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HRC 53: Alice Wairimu Nderitu USG and SA on Prevention of Genocide - 04 July2023
PREVENTION OF GENOCIDE
The HRC holds an Interactive Dialogue with the Special Adviser of the UN Secretary-General on the Prevention of Genocide, Alice Wairimu Nderitu.
Alice Wairimu Nderitu, Special Adviser to the Secretary-General on the Prevention of Genocide, said while new technologies had connected people, they had also been used for online surveillance and harassment, resulting in an exponential spread of online hate speech, often instrumentalised for political gain, that fomented division, violence, and in the most serious cases, atrocity crimes. The increasing number of migrants and asylum seekers dying in transit, including at sea, constituted risk factors for atrocity crimes. The imperative to prevent genocide was legal and moral. This included acting early on the warning signs and indicators of risk, including violence and discrimination based on identity, hate speech and systematic violations of fundamental rights against civilian populations. The failure to promptly respond to those warning signs allowed genocide to happen. The prevention of genocide and related crimes was closely linked to ensuring accountability. Failure to hold perpetrators accountable and allowing impunity increased the risk of future genocides.
In the discussion on the prevention of genocide, some speakers said 75 years after the adoption of the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, the risks of new genocides still existed. The international community was firmly committed to continue working with national and international partners, including civil society, to realise the promise of the responsibility to protect and to prevent genocide. There were always warning signs before genocide happened, some speakers said. It was typically preceded by discriminatory practices against a national, ethnic, racial or religious group, and patterns of human rights violations and abuses. A proper identification of those signs and a prompt reaction to them, helped by the Secretary-General’s Framework of Analysis for Atrocity Crimes, was an important first step towards preventing genocide. A number of speakers said there was no excuse for the failure to properly address situations where genocide was at risk of occurring.
The UN Office on Genocide Prevention and R2P (Joint Office) is mandated to provide early warning and work to enhance UN capacity to analyze and manage information relating to genocide or other atrocity crimes. As such, the Special Advisers should work to raise awareness of situations at risk of atrocity crimes and provide UN member states and the UN human rights system with targeted recommendations for action.
Alice Wairimu Nderitu of Kenya is Under-Secretary-General and Special Adviser on the Prevention of Genocide. Ms Nderitu is a recognized voice in the field of peacebuilding and atrocity crimes prevention. As mediator of armed conflicts, she served as a member of the African Unions Network of African Women in Conflict Prevention and Mediation (Fem-Wise), the Women Waging Peace Network and Global Alliance of Women Mediators. She contributed to defining the role of women mediators, as one of the few women who are signatories to peace agreements as a mediator.
Statement of Ms. Alice Wairimu Nderitu, Under-Secretary-General and Special Adviser on the Prevention of Genocide, at ID Interactive Dialog on prevention of genocide at the Human Rights Council 53rd session - 04 July 2023
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