By Jessica Gresko Lorie Smith, a Colorado web designer, is at the center of the case, which involves whether she can refuse to provide services for same-sex marriages. Credit: Michael A. McCoy for The New York Times WASHINGTON (AP) — In a defeat for gay rights, the Supreme Court’s conservative majority ruled on Friday that a Christian graphic artist who wants to design wedding websites can refuse to work with same-sex couples. One of the court’s liberal justices wrote in a dissent that the decision’s effect is to “mark gays and lesbians for second-class status” and that the decision opens the door to other discrimination. The court ruled 6-3 for designer Lorie Smith, saying she can refuse to design websites for same-sex weddings despite a Colorado law that bars discrimination based on sexual orientation, race, gender and other characteristics. The court said forcing her to create the websites would violate her free speech rights under the Constitution’s First Amendment. The decision suggests that artists, photographers, videographers and writers are among those who can refuse to offer what the court called expressive services if doing so would run contrary to their beliefs. But that’s different from other businesses not engaged in speech and therefore not covered by the First Amendment, such as restaurants and hotels. Justice Neil Gorsuch wrote for the court’s six conservative justices that the First Amendment “envisions the United States as a rich and complex place where all persons are free to think and speak as they wish, not as the government demands.” Gorsuch said the court has long held that “the opportunity to think for ourselves and to express those thoughts freely is among our most cherished liberties and part of what keeps our Republic strong.” The decision is a win for religious rights and one in a series of cases in recent years in which the justices have sided with religious plaintiffs. Last year, for example, the court ruled along ideological lines for a football coach who prayed on the field at his public high school after games. And on Thursday the court in a unanimous decision used the case of a Christian mail carrier who did not want to deliver Amazon packages on Sundays to solidify protections for workers who ask for religious accommodations. The decision is also a retreat on gay rights for the court. For nearly three decades, the court has expanded the rights of LGBTQ people, most notably giving same-sex couples the right to marry in 2015 and announcing five years later in a decision written by Gorsuch that a landmark civil rights law also protects gay, lesbian and transgender people from employment discrimination. In the latest decision, however, Gorsuch said that a ruling against Smith would allow the government “to force all manner of artists, speechwriters, and others whose services involve speech to speak what they do not believe on pain of penalty.” For example, a gay website designer could be forced to design websites for an organization that advocates against same-sex marriage, he wrote. “Countless other creative professionals, too, could be forced to choose between remaining silent, producing speech that violates their beliefs, or speaking their minds and incurring sanctions for doing so.” The court’s dissenting liberal justices led by Justice Sonia Sotomayor warned that the decision will allow a range of businesses to discriminate. “Today, the Court, for the first time in its history, grants a business open to the public a constitutional right to refuse to serve members of a protected class,” Sotomayor wrote in a dissent joined by Justice Elena Kagan and Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson. Sotomayor, who read a summary of her dissent in court to underscore her disagreement, said the decision’s logic “cannot be limited to discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation or gender identity.” A website designer could refuse to create a wedding website for an interracial couple, a stationer could refuse to sell a birth announcement for a disabled couple, and a large retail store could limit its portrait services to “traditional” families, she wrote. President Joe Biden said in a statement that the ruling was “disappointing,” adding that it “weakens long-standing laws that protect all Americans against discrimination in public accommodations – including people of color, people with disabilities, people of faith, and women.” Sotomayor referenced the court’s history with the issue of gay rights in her dissent, writing: “The LGBT rights movement has made historic strides, and I am proud of the role this Court has recently played in that history. Today, however, we are taking steps backward.” “Today is a sad day in American constitutional law and in the lives of LGBT people. ... the immediate, symbolic effect of the decision is to mark gays and lesbians for second-class status,” she wrote at another point. Even as it has expanded gay rights, however, the court has been careful to say those with differing religious views needed to be respected. The belief that marriage can only be between one man and one woman is an idea that “long has been held — and continues to be held — in good faith by reasonable and sincere people here and throughout the world,” Justice Anthony Kennedy wrote in the court’s gay marriage decision. The court returned to that idea five years ago when it was confronted with the case of a Christian baker who objected to designing a cake for a same-sex wedding. The court issued a limited ruling in favor of the baker, Jack Phillips, saying there had been impermissible hostility toward his religious views in the consideration of his case. Phillips’ lawyer, Kristen Waggoner, of the Alliance Defending Freedom, also brought the most recent case to the court. On Friday, she said the Supreme Court was right to reaffirm that the government cannot compel people to say things they do not believe. “Disagreement isn’t discrimination, and the government can’t mislabel speech as discrimination to censor it,” she said in a statement. While basking in the legal win, Smith was forced to answer questions about revelations this week that a man her legal team said requested a wedding website had never asked to work with her. The request, from a person identified as “Stewart,” wasn’t the basis for the federal lawsuit filed preemptively by Smith before she started making wedding websites, but it was referenced by her attorneys. Stewart told The Associated Press he never submitted the request and didn’t know his name was invoked in the lawsuit until he was contacted this week by The New Republic, which first reported his denial. “I was incredibly surprised given the fact that I’ve been happily married to a woman for the last 15 years,” he said. He declined to give his last name for fear of harassment and threats. It was not included in court documents listing his phone number and email address. Waggoner said the wedding request naming Stewart was submitted through Smith’s website and denied it was fabricated. The lawyer suggested it could have been a troll making the request. Smith, who owns a Colorado design business called 303 Creative, does not currently create wedding websites. She has said that she wants to but that her Christian faith would prevent her from creating websites celebrating same-sex marriages. And that’s where she ran into conflict with state law. Colorado, like most other states, has a law forbidding businesses open to the public from discriminating against customers. And about half of the states have laws explicitly prohibiting discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity. Colorado said that under its so-called public accommodations law, if Smith offers wedding websites to the public, she must provide them to all customers, regardless of sexual orientation. Businesses that violate the law can be fined, among other things. Smith argued that applying the law to her violates her First Amendment rights, and the Supreme Court agreed. The case is 303 Creative LLC v. Elenis, 21-476. Copyright 2023 The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.

