Darfur Women Action Group (DWAG) is gravely concerned by the alarming level of violence in West Darfur. The attack on Kerrinek, West Darfur, began on Thursday, April 21, and has continued since. This has resulted in at least 201 casualties, 98 injured, most of whom are women and children, and an unspeakable amount of destruction. This has been one of the deadliest and most destructive attacks that innocent civilians in West Darfur have experienced in the last few years and is a new wave of genocidal violence that is being conducted systematically with impunity. The attack started on Thursday, April 21, with the killing of two people by an unknown assailant around Kerrinek. On the following day, hundreds of armed Arab militiamen encircled Kereneik and began opening fire and going home to home and killing civilians. Credible sources and eyewitnesses on the ground have confirmed that the Janjaweed and Rapid Support Forces (RSF) were responsible for orchestrating these latest attacks. The violence has spread to El Geneina, as shootings erupted outside the main hospital, causing mass fear among residents. In addition, it was reported on Monday morning that militiamen have been terrorizing and preventing civilians from burying dead bodies at the cemetery in El Geneina. The military leader, General al-Burhan, deployed soldiers to Darfur to contain the attacks, however, witnesses have reported that the security forces have acted with little resistance to prevent or contain the violence. This latest violent incident is eerily reminiscent of the violence that took place from January through April of 2021 in and around El Geneina, West Darfur, after the withdrawal of the African Union-United Nations Hybrid Operation in Darfur (UNAMID). The withdrawal of the peacekeeping force in Darfur means there are no civilian protection mechanisms in the region, leaving a security vacuum that makes people more vulnerable to violent attacks and with nowhere to turn for protection. Moreover, the October 25th military coup has further emboldened and energized the Janjaweed and RSF to escalate attacks in Darfur because they know they may commit these attacks without repercussions. The attacks across Darfur have inflicted unimaginable suffering and are a horrifying reminder of the millions of civilians in the region that remain vulnerable. Additionally, DWAG has received credible information that the RSF is mobilizing to escalate its attacks across Darfur. We fear that those who have survived will now be exterminated while the world is watching. DWAG is especially concerned about the humanitarian crisis this has created, as the Darfur Bar Association stated that approximately 20,000 people had been displaced by the violence. This is on top of the soaring levels of displacement from the first two weeks of March following the violent attacks in other areas of West Darfur, in which more than 150,000 families were displaced. The increase in displacement demonstrates how the situation on the ground continues deteriorating and affecting those most vulnerable. Today the situation in West Darfur is extremely catastrophic, with unimaginable loss of lives and humanitarian crises inflicting unbearable pain and suffering on innocent men, women, and children. We fear that as violence continues to escalate, it will cause even higher levels of displacement and suffering for the people of Darfur. These attacks are systematic and directed toward civilians from the indigenous African tribes who were targeted during the genocidal campaign orchestrated by al-Bashir, which is still ongoing despite his ouster in 2019. DWAG is further concerned about the news of the release of 13 former members of the National Congress Party (NCP) and Islamic fundamentalists, who were arrested in 2019 along with former President al-Bashir. This is alarming as, following their release, a coalition of ten Islamic political parties was formed. Among these ten Islamic political parties is the NCP, allowing the NCP to participate in future elections and bring back the genocidal and dictatorial era. DWAG calls on President Biden to publicly denounce the escalated violence in Darfur and urges him to put pressure on Sudan to immediately end these attacks. We further call upon the international community to put pressure on the Sudanese military junta and assert that violence against civilians will not be tolerated. DWAG also urges the United Nations Security Council to take immediate action to authorize a United Nations force to protect civilians in Darfur. The United Nations Security Council must also immediately dispatch high-level Security Council delegates to investigate the situation and summon the military junta leaders before the Council for escalating this violence. The United Nations Security Council and the United States must demand unimpeded access to humanitarian agencies to aid in order to deliver emergency health and other life-saving assistance to those in need. Immediate action must be immediately taken in order to stop violence against innocent civilians before it is too late. Since the October 25th coup, violence has escalated and hundreds have lost their lives, but world leaders have largely overlooked the situation in Sudan. Because of the silence and complicity of our leaders, the military in Sudan will continue to exterminate more civilians. We urge our supporters to join us in demanding President Biden and the United Nations Security Council members to publicly denounce the attack in West Darfur, disarm the Janjaweed and RSF, and ensure that those displaced are protected and provided with life-saving assistance. We must collectively speak up and compel world leaders to act before it’s too late. (c) Darfur Women Action Group

