the denial of the right to live of individual human beings; such denial of the right of existence shocks the conscience of mankind, results in great losses to humanity in the form of cultural and other contributions represented by these human groups, and is contrary to moral law and the spirit and aims of the United Nations. Many instances of such crimes of genocide have occurred when racial, religious, political and other groups have been destroyed, entirely or in part.

-  UN Resolution 96(1), 11 December 1946

The CPPCG was adopted by the UN General Assembly on 9 December 1948 and came into effect on 12 January 1951 (Resolution 260 (III)). It contains an internationally recognized definition of genocide which has been incorporated into the national criminal legislation of many countries and was also adopted by the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court, which established the International Criminal Court (ICC). Article II of the Convention defines genocide as:

... any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such:

(a) Killing members of the group;

(b) Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group;

(c) Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part;

(d) Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group;

(e) Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group.

Incitement to genocide is recognized as a separate crime under international law and an inchoate crime which does not require genocide to have taken place to be prosecutable.

The first draft of the convention included political killings; these provisions were removed in a political and diplomatic compromise following objections from many diverse countries, and originally promoted by the World Jewish Congress and Raphael Lemkin's conception, with some scholars popularly emphasizing in literature the role of the Soviet Union, a permanent United Nations Security Council member. The Soviets argued that the convention's definition should follow the etymology of the term, and Joseph Stalin in particular may have feared greater international scrutiny of the country's political killings, such as the Great Purge. Lemkin, who coined genocide, approached the Soviet delegation as the resolution vote came close to reassure the Soviets that there was no conspiracy against them; none in the Soviet-led bloc opposed the resolution, which passed unanimously in December 1946. Other nations, including the United States, feared that including political groups in the definition would invite international intervention in domestic politics.

By 1951, Lemkin was saying that the Soviet Union was the only state that could be indicted for genocide, his concept of genocide, as outlined in Axis Rule in Occupied Europe, covering Stalinist deportations as genocide by default, and differing in many ways from the adopted Genocide Convention. From a 21st-century perspective, it was such a broad coverage that it would include any grossly human rights violation as genocide, and that many events deemed by Lemkin genocidal did not amount to genocide. As the Cold War began, this change was the result of Lemkin's turn to anti-communism in an attempt to convince the United States to ratify the Genocide Convention.

Under international law, genocide has two mental () elements: the general mental element and the element of specific intent (dolus specialis). The general element refers to whether the prohibited acts were committed with intent, knowledge, recklessness, or negligence. For most serious international crimes, including genocide, the requirement is that the perpetrator act with intent. The Rome Statute defines intent as meaning to engage in the conduct and, in relation to consequences, as meaning to cause that consequence or being "aware that it will occur in the ordinary course of events".

The specific intent element defines the purpose of committing the acts: "to destroy in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such". The specific intent is a core factor distinguishing genocide from other international crimes, such as war crimes or crimes against humanity.[citation needed ]

"Intent to destroy"

In 2007, the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) noted in its judgement on Jorgic v. Germany case that, in 1992, the majority of legal scholars took the narrow view that "intent to destroy" in the CPPCG meant the intended physical-biological destruction of the protected group, and that this was still the majority opinion. But the ECHR also noted that a minority took a broader view, and did not consider biological-physical destruction to be necessary, as the intent to destroy a national, racial, religious or ethnic group was enough to qualify as genocide.

In the case of "Onesphore Rwabukombe", the German Supreme Court adhered to its previous judgement, and did not follow the narrow interpretation of the ICTY and the ICJ.

"In whole or in part"

The phrase "in whole or in part" has been subject to much discussion by scholars of international humanitarian law. In the Ruhashyankiko report of the United Nations it was once argued that the killing of only a single individual could be genocide if the intent to destroy the wider group was found in the murder, yet official court rulings have since contradicted this. The International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia found in Prosecutor v. Radislav Krstic - Trial Chamber I - Judgment - IT-98-33 (2001) ICTY8 (2 August 2001) that Genocide had been committed. In Prosecutor v. Radislav Krstic - Appeals Chamber - Judgment - IT-98-33 (2004) ICTY 7 (19 April 2004) paragraphs 8, 9, 10, and 11 addressed the issue of in part and found that "the part must be a substantial part of that group. The aim of the Genocide Convention is to prevent the intentional destruction of entire human groups, and the part targeted must be significant enough to have an impact on the group as a whole." The Appeals Chamber goes into details of other cases and the opinions of respected commentators on the Genocide Convention to explain how they came to this conclusion.

The judges continue in paragraph 12, "The determination of when the targeted part is substantial enough to meet this requirement may involve a number of considerations. The numeric size of the targeted part of the group is the necessary and important starting point, though not in all cases the ending point of the inquiry. The number of individuals targeted should be evaluated not only in absolute terms but also in relation to the overall size of the entire group. In addition to the numeric size of the targeted portion, its prominence within the group can be a useful consideration. If a specific part of the group is emblematic of the overall group or is essential to its survival, that may support a finding that the part qualifies as substantial within the meaning of Article 4 [of the Tribunal's Statute]."

In paragraph 13 the judges raise the issue of the perpetrators' access to the victims: "The historical examples of genocide also suggest that the area of the perpetrators' activity and control, as well as the possible extent of their reach, should be considered. ... The intent to destroy formed by a perpetrator of genocide will always be limited by the opportunity presented to him. While this factor alone will not indicate whether the targeted group is substantial, it can-in combination with other factors-inform the analysis."