Russian and International Rights Groups Call for Accountability By Tanya Lokshina Elena Milashina © 2009 Patricia Williams Today, a group of armed thugs in Chechnya’s capital, Grozny, attacked Elena Milashina, a prominent journalist and a recipient of Human Right Watch’s award for extraordinary activism, and Alexander Nemov, a human rights lawyer. Both had been working on the case of Zarema Mussaeva, who was being tried on apparent politically motivated charges. Milashina and Nemov were on their way to court when men in black balaclavas dragged them out of their car, held them at gun point, threatened to kill them, kicked and beat them with sticks, and smashed their electronic devices. The attackers poured a bright green solution over Milashina’s head and shaved off her hair. In Chechnya, forcibly shaving a woman’s head is viewed as a particularly degrading form of punishment. Both have multiple injuries. Milashina suffered a concussion and several finger fractures. Nemov’s right leg was pierced with a sharp object, leaving him unable to walk. Milashina’s newspaper, Novaya Gazeta, arranged for the medical evacuation of Milashina and Nemov, and they are now receiving medical treatment outside of Chechnya. Milashina and Nemov were in Grozny for Mussaeva’s trial. She was being prosecuted on bogus charges of fraud and assault of a police officer. In January 2022, Chechen authorities had jailed her to put pressure on her two sons, who have spoken out against Chechnya’s governor, Ramzan Kadyrov. Nemov, who works closely with the Crew Against Torture, a leading Russian human rights organization, is Mussaeva’s defense attorney. Later today, when Nemov was being treated in a hospital following the brutal attack, the court found Mussaeva guilty and sentenced her to five-and-a-half years in prison. According to Sergey Babinets, from Crew Against Torture, who visited Milashina and Nemov in the hospital, they said their assailants told them that the beating was in retaliation for their work on Mussaeva’s case. Following the 2009 murder of Natalia Estemirova, a senior representative of Memorial, Russia’s leading human rights organization, Ramzan Kadyrov unleashed all-out assault on human rights defenders and journalists working to expose abuses in Chechnya. Violent attacks, including Milashina’s previous beating in Grozny in 2020, fabricated prosecutions, death threats, and ferocious smear campaigns have been undertaken with complete impunity. Human Rights Watch, together with 13 Russian and international rights groups, is calling on the Russian government to promptly, credibly, and impartially investigate today’s attack, and put an end to the cycle of violence and impunity. Copyright © 2023 Human Rights Watch

Over 1,100 Palestinians said held by Israel without trial, highest figure since 2003 by Emanuel Fabian Uptick in administrative detentions, reported by rights group HaMoked, comes as military presses on with arrest operations in West Bank amid series of terror attacks. Illustrative: Protesters carry pictures of various Palestinian prisoners, left and center, who are being held in administrative detention and posters of prisoner Nasser Abu Hmeid, right and second left, who is reported to be critically ill and serving several life sentences and an additional 50 years, during a protest against the Israeli administrative detention policy and supporting Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails, in front of the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights in Gaza City, Oct. 12, 2022. Arabic on the red banner reads: “Down with the administrative detention." (AP Photo/Adel Hana) Israel is currently holding over 1,100 Palestinians without trial or charge, the highest figure since 2003, an Israeli rights group said Sunday. The group, HaMoked, which regularly gathers figures from Israeli prison authorities, said that 1,132 people were being held in administrative detention, a practice in which prisoners can be held without charge practically indefinitely and are not granted access to the evidence against them. The vast majority of them are Palestinians. Just four of the detainees are Jewish Israelis. The last time Israel held this many administrative detainees was in May 2003, when at least 1,140 were held without charge in the throes of a violent Palestinian uprising known as the Second Intifada. The number of those held in administrative detention has risen steadily over the past year and a half, as Israel has conducted near-nightly arrest raids in the West Bank in response to a spate of deadly terror attacks against Israelis. Israel says administrative detention is a tool that helps keep dangerous terrorists off the streets and allows the government to hold suspects without divulging sensitive intelligence. Critics say the policy denies prisoners due process. The detentions must be renewed by a military court every six months, and prisoners can remain in jail for years under the mechanism. Some resort to life-threatening hunger strikes to draw attention to their detention, which often drives up tensions between Israel and Palestinians. The practice has also been used with a handful of Jewish Israeli terror suspects in recent years, though far-right leaders have come out against its employment in such cases, including last week, when four settlers were put into administrative detention over their alleged involvement in a series of rampages in Palestinian villages. They are currently the only Jewish Israeli suspects held under the controversial tool. “Against Palestinians, Israel makes wholesale use of what should be a rare, exceptional measure. The government is now expanding the use of administrative detention against Israeli Jews as well,” said Jessica Montell, HaMoked’s executive director. “All administrative detainees must be given a fair trial or released.” © 2023 THE TIMES OF ISRAEL, All Rights Reserved

Migrants stand near the wall on Polish Belarusian border near Bialowieza, Poland May 28, 2023. Agnieszka Sadowska/Agencja Wyborcza.pl via REUTERS WARSAW, July 2 (Reuters) - Poland said on Sunday it will send 500 police to shore up security at its border with Belarus to cope with rising numbers of migrants crossing as well as any potential threats after the Wagner group of mercenaries relocates to Belarus. "Due to the tense situation on the border with Belarus I have decided to bolster our forces with 500 Polish police officers from preventive and counter-terrorism units," Minister of Interior Mariusz Kaminski wrote on his Twitter account. The police force would join 5,000 border guards and 2,000 soldiers in securing the border, he said. Poland has accused Belarus of artificially creating a migrant crisis on the border since 2021 by flying in people from the Middle East and Africa and attempting to push them across the frontier. The Polish Border Guard said on Sunday that 187 people tried to cross into Poland from Belarus illegally on Saturday, and numbers have been growing steadily in recent months, although they are well below levels seen in 2021. A spokeswoman for Poland's Border Guard said that Polish patrols at the border have also faced more aggressive behaviour in the past two months as the number of migrants rose. "The groups are more aggressive. There have been many attacks on Polish patrols. Seventeen vehicles have been damaged this year, of which 13 in June alone," Border Guard spokeswoman Anna Michalska said. Deputy Minister Coordinator of Special Services Stanislaw Zaryn told Reuters the bigger security presence was also in response to the transfer of Wagner group mercenaries to Belarus. Russian President Vladimir Putin's decision to offer troops from the private military company the choice of relocating to Belarus has led to fears among eastern NATO members that their presence will cause greater instability in the region. "It is still a matter of analysis and hypotheses whether the Wagner group will engage in destabilising Poland and will also be active in coordinating the migration route," Zaryn told Reuters by phone. "We assume the Wagners aren't going to Belarus to recuperate, but to carry out a mission. This mission could be aimed at Poland, but also against Lithuania or Ukraine," he added. Copyright © 2023 Reuters

