The fundamental objective of the Genocide Convention is prevention, as its title, the “Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide,” reflects, and as Article I expressly prescribes. The International Court of Justice (ICJ) determined in 2007 that a state’s responsibility to prevent genocide, and the concurrent duty to act, is activated the moment the state becomes aware, or should have become aware, of a serious risk that genocide may occur. This preventive obligation extends beyond a state’s territorial boundaries, applying wherever it might be able to act appropriately.
That’s a big obligation on the part of state parties, and one they’ve often failed to meet, most notoriously in Rwanda and Bosnia. But Russia’s ongoing invasion of Ukraine offers a clear challenge to the signatories of the Genocide Convention—which include Russia itself—to act to prevent genocide. The risk of genocide in Ukraine was brutally clear last year; today, the invasion should be framed not only as a potential genocide but as an ongoing one, the evidence for which our recent work at the New Lines Institute and the Raoul Wallenberg Centre lays out in detail in a new report that concludes the Russian Federation has actively commissioned genocide in Ukraine.
Ukrainians are living through a period of historic torment. In Bucha in spring 2022, a well-documented massacre took place. The same year, thousands of Ukrainian children were taken to Russia for forced adoptions to stop them coalescing as a single identity group. Though these crimes are widely acknowledged, despite Russia’s best efforts at denial, the standard of proof required at the ICJ to create such a legal obligation is very high—proportionate to the severity of the offense—and sound legal argument is needed to connect the evidence to the legal text of the relevant articles.
In an era marked by a continued erosion of global peace and security norms, the need for
rigorous, evidence-based inquiries into serious allegations of international crimes has become
more crucial than ever.
Our initial report in May 2022 found reasonable grounds to believe that Russia had engaged in
direct and public incitement to commit genocide. This was done through the use of language
including “de-nazification,” “de-Satanization,” and the construction of Ukrainians as an
existential threat in attempts to warrant their destruction as a recognized, national group.
Combined with corresponding actions inescapably attributable to the Russian Federation, there
was already a “serious risk of genocide” – the threshold established by the International Court of Justice for the duty to prevent stipulated in Article I of the Genocide Convention. Accordingly, States party to the Genocide Convention should then have been acting preventively – if genocide was not already being committed. Indeed, under customary international law, the international community as a whole should have been acting.
This report – an updated independent inquiry into the Russian Federation’s involvement in Ukraine – extends beyond incitement to the question of actual commission of genocide, separate crimes under Art. III (c) of the Genocide Convention. The evidence presented compels us to
conclude that the Russian Federation has not only continued but escalated its efforts to commit
genocide. Beyond a serious risk of genocide, we conclude there are violations of the Genocide
Convention beyond a reasonable doubt.
The consequences of this finding are far-reaching and clear. The U.N. Convention on the
Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide is a binding agreement; it requires states to
prevent genocide once they become aware of the risk of it or should have become aware of the
risk of it. All the more so, logically, states should stop the commission of genocide.
In what follows, we demonstrate and underline the legal obligation of states to act with urgency
and sufficiency. We hope our findings will provide the necessary impetus to galvanize actions
toward upholding this foundational norm of contemporary international law.
