While horrifying images of Boutcha in Ukraine are circulating, of civilians shot dead in the street or in front of their homes, and reports of what looks like executions, are we witnessing genocide, war crimes or crimes against humanity? Since allegations of all kinds are coming out, The duty interviewed an expert to explain what differentiates these crimes, which are the most serious committed against humankind.
Arriving in Boutcha, near kyiv, the Ukrainian president accused Russia of genocide. Is the population the target of this horrible crime?
The evidence does not prove it – at least, not for the moment, judges the professor of law at the University of Ottawa, Muriel Paradelle, specializing in extreme and mass violence. Genocide – described as a “crime of crimes” – occurs when there is a “willingness to eliminate, to eradicate a group” targeted because of its ethnic, national, racial or religious identity, she explains. A recent case in history is that committed against the Tutsis in Rwanda, who were systematically killed for belonging to an ethnic group. In the case of genocide, the end of armed hostilities does not necessarily put an end to the massacres. If with the capitulation of Ukraine all Russian weapons are lowered, this could tend to demonstrate that the goal is not to annihilate this population.
According to the professor, the word “genocide” has been exploited, because when it is mentioned, it arouses “revolt and compassion. It immediately brings to people’s minds all the atrocities committed against the Jews of Europe in World War II and the horror of the concentration camps, she said. If the Russian President uttered it to justify his invasion of Ukraine, the President of Ukraine, Volodymyr Zelensky, presumably did so to force the international community to act. And then, when Vladimir Poutine speaks about genocide on the Russian-speaking and pro-Russian populations of the east of Ukraine, it could not in any case be a question of genocide, since they are also Ukrainians: their affiliations do not do not constitute an identity group because political groups are not covered by the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, she explained.
Are these then war crimes, as Volodymyr Zelensky also claims?
If what we see in the crude images is indeed proven to be the work of the Russians, these would indeed be war crimes, that is to say serious violations of international humanitarian law, replies the law professor . This type of crime can be committed against civilians or combatants, which may be the case when soldiers have surrendered and laid down their arms – in which case they are no longer combatants – and are nevertheless killed or tortured. There are also war crimes when there is use against the population or the opposing army of weapons prohibited by international conventions, such as chemical weapons or cluster munitions.
In the streets of Boutcha, we also saw people killed, in civilian clothes. To attack a civilian population constitutes a war crime, she explains. It is not a question of “collateral damage”, nor of the “blur” that occurs when an army attacks a military target, for example, an ammunition depot, and the explosion kills civilians who live nearby proximity. Moreover, when a civilian takes up arms to defend his family, this does not make him a combatant in the eyes of the law, she said.
On Monday, the Minister of Foreign Affairs, Mélanie Joly, for her part also denounced “crimes against humanity” after the discovery of bodies wearing civilian clothes in Boutcha. Can we say that such crimes have been perpetrated?
Such a crime is proven when it is shown that there was a general or systematic attack against the civilian population, reports the professor. The goal sought by the striker? Terrorize civilians, for example, by bombarding residential areas, where the aggressor knows full well that there are no military targets, forcing the population to flee, and pushing the leader under attack to negotiate. It must also be demonstrated that these attacks are carried out in execution of a plan: no need for a formal plan and in writing, it can be deduced from a range of acts committed on the ground. But for this reason, this crime is much more difficult to prove than the war crime, underlines Ms. Paradelle. And for crimes against humanity, as for genocide, the fact of obeying orders is not a valid defense, recalls the professor.
Who can be brought to justice for these three different crimes?
It is not States, but individuals who can be accused in court. This is as much for the soldier who activated the missile launcher as it is for senior army officers. Thus, Vladimir Putin could be brought into the dock, but not Russia. The UN and some thirty countries, including Canada, have called for an investigation by the International Criminal Court (ICC) for war crimes committed in Ukraine, long before the events in Boutcha. The ICC has also been investigating on Ukrainian soil since the beginning of March.