When to intervene in a genocide

A confluence of three events occurred this week with respect to genocides.  The first was the news that France is passing a law that makes it a crime to deny genocide occurred.  It is in particular targeted, reputedly, at the Turks with respect to the Armenian genocide.  The Turks are not happy. 

The second was the replay of an interview with Christopher Hitchens (RIP) in which he referred to Kissinger being within listening distance as the Indonesians considered their invasion of East Timor.  And how this genocide then unfolded and flew in the face of international law.

So I looked up this international law.  On trusty old Wiki.

The Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide came into effect on 12 January 1951 by vote of the UN General Assembly.  It has been adopted by the International Criminal Court. 

In Article II it defines genocide as:

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

(a)    Killing a member 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

Further, the UN Security Council must, by law (Resolution 1674), take action to protect populations from genocide, war crimes, ethnic cleansing and crimes against humanity.   

Not all are mentioned, but some of the genocides over the past century are all too familiar:  Bosnia; Rwanda; East Timor; Holocaust; Khmer Rouge; Darfur (Sudan); Soviet POWS.  It is unclear why none of the deaths from Japanese in China (Nanjing) or the Pacific are not mentioned.  But there you have it. 

So it is clear, the world is required to act in the face of a genocide as defined. 

The third event was that I watched the film Balibo.  

It illustrates with implacable clarity the malicious brutality of the Indonesian’s invasion of East Timor in 1975.  It tells the true story of crimes that were covered up for over 30 years.  

A friend grew up in Papua New Guinea, a child of an Australian Major.  He often spoke of the very real threat the community felt from a cross border invasion by the Indonesians from Irian Jaya (the left half of the island of New Guinea).  It was a cloud on the horizon at all times, or a flapping flock of vultures.  There were stories too of people fleeing across the border from West Papua, of rampant deaths, whole villages flattened to make way for the millions of Indonesians being supplanted into the country.

It is difficult to know how widespread the abuse of the nationals is, but there has been plenty, and for a long time.   It is ignored by the international press and there is little or no diplomacy records either about this country of 2.6 million people.  Getting news out is almost impossible and journalists fear for their lives.  

Whole villages are being eradicated and there is no question that with the deliberate death of 400,000 nationals this would be considered genocide.  And the massive profits taken out of the resource (and culturally) rich country are not for the Papuans.  And the US company Freeport should hang its head in shame and every shareholder also.  It is the largest publicly traded copper and molybdenum producer in the world, and operates its PT Freeport Indonesia.  Reputedly, many many deaths of the Papuans have occurred in its name.

There are protests of course, but expect to be shot.  There are protest groups as well, such as 

Free West Papua;  and another domiciled in the UK.

There is a detailed and recent published history here.  Titled:  West Papuans Cry for Help. 

Wake up world!! It has been too long already!!