Never Again

People come together to call for a stop to the genocide in Darfur

April 21 marked “Yom Hashoah,” which translates from Hebrew as Holocaust Remembrance Day. It is observed each year by Jews around the world to pay tribute to the victims of the Holocaust that occurred during World War II.

More than six million Jews were killed in Nazi concentration camps between 1940 and 1945, a genocide that represented the pinnacle of thousands of years of Jewish persecution. It was also the most systematic destruction of human life in world history. After the war, many countries vowed that they would never again let something like this happen.

Unfortunately, this vow has been broken time and again:

In 1971, the Pakistani military executed hundreds of thousands of civilians as it attempted to quell the Bangladeshi independence movement.

A few years later, more than two million Cambodians were wiped out by agents of the Khmer Rouge, while the rest of the world was preoccupied with the Cold War.

During this same time, Indonesia began its occupation of East Timor and over the course of the next 24 years, killed 150,000 people—nearly one-quarter of its entire population.

In 1988, the Iraqi Kurds were targeted by Saddam Hussein’s government and hundreds of thousands were killed by weapons of mass destruction.

Throughout the 1990s, multiple cases of genocide spread like a disease in the former Yugoslavia as it broke down into separate states, including Bosnia and Kosovo.

I would be remiss if I didn’t mention what remain disputed genocides: the mass killing of Afghan civilians by the Soviet military during the 1980s, the “Red Terror” in Ethiopia and the thousands of innocents who died in the crossfire during the 30-year Guatemalan Civil War.

And then there was Rwanda, arguably the most cold-blooded genocide in history. Recently the country observed the 15th anniversary of the tragedy and once again displayed their remarkable strength and commitment to rebuilding their society.

Currently there are three genocides occurring around the world, in West Sudan (Darfur), Burma and the Democratic Republic of Congo. You could probably up that number to eight or 10 depending on your definition of genocide.

When will the world finally intervene and stop genocide from happening? When will any human suffering become an unacceptable amount of human suffering? When will oceans cease to make these places seem other-worldly? Or too far away to care?

When will we say “never again,” and really mean it?

For more information, please visit: www.genocidewatch.org.

Jonah Kanter
International Youth Coordinator

Free The Children is the largest network of children helping children through education in the world, with more than one million youth involved in our innovative education and development programs in 45 countries. Founded by international child rights activist Craig Kielburger, Free The Children has an established track-record of success, with three nominations for the Nobel Peace Prize and partnerships with the United Nations and Oprah’s Angel Network.