In a dramatic reversal of fortune, a key Congressional committee in Peru has effectively blocked a draft law, labeled the “Genocide Bill” by Peru’s Indigenous people for the calamitous effects it would have had if approved. The bill had been progressing through Congress, but the vote by the Decentralization Committee will now prevent it progressing any further. Teresa Mayo of Survival International described this as “a huge victory for Peru’s Indigenous peoples, their organizations, and for thousands of ordinary people around the world who joined the campaign”. Indigenous organizations in Peru such as AIDESEP and ORPIO had lobbied intensively to stop the bill, and more than 13,000 Survival supporters had written to the committee, urging them to block the bill. The bill had been drafted by Congresspeople with ties to the powerful oil and gas industry. It represented a particular threat to the many uncontacted tribes in the country, whose lands would have been opened up for industrial exploitation. Tabea Casique of AIDESEP said: “I’m very happy because we’ve worked hard to stop this draft bill, which violates the rights of uncontacted tribes and those in initial contact…. This scrapping of the draft bill protects our uncontacted relatives, their rights and their lives, and avoids the genocide and ecocide that it would have unleashed.” Roberto Tafur of ORPIO said the decision “highlights the participation of those people with a conscience, in order to look out for our [uncontacted] brothers and sisters. Because life comes before money. It’s been a hard-fought vote to get here. And to continue fighting for our brothers and sisters in the jungle, who don't know that we’re fighting for them.” Teresa Mayo of Survival International said today: “It’s hard to believe that this bill was just one small step away from becoming law. It would have been catastrophic for uncontacted tribes in Peru – they’d have been left utterly exposed to the oil and gas corporations who’ve targeted their lands and resources for generations. “All their rights would have been stripped away, and many would very probably have been wiped out. So we’re delighted this bill has been blocked – but will remain on alert in case the oil and gas giants and their political allies try again.” The crucial vote has come in the middle of Uncontacted Tribes Week, which Survival’s supporters mark annually as a week of action in support of the rights of uncontacted Indigenous peoples worldwide. Celebrities such as Gillian Anderson and Julian Lennon have been posting videos highlighting the campaigns for their rights.

June 27, 20231:15 PM ET By Vincent Ni Pakistan's law and justice minister, Azam Nazeer Tarar, seen here in April in Islamabad, said in an interview with NPR that Pakistan's use of an anti-terrorism law is "fully compliant with international guarantees for free trial" and said those accused have the right to "engage counsel of their choice." He expects it will take "a few months" for trials to wrap up. Anjum Naveed/AP Pakistan's military has fired three senior army officers for failing to prevent violent attacks on military property by supporters of former Prime Minister Imran Khan. The military spokesman, Maj. Gen. Ahmad Sharif Chaudhry, announced the firings in a press conference on Monday, and said those sacked include a lieutenant general. The announcement came as Pakistan continues to deal with fallout following last month's violent protests by thousands of Khan's supporters after Khan was arrested on graft charges on May 9 in Islamabad. They attacked military installations and set fire to the home of an army corps commander in the eastern city of Lahore. Khan was later released, though he still faces many charges. Pakistan's law and justice minister is defending his government's decision to use an anti-terrorism law and military courts to try some civilians who were involved in the protests. Azam Nazeer Tarar tells NPR that he expects it will take "a few months" for the series of trials to complete. Khan, who was ousted as prime minister in a no-confidence vote in parliament in April last year, has repeatedly accused the military of having pushed him out of power. Many demonstrators have said they joined the pro-Khan protests in May to express their frustration with the military, which is widely seen as controlling many aspects of Pakistani politics. "It was not political protest," Tarar, who is also a senator with Pakistan's Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz party, said in an interview with NPR during a visit to Washington on Friday. "Political protests never end up in causing human losses. ... At some places they used the petrol bombs ... They have been pouring fuel on the fires and setting ablaze the belongings and properties which they ransacked." "Every jurisdiction has their own laws," Tarar continued. "[I]f a group of persons with criminal intent cause damage, while criminally trespassing into public property and set it ablaze, they commit arson. This would be an act of terrorism." Tarar insisted that Pakistan's use of the anti-terrorism law is "fully compliant with international guarantees for free trial" and said those accused have the right to "engage counsel of their choice." Human rights organizations say the law is misused to arrest and prosecute civilians accused of a range of crimes. A 2014 report by Justice Project Pakistan and Reprieve found that 10% of the country's death row inmates at the time had been tried as terrorists, and concluded: "The overuse and abuse of this Act is that whole swathes of defendants whose crimes bear no relation to terrorism have been sentenced to death following extremely unfair trials — whilst terrorist attacks continue unabated." The military spokesman also said Monday that at least 102 people, whom he called "miscreants," were on trial in 17 military courts around the country, though on Tuesday, Pakistan's attorney general told the Supreme Court — which is hearing challenges to the trials — that they had not begun. The U.S. State Department says it has continued to urge Pakistani authorities "to respect democratic principles and the rule of law for all people, as enshrined in the country's constitution." In a statement to NPR, a spokesperson said that issues such as human rights and democracy "remain a priority for the United States." In The Nation, a Pakistani daily, Tarar offered a lengthy defense of his government's decision to use military courts to try civilians allegedly involved in attacks on military installations. But human rights organizations have condemned the use of such courts to try civilians. Amnesty International said last month that it has "documented a catalogue of human right violations stemming from trying civilians in military courts in Pakistan, including flagrant disregard for due process, lack of transparency, coerced confessions, and executions after grossly unfair trials. Therefore, any indication that the trial of civilians could be held in military courts is incompatible with Pakistan's obligations under international human rights law." Tarar told NPR that investigations into the former prime minister — who faces more than 100 criminal cases and charges including treason, corruption and murder — are still ongoing. "It will take a couple of weeks, I believe," he said. Political and economic turmoil have persisted in Pakistan in recent months. The country's parliament on Sunday approved the latest budget in order to meet International Monetary Fund conditions for releasing new bailout funds. The previous bailout of $6.5 billion expires on June 30. Copyright 2023 @ NPR. All Rights Reserved.

