War in Ukraine: Supporters of kyiv divided on the use of the term “genocide”

Published on: 04/14/2022 – 22:52 Ukrainians, Americans and Canadians consider that the Russian operation in Ukraine amounts to genocide. A position contested by France and Germany, who consider the term inappropriate at this stage. France 24 deciphers the controversy surrounding the use of this term, which divides kyiv’s allies. “The word genocide has a meaning and the word genocide must be qualified by jurists and not by politicians.” French President Emmanuel Macron reaffirmed, on Wednesday April 14, his refusal to qualify the Russian operation in Ukraine as genocide against the Ukrainians, while recalling his commitment “from day one alongside Ukraine”. the day before, the American president had called Vladimir Putin a “dictator” who “commits genocide on the other side of the world”. An exit that he later qualified, explaining that it was up to international justice to decide. How did this issue become a point of contention between the Western powers opposed to the Russian invasion of Ukraine? “Industrial planning” Legally qualified in 1948 following the Holocaust by a United Nations convention, genocide is defined as a crime “committed with the intention of destroying, in whole or in part, a national, ethnic, racial or religion”. Three cases of genocide which have been prosecuted and condemned by international courts: the genocide of the Jews by the Nazis during the Second World War, that of the Tutsis in Rwanda by the Hutu authorities in 1994, and that of Bosnian Muslim civilians in Srebrenica, Bosnia and Herzegovina, in 1995. States also have the possibility of passing laws to recognize genocides nationwide, as is the case in France for the Armenian genocide committed by the Ottoman Empire from 1915. The massacres recognized as genocides have in common that there was “industrial planning”, explains Gauthier Rybinski, international columnist at France 24. Whether with the Wannsee conference for the Nazis, or the Mille Collines radio station in Rwanda, we find traces of this desire. Ukraine, the Russian withdrawal from the suburbs of kyiv marks a new stage in horror. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky then goes to the town of Boutcha, where the bodies of civilians litter the streets. “These are war crimes, and they will be recognized by the world as genocide,” he said, using this term for the first time against Moscow. Bodies of Boucha residents lie on a street in the city that the Ukrainians recaptured from Russian forces, April 2, 2022. Zohra Bensemra, Reuters Since this declaration, the debate has raged among kyiv’s allies, the question being of whether Russia knowingly planned the destruction of the Ukrainian people. “It is increasingly clear that Putin is trying to sweep away the very idea that one can be Ukrainian”, affirms for his part Joe Biden. A position shared by Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said it was “absolutely correct” to use the term genocide to describe Russia’s actions in Ukraine. On the other side of the Atlantic, Emmanuel Macron and Olaf Scholz refute this term, warning their allies against an escalation of words vis-à-vis Russia, which they consider dangerous. “We have sent magistrates and gendarmes to help Ukraine document these war crimes,” explained the French president on Wednesday, who considers the use of the term “genocide” premature. Protecting the procedure On March 2, the prosecutor of the International Criminal Court (ICC), the Briton Karim Khan, announced the opening of an investigation into the situation in Ukraine. This institution based in The Hague was created in 2002 to judge war crimes, crimes against humanity, genocide and more recently crimes of aggression. But for the time being, the investigation in Ukraine only seems to concern war crimes. This term includes all actions committed by combatants against civilian populations, as well as the use of prohibited weapons. International Criminal Court prosecutor, Britain’s Karim Khan, visits a mass grave in Boutcha, on the outskirts of kyiv, on April 13, 2022, where Russia is accused of committing dozens of atrocities against civilians. © AFP – Fadel Senna For the international columnist of France 24 Gauthier Rybinski, the prudence of the ICC on the question of the genocide is essential to protect its procedure. “For the culprits to be judged, the charges must be precise,” he explains. “If the charge of genocide is not retained, a whole procedure falls.””Genocide is the desire to completely eliminate a population, a group of people”, explains the general French Jean-Philippe Reiland, head of the Central Office for Combating Crimes Against Humanity and Hate Crimes (OCLCH), interviewed by AFP. “It is complicated to consider that we want to make all the Ukrainians disappear based on a village or a district.” While Russia denies any abuse in Ukraine, kyiv is continuing its efforts to federate its allies. The Ukrainian parliament on Thursday adopted a resolution describing the actions of the Russian army in Ukraine as “genocide”, calling on parliaments, governments and international organizations to do the same. With AFP