The St. Bartholomew's Day Massacre

Is Government Really Killing Us? Connecting the Dots

  

Is Government Really Killing Us? Connecting the Dots

Liberty Sentinel by Alex Newman

Mar 19, 2026

Government policy on everything from healthcare to geopolitics may kill you. Indeed, evidence is mounting that Western governments, duty-bound to punish evil and protect citizens’ God-given rights, are instead advancing the opposite — often with deadly consequences.

In this explosive episode of The Sentinel Report, Alex Newman connects the dots of government-sanctioned harm. From the COVID vaccine regime pushed by the Deep State to geopolitical tension in the Strait of Hormuz that could devastate global supply chains and the food supply, the same Insiders are willing to gamble with human life to consolidate power.

Perhaps most chilling is the personal story of Scott Schara, whose daughter died in a hospital after being subjected to government-approved COVID protocols. Schara, who just released the new book “Is the Government Legally Killing Us?” launched a groundbreaking legal battle seeking accountability from the medical establishment and the system that enabled it.

In this must-watch interview, Schara reveals shocking details about what happened and why you or your loved ones could be next. Americans must wake up to the dangers posed by a system that increasingly treats citizens as expendable, or the carnage will continue to escalate.

Dark Waters podcast host James Williams joins the program to offer his insights into the escalating MAGA civil war. With Trump publicly endorsing neoconservative Never Trumper Mark Levin, Williams says it seems the establishment has realized that Trump cannot be fought. Instead, they are seeking to harness.

If you care about truth, medical freedom, and the survival of a free society, this is an episode you cannot afford to miss.

World Council of Churches calls on governments to hold Israel accountable for violations of international law

The World Council of Churches' new campaign called “From Condemnation to Consequences” aims to pressure governments to hold Israel accountable for its deepening occupation of the West Bank and its accelerated program of genocide and ethnic cleansing.

By Jeff Wright 

 March 11, 2026



Scenes showing the widespread destruction of buildings and infrastructure caused by Israeli attacks during the Gaza genocide in Beit Lahia in the northern Gaza Strip. February 22, 2026. (Photo: Omar Ashtawy/APA Images)


Last week, the World Council of Churches (WCC), headquartered in Geneva, launched a month-long campaign titled “From Condemnation to Consequences.” The program calls its member churches—clergy leaders and lay alike—to hold Israel accountable for its failure to fulfill its obligations under international law.

George Sahhar, Advocacy Officer in the Jerusalem Liaison Office of the World Council of Churches, tells Mondoweiss. “When attention is focused on the war in the Middle East, we want the world to see that human rights violations by Israel against Palestinians continue, and that annexation is ongoing and deepened.”

During a webinar introducing the March 4-31 campaign, Kenneth Mtata, WCC Program Director for Life, Justice and Peace, said, “[O]ur campaign needs to remain focused on the commitments that the churches have made together, with all their partners, to see how we move from the statements and condemnation of the occupation and annexation of Palestine, and to try to translate this into concrete changes and transformation.”

“When attention is focused on the war in the Middle East, we want the world to see that human rights violations by Israel against Palestinians continue, and that annexation is ongoing and deepened.” 

George Sahhar, Advocacy Officer in the Jerusalem Liaison Office of the World Council of Churches

Something BIBLICAL Is Happening in Iran — And the World Doesn't See It

 

Something BIBLICAL Is Happening in Iran — And the World Doesn't See It

Scriptures Illustrator

 Feb 27, 2026 End Time Events

🚨 The United States just assembled its largest military force in the Middle East since the 2003 invasion of Iraq

...

Trump makes EMERGENCY Announcement... (IT'S ALREADY BEGUN!!!)

Trump threatens US military action in Nigeria over treatment of Christians

By Andrea Shalal and Camillus Eboh

November 1, 20259:47 PM EDT

Security personnel patrol the streets amid a surge in violence in Mangu

Security personnel patrol the streets amid a surge in violence in Mangu, Plateau State, Nigeria, January 24, 2024, in this screengrab obtained from video. Reuters TV via REUTERS 

Summary

• Trump says he ordered Pentagon to prepare for potential attack on Nigeria
• US president says Nigeria has not done enough to stop killings of Christians
• Nigerian President Tinubu rejects claims of religious intolerance
• Nigeria vows to keep fighting violent extremism

WASHINGTON/ABUJA, Nov 1 (Reuters) - U.S. President Donald Trump on Saturday said he has asked the Defense Department to prepare for possible "fast" military action in Nigeria if the West African nation fails to crack down on the killing of Christians.