By Daria Sito-sucic President of Republika Srpska (Serb Republic) Milorad Dodik waves as he attends Serb Republic national holiday, banned by the constitutional court, in East Sarajevo, Bosnia and Herzegovina, January 9, 2023. REUTERS/Dado Ruvic/File Photo. SARAJEVO, June 27 (Reuters) - Lawmakers in Bosnia's autonomous Serb Republic voted on Tuesday to suspend rulings by Bosnia's constitutional court, a move described by experts as a "legal secession" that is set to deepen political divisions in the volatile Balkan country. The region's separatist pro-Russian President Milorad Dodik, who has long criticised the court for having foreign judges on board, initiated the vote after the court last week decided to change the rules to be able to convene sessions and make decisions without Serb judges. The Serb Republic lawmakers agreed that the decisions and acts of the constitutional court would not be implemented on their territory until a nationwide law on the court had been adopted by the national parliament. The lawmakers also agreed that Serb representatives in state institutions would not take part in any talks on reforms needed for Bosnia's integration into the European Union until the constitutional court had been reformed and the office of an international peace overseer had been closed down. Following its war in the 1990s, Bosnia was split into two autonomous regions, the Serb Republic and the Federation shared by Bosniaks and Croats, which are linked via a weak central government. The 1995 Dayton peace agreement that ended the war established the constitutional court with exclusive jurisdiction to decide any dispute that arises between the entities, between the state and the entities or between state institutions. Three of the nine court members are appointed by the president of the European Court of Human Rights and six by regional parliaments. The Serb Republic parliament, which appoints two Serb judges to the court, has failed to nominate a new candidate to fill a vacancy, while Dodik and his allies have called on the remaining Serb judge to withdraw from the court, which they say has acted against Serb interests. "This is a biased, inquisition court ... which has violated the constitution in a number of cases," Dodik told the parliament. Dodik, who has long called for the secession of his region from Bosnia, announced that he might also seek to suspend the work of Bosnia's state court, prosecution and the state police agency SIPA in the Serb Republic. "This is a long announced legal secession in Bosnia and Herzegovina," said Nedim Ademovic, a constitutional law expert, adding the move would trigger the "deepest crisis since the Dayton peace deal". The envoy, German former government minister Christian Schmidt, had said the vote would represent the attack on Bosnia's constitutional order and constitute a serious violation of the Dayton agreement. © 2023 Reuters. All rights reserved.

Milosevic speaking to crowd credit: Manuel Stanescu "Ethnic Cleansing" is a Euphemism Used for Genocide Denial By Dr. Gregory H. Stanton Founding President Genocide Watch “Ethnic cleansing” is a term invented by Slobodan Milošević and Serbian propagandists as a euphemism for forced deportation and genocide. It is history's most successful euphemism used for genocide denial. Milošević is laughing from his grave. "Ethnic cleansing" has become the dominant term used to describe genocidal crimes without using the word, "Genocide." It has invaded the legal lexicon, statements by the United Nations, reporting in the press, policy making by governments, and even judgments by the International Court of Justice. “Ethnic cleansing” in common usage means forced deportation. But unlike the crime against humanity of deportation or forcible transfer of population, and the crime of genocide, it is not a term that appears in the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court (ICC). It has no legal meaning in international law. There is no treaty outlawing it. Ethnic cleansing is not even a crime. No national legal codes prohibit it. No prosecutor can charge anyone for committing it. The term is a license for impunity. Because Article 1 of the Genocide Convention implies the obligation to act to prevent genocide, avoiding use of the term “genocide” has the same practical outcome as genocide denial. Policy makers who use the term “ethnic cleansing”—like genocide deniers—are absolved of their duty to prevent genocide. "Ethnic cleansing" has become the dominant euphemism used to deny genocide. Since the Serbo-Croatian term “ethnic cleansing” was first used by the Western press in 1992, it has become the dominant term used by the press, governments, U.N. lawyers, and even by human rights groups for both forced deportation, and also for genocidal massacres. William Safire prophetically warned that the term "ethnic cleansing...is likely to be with us for a while." The term "ethnic cleansing" was first applied to the crimes against humanity and genocide in Bosnia - Herzogovina. The world press and U.S. called the massacres “ethnic cleansing” from 1991 until 1995. Does it make any practical difference if crimes are called “genocide” rather than “ethnic cleansing?” The answer is a resounding yes. In 2007, three epidemiologists (Rony Blum, Shira Sagi, and Elihu Richter) and I conducted a study of the political effect of using the words “ethnic cleansing” rather than "genocide" during four recent genocides: Rwanda, Bosnia, Kosovo, and Darfur. Researchers counted the number of times the terms “ethnic cleansing” and “genocide” were used in The New York Times, U.N. press releases, major law journals, and statements by Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch from 1990 through 2005. We published our findings in the European Journal of Public Health as "'Ethnic Cleansing Bleaches the Atrocities of Genocide." Our study came to three conclusions: 1. Use of the terms "ethnic cleansing" or "genocide" has no relationship to the number of people who have been killed. In 1994, U.S. State Department lawyers would not permit the mass murders in Rwanda to be called "genocide" for three months while over 500,000 people were massacred. 