"A national, ethnic, racial or religious group"

The drafters of the CPPCG chose not to include political or social groups among the protected groups. Instead, they opted to focus on "stable" identities, attributes that are historically understood as being born into and unable or unlikely to change over time. This definition conflicts with modern conceptions of race as a social construct rather than innate fact and the practice of changing religion, etc.

In such a situation where a definitive answer based on objective markers is not clear, courts have turned to the subjective standard that "if a victim was perceived by a perpetrator as belonging to a protected group, the victim could be considered by the Chamber as a member of the protected group". Stigmatization of the group by the perpetrators through legal measures, such as withholding citizenship, requiring the group to be identified, or isolating them from the whole could show that the perpetrators viewed the victims as a protected group.

The Genocide Convention establishes five prohibited acts that, when committed with the requisite intent, amount to genocide. Although massacre-style killings are the most commonly identified and punished as genocide, the range of violence that is contemplated by the law is significantly broader.

Killing members of the group

While mass killing is not necessary for genocide to have been committed, it has been present in almost all recognized genocides. A near-uniform pattern has emerged throughout history in which men and adolescent boys are singled out for murder in the early stages,[citation needed ] such as in the genocide of the Yazidis by Daesh, the Ottoman Turks' attack on the Armenians, and the Burmese security forces' attacks on the Rohingya. Men and boys are typically subject to "fast" killings, such as by gunshot. Women and girls are more likely to die slower deaths by slashing, burning, or as a result of sexual violence. The jurisprudence of the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR), among others, shows that both the initial executions and those that quickly follow other acts of extreme violence, such as rape and torture, are recognized as falling under the first prohibited act.

A less settled discussion is whether deaths that are further removed from the initial acts of violence can be addressed under this provision of the Genocide Convention. Legal scholars have posited, for example, that deaths resulting from other genocidal acts including causing serious bodily or mental harm or the successful deliberate infliction of conditions of life calculated to bring about physical destruction should be considered genocidal killings.

Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group Article II(b)

This second prohibited act can encompass a wide range of non-fatal genocidal acts. The ICTR and International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) have held that rape and sexual violence may constitute the second prohibited act of genocide by causing both physical and mental harm. In its landmark Akayesu decision, the ICTR held that rapes and sexual violence resulted in "physical and psychological destruction". Sexual violence is a hallmark of genocidal violence, with most genocidal campaigns explicitly or implicitly sanctioning it. It is estimated that 250,000 to 500,000 women were raped in the three months of the Rwandan genocide, many of whom were subjected to multiple rapes or gang rape. In Darfur, a systemic campaign of rape and often sexual mutilation was carried out and in Burma public mass rapes and gang rapes were inflicted on the Rohingya by Burmese security forces. Sexual slavery was documented in the Armenian genocide by the Ottoman Turks and Daesh's genocide of the Yazidi.

Torture and other cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment or punishment, when committed with the requisite intent, are also genocide by causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group. The ICTY found that both experiencing a failed execution and watching the murder of one's family members may constitute torture. The Syrian Commission of Inquiry (COI) also found that enslavement, removal of one's children into indoctrination or sexual slavery, and acts of physical and sexual violence rise to the level of torture, as well. While it was subject to some debate, the ICTY and, later, the Syrian COI held that under some circumstances deportation and forcible transfer may also cause serious bodily or mental harm.

Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction

The third prohibited act is distinguished from the genocidal act of killing because the deaths are not immediate (or may not even come to pass), but rather create circumstances that do not support prolonged life. Due to the longer period of time before the actual destruction would be achieved, the ICTR held that courts must consider the duration of time the conditions are imposed as an element of the act. The drafters incorporated the act to account for the horrors of the Nazi concentration camps and to ensure that similar conditions never be imposed again. However, it could also apply to the Armenian death marches, the siege of Mount Sinjar by Daesh, the deprivation of water and forcible deportation against ethnic groups in Darfur, and the destruction and razing of communities in Burma.

The ICTR provided guidance into what constitutes a violation of the third act. In Akayesu, it identified "subjecting a group of people to a subsistence diet, systematic expulsion from homes and the reduction of essential medical services below minimum requirement" as rising to genocide. In Kayishema and Ruzindana, it extended the list to include: "lack of proper housing, clothing, hygiene and medical care or excessive work or physical exertion" among the conditions. It further noted that, in addition to deprivation of necessary resources, rape could also fit within this prohibited act.

Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group

The fourth prohibited act is aimed at preventing the protected group from regenerating through reproduction. It encompasses acts with the single intent of affecting reproduction and intimate relationships, such as involuntary sterilization, forced abortion, the prohibition of marriage, and long-term separation of men and women intended to prevent procreation. Rape has been found to violate the fourth prohibited act on two bases: where the rape was committed with the intent to impregnate a woman and thereby force her to carry a child of another group (in societies where group identity is determined by patrilineal identity) and where the person raped subsequently refuses to procreate as a result of the trauma. Accordingly, it can take into account both physical and mental measures imposed by the perpetrators.

Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group

The final prohibited act is the only prohibited act that does not lead to physical or biological destruction, but rather to destruction of the group as a cultural and social unit. It occurs when children of the protected group are transferred to the perpetrator group. Boys are typically taken into the group by changing their names to those common of the perpetrator group, converting their religion, and using them for labor or as soldiers. Girls who are transferred are not generally converted to the perpetrator group, but instead treated as chattel, as played out in both the Yazidi and Armenian genocides. The measures used to forcibly transfer children may be imposed by direct force or psychological coercion, such as threats, duress, or detention. For example, the removal of children into boarding schools and white adoptive families to forcibly assimilate indigenous peoples of the Americas was commonplace in the United States and Canada in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Boarding schools and adoptions were a means of the government to strip children from their families, and thereby their languages, cultures, ceremonies, and land; this was in service of governments' missions to erase indigenous peoples from their land and its history.

Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide

The convention came into force as international law on 12 January 1951 after the minimum 20 countries became parties. At that time however, only two of the five permanent members of the UN Security Council were parties to the treaty: France and the Republic of China. The Soviet Union ratified in 1954, the United Kingdom in 1970, the People's Republic of China in 1983 (having replaced the Taiwan-based Republic of China on the UNSC in 1971), and the United States in 1988.[citation needed ]

UN Security Council Resolution 1674

UN Security Council Resolution 1674, adopted by the United Nations Security Council on 28 April 2006, "reaffirms the provisions of paragraphs 138 and 139 of the 2005 World Summit Outcome Document regarding the responsibility to protect populations from genocide, war crimes, ethnic cleansing and crimes against humanity". The resolution committed the council to action to protect civilians in armed conflict.

In 2008 the UN Security Council adopted resolution 1820, which noted that "rape and other forms of sexual violence can constitute war crimes, crimes against humanity or a constitutive act with respect to genocide".

Municipal law

Since the Convention came into effect in January 1951 about 80 United Nations member states have passed legislation that incorporates the provisions of CPPCG into their municipal law.

Other definitions of genocide

Writing in 1998, Kurt Jonassohn and Karin Björnson stated that the CPPCG was a legal instrument resulting from a diplomatic compromise. As such the wording of the treaty is not intended to be a definition suitable as a research tool, and although it is used for this purpose, as it has international legal credibility that others lack, other genocide definitions have also been proposed. Jonassohn and Björnson go on to say that none of these alternative definitions have gained widespread support for various reasons. Jonassohn and Björnson postulate that the major reason why no single generally accepted genocide definition has emerged is because academics have adjusted their focus to emphasise different periods and have found it expedient to use slightly different definitions. For example, Frank Chalk and Kurt Jonassohn studied all human history, while Leo Kuper and Rudolph Rummel in their more recent works concentrated on the 20th century, and Helen Fein, Barbara Harff, and Ted Gurr have looked at post-World War II events.

The exclusion of social and political groups as targets of genocide in the CPPCG legal definition has been criticized by some historians and sociologists, for example, M. Hassan Kakar in his book The Soviet Invasion and the Afghan Response, 1979-1982 argues that the international definition of genocide is too restricted, and that it should include political groups or any group so defined by the perpetrator and quotes Chalk and Jonassohn: "Genocide is a form of one-sided mass killing in which a state or other authority intends to destroy a group, as that group and membership in it are defined by the perpetrator." In turn some states such as Ethiopia, France, and Spain include political groups as legitimate genocide victims in their anti-genocide laws.

Harff and Gurr defined genocide as "the promotion and execution of policies by a state or its agents which result in the deaths of a substantial portion of a group ... [when] the victimized groups are defined primarily in terms of their communal characteristics, i.e., ethnicity, religion or nationality". Harff and Gurr also differentiate between genocides and politicides by the characteristics by which members of a group are identified by the state. In genocides, the victimized groups are defined primarily in terms of their communal characteristics, i.e., ethnicity, religion or nationality. In politicides the victim groups are defined primarily in terms of their hierarchical position or political opposition to the regime and dominant groups. Daniel D. Polsby and Don B. Kates, Jr. state that "we follow Harff's distinction between genocides and ' pogroms', which she describes as 'short-lived outbursts by mobs, which, although often condoned by authorities, rarely persist'. If the violence persists for long enough, however, Harff argues, the distinction between condonation and complicity collapses."

According to Rummel, genocide has three different meanings. The ordinary meaning is murder by the government of people due to their national, ethnic, racial, or religious group membership. The legal meaning of genocide refers to the international treaty, the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide (CPPCG). This also includes non-killings that in the end eliminate the group, such as preventing births or forcibly transferring children out of the group to another group. A generalized meaning of genocide is similar to the ordinary meaning but also includes government killings of political opponents or otherwise intentional murder. It is to avoid confusion regarding what meaning is intended that Rummel created the term democide for the third meaning.

Highlighting the potential for state and non-state actors to commit genocide in the 21st century, for example, in failed states or as non-state actors acquiring weapons of mass destruction, Adrian Gallagher defined genocide as 'When a source of collective power (usually a state) intentionally uses its power base to implement a process of destruction in order to destroy a group (as defined by the perpetrator), in whole or in substantial part, dependent upon relative group size'. The definition upholds the centrality of intent, the multidimensional understanding of destroying, broadens the definition of group identity beyond that of the 1948 definition yet argues that a substantial part of a group has to be destroyed before it can be classified as genocide.

International prosecution

All signatories to the CPPCG are required to prevent and punish acts of genocide, both in peace and wartime, though some barriers make this enforcement difficult. In particular, some of the signatories-namely, Bahrain, Bangladesh, India, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore, the United States, Vietnam, Yemen, and former Yugoslavia-signed with the proviso that no claim of genocide could be brought against them at the International Court of Justice without their consent. Despite official protests from other signatories (notably Cyprus and Norway) on the ethics and legal standing of these reservations, the immunity from prosecution they grant has been invoked from time to time, as when the United States refused to allow a charge of genocide brought against it by former Yugoslavia following the 1999 Kosovo War.