The U.S. government will also immediately stop all aid and assistance to Nigeria, Africa's most populous nation and top oil producer, Trump said in a post on Truth Social.

The Reuters Daily Briefing newsletter provides all the news you need to start your day. Sign up here.

If the United States sends in military forces, it would go in "'guns-a-blazing,' to completely wipe out the Islamic Terrorists who are committing these horrible atrocities," Trump wrote, without providing any evidence of specifics about the treatment of Christians in Nigeria.

Trump called Nigeria a "disgraced country" and warned its government must move quickly. "If we attack, it will be fast, vicious, and sweet, just like the terrorist thugs attack our CHERISHED Christians!" he wrote.

TRUMP, SOUTH AFRICAN FARMERS & RHODESIA_05.22.2025 Chris Pinto

Stream Episode

NOISE OF THUNDER RADIO - 5.22.2025

Today's Show: TRUMP, SOUTH AFRICAN FARMERS & RHODESIA

Chris discusses the recent controversy over President Trump extending refugee status and citizenship to the white South African farmers who have been persecuted through incessant farm attacks and murders along with land confiscation under the ANC government. We hear the notorious "Kill the Boer" song from the political leader, Julius Malema who has openly called for the killing of whites. Now the SA government has developed a new law which allows them to confiscate land from the white farmers without any financial compensation whatsoever. We also review the history of what happened leading to the fall of Rhodesia, which was given over to the Jesuit trained Robert Mugabe. Many researchers believe the same playbook used in Rhodesia and South Africa is what the global elites are also planning for America.

Image Credit: By Johnnyhurst - Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=33357596

 

Proof of Persecution in South Africa: SHOWN IN THE OVAL OFFICE

Trump ambushes South African president with videos of ‘white persecution’

RCC- Vatican Inquisition - Tortured And Murdered Over 80 Million People

THE SEQUEL TO THE FALL OF THE CABAL - PART 26: WRAPPING UP GENOCIDE

💥Dr. David Martin exposed the convoluted global democide💥

Armenia marks Remembrance Day following Sargsyan's resignation

Genocide Treaty - Deborah Tavares

Waco - A New Revelation

A look at the Operation Condor conspiracy in South America

 

US

Published May 27, 2016

 Associated Press





 FILE - In this Sept. 1988 file photo, Chile's dictator Augusto Pinochet is flanked by subordinates at a ceremony in Santiago, Chile. With a world divided by the Cold War, South America’s dictatorships in 1975 agreed to start exchanging information on political dissidents, trade unionists, students and any individual suspected of being leftist. The goal was to hunt down and eliminate the enemies of the dictatorships across the continent and beyond. According to declassified documents, various agencies of the U.S. government were aware of the plan. (AP Photo/Santiago Llanquin, File) (The Associated Press)



 FILE - In this March 24, 1976 file photo, Argentina's dictator Gen. Jorge Rafael Videla, center, is sworn-in as president at the Government House in Buenos Aires, Argentina. With a world divided by the Cold War, South America's dictatorships in 1975 agreed to start exchanging information on political dissidents, trade unionists, students and any individual suspected of being leftist. The goal was to hunt down and eliminate the enemies of the dictatorships across the continent and beyond. According to declassified documents, various agencies of the U.S. government were aware of the plan. (AP Photo/Eduardo Di Baia, File) (The Associated Press)



 FILE - In this July 9, 1982 file photo, Argentina's last dictator, General Reynaldo Bignone, arrives for a religious ceremony at the Cathedral in Buenos Aires. A court in Argentina has sentenced the former junta leader to 20 years in prison for Operation Condor crimes. The secret conspiracy was launched by six South American dictators in the 1970s in a combined effort to track down their enemies and eliminate them. The federal court ruled Friday, May 27, 2016. Bignone is already serving life sentences for multiple human rights violations during the 1976-1983 dictatorship. (AP Photo/Eduardo Di Baia, File) (The Associated Press)



BUENOS AIRES, Argentina – Argentina's last dictator and 14 other former military officials were sentenced Friday to prison for human rights crimes committed during the Operation Condor conspiracy. Here is a look at the clandestine program's main features:

WHAT WAS OPERATION CONDOR?