8000 men killed at Srebrenica in 1995 was ruled “genocide” by the ICTY. But over 100,000 Bosnian Muslims killed from 1992 to 1995 by Bosnian Serb forces with the direct support of Serbia was not sufficient evidence for the International Court of Justice to find that Serbia had violated the Genocide Convention. In Kosovo in 1999, lawyers quarreled over whether 10,000 Kosovar Albanians killed should be called "ethnic cleansing" or "genocide." Many peace activists protested that any intervention should be authorized by the U.N. Security Council, in spite of a certain veto by Russia. In Darfur, a U.N. Commission of Inquiry led by Judge Antonio Cassese ruled that over 50,000 killed in Darfur (now over 400,000) was insufficient evidence of intent by the government of Sudan to accuse it of genocide. 2. Choice of whether atrocities are called "ethnic cleansing" or "crimes against humanity" instead of “genocide" is determined by willingness to take forceful action to stop the killing. When the terms “ethnic cleansing” or "crimes against humanity" are used, it indicates unwillingness to take forceful action to stop the crimes. The term "genocide" is avoided because the decision against the use of force has already been made. For three months in 1994, lawyers in the State Department led by Joan Donoghue, George Taft, Ted Borek, and David Stewart, ordered that the word “genocide” should not be used to describe the massacres in Rwanda due to "insufficient proof of intent." Instead, the State Department's spokesperson, Christine Shelly infamously told reporters that “acts of genocide” was the formulation approved by State Department lawyers. Could the U.S., U.K., France, and U.N. have acted to stop or substantially reduce the genocide of Tutsis in Rwanda? Within a week, France and Belgium sent in over a thousand troops to evacuate their citizens and even their pets. But none of these European powers would risk a single life to save Rwandan human beings. The U.S. had thousands of U.S. Marines on ships just off the coast of East Africa when the Rwandan genocide began on April 7, 1994. The ships carried large helicopters and other aircraft that could have airlifted thousands of U.S. Marines into Rwanda within weeks. [This capability was Top Secret until U.S. records were recently declassified. But I knew this in 1994 because I worked in the State Department and had Top Secret Codeword clearance.] This fact is still ignored by apologists for American failure to intervene like Alan Kuperman in "The Limits of Humanitarian Intervention: Genocide in Rwanda," a book refuted by Alison Des Forges of Human Rights Watch and by Gregory Stanton in "Could the Rwandan Genocide Have Been Prevented?" The U.S. Peacekeeping Task Force (Susan Rice, George Ward, and Sarah Sewell, with resistance from Prudence Bushnell) recommended withdrawal of UNAMIR rather than risk getting the U.S. involved in "another Somalia." The U.S., joined by the U.K., led the U.N. Security Council to vote on April 21, 1994, to withdraw over 2000 UNAMIR troops, rather than send in reinforcements to stop the genocide, as requested by General Roméo Dallaire, the UNAMIR commander. From 1992 to 1995 in Bosnia, Yasushi Akashi, the pacifist head of the U.N. mission refused to authorize UNPROFOR bombing of Serb forces, or even counterattacks against Serb snipers who murdered Bosnians going to market in Sarajevo. In 1999 in Kosovo over ten thousand Kosovars were killed by Serb militias and hundreds of thousands were driven out of their homes. The U.S. publicly announced it would not send U.S. troops to stop the Serbian Army's occupation of Kosovo. In Darfur in 2004, U.N. Security Council Resolutions called on the government of Sudan to prevent Janjaweed militias from murdering tens of thousands of Fur, Masalit, and Zaghawa people and destroying over 400 of their villages, in full knowledge that the Sudanese government armed and financed the militias and used the Sudanese Air Force to bomb the villages. 3. It was not until the term “genocide” was applied to the crimes that force was used to stop them. Recognition of the "genocide" in Rwanda only occurred three months into the massacres. But recognition of “genocide” came too late. In June 1994, the U.N. Security Council re-authorized sending in U.N. peacekeepers. By July 1994, the Rwandan Patriotic Front had defeated the genocidal Rwandan army, Presidential Guard, and Hutu militias. By that time 800,000 Rwandans had already been slaughtered. On July 11–13, 1995, Bosnian Serb forces under Radko Mladić murdered 8000 Bosnian men from Srebrenica. That crime provoked a NATO conference on July 21, 1995, during which the mass murders were finally called “genocide.” NATO bombing of Serb forces began on August 30, 1995. The bombing brought Serbia to Dayton to agree to a ceasefire, division of Bosnia, and a NATO peacekeeping operation. The Bosnian civil war came to an end. Kosovo was called “ethnic cleansing” until U.S. War Crimes Ambassador David Scheffer noted “indicators of genocide” on April 7, 1999. His statement was followed within a week by bombing of Belgrade, which brought Serb surrender and NATO occupation of Kosovo. NATO peacekeepers are still in Kosovo. Use of the term "genocide" is necessary but not sufficient to motivate forceful action to stop it. After a careful empirical survey of evidence of genocide among Darfur refugees, on September 9, 2004, Secretary of State Colin Powell declared, “Genocide has occurred and may still be occurring in Darfur.... We believe the evidence corroborates the specific intent of the perpetrators to destroy ‘a group in whole or in part.’” Unfortunately, Secretary Powell also said, “However, no new action is dictated by this determination.” The U.N. resisted the American finding and refused to invoke the G-Word: “genocide.” The U.N. appointed its own Commission of Inquiry, led by Antonio Cassese, who as President of the ICTY never handed down a conviction for genocide. Insiders report that even before his Commission left for Sudan, Cassese told them it was unlikely that it could find evidence of genocidal intent by the Sudanese government. The Commission detailed many “crimes against humanity” in Darfur, but it refused to call them “genocide.” All that followed were ineffective increases in a joint U.N./African Union monitoring force without a mandate to fight the Janjaweed and Sudanese military forces that massacred Darfuris and forcibly displaced them. To this day there has been no forceful intervention by U.N., NATO, or African Union troops to stop the genocide. The Darfur genocide continues to this day. Genocide denial has resulted in continuing genocide. Since our 2007 study of the effects of use of the terms "ethnic cleansing" or "genocide," several other genocides have occurred that illustrate how the euphemism "ethnic cleansing" is used to deny genocide. ISIS Genocide Against Yazidis, Christians, Shi'a Muslims, and other religious minorities ISIS