Abstract
This article begins by addressing the limitations imposed on contemporary genocidal situations by the 1948 Convention on the Prevention of Genocide, described as a “historically circumscribed” text. The author then discusses the inability of the international community to confront the atrocities in Darfur and analyzes if and how these atrocities could be stopped.
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Notes
- 1.
The main events of the Armenian Genocide are recounted in Douglas Greenberg, Chapter 5 (below); an explanation of the Turkish government ’s stance towards the genocide is provided in Taner Akçam, Chapter 10 (below).
- 2.
Tony Judt , “The Problem of Evil in Postwar Europe ,” The New York Review of Books, February 14, 2008.
- 3.
An analysis of the difficulty in determining intent according to the terms of the Genocide Convention is provided in Francis M. Deng, Chapter 4, Section 3.2 (below).
- 4.
Ibid.
- 5.
The difficulties in meeting the Genocide Convention requirements and potential failure to capture certain situations are examined in Francis M. Deng, Chapter 4, Section 4.2 (below).
- 6.
I saw these slogans still freshly scrawled on the walls with my own eyes in the weeks following the end of the war .
- 7.
None of these horrible violations of human rights led to any form of international action or even serious condemnation. As for the Idi Amin regime it was removed by the unilateral action of the Tanzanian Army in 1978–1979.
- 8.
This simply means tribes whose mother tongue is Arabic. Their racial appearance is often very close to that of the “African” tribes.
- 9.
These claims were completely spurious as the Janjaweed were armed, trained and paid by the government, operated jointly with regular army units and supported by vehicles and even aircraft of the government’s army. For more details see my book, Darfur : The Ambiguous Genocide. (London/New York : Hurst/Cornell University Press, 2005).
- 10.
They would not even be labelled as “ethnic cleansing ” because “ethnic cleansing” is supposed to be an organized crime, coordinated by authorities .
- 11.
The 200,000 casualty figure bandied around by the international community does not bear close scrutiny. For a realistic assessment of Darfur ’s human losses see the work of Sudan specialist Eric Reeves at http://www.sudanreeves.org (Accessed June 9, 2009).
- 12.
The situation in Darfur is examined in Catherine Lu, Chapter 18, Section 18.1 and 18.2 (below) and Luis Moreno-Ocampo , Chapter 16 (below).
- 13.
The experience of attending to the interests IDPs as part of a UN mandate is recounted in Francis M. Deng, Chapter 4, Section 4.1 (below).
- 14.
Judt , “The Problem of Evil,” 2008.
- 15.
Gareth Evans , “Genocide or Crime? Action Speaks Louder than Words in Darfur ,” European Voice, February 18, 2005. See also David Scheffer , “How to Bring Atrocity Criminals to Justice,” Financial Times . February 2, 2005.
- 16.
An argument for the use of the label “mass atrocities ” is provided in Yehuda Bauer, Chapter 7, Section 7.1 (below).
- 17.
In early 1995, this author met many NGO and international workers in Rwanda who were talking of “having been there as long as the war ,” i.e., since the April 1994 genocide. They were completely unaware of the fact that there had been a war going on in Rwanda since October 1990. Similarly, practically nobody among the humanitarian workers who came into Darfur in late 2004 would have been able to date the beginning of the hostilities to 9 years before. See Africa Watch, The Forgotten War in Darfur Flares up Again (Africa Watch, London, April 6, 1990) and Gérard Prunier, “Ecologie, structures ethniques et conflits politiques au Dar Fur,” in Sudan : History, Ideology, Identity, eds. Hervé Bleuchot, Christian Delmet and Derek Hopwood (Oxford: Ithaca Press, 1991), 85–103.
- 18.
These were the words used in an article entitled “Tutsis and Hutus : More Blood to Come” on Burundi in The Economist , July 22, 1995, 53, to describe still another one of these “low intensity” conflicts.
- 19.
See Amnesty International , Human Rights Watch Africa and the International Crisis Group reports for 2004.
- 20.
The adverse conditions surrounding peacekeeping missions and guidelines in line with the “responsbility to protect” are set forth in Wiebe Arts, Chapter 8, Section 8.1 and 7.2 (below).
- 21.
Sudan Tribune, African Darfur troops must meet UN standards-joint envoy, August 17, 2007.
- 22.
This was particularly conspicuous when looked at from the vantage point of Addis Ababa, where the African Union is based. Most senior African Union government representatives went along with the “anti-colonialist ” rhetoric of the government of Sudan . This political line did not go down very well with junior diplomats for whom “anti-colonialism ” was flogging a dead horse; it went down even less well with the African military men who were in Darfur and who, as Black Africans , had experienced the constant racism of the supposedly “anti-colonialist” Arabs .
- 23.
It is officially called United Nations African Mission in Darfur , or UNAMID .
- 24.
Gérard Prunier, “Chad : between Sudan ’s Blitzkrieg and Darfur ’s War,” OpenDemocracy.net February 19, 2008, http://www.opendemocracy.net/article/democracy_power/africa/chad_sudan_darfur (Accessed June 9, 2009).
- 25.
President Omar al-Bashir , “Sudan crisis focus of Al-Bashir Speech,” http://www.webindia123.com, February 25, 2007, Accessed July 11, 2009, http://news.webindia123.com/news/ar_showdetails.asp?id=702250028&cat=&n_date=20070225
- 26.
Sudan Tribune, “Sudan’s Bashir refuses to cooperate with the ICC,” August 4th, 2008, Accessed July 11, 2009, http://www.sudantribune.com/spip.php?article28143.
- 27.
The possibility of using a modified Oil-for-Food program as a way to exert pressure on the Sudanese government while allowing oil exports to continue is advanced in Richard J. Goldstone, Chapter 11, Section 11.4 (below).
- 28.
This was the case for the massive human rights violations committed by the Soviet regime in Russia up to the 1960s, by the Maoist regime in China up to the 1970s and by the Iranian regime up to the 1980s. Let us not even discuss the cases of the myriad of small dictatorships that proliferated in Latin America, Africa , Asia and the Middle East in the shadow of the Cold War and got away with murder in the name of either “Socialism” or “Freedom.”
- 29.
There was a ridiculously underfunded compensation fund for the surviving victims of the massacres (each was supposed to receive about $18!), a $300 m (over 3 years!) investment fund for basic infrastructures and the creation of a regional administration.
- 30.
An argument for resorting to mercenaries in genocidal conflicts is provided in Krzystof Kotarski and Samuel Walker, Chapter 14, Section 14.3 and 14.4 (below).
- 31.
The National Islamic Front received 7% of the vote in the last elections before it carried out its coup d’état. Its victory in a free and fair poll is quite unlikely.
- 32.
Sudanese Media Center communiqué, Khartoum , March 13, 2008.
- 33.
This is particularly clear in the case of another forgotten “Peace Agreement,” the Eastern Peace Agreement or EPA, signed in October 2006, none of whose provisions were ever carried out.
- 34.
This is the case of Darfur .
- 35.
The struggles around the contents of the electoral law and the pre-election census are cases in point.
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Prunier, G. (2011). Darfur: Genocidal Theory and Practical Atrocities. In: Provost, R., Akhavan, P. (eds) Confronting Genocide. Ius Gentium: Comparative Perspectives on Law and Justice, vol 7. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-90-481-9840-5_3
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