Kathryn Baron | Genocide Watch Haiti is in a cascading political, economic, and social crisis. It is a nation heavily dependent on foreign aid. More than three-quarters of the population lives below the poverty line. The country has experienced decades of political turmoil and has regularly suffered from devastating earthquakes and hurricanes. Haiti is still recovering from a 7.2 magnitude earthquake that rocked the country in August 2021, and from the 2010 earthquake that killed over 200,000 people. Before Haiti could recover from these earlier disasters, a 5.3 magnitude earthquake struck in early 2022. Rampant government corruption has sabotaged any chance of recovery. Major parts of Port-au-Prince are controlled by nine powerful gangs (“G9”) that compete over resources and territory. They operate with no regard for law, often in collusion with government officials. Their leaders are quasi-warlords and control 60% of the country. In areas they control, gangs traffic drugs, murder, rape, kidnap for ransom, and terrorize people with impunity. In 2019, evidence surfaced that much foreign aid for infrastructure and healthcare had been embezzled by three successive administrations. These revelations prompted civil unrest against the government. Demonstrations persisted throughout 2020 and 2021 against the government of Jovenel Moïse. In July 2021, President Moïse was assassinated, plummeting Haiti into political turmoil. Currently, there is no sitting parliament due to delayed elections. Prime Minister Ariel Henry assumed office after Moïse’s assassination. In September, Haiti’s Chief Prosecutor claimed Henry was in close communication with the key suspects in the Moïse assassination. He asked the Justice Minister to indict Henry. Henry immediately fired both the Chief Prosecutor and the Justice Minister. Hundreds of thousands of Haitians, including much of Haiti’s educated medical and professional elite, have left the country to escape Haiti’s political instability, gang violence, and lack of access to essential services such as clean water, food, and education. Remittances from the Haitian diaspora contribute nearly a quarter of Haiti’s annual GDP. Due to unchecked gang rule, violent repression of peaceful protests for political reform, and assassinations of politicians and officials who challenge corruption, Genocide Watch classifies Haiti as being at Stage 5: Organization and Stage 6: Polarization. Genocide Watch recommends: • The U.S. and other nations should withdraw their support for the illegitimate Henry government. • The U.S., OAS, and U.N. should re-establish a UN peacekeeping mission like the Brazil-led mission that departed in 2017. • The U.N. peacekeeping mission should conduct elections for a transitional government. • The U.N. peacekeeping mission should arrest and prosecute gang leaders and other criminals. © Genocide Watch 2022

A woman walks past a poster of the Bollywood movie "The Kashmir Files" inside a cinema in Mumbai on March 17. (Francis Mascarenhas/Reuters) I tried watching ‘The Kashmir Files.’ I left the theater to screams of ‘Go to Pakistan.’ The Washington Post March 29, 2022 By Rana Ayyub Global Opinions contributing writer The collective conscience of India is being altered beyond repair with hatred so potent that it even consumes the seemingly most unlikely people — such as the elderly man who arrived in a wheelchair to the theater to watch “The Kashmir Files.” Two weeks ago, I gathered the courage to go watch the film against the advice of family and friends. “The Kashmir Files,” which portrays the exodus in the 1990s of Kashmiri Pandits, a minority Hindu community, has triggered anti-Muslim hate chants in theaters across India. As soon as I entered the theater in Mumbai, the audience broke into cries of “Bharat Mata ki jai” (Glory to India), a nationalist chant that has been repeatedly weaponized against Muslims. The man in the wheelchair soon joined the chants of “Sab mulle aatankwaadi” (Muslims are terrorists). I left before the movie even began. I tried again the next day. A group of teenagers sitting in the front row soon began chanting “Bharat Mata ki jai.” I was seated in the fourth row, between an expectant mother and an elderly man who spoke proudly of how history in India was being redeemed under Prime Minister Narendra Modi. The film began, and within 20 minutes there were disturbing scenes of Muslims lusting after Hindu women and a Muslim neighbor betraying his Hindu friend to support terrorism. There were scenes of Muslim kids flaunting Kalashnikovs and insulting Hindu deities. At one point in the movie, a Muslim militant tells a Kashmiri Hindu who wore attire depicting a Hindu god that only those chanting “Allahu akbar” will be allowed to flourish in Kashmir. That’s when the audience started chanting “Jai Shri Ram” (Glory to Lord Ram). The teens in the front row whistled and started clapping at the slogans. Scenes of Muslims in skullcaps brutally murdering Hindus drew painful gasps from the audience. The expectant mother seated next to me turned to her husband: “These Muslims are born bastards.” Unable to take the hate, I informed them that I am a Muslim and the language they were using was hate speech against my community. “Hate is what your religion teaches, not ours,” the woman responded. Others seated near us started cheering her statement, and I left the theater, just 30 minutes into the movie, feeling humiliated and physically unsafe. A man yelled at me “Ja Pakistan!” (Go to Pakistan). When I complained to a theater manager about being heckled and abused, he gave me a blank look. The film has been a box-office hit. The theaters are packed. The Indian government has even given the film tax privileges, deeming it important for the well-being of the country. That means audiences can buy the tickets at cheaper rates. The next day, Modi met the cast and crew