Rwanda and Darfur: the International Debate on Prevention and Repression of the Crime of Genocide

Abstract

“Rwanda and Darfur: the International Debate on Prevention and Repression of the Crime of Genocide” aims at focusing on two contemporary examples of mass exterminations occurred in the African continent. Hundreds of thousands deaths and displaced people, frequent episodes of rape and torture against civilians, that is what happened in Rwanda in 1994 and what has occurred again in the region of Darfur, in Western Sudan, in the last ten years. Yet the most striking similarity between Rwanda and Darfur is the reluctance shown by governments and UN institutions to label those atrocities with their rightful name, genocide. After having taken into consideration the text of the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide of 1948, which defines the legal meaning of such a crime, the attention will be focused on the international debate which took place on this subject matter. Despite the inadequacy of international responses, both in prevention and repression of those massacres, of considerable importance was the institution of two international tribunals, the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda and the International Criminal Court, aiming at the prosecution of perpetrators of hideous crimes there committed. Lastly, an overlook to the nowadays situation in both places will be provided.