It is commonly accepted that, at least since World War II, genocide has been illegal under customary international law as a peremptory norm, as well as under conventional international law. Acts of genocide are generally difficult to establish for prosecution because a chain of accountability must be established. International criminal courts and tribunals function primarily because the states involved are incapable or unwilling to prosecute crimes of this magnitude themselves.[citation needed ]

Nuremberg Tribunal (1945-1946)

The Nazi leaders who were prosecuted shortly after World War II for taking part in the Holocaust, and other mass murders, were charged under existing international laws, such as crimes against humanity, as the crime of "genocide' was not formally defined until the 1948 Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide (CPPCG). Nevertheless, the recently coined term appeared in the indictment of the Nazi leaders, Count 3, which stated that those charged had "conducted deliberate and systematic genocide-namely, the extermination of racial and national groups-against the civilian populations of certain occupied territories in order to destroy particular races and classes of people, and national, racial or religious groups, particularly Jews, Poles, Gypsies and others."

International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia (1993-2017)

The term Bosnian genocide is used to refer either to the killings committed by Serb forces in Srebrenica in 1995, or to ethnic cleansing that took place elsewhere during the 1992-1995 Bosnian War.

In 2001, the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia (ICTY) judged that the 1995 Srebrenica massacre was an act of genocide. On 26 February 2007, the International Court of Justice (ICJ), in the Bosnian Genocide Case upheld the ICTY's earlier finding that the massacre in Srebrenica and Zepa constituted genocide, but found that the Serbian government had not participated in a wider genocide on the territory of Bosnia and Herzegovina during the war, as the Bosnian government had claimed.

On 12 July 2007, European Court of Human Rights when dismissing the appeal by Nikola Jorgić against his conviction for genocide by a German court (Jorgic v. Germany) noted that the German courts wider interpretation of genocide has since been rejected by international courts considering similar cases. The ECHR also noted that in the 21st century "Amongst scholars, the majority have taken the view that ethnic cleansing, in the way in which it was carried out by the Serb forces in Bosnia and Herzegovina in order to expel Muslims and Croats from their homes, did not constitute genocide. However, there are also a considerable number of scholars who have suggested that these acts did amount to genocide, and the ICTY has found in the Momcilo Krajisnik case that the actus reus of genocide was met in Prijedor "With regard to the charge of genocide, the Chamber found that in spite of evidence of acts perpetrated in the municipalities which constituted the actus reus of genocide".

About 30 people have been indicted for participating in genocide or complicity in genocide during the early 1990s in Bosnia. To date, after several plea bargains and some convictions that were successfully challenged on appeal two men, Vujadin Popović and Ljubiša Beara, have been found guilty of committing genocide, Zdravko Tolimir has been found guilty of committing genocide and conspiracy to commit genocide, and two others, Radislav Krstić and Drago Nikolić, have been found guilty of aiding and abetting genocide. Three others have been found guilty of participating in genocides in Bosnia by German courts, one of whom Nikola Jorgić lost an appeal against his conviction in the European Court of Human Rights. A further eight men, former members of the Bosnian Serb security forces were found guilty of genocide by the State Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina (See List of Bosnian genocide prosecutions).

Slobodan Milošević, as the former President of Serbia and of Yugoslavia, was the most senior political figure to stand trial at the ICTY. He died on 11 March 2006 during his trial where he was accused of genocide or complicity in genocide in territories within Bosnia and Herzegovina, so no verdict was returned. In 1995, the ICTY issued a warrant for the arrest of Bosnian Serbs Radovan Karadžić and Ratko Mladić on several charges including genocide. On 21 July 2008, Karadžić was arrested in Belgrade, and later tried in The Hague accused of genocide among other crimes. On 24 March 2016, Karadžić was found guilty of genocide in Srebrenica, war crimes and crimes against humanity, 10 of the 11 charges in total, and sentenced to 40 years' imprisonment. Mladić was arrested on 26 May 2011 in Lazarevo, Serbia, and was tried in The Hague. The verdict, delivered on 22 November 2017 found Mladić guilty of 10 of the 11 charges, including genocide and he was sentenced to life imprisonment.

International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (1994-present)

The International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) is a court under the auspices of the United Nations for the prosecution of offenses committed in Rwanda during the genocide which occurred there during April 1994, commencing on 6 April. The ICTR was created on 8 November 1994 by the Security Council of the United Nations in order to judge those people responsible for the acts of genocide and other serious violations of the international law performed in the territory of Rwanda, or by Rwandan citizens in nearby states, between 1 January and 31 December 1994.

So far, the ICTR has finished nineteen trials and convicted twenty-seven accused persons. On 14 December 2009, two more men were accused and convicted for their crimes. Another twenty-five persons are still on trial. Twenty-one are awaiting trial in detention, two more added on 14 December 2009. Ten are still at large. The first trial, of Jean-Paul Akayesu, began in 1997. In October 1998, Akayesu was sentenced to life imprisonment. Jean Kambanda, interim Prime Minister, pleaded guilty.

Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia (2003-present)

The Khmer Rouge, led by Pol Pot, Ta Mok and other leaders, organized the mass killing of ideologically suspect groups. The total number of victims is estimated at 1.7 million Cambodians between 1975 and 1979, including deaths from slave labour.

On 6 June 2003 the Cambodian government and the United Nations reached an agreement to set up the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia (ECCC) which would focus exclusively on crimes committed by the most senior Khmer Rouge officials during the period of Khmer Rouge rule of 1975-1979. The judges were sworn in early July 2006.

