THE CRIME OF GENOCIDE AND POTENTIAL NEW INTERNATIONAL CRIMES

Abstract

The crime of genocide was first defined by the Genocide Convention (1948), and this definition was subsequently repeated in the statutes of international criminal courts. However, in the legislation of individual states and in the practice of international criminal tribunals, there is a tendency to expand this crime so that acts such as torture, mass rape, and others are also considered genocide. This is unacceptable, as it may lead to various abuses and undermines the distinct gravity of genocide. It would be much better and more useful to distinct such crimes – crimes against humanity, which in some ways resemble genocide – as separate international criminal offenses, and even introduce completely new criminal offenses. This paper examines the place of genocide among other criminal offenses, points to the tendency to expand the concept of genocide, and considers potential new international criminal offenses. Some of these have already been criminalized in some way (such as sexual crimes and ethnic cleansing), but it would be useful to give them a new identity and independence by regulating them under a dedicated universal convention. Others are known mainly only in academic literature (such as ethnocide, democide, massacre, ecocide, biocide). The author also offers his proposal for a new crime of humanicide, by which he means the extermination of the entire human race or a significant part of it (i.e., the vast majority of people).