It was a coordinated effort by the military dictatorships in Argentina, Chile, Paraguay, Bolivia, Uruguay and Brazil to hunt down and eliminate opponents and leftists across the continent and beyond. It operated from the mid-1970s to the early 1980s.

HOW DID IT WORK?

Operation Condor officially began in 1975, when South America's dictatorships agreed to start exchanging information on political dissidents, trade unionists, students and anyone suspected of being leftist, especially those who had sought refuge in other countries. According to declassified documents, various U.S. government agencies were aware of the plan.

The covert operation involved the deployment of special transnational teams to kidnap subversive "targets," who were then interrogated and tortured in seven clandestine prisons located on military or police bases in Argentina, Paraguay, Uruguay and Chile. The dissidents were sometimes returned to their country of origin and disappeared.

Condor's agents also assassinated political leaders seen as influencing public opinion against the military regimes. Some of their targets were in the United States and Europe. The September 1976 assassination of Orlando Letelier, the ex-foreign minister of Chile's socialist President Salvador Allende, was the best-known case. Letelier, and his U.S. aide Ronni Moffitt, were killed by a bomb placed in his car in Washington D.C. Investigators found that the Chilean dictatorship's spy agency, known as DINA, and an anti-Castro group, many of whose members had been trained by the CIA, were behind the assassination.

WHO WERE CONDOR'S MASTERMINDS?

Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet, Paraguay's Alfredo Stroessner, Bolivia's Hugo Banzer, Argentine dictator Jorge Videla and Juan Maria Bordaberry of Uruguay. While no representative of Brazil signed the operation's charter, its government cooperated with the program and dissidents were killed and kidnapped in its territory.

HOW MANY VICTIMS?

According to a 2015 report by UNESCO's International Center for the Promotion of Human Rights, Operation Condor had 376 victims: 177 Uruguayans, 72 Argentines, 64 Chileans, 25 Paraguayans, 15 Peruvians, 12 Bolivians, five Brazilians, three Cubans, two Americans and a Spaniard.



Source

.

Facts about the Roman Catholic Inquisitions

        

                          

Jesuit New World Order

 

 

Published on Aug 29, 2015

 

Facts about the Roman Catholic Inquisitions

Revelations 18:24 And in her was found the blood of prophets, and of saints, and of all that were slain upon the earth.

via: www.youtube.com/user/adam25ify/

Jesuit Oath: http://www.reformation.org/oath.html
Almost Forbidden Books: http://goo.gl/fvjtWA


.

In Bolivia, Pope Francis Apologizes for Church’s ‘Grave Sins’

AMERICAS




By JIM YARDLEY and WILLIAM NEUMAN

JULY 9, 2015

Pope Francis celebrated mass in Santa Cruz, Bolivia, on Thursday during his tour of South America. By Reuters on Publish DateJuly 9, 2015. Photo by Martin Alipaz/European Pressphoto Agency. 

Watch in Times Video »


SANTA CRUZ, Bolivia — Pope Francis offered a direct apology on Thursday for the complicity of the Roman Catholic Church in the oppression of Latin America during the colonial era, even as he called for a global social movement to shatter a “new colonialism” that has fostered inequality, materialism and the exploitation of the poor.

Speaking to a hall filled with social activists, farmers, garbage workers and Bolivian indigenous people, Francis offered the most ambitious, and biting, address of his South American tour.

He repeated familiar themes in sharply critiquing the global economic order and warning of environmental catastrophe — but also added a twist with his apology.

“Some may rightly say, ‘When the pope speaks of colonialism, he overlooks certain actions of the church,’ ” Francis said. “I say this to you with regret: Many grave sins were committed against the native people of America in the name of God.”