The genocide charges related to killings of Cambodia's Vietnamese and Cham minorities, which is estimated to make up tens of thousand killings and possibly more

The investigating judges were presented with the names of five possible suspects by the prosecution on 18 July 2007.

Kang Kek Iew was formally charged with a war crime and crimes against humanity and detained by the Tribunal on 31 July 2007. He was indicted on charges of war crimes and crimes against humanity on 12 August 2008. His appeal against his conviction for war crimes and crimes against humanity was rejected on 3 February 2012, and he is serving a sentence of life imprisonment.

Nuon Chea, a former prime minister, who was indicted on charges of genocide, war crimes, crimes against humanity and several other crimes under Cambodian law on 15 September 2010. He was transferred into the custody of the ECCC on 19 September 2007. His trial started on 27 June 2011 and ended on 7 August 2014, with a life sentence imposed for crimes against humanity.

Khieu Samphan, a former head of state, who was indicted on charges of genocide, war crimes, crimes against humanity and several other crimes under Cambodian law on 15 September 2010. He was transferred into the custody of the ECCC on 19 September 2007. His trial began on 27 June 2011. and also ended on 7 August 2014, with a life sentence imposed for crimes against humanity.

Ieng Sary, a former foreign minister, who was indicted on charges of genocide, war crimes, crimes against humanity and several other crimes under Cambodian law on 15 September 2010. He was transferred into the custody of the ECCC on 12 November 2007. His trial started on 27 June 2011, and ended with his death on 14 March 2013. He was never convicted.

Ieng Thirith, a former minister for social affairs and wife of Ieng Sary, who was indicted on charges of genocide, war crimes, crimes against humanity and several other crimes under Cambodian law on 15 September 2010. She was transferred into the custody of the ECCC on 12 November 2007. Proceedings against her were suspended pending a health evaluation. In September 2012, she was released from prison on account of advanced Alzheimer's disease; she died on 22 August 2015 at the age of 83 from complications of the disease.

There has been disagreement between some of the international jurists and the Cambodian government over whether any other people should be tried by the Tribunal.

By the International Criminal Court

Since 2002, the International Criminal Court can exercise its jurisdiction if national courts are unwilling or unable to investigate or prosecute genocide, thus being a "court of last resort," leaving the primary responsibility to exercise jurisdiction over alleged criminals to individual states. Due to the United States concerns over the ICC, the United States prefers to continue to use specially convened international tribunals for such investigations and potential prosecutions.

Darfur, Sudan

There has been much debate over categorizing the situation in Darfur as genocide. The ongoing conflict in Darfur, Sudan, which started in 2003, was declared a "genocide" by United States Secretary of State Colin Powell on 9 September 2004 in testimony before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. Since that time however, no other permanent member of the UN Security Council has done so. In fact, in January 2005, an International Commission of Inquiry on Darfur, authorized by UN Security Council Resolution 1564 of 2004, issued a report to the Secretary-General stating that "the Government of Sudan has not pursued a policy of genocide." Nevertheless, the Commission cautioned that "The conclusion that no genocidal policy has been pursued and implemented in Darfur by the Government authorities, directly or through the militias under their control, should not be taken in any way as detracting from the gravity of the crimes perpetrated in that region. International offences such as the crimes against humanity and war crimes that have been committed in Darfur may be no less serious and heinous than genocide."

In March 2005, the Security Council formally referred the situation in Darfur to the Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court, taking into account the Commission report but without mentioning any specific crimes. Two permanent members of the Security Council, the United States and China, abstained from the vote on the referral resolution. As of his fourth report to the Security Council, the Prosecutor has found "reasonable grounds to believe that the individuals identified [in the UN Security Council Resolution 1593] have committed crimes against humanity and war crimes," but did not find sufficient evidence to prosecute for genocide.

On 14 July 2008, prosecutors at the International Criminal Court (ICC), filed ten charges of war crimes against Sudan's President Omar al-Bashir: three counts of genocide, five of crimes against humanity and two of murder. The ICC's prosecutors claimed that al-Bashir "masterminded and implemented a plan to destroy in substantial part" three tribal groups in Darfur because of their ethnicity.

On 4 March 2009, the ICC issued a warrant of arrest for Omar Al Bashir, President of Sudan as the ICC Pre-Trial Chamber I concluded that his position as head of state does not grant him immunity against prosecution before the ICC. The warrant was for war crimes and crimes against humanity. It did not include the crime of genocide because the majority of the Chamber did not find that the prosecutors had provided enough evidence to include such a charge. Later the decision was changed by the Appeals Panel and after issuing the second decision, charges against Omar al-Bashir include three counts of genocide.

The concept of genocide can be applied to historical events. The preamble of the CPPCG states that "at all periods of history genocide has inflicted great losses on humanity." Revisionist attempts to challenge or affirm claims of genocide are illegal in some countries. Several European countries ban the denial of the Holocaust and the denial of the Armenian genocide, while in Turkey referring to the Armenian genocide, Greek genocide, and , and to the period of mass starvation during the Great Famine of Mount Lebanon affecting Maronites, as genocides may be prosecuted under Article 301.

