Genocide Determination Bill [HL]

Lord Mann Excerpts

2nd reading
Friday 28th October 2022 Lords Chamber

[Lord Mann (Non-Afl)]

My Lords, I am very supportive of the direction of travel of the noble Lord, Lord Alton, and, as he knows, of his detailed work in this area. I therefore support the principle of the Bill, but a lot of the detail poses difficult dilemmas. I think the noble Lord himself referred to the 2007 ICC ruling, which highlights the dilemmas when using the term and concept of genocide.

What was determined in 1948 needs—this is not an issue for the British Government per se—further refinement in the modern era. The kind of example I would cite is an attempt by a state to eradicate a religion, or a language, or perhaps both together. There are many techniques that could be used these days to do that, but which do not necessarily involve the mass murder of or attempt to exterminate either a population or a section of it. But the invidious nature of such genocide, as it would be accurately described, is still there.

In recent times, Philippe Sands, on looking at the definitions used in the Nuremberg trials, rather brilliantly illustrated the differential background arguments between the concepts of genocide and of crimes against humanity. Conceptually, for most people they would be the same, but in terms of what action is taken they can have very different targets and consequences. What is happening in Russia falls within that, from my perspective. Is it a war crime? Is a crime against humanity? Is it a mass atrocity? Is it genocide? There are differences between those. The fact that language is used loosely is a danger. The nationalising—and the internationalising—of the issue is a danger. There are ways of bridging the gap, but doing so can weaken the international to the national. Mr Raab is now in post, but hopefully he will not attempt to remove us from the European Convention on Human Rights. There is a principle within it that, if you nationalise these issues, it gives the green light to others to nationalise them. We may be capable of doing so on a rational, unbiased and impartial basis, but not all states will be.

Let us consider the targets of genocide. Let us consider the Armenians, who have a genocide centre where there will be a big conference in the near future. They have very eloquently argued their case that what happened to the Armenians a hundred or so years ago was a genocide. It is easier to do if you are a nation state than if you are, say, the Batwa. I have not heard the Batwa raised very often but, statistically, the elimination of the Batwa population across Africa is so extraordinarily all-encompassing that it defeats anything else, numerically. But I have seen no evidence that the Batwa have ever attempted to have a nation state; they have dwindled in number because they have been fair game for mass atrocities by virtually everybody, in huge numbers. Is that recognised as a genocide? What is then to be done about that?

The detail here is critical. Removing us from the convention would be foolhardy, and I am sure the Minister will want to discreetly talk to his colleague Mr Raab. The European Convention on Human Rights was part of the same systems determined at the time of the genocide convention; it came from the same ethos—Churchill knew what he was doing. I hope that this will go forward and that the Minister will use his great influence on other matters.