RELATED COVERAGE

Pope Francis Faces a Latin America Where Many Catholics Worship to a Different BeatJULY 9, 2015

Pope Francis, in Ecuador, Calls for More Protection of Rain Forest and Its PeopleJULY 7, 2015

Pope Francis Focuses on Family in Ecuador MassJULY 6, 2015

He added: “I humbly ask forgiveness, not only for the offense of the church herself, but also for crimes committed against the native peoples during the so-called conquest of America.”

Pope Francis met Thursday with President Evo Morales of Bolivia and apologized for the church's "sins" during Latin America's colonial era.
Credit David Mercado/Reuters

Francis, an Argentine, is the first Latin American pope, and his apology comes as he is trying to position the church as a refuge and advocate for the poor and dispossessed of his native continent.

During his visit to Ecuador, and now Bolivia, Francis has made broad calls for Latin American unity — on Thursday mentioning “Patria Grande,” the historic ambition to make the continent a unified world force — even as he has sidestepped some local controversies.

Bolivia suffered stark exploitation during Spanish rule, as silver deposits helped finance the Spanish empire, bankroll European colonialism elsewhere and also fill the treasury of the Vatican. Bolivia’s president, Evo Morales, is a longtime leftist critic of the church, yet on Thursday he spoke before the pope and praised him.

Francis’ criticism of multinational corporations and global capitalism has already brought him criticism and suspicions among some who question the leftist tint of his ideas.

Francis spoke in Santa Cruz, Bolivia, on Thursday at the Second World Meeting of Popular Movements, a congress of global activists. CreditAlessandro Bianchi/Reuters

Mr. Morales, a fierce critic of American corporate influence, wore a white shirt and a dark jacket bearing a picture of the Communist revolutionary Che Guevara on the left breast.

“For the first time, I feel like I have a pope: Pope Francis,” Mr. Morales said.

Francis has filled four consecutive days with appearances, but other than an environmental critique offered in Ecuador, the pope had hewed mostly to theological topics or broad themes like family, service and mission.

His appearance on Thursday night was at the Second World Meeting of Popular Movements, a congress of global activists working to mobilize and help the poor. Some people wore Che Guevara T-shirts while some indigenous women wore traditional black bowlers.

Francis drew cheers when he called on the activists and others to change the social order: “I would even say that the future of humanity is in great measure in your own hands, through your ability to organize and carry out creative alternatives, through your daily efforts to ensure the three Ls — labor, lodging, land.”

Francis repeated his condemnation of an economic system rooted in pursuit of money and profits, but in an aside he criticized “certain free-trade treaties” and “austerity, which always tightens the belt of workers and the poor” — a likely reference to Greece.

“Human beings and nature must not be at the service of money,” he said. “Let us say no to an economy of exclusion and inequality, where money rules, rather than service. That economy kills. That economy excludes. That economy destroys Mother Earth.”

But if Francis again called for change, he also offered no detailed prescription.

8 Ways Pope Francis Is Changing the Direction of the Catholic Church

Francis has differed significantly from his predecessors with his outspoken style and his approach to leading the church. Here is a look at some of his comments on poverty, church reform, climate change and divorce.

“Don’t expect a recipe from this pope,” he said. “Neither the pope nor the church have a monopoly on the interpretation of social reality or the proposal of solution to contemporary issues. I dare say no recipe exists.”

In Latin America, Francis’ apology will likely draw the most attention, though he told the audience that Pope John Paul II had already apologized.

In 2000, John Paul made a blanket apology from the Vatican, asking forgiveness from Jews, ethnic populations on different continents and other groups. Francis’ apology was specific and made on Bolivian soil.

Yet Francis’s agenda for the trip includes bolstering the church, and he noted that many priests and laity had acted with courage on behalf of Latin America and said Catholicism was integral to the continent’s identity.

On the Road With the Pope

Our Vatican correspondent, Jim Yardley, is traveling with Pope Francis as he visits Ecuador, Bolivia and Paraguay. Follow along as he chronicles the trip.

