CRIME OF GENOCIDE BEFORE THE INTERNATIONAL COURT OF JUSTICE

Authors

  • Vesna Crnić Grotić University of Rijeka, Faculty of Law, Rijeka

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.30925/zpfsr.40.3.3

Keywords:

Genocide Convention; International Court of Justice; Bosnian genocide case; Croatia; Serbia

Abstract

When Mr. Raphael Lemkin invented the term genocide in 1944 he was trying to fill the void in the existing list of international crimes because, in his view, none of them was appropriate to address the terrible mass atrocities of World War II. The mass extermination of Jews, Gypsies, Slavs and other groups should have been different from “ordinary” crimes against humanity. His fight led to the adoption of the UN Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide in 1948. Although the Convention was primarily designed to punish
individual perpetrators, States parties can also be held responsible for the same crime. The reference in Article IX of the Convention to the jurisdiction of the International Court of Justice clearly shows in that direction. However, the first case appearing before that court was the case of Bosnia v. Serbia in 1993 and the Court made its ruling on the merits in 2007. The following ruling concerned the case of Croatia v. Serbia in 2015. Neither of the final rulings established the responsibility of the respondent state for genocide, although the crime had been
established in the case of Bosnia. The article will look into the requirements for the genocide to be established and what was the missing link between the crime and the defendant state.

Additional Files

Published

2020-09-25

How to Cite

Crnić Grotić, V. (2020). CRIME OF GENOCIDE BEFORE THE INTERNATIONAL COURT OF JUSTICE. Collected Papers of the Law Faculty of the University of Rijeka, 40(3), 1033–1049. https://doi.org/10.30925/zpfsr.40.3.3