provided another example of the importance of calling genocide by its proper name. For two years, the press, the U.S. State Department, the European Union, human rights groups, and the U.N. refused to call the ISIS crimes “genocide,” except for the massacres against the Yazidi. Even the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum denied that Christians and Shi’a Muslims were also victims of genocide. In 2015, Genocide Watch, the Hudson Institute, the Knights of Columbus, Catholic University, and Congressional staff from both parties formed the Genocide Working Group in Washington, DC. The group drafted resolutions that were introduced in Congress and in the European Parliament declaring that ISIS was committing genocide against the Yazidis, Christians, Shi’a Muslims and other religious groups. The resolution passed unanimously in the United States Congress and nearly unanimously in the European Parliament. U.S. Secretary of State Kerry overruled his legal advisors and declared that ISIS was committing genocide. The U.S. and coalition response was immediate. Military action against ISIS was intensified. ISIS was militarily defeated in Iraq and Syria. Laws were passed to support resettlement of the victims of ISIS in Iraq. Myanmar's genocide against the Rohingya Genocide is precisely what the Myanmar government and supporting militias have committed against the Rohingya since 2012. Myanmar committed both forced displacement [“ethnic cleansing”] and genocide. The crimes often go together. Genocidal massacres are used to terrorize a victim group into fleeing. Over 700,000 Rohingya fled into Bangladesh in 2017 to escape systematic massacres by the Myanmar army that killed at least 10,000 Rohingya and burned over 400 Rohingya villages to the ground. Yet the so-called “international community” (which exists only in popular imaginations) still avoids using the word “genocide.” The UN, press, human rights groups, and many governments still call the Myanmar Army's aggression, genocidal massacres, and forced deportation against the Rohingya “ethnic cleansing.” Since 2012, the term “ethnic cleansing” has been the dominant term used for the Rohingya genocide in articles in the New York Times, Washington Post, the Guardian, in statements by United Nations officials, in statements by Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch. and in statements by the U.S. State Department. Why do certain groups insist on using the euphemism "ethnic cleansing" to deny that "genocide" is underway or has occurred? “Ethnic cleansing” is used by the press because reporters consider genocide a legal word that can only be validly used by lawyers. Members of the press are reluctant to use legal terms they are unsure about. Diplomats speak of “ethnic cleansing” rather than genocide to avoid offending other diplomats or U.N. member states, and to avoid implying that their nation or the U.N. has a duty to take preventive action. Lawyers are reluctant to use the word “genocide” for several reasons: Lawyers have gutted the word “genocide” of its preventive effect by insisting on judicial standards of proof of specific intent beyond a reasonable doubt rather than a prosecutor’s preponderance of the evidence. Lawyers sometimes think that statements by the perpetrator are necessary to prove specific intent. But the only thing “specific” about specific intent is that the intent must be to destroy a group. As in ordinary criminal law, perpetrators seldom announce their intentions. Actions are the normal way to prove intent. A systematic campaign of killings and destruction should be enough proof of the specific intent to destroy a group, in whole or in part. Many British Foreign Office, E.U., and U.N. lawyers even claim that only a court can invoke the word “genocide.” This view is profoundly wrong. It ignores the very name of the International Convention for the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide. Courts judge cases after genocide is over—too late for prevention. Following Schabas, legal advisors to governments and tribunals argue that it is equally damning to call the crimes "ethnic cleansing,” “atrocities,” or “crimes against humanity.” Prison sentences for crimes against humanity in international tribunals have been equal to sentences for genocide. Therefore, charging perpetrators with “crimes against humanity” is as effective as charging them with “genocide.” Such reasoning may apply in trials of individual perpetrators after a genocide is over. But it gives policy makers an easy way out so they can deny their nations' legal duty to prevent genocide. Lawyers for human rights groups like Human Rights Watch or Amnesty International avoid using the word genocide because they share Schabas’ narrow view of genocidal intent and because they usually oppose military intervention to prevent genocide. They seldom use the word until after a genocide is over. Some lawyers like Schabas and lawyers at the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum, Yad Vashem, Human Rights Watch, and elsewhere avoid using the word “genocide” because they do not want to de-value its special application to the Holocaust. They limit use of the word to genocides “in whole,” where the intent is to destroy a whole group. Schabas refuses to apply the word “genocide” to most genocides “in part.” Schabas denies that genocide occurred in Cambodia, Darfur, the Holodomor, Myanmar, Bangladesh, and other genocides "in part," even though these are considered genocides by most other genocide scholars. On April 20, 2021, writing with Jeffrey Sachs, Schabas also denied that the word “genocide” should be applied to the Chinese crimes against the Uyghurs in Xinjiang. Policy makers who do not want their nations to be involved in forceful military action avoid using the word “genocide.” They often even oppose deployment of U.N. peacekeeping forces with strong enough mandates and rules of engagement to aggressively protect civilians against genocidal militias and armies. This is a dominant reason that the State Department's Office of the Legal Advisor and the British Foreign Office avoid the word "Genocide." Raphael Lemkin invented the word “genocide” because "extermination" or "barbarism" did not express the horror of the Armenian Genocide or the Holocaust. He meant it to apply to partial genocides as well as genocides intended to destroy "in whole." Genocide consists of acts of genocide intended to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnic, racial, or religious group. Genocidal massacres are acts of genocide. Conclusion “Genocide” is a more powerful word than “ethnic cleansing.” When the term “genocide” is used instead of “ethnic cleansing,” use of force to stop it becomes possible. When the crimes are called “ethnic cleansing” or “crimes against humanity,” it is an indicator of lack of political will to use force to stop them. "Ethnic cleansing" is a term used to avoid prevention of genocide. Since 2000, the term “atrocities” (which also has no status in international law) has become another euphemism that indicates the absence of political will to take forceful action to stop genocide. The term "ethnic cleansing" is a euphemism used for genocide denial. "Ethnic cleansing" should be expunged from the legal and journalistic lexicon. Copyright 2023 Gregory H. Stanton