My Travels With Pope Francis

“An identity which here, as in other countries, some powers are committed to erasing, at times because our faith is revolutionary, because our faith challenges the tyranny of Mammon,” he said.

Inside the conference hall, Francis’ words resonated. Isabel Olivo, 64, an Uruguayan dairy farmer, praised the speech.

“Now what is needed is that what he said goes onto the agenda of all the politicians and the movements, that it goes on their work agenda and doesn’t get buried on their desks,” she said.

And Alfredo Marco, 48, a taxi driver and representative of neighborhood councils in Santa Cruz, praised the pope as speaking the “same language as President Evo, the same words.”

“There are two popes, Pope Francis and Pope Evo,” he said.

At the end of the speech, Francis made his familiar request that people pray for him, but mindful that this was a more secular crowd, he added that if people could not pray for him that “you think well of me and that you send me good energy.”


A version of this article appears in print on July 10, 2015, on page A4 of the New York edition with the headline: In Bolivia, Pope Apologizes for Church’s ‘Grave Sins’.

Source

.

10 Pope Quotes on Social Justice, Climate Change, Colonialism

Pope Francis receives a typical sombrero from Bolivian President Evo Morales during a World Meeting of Popular Movements in Santa Cruz, Bolivia, July 9, 2015. | Photo: Reuters


Published 10 July 2015 (3 hours 55 minutes ago)



During his tour of South America the pope has emphasized his message of social inclusion, peace and justice Pope Francis addressed social movements from around the world on Thursday during his visit to Bolivia. Below we look at some of the highlights.  


On Social Justice

• "The rights of the planet, and the right to shelter and work, for all our brother sisters are sacred rights worth fighting for"   
• “Its not enough to let some (wealth) trickle down, when the poor shake that cup it never trickles down by itself,”   
• “There should be no family without a home, no farmer with land, no workers without rights, no people without sovereignty, no person without dignity, no child without childhood, no youth without possibilities, no elderly without venerable old age.”   
• "You, the lowly, the exploited, the poor and underprivileged, can do, and are doing, a lot. I would even say that the future of humanity is in great measure in your own hands, through your ability to organize and carry out creative alternatives, through your daily efforts to ensure the three "l's" (labor, lodging, land)."   

On Colonialism 

• “The new colonialism  is taking on diverse forms. At times it is the anonymous power of money, of money-lending corporations, of free trade agreements and the imposition of austerity measures that tighten the belts of the workers and the poor...”   
• “No power has has the right to strip poor countries of their sovereignty... When they do it we see new forms of colonialism that seriously affect the possibilities of peace and justice....”   
• “The people of the world want to control their own destiny and want to march peacefully towards justice... They do not want to be lectured and they don't want interference from the stronger who subordinate the weaker…”   
• "I say this to you with regret: many grave sins were committed against the native peoples of America in the name of god.   
• "I humbly ask forgiveness, not only for the offenses of the church herself, but also for crimes committed against the native peoples during the so-called conquest of America."   

On Climate Change 

• "Time, my brothers and sisters, seems to be running out; we are not yet tearing one another apart, but we are tearing apart our common home. Today, the scientific community realizes what the poor have long told us: harm, perhaps irreversible harm, is being done to the ecosystem. The earth, entire peoples and individual persons are being brutally punished. And behind all this pain, death and destruction there is the stench of what Basil of Caesarea called "the dung of the devil."

Source
.

Rwanda Marks the 1994 Genocide: Is Never Again Possible?

16 April 2014 at 2:30 AM ET edited by Kenneth Hall

JURIST Guest Columnist Fred K. Nkusi of the Independent Institute of Lay Adventists of Kigali and Mount Kenya University in Rwanda argues that the twentieth anniversary of the Rwandan genocide is a period of mourning for those lost as well as remembrance of the international community's failure to comply with its international obligations ...

