The word genocide (from the greek genos - tribe, race; and from latin city - kill) it is used to refer to the act of systematic extermination of an ethnic group or to any deliberate act aimed at exterminating a fundamental cultural aspect of a people. The term was first used in 1944 by Raphael Lemkin, a Polish jurist who contributed during and after the Second World War period for the construction of international laws about this crime. Lemkim was one of the main figures participating in the 1948 UN Convention for the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide.
While this is not a new phenomenon, as there are records of genocide throughout human history, it was only after the appalling events that took place during World War II, perpetrated fur Nazism, that the international community met to try to curb this type of crime. In 1946, the UN Assembly defined Genocide as “the denial of the right to the existence of entire human groups (...) a crime of the right of peoples, in contrast to the spirit and objectives of the United Nations, a crime that the civil world condemns
", and determined a draft Convention to deal with the matter. The bill was approved by the General Assembly on December 9, 1948, and defined the crime of Genocide in its Article 2 as follows:Article II - In this Convention, genocide is understood to be any of the following acts, committed with the intention to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnic, racial or religious group, while such:
(a) murder of group members;
b) serious damage to the physical or mental integrity of group members;
(c) intentional subjection of the group to living conditions designed to bring about its total or partial physical destruction;
(d measures to prevent births within the group;
(e) forcibly transferring children from the group to another group.
The motivations for the acts of genocide can be numerous: xenophobia, feelings of hatred, fear or deep dislike for people belonging to a different nationality, ethnic disputes and even religious. The Convention, however, established the principle of individual responsibility for all acts related to the crime of genocide and also determined punishment for those who commit them.
Genocides in recent times
The best-known genocide in history took place during World War II. It is estimated that more than six million Jews, homosexuals, gypsies, blacks, “communists” and Slavs have been systematically murdered in concentration camps. However, he was not the first. The Armenian genocide is considered by the vast majority of the international community to be the first act of systematic extermination of an ethnic group in recent history. The events that led to this tragedy took place during World War I, when the then Empire Ottoman joined a mass murder enterprise against the population of Armenia, killing 1.8 million people. people.
Another well-known case that is still a source of great controversy is the so-called Holodomor or the Ukrainian genocide, which took place between 1932 and 1933. The actions that led to the deaths of 3 to 3.5 million people from starvation (starvation), according to recent estimates by historian Stanislav Kulchytsky, are attributed to the Soviet government of Joseph Stalin.
The changes implemented by the Soviet government in an attempt to industrialize the Soviet economy and production, a deep drought period that the region was facing and strong measures implemented by the Stalinist government, such as the “compulsory requisition”, which determined that the agricultural producers to sell surplus production to the State at very low prices, are part of the reasons pointed out as responsible for the tragedy. However, although the reason for the large number of deaths in such a short period is still open to debate in the media. academics today, it is widely accepted by the international community that the then-USSR's responsibility for the deaths is a fact.
by Lucas Oliveira
Graduated in Sociology