Historian William Rubinstein argues that the origin of 20th-century genocides can be traced back to the collapse of the elite structure and normal modes of government in parts of Europe following World War I, commenting:

The 'Age of Totalitarianism' included nearly all of the infamous examples of genocide in modern history, headed by the Jewish Holocaust, but also comprising the mass murders and purges of the Communist world, other mass killings carried out by Nazi Germany and its allies, and also the Armenian genocide of 1915. All these slaughters, it is argued here, had a common origin, the collapse of the elite structure and normal modes of government of much of central, eastern and southern Europe as a result of the First World War, without which surely neither Communism nor Fascism would have existed except in the minds of unknown agitators and crackpots.

Stages, risk factors, and prevention

Study of the risk factors and prevention of genocide was underway before the 1982 International Conference on the Holocaust and Genocide during which multiple papers on the subject were presented. In 1996 Gregory Stanton, the president of Genocide Watch, presented a briefing paper called " The 8 Stages of Genocide" at the United States Department of State. In it he suggested that genocide develops in eight stages that are "predictable but not inexorable".

The Stanton paper was presented to the State Department, shortly after the Rwandan Genocide and much of its analysis are based on why that genocide occurred. The preventative measures suggested, given the briefing paper's original target audience, were those that the United States could implement directly or indirectly by using its influence on other governments.

In April 2012, it was reported that Stanton would soon be officially adding two new stages, Discrimination and Persecution, to his original theory, which would make for a 10-stage theory of genocide.

Stage

Characteristics

Preventive measures

1.
Classification

People are divided into "us and them".

"The main preventive measure at this early stage is to develop universalistic institutions that transcend... divisions."

2.
Symbolization

"When combined with hatred, symbols may be forced upon unwilling members of pariah groups..."

"To combat symbolization, hate symbols can be legally forbidden as can hate speech".

3.
Discrimination

"Law or cultural power excludes groups from full civil rights: segregation or apartheid laws, denial of voting rights".

"Pass and enforce laws prohibiting discrimination. Full citizenship and voting rights for all groups."

"One group denies the humanity of the other group. Members of it are equated with animals, vermin, insects, or diseases."

"Local and international leaders should condemn the use of hate speech and make it culturally unacceptable. Leaders who incite genocide should be banned from international travel and have their foreign finances frozen."

5.
Organization

"Genocide is always organized... Special army units or militias are often trained and armed..."

"The U.N. should impose arms embargoes on governments and citizens of countries involved in genocidal massacres, and create commissions to investigate violations"

6.
Polarization

"Hate groups broadcast polarizing propaganda..."

"Prevention may mean security protection for moderate leaders or assistance to human rights groups...Coups d'état by extremists should be opposed by international sanctions."

7.
Preparation

"Victims are identified and separated out because of their ethnic or religious identity..."

"At this stage, a Genocide Emergency must be declared. ..."

8.
Persecution

"Expropriation, forced displacement, ghettos, concentration camps".

"Direct assistance to victim groups, targeted sanctions against persecutors, mobilization of humanitarian assistance or intervention, protection of refugees."

9.
Extermination

"It is 'extermination' to the killers because they do not believe their victims to be fully human".

"At this stage, only rapid and overwhelming armed intervention can stop genocide. Real safe areas or refugee escape corridors should be established with heavily armed international protection."

"The perpetrators... deny that they committed any crimes..."

"The response to denial is punishment by an international tribunal or national courts"

Other authors have focused on the structural conditions leading up to genocide and the psychological and social processes that create an evolution toward genocide. Ervin Staub showed that economic deterioration and political confusion and disorganization were starting points of increasing discrimination and violence in many instances of genocides and mass killing. They lead to scapegoating a group and ideologies that identified that group as an enemy. A history of devaluation of the group that becomes the victim, past violence against the group that becomes the perpetrator leading to psychological wounds, authoritarian cultures and political systems, and the passivity of internal and external witnesses (bystanders) all contribute to the probability that the violence develops into genocide. Intense conflict between groups that is unresolved, becomes intractable and violent can also lead to genocide. In 2006, Dirk Moses criticised genocide studies due to its "rather poor record of ending genocide".

References

Further reading

(in Spanish) Aizenstatd, Najman Alexander. "Origen y Evolución del Concepto de Genocidio". Vol. 25 Revista de Derecho de la Universidad Francisco Marroquín 11 (2007). ISSN 1562-2576 [1]

(in Spanish) Marco, Jorge. "Genocidio y Genocide Studies: Definiciones y debates", en: Aróstegui, Julio, Marco, Jorge y Gómez Bravo, Gutmaro (coord.): "De Genocidios, Holocaustos, Exterminios...", Hispania Nova, 10 (2012). Véase [2]

Krain, M. (1997). "State-Sponsored Mass Murder: A Study of the Onset and Severity of Genocides and Politicides." Journal of Conflict Resolution 41(3): 331-360.

Bloxham, Donald & Moses, A. Dirk [editors]: The Oxford Handbook of Genocide Studies. [Interdisciplinary Contributions about Past & Present Genocides]. Oxford University Press, second edition 2013. ISBN 978-0-19-967791-7

Gellately, Robert; Kiernan, Ben (July 2003). The Specter of Genocide: Mass Murder in Historical Perspective. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-0-521-52750-7.

Kiernan, Ben (2007). Blood and Soil: A World History of Genocide and Extermination from Sparta to Darfur. Yale University Press. ISBN 978-0-300-10098-3.

Levene, Mark (2005). Genocide in the Age of the Nation State. New York, Palgrave Macmillan.

Lewy, Guenter (2012). Essays on Genocide and Humanitarian Intervention. University of Utah Press. ISBN 978-1-60781-168-8.

