Human Rights

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Human Rights

• Violations from the Past

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Things to consider

• Historical Context
• Cultural Context
• Presentism?
• Revisionism?

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The Armenian Genocide

• Anatolia (Eastern Turkey)
• 1915-1917
• 500 000 to 1.5 million Eastern Orthodox Armenian
  Turks killed
• Complex Historical Past
• Familiar legitimization

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The Situation

• 1914- 2 million Armenian Turks living in Turkey
• Christian Orthodox followers in a Muslim country
• Armenians rose in education and business
  prosperity (Wealth Gap)
• Muslim Turks retained control of Govt and
  Military

5
The Beginnings

• Turkey sided with the Triple Alliance in WWI
• Fear emerged that Armenian Turks would side with
  Russia
• Deportation orders followed propaganda
• Land and possessions were expropriated

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The Killings

• Some killed through starvation and imprisonment
• Some pressed into indentured labour
• Many killed enroute to or at deportation and
  internment camps

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(No Transcript)
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"the clearance of race from Asia Minor was about
as complete as such an act could be...There is no
reason to doubt that this crime was planned and
executed for political reasons. The opportunity
presented itself for clearing Turkish soil of a
Christian race opposed to all Turkish ambitions.
Winston Churchill
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Results

• Conservative estimates ? 850 000 killed during
  the deportation alone
• Military tribunals established afterwards by
  British and American Powers to route out
  organizers had little real results
• This event is the subject of significant modern
  revisionism and denial

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Would you admit to the crimes of your
grandfathers, if these crimes didn't really
happen?" Turkey's bureaucratic elite have never
really shed themselves of the Ottoman tradition
-- in the perpetrators, they see their fathers,
whose honor they seek to defend. - Hrant Dink,
publisher and editor-in-chief of the
Istanbul-based Armenian weekly Agos
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The Nanking Massacre

• Nanking- Capital of China in the 1930s
• Second Sino-Japanese War 1937-1945
• 150 000 to 300 000 killed in 6 weeks between
  November 1937 and January 1938

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The Situation

• The Imperial Japanese Army invaded the capital
  with its new No prisoners doctrine.
• The Chinese Army retreat and are slaughtered

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The Atrocities begin

• Despite warnings and threats of harsh treatment
  by their superiors, Japanese soldiers, loot,
  burn, pillage rape and kill civilians and troops
  alike for the next six weeks
• An international Safety Zone was set up several
  foreigners to protect as many civilians as
  possible
• 20 000 to 30 000 women raped
• One trench, 300 metres long has been determined
  to contain 12 000 bodies

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Robert Wilson in his letter to his family The
slaughter of civilians is appalling. I could go
on for pages telling of cases of rape and
brutality almost beyond belief. Two bayoneted
corpses are the only survivors of seven street
cleaners who were sitting in their headquarters
when Japanese soldiers came in without warning or
reason and killed five of their number and
wounded the two that found their way to the
hospital. John Magee in his letter to his wife
They not only killed every prisoner they could
find but also a vast number of ordinary citizens
of all ages.... Just the day before yesterday we
saw a poor wretch killed very near the house
where we are living. Robert Wilson in another
letter to his family They Japanese soldiers
bayoneted one little boy, killing him, and I
spent an hour and a half this morning patching up
another little boy of eight who had five bayonet
wounds including one that penetrated his stomach,
a portion of omentum was outside the abdomen.
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The Results

• 300 000 dead
• Two thirds of the city burned or destroyed
• Post war Nanking tribunal sentences several lower
  ranked officers to death
• Forensic evidence is bolstered by the Magee film

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Controversy

• The incident had fallen into obscurity by the
  1970s
• Several news articles sparked debate and
  minimization from the Japanese government
• The Japanese Ministry of Education censored
  mention of the event from High school texts in
  the 1980s, as it was not a well-established
  historical event.

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Rwanda

• Impoverished former Belgian colony
• 1994 government faction-backed militia purge 500
  000 to
• 1 000 000 citizens
• 500 000 refugees produced

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The Situation

• Rwandan society ? divided into two
  Ethnic Tutsis have a history of power though they
  are the minority
• Ethnic Hutu majority claims power during a
  bloody civil conflict following Belgian departure
• Expatriate Tutsis wish to return as full
  citizens? Hutu government conspires to eliminate
  the threat

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The Genocide begins

• The government armed and supported youth militias
• UN presense (UNAMIR) led by Canadian Romeo
  Dallaire warned of an impending disaster
• A group of 30 000 armed with AK-47s to machetes
  was ready

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Rwandan Prime Minister Jean Kambanda revealed, in
his testimony before the International Criminal
Tribunal, that the genocide was openly discussed
in cabinet meetings and that "one cabinet
minister said she was personally in favor of
getting rid of all Tutsi without the Tutsi, she
told ministers, all of Rwanda's problems would be
over."
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Massacre

• April 7th 1994, The downing of the Rwandan and
  Burundi Presidents plane at Kigali airport
  touched off the slaughter
• Radio stations around the country were used to
  spark the violence

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Results

• Between 800 000 and 1 000 000 Tutsis killed in
  four months
• 10 were ethnic Hutus
• Several million refugees into neighbouring
  countries

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Controversy

• Some within Rwanda claim European or American
  powers incited and/or the Violence
• Some claim that there was actually two genocides
  going on as Tutsis responded in kind to Hutus

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James Smith of Aegis Trust notes, "What's
important to remember is that there was a
genocide. There was an attempt to eliminate
Tutsis men, women, and children and to erase
any memory of their existence."
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http//www.youtube.com/watch?vuWNS4MkSpYE 2305