of the film. In a televised speech, the prime minister mocked the criticism, saying, “Those who always carry the flag of freedom of expression, this entire group has been rattled these past five to six days.” I’ve written before about the power these films have to stir nationalist fervor and Islamophobic hatred. It’s now a proven formula. But the record-breaking success of “The Kashmir Files” has taken the propaganda to a genocidal level. The film is dominating all discussions. The head of government promotes it while large networks dedicate hours of programming to extoll the bravado in the film. And even after failing to recover fully from the fear and humiliation I felt at the movie theater, I have to deal with the news that a court in India’s Karnataka state is upholding a ban against wearing the hijab in schools. The ruling came after Muslim students challenged a ban on headscarves in some educational institutions in the state, a clear violation of their rights. The state government, run by Modi’s Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), argued that wearing a hijab is not an essential practice of Islam. It’s at times like these that I usually try to take refuge in the words of Mahatma Gandhi, who wrote: “When I despair, I remember that all through history the way of truth and love have always won. There have been tyrants and murderers, and for a time, they can seem invincible, but in the end, they always fall.” I once had great faith in these lines. But today, I do not. Hate in India now packs courts and movie theaters — and my despair is giving way to fear. The dark forces seem more invincible than ever. Opinion by Rana Ayyub Rana Ayyub is an Indian journalist and author of “Gujarat Files: Anatomy of a Cover-Up.” Copyright 2022 The Washington Post

The United States Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF) today released its 2022 Annual Report documenting developments during 2021, including significant regress in countries such as Afghanistan and the Central African Republic (CAR). USCIRF’s 2022 Annual Report provides recommendations to enhance the U.S. government’s promotion of freedom of religion or belief abroad. The report also notes USCIRF recommendations implemented by the U.S. government—including the designation of Russia as a country of particular concern, the imposition of targeted sanctions on religious freedom violators, and genocide determinations for atrocities perpetrated by the Chinese government against Uyghur and other Turkic Muslims and by the Burmese military against Rohingya Muslims. “We are disheartened by the deterioration of freedom of religion or belief in some countries— especially Afghanistan under the Taliban’s de facto government since August. Religious minorities have faced harassment, detention, and even death due to their faith or beliefs, and years of progress toward more equitable access to education and representation of women and girls have disappeared,” USCIRF Chair Nadine Maenza said. “Meanwhile, USCIRF is encouraged by the Biden administration’s continued prioritization of international religious freedom during its first year. To continue this progress, we strongly urge the administration to implement USCIRF’s recommendations—in particular, to expand its Priority 2 refugee designation to grant access for at-risk religious groups in Afghanistan, and to designate Nigeria as a country of particular concern.” USCIRF’s independence and bipartisanship enable it to unflinchingly identify threats to religious freedom abroad. In its 2022 Annual Report, USCIRF recommends 15 countries to the State Department for designation as “countries of particular concern” (CPCs) because their governments engage in or tolerate “systematic, ongoing, and egregious violations.” These include 10 that the State Department designated as CPCs in November 2021: Burma, China, Eritrea, Iran, North Korea, Pakistan, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Tajikistan, and Turkmenistan—as well as five others: Afghanistan, India, Nigeria, Syria, and Vietnam. For the first time ever, the State Department designated Russia as a CPC in 2021, which USCIRF had been recommending since 2017. Regrettably, the State Department removed Nigeria as a CPC though it had been added the previous year and religious freedom conditions remain dire. The 2022 Annual Report also recommends 12 countries for placement on the State Department’s Special Watch List (SWL) based on their governments’ perpetration or toleration of severe violations. These include three that the State Department placed on that list in November 2021: Algeria, Cuba, and Nicaragua—as well as nine others: Azerbaijan, CAR, Egypt, Indonesia, Iraq, Kazakhstan, Malaysia, Turkey, and Uzbekistan. In 2021, USCIRF removed CAR from its SWL recommendations because incidents of religious targeting and violence had decreased during 2020, but these trends have since been reversed. The 2022 Annual Report further recommends to the State Department seven non-state actors for redesignation as “entities of particular concern” (EPCs) for systematic, ongoing, egregious violations. The State Department designated all seven of these groups as EPCs in November 2021: al-Shabaab, Boko Haram, the Houthis, Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), Islamic State in the Greater Sahara (ISGS), Islamic State in West Africa Province (ISWAP or ISIS-West Africa), and Jamaat Nasr al-Islam wal Muslimin (JNIM). “Throughout the past year, the U.S. government continued to condemn abuses of religious freedom and hold perpetrators accountable through targeted sanctions and other tools at its disposal. Moving forward, the United States should take additional steps to support freedom of religion or belief around the world. USCIRF’s 2022 Annual Report makes recommendations on