Rosenfeld, Gavriel D. (1999). "The Politics of Uniqueness: Reflections on the Recent Polemical Turn in Holocaust and Genocide Scholarship". Holocaust and Genocide Studies. 13 (1): 28-61. doi:10.1093/hgs/13.1.28.

Rosenbaum, Alan S. (2018). Is the Holocaust unique?: perspectives on comparative genocide. Routledge.

Rummel, R.J. (1994). Death by Government: Genocide and Mass Murder in the Twentieth Century. Transaction Publishers. ISBN 978-1-56000-927-6.

Schmid, A.P. (1991). Repression, State Terrorism, and Genocide: Conceptual Clarifications. State Organized Terror: The Case of Violent Internal Repression. P.T. Bushnell. Boulder, Colo.: Westview Press. 312 p.[ISBN missing ]

The roots of evil: The origins of genocide and other group violence. New York: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-0-521-42214-7

Overcoming Evil: Genocide, violent conflict and terrorism. New York: Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-19-538204-4

Valentino, Benjamin A. (2004). Final Solutions: Mass Killing and Genocide in the 20th Century. Cornell University Press. ISBN 978-0-8014-3965-0.

Weitz, Eric D. (2003). A Century of Genocide: Utopias of Race and Nation. Princeton University Press. p. 360. ISBN 978-0-691-12271-7.

External links

Research institutes, advocacy groups, and other organizations

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Genocide is the intentional destruction of a people - usually defined as an ethnic, national, racial, or religious group - in whole or in part. Raphael Lemkin coined the term in 1944, combining the Greek word ( genos, "race, people") with the Latin suffix -caedo ("act of killing").

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Weimar Republic | Facts, Constitution, & Downfall

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Weimar Republic: Weimar Republic, the government of Germany from 1919 to 1933. Economic crisis and political instability led to the collapse of the republic and the rise of the Third Reich. Learn more about the history and significance of the Weimar Republic in this article.

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“Treaty of Munich” redirects here. For the Austro-Bavarian agreement after the Napoleonic Wars, see Treaty of Munich (1816).

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Concentration camps ( Konzentrationslager; abbreviated as KL or KZ) were an integral feature of the regime in Nazi Germany between 1933 and 1945.

The term concentration camp refers to a camp in which people are detained or confined, usually under harsh conditions and without regard to legal norms of arrest and imprisonment that are acceptable in a constitutional democracy.

The First Concentration Camps in Germany

The first concentration camps in Germany were established soon after Hitler's appointment as chancellor in January 1933. In the weeks after the Nazis came to power, the SA ( Sturmabteilung; commonly known as the Storm Troopers), the SS ( Schutzstaffel; Protection Squadrons-the elite guard of the Nazi party), the police, and local civilian authorities organized numerous detention camps to incarcerate real and perceived political opponents of Nazi policy.

German authorities established camps all over Germany on an ad hoc basis to handle the masses of people arrested as alleged subversives. The SS established larger camps in Oranienburg, north of Berlin; Esterwegen, near Hamburg; Dachau, northwest of Munich; and Lichtenburg, in Saxony. In Berlin itself, the Columbia Haus facility held prisoners under investigation by the Gestapo (the German secret state police) until 1936.

Centralization of the Concentration Camp System

The SS gained its independence from the SA in July 1934, in the wake of the Röhm purge. Hitler then authorized SS leader Heinrich Himmler to centralize the administration of the concentration camps and formalize them into a system. Himmler chose SS Lieutenant General Theodor Eicke for this task. Eicke had been the commandant of the SS concentration camp at Dachau since June 1933. Himmler appointed him Inspector of Concentration Camps, a new section of the SS subordinate to the SS Main Office.

After December 1934, the SS became the only agency authorized to establish and manage facilities that were formally called concentration camps. Local civilian authorities did continue to establish and manage forced-labor camps and detention camps throughout Germany. In 1937, only four concentration camps were left: Dachau, near Munich; Sachsenhausen near Berlin; Buchenwald near Weimar; and Lichtenburg near Merseburg in Saxony for female prisoners.

Purposes of the Camp System

Concentration camps are often inaccurately compared to a prison in modern society. But concentration camps, unlike prisons, were independent of any judicial review. Nazi concentration camps served three main purposes:

To incarcerate people whom the Nazi regime perceived to be a security threat. These people were incarcerated for indefinite amounts of time.

To eliminate individuals and small, targeted groups of individuals by murder, away from the public and judicial review.

To exploit forced labor of the prisoner population. This purpose grew out of a labor shortage.

Concentration Camp Administration

Already as commandant of Dachau in 1933, Eicke developed an organization and procedures to administer and guard a concentration camp. He issued regulations for the duties of the perimeter guards and for treatment of the prisoners. The organization, structure, and practice developed at Dachau in 1933-34 became the model for the Nazi concentration camp system as it expanded. Among Eicke's early trainees at Dachau was Rudolf Höss, who later commanded the Auschwitz concentration camp.

Special "political units on alert" ( Politische Bereitschaften) originally guarded the SS concentration camps. They were renamed "SS Guard Units" ( SS-Wachverbände) in 1935 and "SS Death's-Head Units" ( SS-Totenkopfverbände) in April 1936. One SS Death's-Head Unit was assigned to each concentration camp. After 1936, the camp administration, including the commandant, was also a part of the SS Death's-Head Unit.

Although all SS units wore the Death's-Head symbol (skull and crossbones) on their caps, only the SS Death's-Head Units were authorized to wear the Death's Head Symbol on their lapels. The "SS Death's-Head Division" of the Waffen SS was created in 1940. Its officers were recruited from concentration camp service. They also wore the Death's-Head symbol on their lapel.

