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Ethnic Cleansing In WW1

1250 Words5 Pages

During 1991-1995, war raged on between Yugoslavia and Croatia. Croatia filed a lawsuit in 1991 against Serbia for committing genocide against, which was a remnant of Yugoslavia along with Montenegro. The lawsuit was filed in the highest UN court, The International Court of Justice, where the hearings took place for Croatia’s claim that Serbia committed genocide towards Croatians and also Serbia’s counterclaim that Croatia committed genocide against its own citizens. Both lawsuits were dismissed because there wasn 't sufficient evidence to prove that they committed genocide. There needs to be a specific intent that they in fact did commit genocide, also genocide is a severe crime to prove in the International Court of Justice.The …show more content…

“What is generally is ethnic cleansing does not constitute genocide” - Judge Tomka This shows that, Judge Tomka believes that ethnic cleansing doesn’t mean it’s essentially genocide. The definition for ethnic cleansing is “the mass expulsion or killing of members of an unwanted ethnic or religious group in a society.” The definition for genocide is “the deliberate killing of a large group of people, especially those of a particular ethnic group or nation.”Furthermore, ethnic cleansing is to get rid of certain people or groups while genocide is specifically targeting certain groups and …show more content…

The court ruled that neither side had committed genocide but stopped short of declaring Serbia guilty for genocide. “In 2007 it ruled that genocide had taken place in only one instance, in Srebrenica, in 1995, when 8,000 Bosniak men and boys were murdered in a few days.” This shows that, genocidal acts were committed throughout the war.Furthermore, the lives of males were lost in Srebrenica, but the people were from Bosnia, not Croatia.“Significantly it ruled that Serbia, as a state, as opposed to Bosnian Serb leaders, was not guilty of this crime, though Serbia was faulted for not having prevented it.” This shows that, Serbia was not found guilty of the crime.Furthermore, Serbia could have and should have prevented for letting the genocidal act happen.A genocidal act did happen but it was not against Croatia. Serbia was not found responsible for the act but they could 've prevented it from

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