how Congress and the Executive Branch can further advance this universal, fundamental human right,” USCIRF Vice Chair Nury Turkel stated. In addition to chapters with key findings and U.S. policy recommendations for these 27 countries, the annual report describes and assesses U.S. international religious freedom policy overall. The report also highlights important global developments and trends related to religious freedom during 2021—including in countries that do not meet the criteria for CPC or SWL recommendations. These include the COVID-19 pandemic and religious freedom, blasphemy and hate speech law enforcement, transnational repression, religious intolerance in Europe, deteriorating religious freedom conditions in South Asia, and political upheaval that raises religious freedom concerns. The report also includes sections highlighting key USCIRF recommendations that the U.S. government has implemented from USCIRF’s 2021 Annual Report, discussing human rights violations perpetrated based on the coercive enforcement of interpretations of religion, and providing details on individuals included in USCIRF’s Freedom or Religion or Belief (FoRB) Victims List and Religious Prisoners of Conscience Project. (c) 2022 United States Commission on International Religious Freedom

Mass graves near besieged Ukrainian city Mariupol are evidence of war crimes, say Ukrainian officials CNN April 22, 2022 By Nathan Hodge, Julia Presniakova, Katie Polglase, Jennifer Hauser, Hira Humayun and Julia Hollingsworth, (CNN) Ukrainian officials say they have identified mass graves outside the city of Mariupol, which they say adds to mounting proof of Russian war crimes against Ukrainian civilians. The claim is supported by photos collected and analyzed by US satellite imagery company Maxar Technologies that appear to show more than 200 new graves at a site on the northwestern edge of Manhush, a town around 12 miles (19 kilometers) to the west of Mariupol. An estimated 100,000 people remain trapped in Mariupol which has been under constant bombardment since it was surrounded by Russian forces on March 1, according to Ukrainian officials. Ukrainian officials claim that more than 20,000 people in the city have died during the assault. In a post-Thursday on messaging app Telegram, Petro Andriushchenko, an adviser to the mayor of Mariupol, said Russian trucks had collected bodies from the port city, before "dumping them" in Manhush. "This is direct evidence of war crimes and attempts to cover them up." A satellite image from April 3 shows what appears to be a newly dug mass gravesite, next to the cemetery. A Maxar review of the satellite images from mid-March through to mid-April indicated the expansion of the gravesite began between March 23 to 26 and continued into April. According to Maxar's analysis, there are more than 200 newly dug graves at a site on the northwestern edge of Manhush. "According to recent media reports, Russian soldiers have been taking the bodies of people killed in Mariupol to this location," Maxar said in its analysis. A firm death toll following weeks of heavy bombardment of Mariupol is not available. However, journalists in Mariupol have documented the hasty burial of civilians in the besieged city, and images have surfaced on social media showing bodies apparently left for collection in the city. Vadym Boichenko, the mayor of Mariupol, said Thursday that women, children and the elderly had died on the streets of the city. "Unfortunately, we have seen that the bodies of dead Mariupol residents have begun to disappear from the streets of our city," he said. According to Boichenko, the mass graves are off a bypass road, near a cemetery. He said there was a field near the cemetery with 30 meter-long (98-feet-long) ditches. "And there they bury them, bring the bodies of the dead by trucks and throw them into these ditches," he said. Evidence of mass graves outside Mariupol surfaced as Russian President Vladimir Putin proclaimed the "liberation" of the southeastern port city by Russian forces -- even as he called off an attempt to storm the Azovstal steel plant, the final bastion of Ukrainian defenders inside the city, where civilians have also sheltered. Mariupol has been under nearly constant attack since the early days of Putin's invasion, and much of the city has been destroyed by Russian shelling. Civilian structures targeted included a maternity hospital and a theater where up to 1,300 people were seeking refuge. Though many have fled, an estimated 100,000 people still remain in Mariupol and its immediate surroundings, which are reported to be largely under Russian control. Ukrainian officials, who maintain the city remains contested, have warned of a major humanitarian emergency in Mariupol as food and water run out, with electricity and gas cut -- but several attempts to establish evacuation corridors to allow civilians to escape have failed. "Unfortunately, it is not possible today to evacuate civilians from Azovstal," Boichenko, the city's mayor, said Thursday. "Because we are asking for a stable ceasefire. Somewhere we need one day to be able to accommodate those residents who have been hiding there for 57 days in a row, and they are being bombed, bombed, and bombed." US Undersecretary of State for Political Affairs Victoria Nuland said Wednesday that the siege of Mariupol speaks "to the brutality of this war" and the war crimes Vladimir Putin is committing. Iryna Venediktova, Ukraine's prosecutor general, said earlier this month that her office is investigating 5,800 cases of alleged Russian war crimes, with "more and more" proceedings opening every day. US President Joe Biden, meanwhile, has called the atrocities being uncovered in Ukraine a "genocide." Copyright 2022 CNN

MSNBC April 25, 2022 To view program, click on image above.

