Intent to destroy an ethnic group: a failed promise of in Dubio Pro Reo?

Abstract

" ... the crime of genocide is singled out for special condemnation and opprobrium. The crime is horrific in its scope; its perpetrators identify entire human groups for extinction. Those who devise and implement genocide seek to deprive humanity of the manifold richness its nationalities, races, ethnicities and religions provide. This is a crime against all of humankind, its harm being felt not only by the group targeted for destruction, but by all of humanity ... "2 The year 1948 brought with it the Convention on the Prevention on Punishment of the crime of Genocide (hereinafter the Convention), the first form of codification of law with regards to the crime of genocide.3 Subsequent statutes like the Rome Statute4, the ICTR statute5 and the ICTY statute 6 borrow the language put down in the Convention verbatim. Naturally, one would conclude that the considerations and conclusions of the drafters of the Genocide Convention were indeed the most universally accepted such that subsequent drafters adopted their language almost entirely.7