The SS Death's-Head Unit at each camp was divided into two groups. The first was the camp staff, which covered:

the commandant and his personal staff

a Security Police officer and an assistant to maintain and update prisoner records

the commandant of the so-called protective detention camp (Schutzhaftlagerführer) which housed the prisoners, and his staff (including the labor allocation officer, the roll call officer, and the Blockführer, who were responsible for the individual prisoner barracks)

an administrative staff responsible for the fiscal and supply administration of the camp

an infirmary run by an SS physician assisted by one or two SS sanitation officers and/or medical orderlies.

The second group constituted the guard detachment ( SS-Wachbataillon), which prior to 1939 was at battalion strength.

The model established by Eicke in the mid-1930s characterized the concentration camp system until the collapse of the Nazi regime in the spring of 1945. The daily routine at Dachau, the methods of punishment, and the duties of the SS staff and guards became the norm, with some variation, at all German concentration camps.

Authority to Imprison People in Concentration Camps

After 1938, authority to incarcerate persons in a concentration camp formally rested exclusively with the German Security Police (made up of the Gestapo and the Criminal Police).

The Security Police had held this exclusive authority de facto since 1936. The "legal" instrument of incarceration was either the "protective detention" ( Schutzhaft) order or the "preventative detention" ( Vorbeugungshaft) order. The Gestapo could issue a "protective detention" order for persons considered a political danger after 1933. The Criminal Police could issue a "preventative detention" order after December 1937 for persons considered to be habitual and professional criminals, or to be engaging in what the regime defined as "asocial" behavior. Neither order was subject to judicial review, or any review by any German agency outside of the German Security Police. As the concentration camp system expanded, the camps fell within the exclusive authority of the SS. The German judicial administration had no jurisdiction with the growing camp system.

Expansion of the Camp System

Nazi Germany expanded by bloodless conquest into Austria and Czechoslovakia between 1938 and 1939. The numbers of those labeled as political opponents and as "asocials" in German society increased, requiring the establishment of new concentration camps.

By the time the Germans invaded Poland in September 1939, unleashing World War II, there were six concentration camps in the so-called Greater German Reich: Dachau (founded 1933), Sachsenhausen (1936), Buchenwald (1937), Flossenbürg in northeastern Bavaria near the 1937 Czech border (1938), Mauthausen, near Linz, Austria (1938), and Ravensbrück, the women's camp, established in Brandenburg Province, southeast of Berlin (1939), after the dissolution of Lichtenburg.

Forced Labor

From as early as 1934, concentration camp commandants used prisoners as forced laborers for SS construction projects such as the construction or expansion of the camps themselves. By 1938, SS leaders envisioned using the supply of forced laborers incarcerated in the camps for a variety of SS-commissioned construction projects. To mobilize and finance such projects, Himmler revamped and expanded the administrative offices of the SS and created a new SS office for business operations. Both agencies were led by SS Major General Oswald Pohl, who would take over the Inspectorate of Concentration Camps in 1942.

Beginning a pattern that became typical after the war began, economic considerations had an increasing impact on the selection of sites for concentration camps after 1937. For instance, Mauthausen and Flossenbürg were located near large stone quarries. Likewise, concentration camp authorities increasingly diverted prisoners from meaningless, backbreaking labor to still backbreaking and dangerous labor in extractive industries, such as stone quarries and coal mines, and construction labor.

Concentration Camps after the Outbreak of World War II

After Nazi Germany unleashed World War II in September 1939, vast new territorial conquests and larger groups of potential prisoners led to the rapid expansion of the concentration camp system to the east. The war did not change the original function of the concentration camps as detention sites for the incarceration of political enemies. The climate of national emergency that the conflict granted to the Nazi leaders, however, permitted the SS to expand the functions of the camps.

The concentration camps increasingly became sites where the SS authorities could kill targeted groups of real or perceived enemies of Nazi Germany. They also came to serve as holding centers for a rapidly growing pool of forced laborers used for SS construction projects, SS-commissioned extractive industrial sites, and, by 1942, the production of armaments, weapons, and related goods for the German war effort.

Despite the need for forced labor, the SS authorities continued to deliberately undernourish and mistreat prisoners incarcerated in the concentration camps. Prisoners were used ruthlessly and without regard to safety at forced labor, resulting in high mortality rates.

Last Edited: Jun 27, 2019

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Concentration camps ( Konzentrationslager; abbreviated as KL or KZ) were an integral feature of the regime in Nazi Germany between 1933 and 1945. The term concentration camp refers to a camp in which people are detained or confined, usually under harsh conditions and without regard to legal norms of arrest and imprisonment that are acceptable in a constitutional democracy.

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Collectivization in the Soviet Union - Wikipedia

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The Soviet Union enforced the collectivization ( Russian: Коллективизация) of its agricultural sector between 1928 and 1940 during the ascendancy of Joseph Stalin. It began during and was part of the first five-year plan. The policy aimed to consolidate individual landholdings and labour into collective farms: mainly and .

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Adolf Hitler was to be looked at as the "Fuhrer".

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This book was written by Adolf Hitler while he was in prison. This book contained racism.

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Indigenous to large parts of western and central Russia are the Uralic peoples, such as the Vepsians, Mordvins, Maris and Permians. Historically, the Russification of Uralic peoples begins already with the original eastward expansion of the East Slavs.