By Deng Machol © UNICEF/UN0234655/Modola Dozens of people have recently been killed in violence that includes beheadings and sexual attacks in a volatile county in South Sudan, the United Nations Mission in South Sudan said Monday. The mission said it documented 72 civilian deaths between Feb. 17 and April 7 in Unity State’s Leer county. Among the victims was a local staffer with the humanitarian group Doctors Without Borders, it said. Sixty-four cases of sexual violence, including gang rapes, were recorded in Leer in the same period. The attacks were carried out by “armed youth” from the neighboring counties of Koch and Mayendit. “I am strongly appalled by these horrific attacks on civilians in Leer,” Nicholas Haysom, special representative of the U.N. secretary-general for South Sudan, said in a statement. “We must all do everything we can to ensure that victims and survivors get the justice they deserve and receive the care and support they need.” Markets, homes, humanitarian facilities and warehouses were looted and burned down. An estimated 40,000 people have fled the violence in Leer, with thousands reportedly crossing the Nile River to shelter in another state, that statement said. The U.N. mission said it has deployed more peacekeepers to conduct regular patrols in Leer town. South Sudan has been plagued by sporadic violence since it gained independence from Sudan in 2011. While some of the violence is communal, with rival ethnic groups retaliating against each other in remote areas, tensions in the capital Juba have risen recently after the deputy president accused the president of violating a fragile truce. After years of battling against Sudan, South Sudan won independence in 2011. But just two years later the new country descended into a civil war in which tens of thousands of people were killed. The civil war ended in 2018 with a peace agreement that brought President Salva Kiir and Vice President Riek Machar together in a government of national unity, although relations remain strained between the two sides. © AP News 2022

The blast in Mazar-i-Sharif, one of Afghanistan’s economic hubs, was the latest in a series of attacks on Hazaras and was claimed by an ISIS affiliate. The New York Times April 21, 2022 By Yaqoob Akbary and Thomas Gibbons-Neff The explosion at a Hazara Shiite mosque in northern Afghanistan killed at least 10 people and wounded over two dozen others. The attack was claimed by an Islamic State affiliate. Credit...Agence France-Presse — Getty Images KABUL, Afghanistan — An explosion at a Shiite mosque in northern Afghanistan on Thursday killed at least 10 people and wounded more than two dozen others, local officials said, adding to the toll of a bloody week for the country’s Hazaras. The attack, during afternoon prayers at the Seh Dokan mosque in the center of Mazar-i-Sharif, one of the country’s economic hubs with a bustling downtown of alleyway shops, came just two days after several explosions ripped through a predominantly Hazara Shiite neighborhood in Kabul, the capital. While the details of the attack at the mosque were murky, and there were fears that the death toll would climb higher, unverified videos shot inside the building showed an amount of carnage that has become all too familiar in Afghanistan over four decades of conflict. “Up to now we have 12 dead and 35 injured. Eight of them are in bad condition,” said Dr. Gaousuddin Anwari, the director of Abu Ali Sina-e-Balkhi Hospital in Mazar-i-Sharif. Abdul Nafi Takor, a spokesman for the Interior Ministry, offered a different assessment, saying that 10 people had been killed. A Taliban official in the province said it was unclear what caused the explosion, but the Islamic State’s affiliate in Afghanistan, known as Islamic State Khorasan, claimed responsibility for the blast, according to SITE Intelligence Group, which tracks extremist organizations. “I was in my pharmacy when I heard the sound of an explosion,” said Nazir Samim, a resident of Mazar-i-Sharif. “I went to the mosque to help the wounded, but the Taliban did not allow me to enter.” Around the time of the mosque blast, an explosion targeting a minibus in Kunduz city, the capital of the province of the same name and about 100 miles to the east, killed at least four people and wounded 18, said Obaidlah Abedi, a spokesman for the Kunduz police. The Islamic State claimed responsibility for that attack too, according to SITE. On Tuesday, several explosions outside an education center and a public high school in the western Kabul predominantly Hazara neighborhood of Dasht-e-Barchi killed at least six people and wounded at least a dozen more. The area, home to a large Hazara community, an ethnic minority that is predominantly Shiite, was frequently targeted by both the Taliban and the Islamic State over the last 20 years, when the country’s Western-backed government was in power. Since the Taliban took control of the country in August, the hard-line Sunni religious group has pledged to provide security to Afghans of all religious groups and ethnicities — even though it targeted Hazaras during the past two decades and killed thousands of Hazaras during its first tenure in the 1990s. Despite that pledge, Shiites, especially Hazaras, have come under frequent attack, primarily from the Islamic State’s affiliate in the country, over the past eight months. Last year, Islamic State bombings of Hazara Shiite mosques in Kandahar and Kunduz killed and wounded dozens. In the Dasht-e-Barchi area of Kabul, a series of unclaimed car bombings have regularly killed Hazaras, though in relatively small numbers. On Monday, the Islamic State claimed it had carried out a rocket attack from Haritan, a border town roughly 50 miles north of Mazar-i-Sharif, on a military base in Uzbekistan, but the Uzbek government denied any such attack took place. The extremist group has slowly gathered strength in recent months, despite the Taliban’s attempts to stamp out its fighters in the country’s east. Yaqoob Akbary reported from Kabul, and Thomas Gibbons-Neff from Kharkiv, Ukraine. Najim Rahim contributed reporting from New York. Thomas Gibbons-Neff is the Kabul bureau chief and a former Marine infantryman. @tmgneff Copyright 2022 The New York Times Company