© WikiMedia (user)

On April 7, 2014, Rwanda held commemorative events for the twentieth anniversary of the 1994 Rwandan genocide against the Tutsi in Rwanda. As President Paul Kagame remarked in his speech: "we are gathered here to remember those who lost their lives in the genocide and comfort those who survived." The mourning week reminds Rwandans and the international community of the tragic events in 1994 in which a million Tutsi Rwandans—the minority ethnic group—were largely exterminated. While the brutal killings were occurring, the global community stood by idly and essentially spectated the mass slaughter, something Ban Ki-Moon—the UN Secretary-General— recently apologized for on behalf of the international community. As well known, the genocide lasted for 100 days, until the Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF)—an opposition movement descended from Uganda—was able to fully liberate the country.

What has Rwanda done to prevent and punish the crime of genocide and ensure that it never happens again? What role does the international community play in preventing and punishing the crime of genocide? Why have some of the genocide perpetrators not yet been brought to justice?

In July of 1994, the RPF—the dominant political party currently—ended the genocide after the liberation war. This happened when the UN Assistance Mission in Rwanda (NAMIR)—supposedly established to bring Rwanda security—failed to live up to its mandate. The first remarkable victory by the RPF was to halt the widespread killings of the Tutsi by Hutus militias. Secondly, the newly installed RPF government designed, inter alia, legal and institutional mechanisms in response to the perpetration of genocide. This was empathized in President Kagame's speech: "we have pursued justice and reconciliation as best as we could. But it does not restore what we lost."

In response to the genocide, Rwanda adopted Organic Law No. 08/96 of August 30, 1996, organizing criminal proceedings against persons accused of committing acts of genocide or other crimes against humanity from October 1, 1990 through December 31, 1994, and established special benches of ordinary and military courts to hear the cases. Five years later, the government enacted Organic Law No. 40/2000 of January 26, 2001 [PDF], governing the creation of a new court system—the Gacaca Courts—to expedite the administration and reduce the costs of the proceedings. This law created a Gacaca Court at every administrative level of local government, particularly at the Cell level—the second lowest administrative unit. Both of these laws served as a lodestar to a legal and institutional framework in which justice could be brought against the perpetrators of genocide and other human rights violations.

At the closing of the Gacaca Courts in 2012, it is estimated [PDF] that the Gacaca Courts had tried nearly two million cases. However, not all genocide perpetrators were identified and punished for their crimes.

Currently, the Constitution of the Republic of Rwanda of June 4, 2003 [PDF], as amended to date, envisages in its Preamble that Rwanda is "[r]esolved to fight the ideology of genocide and all its manifestations and to eradicate ethnic, regional and any other form of divisions."

The existing Rwandan Penal Code punishes the crime of genocide and other serious international crimes. It not only punishes the crime of genocide, but also the denial of genocide. Organic law n° 01/2012/OL of 02/05/2012 [PDF] —instituting the penal code—describes the Rwandan crime of genocide in Article 114, which perfectly mirrors Article 2 of the UN Genocide Convention of 1948. Accordingly, Article 115 of the same penal code provides: "Any person, who commits, in time of peace or in time of war, the crime of genocide as provided in the preceding Article, shall be liable to life imprisonment with special provisions." Furthermore, Article 116 states:
Any person who publicly shows, by his/her words, writings, images, or by any other means, that he/she negates the genocide against the Tutsi, rudely minimizes it or attempts to justify or approve its grounds, or any person who hides or destroys its evidence shall be liable to a term of imprisonment of more than five (5) years to nine (9) years."

In view of the existing legal framework, can one say "never again" regarding genocide in Rwanda? The answer to the question transcends a mere declaration of words on paper, and a number of conditions will likely have to be met. First, there is a need for greater political will and support of the populace to live up to notion of 'never again genocide'—to prods us into action and awakens us from passivity, indifference or ignorance in order to defeat genocide once and for all. Second, law enforcement needs greater empowerment to act as a deterrent to genocide—to ensure a strict observance and promotion of human rights and the rule of law. Third, there must be an improvement in our awareness—by promoting the general and civil education of our children in schools and institutions of higher learning—that advance the understanding that the commission of genocide, or denial of a group's right to life, is the vilest encroachment upon human rights.

