Combating Atrocity Crimes, Crimes Against Humanity and Genocide

Baroness Goudie Excerpts

Thursday 4th June 2026 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Goudie (Lab)]

My Lords, I thank my noble friend Lord Alton for arranging this debate today and for all the work he is doing with us and outside this House. I offer further congratulations on the Private Member’s Bill, which we will all support, as I am sure others will outside this House, too.

Crimes of atrocity are just awful. I have worked on this subject for decades. From the numerous debates, the important conversations in this House and my work as an adviser to the Georgetown Institute for Women, Peace and Security, I have come to know with absolute certainty that atrocity crimes do not start on the day this House or an international community notices them. There are always warning signs, like the targeting of minorities, the silencing of certain groups, dehumanising language, and very often the deliberate use of sexual violence as a weapon of war. The Georgetown Institute’s recent index, which has just been updated, shows the many countries throughout the world where there are signs of this happening.

The question, therefore, is not only how we recognise these crimes but how we use government policy and our global influence to prevent them escalating in the first place. For example, the G20 and the G7 are coming up, where we should be able to insist that this issue is on the agenda. We have an opportunity to put it on the agenda and keep it there.

July last year marked 20 years since we, as the international community, recognised the responsibility to protect, but between 2000 and 2020, at least 37 countries either certainly experienced or were highly likely to experience atrocity crimes of some nature. The world is now witnessing the highest number of armed conflicts. As my noble friend Lord Robertson says, the world is at war; it is witnessing the highest number of crimes since the end of the Second World War. Attacks on civilians and widespread violations of international humanitarian law are brazenly conducted with impunity. We have to do more to protect other countries and to enforce the law through the international courts and the global organisations of which we are a member.

In Ukraine, we know that civilians and children are being targeted and there are reports of abductions of Ukrainian children. In Sudan, the people of Darfur are persecuted and killed based on ethnicity, and there are well-established reports of rape and other forms of sexual violence. In Myanmar, the Rohingyas have suffered grievously; in Afghanistan, women and girls have been erased from public life; and in Gaza the suffering of civilians, especially women and children, is devastating. Unfortunately, this is to name just a few such cases. We have to put pressure on the international community to work against these atrocities.

I welcome the Government’s clear commitment to atrocity prevention, in particular through the work of the conflict and atrocity prevention department, which I hope will not be affected by the redistribution of funds and reorganisation of the FCDO. I welcome the Government’s stated intention to strengthen their ability to identify risks at the earliest possible stage, to uphold international law and to work with international partners to save lives.

Atrocity prevention is not the same as conflict prevention; it requires distinct skills, systems and tools. I hope that Ministers will ensure that our approach is cross-government and that our diplomats, experts, defence teams and specialists all have the training and political support necessary to act urgently, early and coherently. In the months ahead, I hope that Ministers will continue to strengthen a clear, cross-government approach to atrocity prevention. That means ensuring that our diplomats, development experts, defence teams and sanctions specialists have the tools, training and political support they need from the Government to identify risks early and act coherently.

I would like to take a moment to remind the Government that women, peace and security must remain central to the agenda. Women are, of course, both victims and survivors of atrocity crimes, but they are also the route to sustained peace through their work as peacebuilders, human rights defenders, mediators and early-warning actors. We must use their knowledge and expertise to shape our analysis, programming and diplomacy in those countries after peace is established. It is women who understand what is needed in development, health and education and for the long-term future of these countries. We know that where women sign peace agreements, those agreements stay.

I support the proposal advanced by my friend, the noble Baroness, Lady Helic, for a permanent international investigative commission on conflict-related sexual violence. Such a mechanism would help ensure that evidence is gathered properly, survivors are treated with dignity and sexual violence is investigated as a core feature of atrocity crimes, not as an afterthought.