Genocide

Genocide is a crime under international law and condemned by the civilized world. It includes any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group:

1. Killing members of the group;
2. Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group;
3. Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part;
4. Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group;
5. Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group.

The legal definition of genocide includes the following:

Acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group such as:

• Killing members of the group;
• Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group;
• Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part.

In all periods of history genocide has inflicted great losses on humanity. It has been practised against Armenians during the Ottoman Empire; against Hebrews, Slavs, and other racial groups during the Hitler regime (1933-1945); by the Khmer Rouge (under Pol Pot) in Kampuchea; against the Baha'is in Iran; by the Tutsi against the Hutu in Burundi in 1965, 1972 and 1988; by the Iraqis against the Kurds; by Paraguayans against the Ache Indians before 1974 and a number of others.

The Holocaust was the systematic murder of 6 million Jews, gypsies, homosexuals, Jehovah's Witnesses, and "mental defectives" in Europe by the Nazis during and prior to World War II. Most were killed in gas chambers; but also infants were bayoneted for fun, workers thought to be slacking were casually shot in mid-conversation, pregnant women were kicked into parturition, and children's skulls were smashed against the wheels of railroad car.  In the immediate postwar period, war crimes against around 500,000 of Europe’s Roma and Sinti were not prosecuted. Survivors struggled to get recognition and compensation for the persecution they experienced. Roma victims were also not acknowledged in monuments commemorating the Nazis’ victims.