Twin blasts in the heart of Shiite and Hazara community struck students leaving public school classes. By Pamela Constable Relatives rush to find family at a hospital in Kabul on April 19 after two bomb blasts at a public school. (Wakil Kohsar/AFP/Getty Images) At least six people were killed and 11 injured by two explosions on Tuesday morning outside a large public school in West Kabul, police and school officials said. The attacks took place in the heart of the capital’s minority ethnic Shiite and Hazara community, and police and school officials said the number of casualties was likely to rise significantly. Witnesses said the first blast detonated around 10 a.m., outside the main entrance of the Abdul Rahim Shahid School as 11th- and 12th-graders were leaving their class shifts. A second blast followed 10 minutes later in an alley beside the high-walled campus compound, as family members and others rushed to the site. Both blasts left the ground cratered, witnesses said. Explosions rocked a high school in western Kabul on April 19, killing at least six people, according to Afghan security and health officials. (Video: Reuters) Taliban police cordoned the school area as victims were taken to hospitals. There were additional reports of an earlier blast outside a private education center near the school, but no casualties were reported there. The Shahid school is one of the largest in Kabul, with more than 16,000 students attending in four shifts. It is also one of the most prominent, with a history of high student achievement and success in college exams. Boys and girls study there through sixth grade, in classes segregated by gender. Only boys are allowed to attend higher classes under the strict religious rules of Afghanistan’s Taliban government. No one claimed responsibility Tuesday for the attacks. They are similar to previous strikes on educational facilities in that area that have been attributed to the Afghan branch of the Islamic State, known as ISIS-K, which views Shiites as apostates. The urban community near the school, Dasht-i-Barchi, is poor but highly motivated to educate its children, and the Shahid school has long drawn ambitious students. School officials, who have worked there long before the Taliban took power in August, said this week that they were aiming to maintain its high educational standards. A district education official, in a brief interview Tuesday, said that “dozens of children” from the school had been either killed or injured in the attack but that he had few details. Since 2015, the Islamic State has either claimed or been blamed for dozens of attacks on the Shiite community in Kabul, especially on religious and educational sites. In May, two bombings outside the gates of another large high school in Dasht-i-Barchi, the Syed Al-Shahda school, killed at least 90 people, many of them girls who were walking home from afternoon classes. In March 2018, the extremist group claimed an assault on a large Shiite shrine in the community that wounded at least 60 people. A would-be suicide bomber also detonated grenades at a private education center, wounding six students inside a crowded study hall. The group has staged attacks in Kandahar, Mazar-e Sharif and other Afghan cities. When the Taliban came to power in 2021, many Shiites expressed fears of a sectarian crackdown, but Taliban officials have stated they would not discriminate. In Kabul, education officials have singled out the Shahid school as an exemplary institution, both for its educational achievements and its careful separation of girls and boys. © The Washington Post 2022

Washington Post By Claire Parker April 17, 2022 Oleg Yevtushenko, 55, stands by the grave of a neighbor he said was killed by Russian soldiers in Bucha, Ukraine. (Heidi Levine for The Washington Post) In the nearly eight decades since the term was first used, “genocide” has conjured images of gas chambers, killing fields in Rwanda and mass graves in Srebrenica. Evidence of Russian atrocities in Ukrainian towns such as Bucha, combined with ominous rhetoric in Russian media suggesting “de-Ukrainization,” have fueled discussion about whether Russia is carrying out genocide in Ukraine. President Biden used the term on Tuesday, saying, “It’s become clearer and clearer that Putin is trying to wipe out the idea of being Ukrainian.” Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, who has described Russian atrocities as genocide, praised Biden’s comments and called on the United States to send additional heavy weapons. Other Western leaders have been more hesitant. The Kremlin called Biden’s accusation “unacceptable.” Experts are divided over the merits of declaring Russian atrocities in Ukraine a genocide at this point. In Bucha, the story of one man’s body left on a Russian killing field Here’s what to know about the term and its significance. What to know: What is the definition of ‘genocide’? What legal and moral significance does the term carry? Who determines whether a genocide is occurring, and how? What could be the implications of calling Russian atrocities genocide? What is the definition of ‘genocide’? The term “genocide” was coined by Polish lawyer Raphael Lemkin in 1944, in part to describe the Nazis’ systematic murder of Jews during the Holocaust. The Genocide Convention of 1948 codified genocide as an international crime, defining it as “acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group.” Those acts include killings, inflicting serious harm on a group, making its living conditions impossible, preventing births within the group, or forcibly transferring children to another group. Gregory Stanton, founder of Genocide Watch, said people often ignore the “in part” element. Atrocities can count even if they don’t aim to wipe out a whole population, he said. Genocide Watch has called Russia’s campaign to destroy Ukrainian cities a genocide. The roughly 150 parties to the convention — including Russia — are supposed to try to prevent and punish genocide. Under the convention, perpetrators charged with genocide are supposed to be tried in the country where the act occurred or in an international court. Past genocides include the killing of more than 800,000 Tutsi and moderate Hutu in Rwanda by Hutu extremists in 1994; the massacre of Bosnian Muslim men and boys by Bosnian Serbs in Srebrenica in 1995; and the forced displacement of and attacks on ethnic groups by Sudanese forces and militias in Darfur in the early 2000s. What legal and moral significance does the term carry? Family photographs of some of the 800,000 people killed in the Rwandan genocide hang on display in an exhibition at the Kigali Genocide Memorial center in the capital, Kigali, on April 5, 2019. (Ben Curtis/AP) Some use the term “to describe a situation that is horrific, that feels unimaginable,” said Rebecca Hamilton, an international law professor at American University and a former lawyer in the International Criminal Court’s prosecutor’s office. “Unfortunately, there is a real disconnect between the legal use of the term genocide and the way that genocide is understood in popular discourse.” Genocide is often viewed as the ultimate crime, even though it holds the same penalties under international law as war crimes and crimes against humanity, experts said. What are war crimes, and is Russia committing them in Ukraine? People often expect that officials’ use of the term will trigger international intervention, Hamilton said. Under the Genocide Convention, Hamilton said, countries commit “to prevent and to punish” genocide — but “there isn’t a lot of clarity and precedent for what prevention looks like.” “Certainly, it is not the case that once you have a genocide determination, you automatically have a military intervention,” Hamilton said. The United States did not intervene militarily to stop the genocides in Rwanda and Darfur, for example. Stanton said there are other ways countries can exercise their duty to prevent genocide. They could provide weapons to the group under attack, he said, and the U.N. General Assembly has the power under certain circumstances to send peacekeepers. Who determines whether a genocide is occurring, and how? International Criminal Court prosecutor Karim Khan, who has opened an investigation into potential war crimes and crimes against humanity in Ukraine, stands next to a grave on April 13 where remains of three bodies were found, in the city of Bucha, outside Kyiv. (Volodymyr Petrov/Reuters) To demonstrate that genocide has occurred, lawyers must show the existence of a group protected under the Genocide Convention, genocidal acts, and an intent to destroy at least part of the group in question. The first two elements are clearly present in Ukraine, Stanton said, citing the weeks-long Russian siege of Mariupol and the forcible deportation of children to Russia as examples of acts of genocide. Intent is much harder to prove. One way to do so is to obtain evidence of orders up the chain of command, Hamilton said, but “in most cases, you don’t have a smoking gun.” Genocidal statements in Kremlin-affiliated media — as well as some recent accounts from Ukrainian rape survivors — could help bolster a prosecutor’s case, though. Putin has rejected the idea of Ukrainian nationhood. And in recent weeks, Russian officials and media personalities suggested that Russia should “reeducate” Ukrainians and falsely described all Ukrainians as Nazis who must be fought. Another way to demonstrate intent is to show a clear pattern of actions that would result in part in a group’s destruction, such as the siege and shelling of whole cities, Stanton said. “We’ve got a very clear, systematic pattern of actions that the foreseeable consequences of are to destroy part of a national group, namely the Ukrainian group,” he said. The United States has made eight formal declarations of genocide since World War II, including the recognition last year of the Armenian genocide more than a century ago. The State Department has traditionally made these determinations. Most recently, the Biden administration announced in March that the Myanmar military had committed genocide against the Rohingya minority group. That determination came five years after the height of the mass displacement of Rohingya. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said it was based on the State Department’s “rigorous fact-finding” as well as “detailed documentation” from independent sources including rights groups and researchers. Rohingya refugees walk through a shallow canal as they flee violence in Myanmar in 2017. The Biden administration announced last month that the Myanmar military committed genocide against the minority group. (Munir Uz Zaman/AFP/Getty Images) The United States is typically cautious about these decisions. Before Biden’s comments, White House national security adviser Jake Sullivan said U.S. officials had “not yet seen a level of systematic deprivation of life of the Ukrainian people to rise to the level of genocide.” International courts provide an avenue for accountability. The first genocide conviction at the international level came in 1998, when a former Rwandan mayor was found guilty of genocide and crimes against humanity at a special tribunal. In 2002, the International Criminal Court was established to prosecute individuals for grievous crimes including genocide. ICC prosecutor Karim Khan, who has opened an investigation into potential war crimes and crimes against humanity in Ukraine, traveled to the country this month to help collect evidence. The court has only charged one person with genocide: former Sudanese president Omar Hassan al-Bashir. Sudan and other countries have not handed him over to face trial. The International Court of Justice, meanwhile, is responsible for adjudicating disputes between states. “That’s the place where states can charge other states with violating the Genocide Convention,” Hamilton said. What could be the implications of calling Russian atrocities genocide? Advocates of using the term in the context of Ukraine say it will keep global attention on atrocities there and could result in more aid to Ukrainians and sanctions against Russians. It could also place those documenting atrocities on alert for signs of genocidal intent by Russian forces. But Stanton said he hopes the label will trigger international action that will end the misery well before then. “Genocide” is more likely than other descriptors to catalyze a sense of global urgency, he said. “If you wait till a genocide is over and you have cases in courts, it’s too late, because the genocide is already accomplished,” he said. Maite Fernández Simon contributed to this report. Copyright 2022 The Washington Post

At least 88 were reportedly arrested in connection to violence in the south Indian city of Hubli. By Alisha Rahaman Sarkar Saffron-coloured flags lie outside a mosque the day after clashes in the Jahangirpuri neighbourhood of Delhi (AP) Dozens of people have been arrested after religious violence engulfed parts of India, including the capital Delhi, over the Easter weekend. Violent clashes broke out after a procession celebrating the Hindu festival of Hanuman Jayanti – the birth anniversary of Hindu god Hanuman – allegedly attempted to wave saffron-coloured flags in front of a mosque in north Delhi’s Jahangirpuri area on Saturday. The colour is associated with Hindu nationalist groups in India. Members of the mob were seen brandishing swords and guns, and dancing to religious songs. Some youngsters tried to wave saffron flags in front of a local mosque, leading to stones being thrown on both sides. Gunshots were fired and some vehicles were set ablaze, according to The Wire. Both Hindus and Muslims have accused each other of instigating the violence. The Delhi police, which reports to prime minister Narendra Modi’s Hindu nationalist government, was accused of arbitrarily arresting 23 Muslims, including two juveniles, from the relatively poor neighbourhood following the clashes. After facing a backlash, Delhi police commissioner Rakesh Asthana on Monday said that eight of those arrested have past criminal records. “No one involved will be spared, irrespective of their class, creed and religion,” he said. He also denied reports that some people attempted to hoist saffron flags at the mosque. Hindu religious flags outside a mosque in Jahangirpuri after violence during a Hindu religious procession (EPA) The Jahangirpuri violence was the biggest communal flare-up in Delhi in recent weeks, which is still recovering from the scars of the 2020 riots that killed at least 50 people. Similar religious violence broke out in five states across the country earlier this month during celebrations for the Hindu god Ram, prompting questions about the right-wing weaponising Hindu festivals to target minorities. In the south Indian city of Hubli, a mob attacked police and vandalised public property on Saturday after a derogatory message targeting Muslims spread on WhatsApp, police said. At least 88 people were reportedly arrested in connection to the violence after 12 police officials suffered injuries. “People still gathered near the police station. The mob pelted stones at police, tried to enter the police station and damaged police vehicles,” said Labhu Ram, a senior police official probing the incident. A prohibitory order has been imposed in the city and Karnataka chief minister and leader of the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), Basavaraj Bommai, said action would be taken against the perpetrators of violence. “We have arrested all accused, and further investigation is going on. Action will be taken against the perpetrators after the investigation,” he said, according to news agency ANI. In another incident, riots broke out after a “minor” road accident involving two motorcyclists in the western state of Gujarat on Sunday night. Stones were thrown, a shrine was vandalised and at least 10 vehicles were torched. The local police have arrested 19 people for rioting and three others in connection with the accident. © The Independent 2022