Wagner Group fighters are seen near the headquarters of Russia's Southern Military District in Rostov-on-Don on Saturday. (Reuters) A fast-moving crisis unfolded in Russia on Saturday as Vladimir Putin faced an insurrection from an ally, Yevgeniy Prigozhin, and the Russian mercenary fighters he leads. For the moment, the situation appears to have de-escalated. The forces answering to Prigozhin, the Wagner Group chief, halted their march toward Moscow and turned around, as Prigozhin was offered safe passage to Belarus, where he arrived Tuesday, according to Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko, a state media outlet reported. Lukashenko brokered an agreement between Prigozhin and Putin, according to Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov. Criminal charges against Prigozhin are to be dropped, and preparations were made for Wagner to hand over its heavy military equipment to the Russian military. The deal appears to be holding. Still, the dispute represents a significant challenge to Putin’s leadership, the potential loss of one of Putin’s most successful field commanders and a possible shift in the course of the war in Ukraine. Here’s a summary of what we know about the conflict. Who is Yevgeniy Prigozhin, and why is he so important? The 62-year-old Prigozhin had been a fervent supporter of Russia’s war in Ukraine and is in charge of the Russian private military contractor known as the Wagner Group. Prigozhin had played a central role in the war, first by deploying his mercenaries on the front lines and later by recruiting heavily from prisons to bolster Moscow’s depleted forces. Wagner led the onslaught in Bakhmut, which culminated in Putin declaring the city under Russian control — his first significant territorial gain since last summer. Americans may remember Prigozhin as the financier of the internet Research Agency — the Russian “troll farm” that the Justice Department named in a 2018 indictment over interference in the 2016 U.S. presidential election through weaponized social media. How did the dispute start? Internal tensions between Prigozhin and Russian military leaders have been simmering for months over what Prigozhin believed were leadership failures within the military. Prigozhin accused Russian generals of stonewalling his ammunition requests and, as a result, blamed them for his fighters dying “in heaps” in Ukraine. The dispute reached a boiling point Friday when Prigozhin accused Russian forces of conducting a strike on his fighters at an encampment in Ukraine. Who are the other key players here? Two of Putin’s top military leaders — Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu and Valery Gerasimov, chief of the Russian General Staff — have been on the receiving end of Prigozhin’s vitriol. At one point, he called for Shoigu and Gerasimov to face a firing squad. Shoigu recently decreed that all “volunteer formations” must sign a contract with the Defense Ministry by July 1, which would place Prigozhin’s mercenaries under Shoigu’s control. Prigozhin said Wagner would not sign. The appointment of Gerasimov as overall commander of the war in Ukraine also was viewed as a blow to Prigozhin, who lost his main source of manpower when the Defense Ministry barred him from recruiting in prisons. What exactly did Prigozhin do? Prigozhin said he had taken control of the main Russian military command base in the southern region of Rostov and told two Russian military commanders that he would blockade Rostov and send his forces to Moscow unless he could confront his enemies: Shoigu and Gerasimov. Prigozhin called for Russians to join Wagner against Shoigu and Gerasimov. He also accused the pair of lying about the war in Ukraine and undercounting casualties. “This is not a military coup, but a march of justice,” Prigozhin declared. By Saturday, Prigozhin had agreed to turn his forces around and not march to Moscow. What deal was brokered? Many analysts predicted that Prigozhin would be killed or arrested as Wagner forces moved toward Moscow. But the sudden about-face of Prigozhin’s troops appeared to have eased the crisis for now. The agreement for Prigozhin’s forces to turn around was brokered by the Belarusian president, who spoke with Putin before negotiating with Prigozhin, according to the Belarusian state-owned news agency Belta and the Kremlin. With security guarantees for Wagner on the table, Prigozhin reportedly agreed to stop his dash to Moscow. Russian media outlets reported Wagner forces leaving the city of Rostov-on-Don after the Kremlin said that charges will be dropped against the Wagner chief and that he will be sent to Belarus. Prigozhin has often been seen as the most credible of Russia’s field commanders. His disappearance from the battlefield will be watched closely. How is Ukraine responding? Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said in his evening address Saturday that the events inside Russia show “that the bosses of Russia do not control anything.” “Nothing at all. Complete chaos,” Zelensky said. “And it is happening on Russian territory, which is fully loaded with weapons.” The Ukrainian military continued pressing its offensive Saturday, though there were no immediate signs that the rebellion next door had eased the Ukrainian path to victory. Valeriy Shershen, an armed forces spokesman in eastern Ukraine, said Saturday that Kyiv’s troops had liberated “several positions” in the Donetsk region in the country’s east, recapturing territory that had been under the control of Russian forces and Moscow-backed separatists since hostilities broke out in eastern Ukraine in 2014. Shershen said that the territory was retaken a week ago but that the news was withheld for “certain tactical considerations.” How are Western officials responding? The United States and many NATO allies have said they have been closely monitoring the situation in Russia. The U.S. National Security Council said President Biden was briefed Friday night, and Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin spoke Saturday with allies from Canada, France, Germany, Poland and Britain. The Pentagon’s top military officer, Gen. Mark A. Milley, canceled a trip to the Middle East in light of the crisis, an official said Saturday. Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, was to leave Washington on Saturday to visit Israel and Jordan, said his spokesman, Col. David Butler. Milley instead spoke Saturday with his Ukrainian counterpart, Gen. Valery Zaluzhny, Butler said in a separate statement. What do I need to know about the Wagner Group? The Wagner Group is not a single, traditional company, but a shadowy network of organizations providing fighters for hire — with the approval of the Kremlin. According to research by the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, the group has probably operated in as many as 30 countries and has two training camps in Russia. It is ostensibly private, but according to CSIS, “its management and operations are deeply intertwined with the Russian military and intelligence community” under Putin. Prigozhin made billions through government catering contracts. While the Wagner Group appears to be partly bankrolled by Prigozhin’s ties to the Kremlin, it has also used violence and extortion in an effort to corner the extremely lucrative diamond industry in the Central African Republic. Who are the mercenaries who fight as part of the Wagner Group? The United States estimated earlier this year that about 50,000 of Prigozhin’s Wagner fighters had deployed to Ukraine, the majority of them recruited from inside Russian prisons. The United States has imposed rounds of sanctions on the group and designated it a “significant transnational criminal organization.” The mercenary outfit has been accused of “mass executions, rape, child abductions, and physical abuse in the Central African Republic (CAR) and Mali,” Treasury Secretary Janet L. Yellen said in a statement earlier this year. This report has been updated. © Copyright 2023 The Washington Post

University of Barcelona venue of 16th Biennial Meeting of the International Association of Genocide Scholars THE IAGS CONFERENCE AGENDA IS COPIED BELOW. THE CONFERENCE IS OPEN TO THE PUBLIC. Please register by June 30 for the conference at https://www.conftool.com/iags2023/

Genocide Watch will present two panels at the biennial conference of the International Association of Genocide Scholars (IAGS) to be held in Barcelona, Spain July 10 - 14. The two Genocide Watch panels are entitled "Processes of Genocide and Genocide Prevention" and "Genocide Denial as Genocide Warning. Genocide Watch is also presenting its Report on the Kurdish Genocides and co-sponsored by the KG Lobby, a proposed International Association of Genocide Scholars Resolution to Declare that Massacres and Persecution of Iraqi Kurds were Crimes of Genocide and Crimes Against Humanity

EUROPE DAY DAN EVROPE Europe Day celebrates peace and unity in Europe. During these challenging times, for Europe Day 2023 we joined partners from Flemish Peace Institute in organizing the ''Reimagining peace: New agendas for research & policy in times of conflict'' conference in Brussels. Dan Evrope slavi mir i jedinstvo u Evropi. U ovim izazovnim vremenima, za Dan Evrope 2023 pridružili smo se partnerima iz Flamanskog instituta za mir u organizaciji konferencije „Reimagining peace: New agendas for research & policy in times of conflict“ u Briselu. LESSONS FROM THE PAST, VISIONS FOR THE FUTURE LEKCIJE IZ PROŠLOSTI, VIZIJE ZA BUDUĆNOST PCRC President, Velma Šarić, had an opportunity to share her experience in utilizing judicial archives and legacy in informing and educating youth as well as our work in the field of genocide and mass atrocity crimes prevention at a panel session organized by Balkan Investigative Reporting Network. Predsjednica CPI-a, Velma Šarić, imala je priliku podijeliti svoja iskustva u korištenju pravosudnih arhiva i naslijeđa u informisanju i edukaciji mladih, kao i naš rad na polju prevencije zločina genocida i masovnih zločina, na panel sesiji koju je organizovala Balkanska istraživačka mreža. NEW DOCUMENTARY NOVI DOKUMENTARNI FILM Filming of a new documentary about the Partisan Memorial Cemetery in Mostar and its historical, but underrepresented value has begun in May. Produced by Journey Productions led by Chris Leslie and Oggi Tomic Films with PCRC as local partners. Read more in a new piece for Guardian. Snimanje novog dokumentarnog filma o Partizanskom groblju u Mostaru i njegovoj istorijskoj, ali nedovoljno promovisanoj vrijednosti počelo je u maju. Film se realizuje u produkciji Journey Productions uz vođstvo Chris Lesliea i Oggi Tomić Films sa našim centrom kao glavnim lokalnim partnerima. Pročitajte više u novom članku za Guardian. NETWORKING IN PEACEBUILDING RESEARCH UMREŽAVANJE U ISTRAŽIVANJU IZGRADNJE MIRA PCRC is a meeting place for local, regional, and international peacebuilders to collaborate and think creatively about what peace might look like and how reconciliation can be achieved in the region and around the world. Recently we met with and hosted young researchers from University of Portugal, University of Vienna, Leiden University, University of Alabama at Birmingham, University of Amsterdam, NIOD Institute for War, Holocaust and Genocide Studies and Radboud University. Naš centar je mjesto okupljanja lokalnih, regionalnih i međunarodnih graditelja mira gdje imaju priliku da sarađuju i kreativno razmišljaju o tome kako bi mir mogao izgledati i kako se pomirenje može postići u regiji i širom svijeta. Nedavno smo se susreli i ugostili mlade istraživače sa Univerzita u Portugalu, Univerzita u Beču, Univerziteta Leiden, Univerziteta Alabama u Birminghamu, Univerziteta u Amsterdamu, NIOD Instituta za studij rata, holokausta i genocida i Radboud Univerziteta. SUMMER INTERNS LJETNJA GRUPA PRIPRAVNIKA Our summer group of interns come from all around the world - United States, Switzerland, Austria, Ireland, United Kingdom, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Ukraine and Japan. Naša ljetna grupa pripravnika dolazi iz cijelog svijeta - Sjedinjenih Država, Švicarske, Austrije, Ukrajine, Irske, Ujedinjenog Kraljevstva, Japana i Bosne i Hercegovine. Post-Conflict Research Center (PCRC) | Centar za postkonfliktna istraživanja Pruščakova 21, 71000 Sarajevo Bosnia and Herzegovina pcrc.bih@gmail.com