What is the role of the international community in preventing and punishing the crime of genocide? Without mincing my words, when I talk of the international community I specifically refer to the UN Security Council, whose primary responsibility—as enshrined in the first paragraph of Chapter V, Article 24, of the UN Charter—is to maintain or restore international peace and security. On October 5, 1993, while Rwanda's crisis was underway, the UN Security Council unanimously adopted Resolution 872 [PDF], establishing the UN Assistance Mission for Rwanda (UNAMIR) with explicit instructions of contributing to the security of the city of Kigali and monitoring the observance of the cease-fire agreement—during the transitional government's mandate—leading up to the elections. But UNAMIR lacked the precise authorization to halt the killing, along with enough contingent force to accomplish such a mission. On both issues the UN reneged to fulfill its directive until the volatile situation culminated into full-blown genocide. The failure of the international community to avert such a humanitarian catastrophe was an unforgivable betrayal in the eyes of many Rwandans.

Article 1 of the UN Genocide Convention requires signatory "[p]arties confirm that genocide, whether committed in time of peace or in time of war, is a crime under international law which they undertake to prevent and to punish." The provision expressly places a legal and moral obligation on the international community to prevent and punish the crime of genocide.

According to Jacob Schiff's 2008 paper The Trouble with "Never Again!", after the Holocaust—when the Nazis conducted an exterminatory campaign against the Jews and other minority groups in Germany—the international community declared "never again," but there have been genocides and other mass atrocities in various countries since, most notably in Cambodia, Srebrenica, Rwanda, Kosovo, East Timor, Darfur and the current situation in Syria. Likewise, after the horrific episode in Rwanda, the international community was quick to declare 'genocide never again', but 'never again' persists throughout the world time and time again. Of course, it goes without saying that it is easier said than done. In fact, the international community's inaction portrays cynicism and indifference as opposed to hierocracy. The international community must stop merely paying lip service where urgent action is desperately needed.

In utter shame, the UN Security Council adopted Resolution 955 [PDF] as a response to the 1994 genocide and their subsequent inaction, which called for:
An international tribunal for the sole purpose of prosecuting persons responsible for genocide and other serious violations of international humanitarian law committed in the territory of Rwanda and Rwandan citizens responsible for genocide and other such violations committed in the territory of neighboring States, between 1 January 1994 and 31 December 1994.The International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda ("ICTR") had jurisdiction over genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity committed in Rwanda and neighboring countries by Rwandans within the preceding specific time frame—ratione temporis. The establishment of the ICTR was a measure to restore peace and security by forging a sense of justice; nevertheless, the UN deserves little—if any—credit precisely because it was a measure taken after failing to discharge its responsibilities in the first place. At this juncture, some of the genocide perpetrators are still shuttling around the world and have never been brought to justice. As ever disappointing Rwandans, no measures have been taken against countries harboring them. It is very likely that some of the perpetrators may go unpunished throughout the remainder of their lives. There is a general lack of genuineness by some countries to arrest the suspects or extradite them to Rwanda. Despite their dismal response to Rwanda's situation during the genocide's occurrence, today, one would laud the international community for their swift response in South Sudan, Mali and the Central African Republic (CAR), where the situations are approaching a restoration of peace and security. However, the Syrian crisis is yet another shift of the blame to the UN Security Council—which has become a dead end—where the P-5 members are safeguarding their subjective interests instead of actively resolving a dire situation.

At this particular juncture in time—as Rwandans reflect on the horrific events that occurred during the 1994 genocide—one would opine that the UN ought to revisit its legal and moral obligation outlined in its legal framework as well as the Genocide Convention of 1948.


Fred Kennedy Nkusi is a Rwandan lawyer, Lecturer and Researcher at the Independent Institute of Lay Adventists of Kigali (INILAK) and a part-time lecturer in Mount Kenya University in Kigali, Rwanda. He did his LLB at the National University of Rwanda (NUR) and received an LLM from Groningen University in the Netherlands. His areas of specialization are International Law, the law of international organizations, international criminal law and international environmental law. He is also versed in medial law and IT law.

Suggested Citation: Fred Nkusi, Rwanda marks the 1994 Genocide: is Never Again possible?, JURIST - Forum, Apr. 16, 2014, http://jurist.org/forum/2014/04/fred-nkusi-rwanda-genocide.php. 

 

 

Source

.