Academy Director Professor Dr Christoph Safferling was invited by the UN Special Adviser on the Prevention of Genocide, Alice Wairimu Nderitu to speak at the official “Event to mark the 75th Anniversary of the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide and the International Day of Commemoration and Dignity of the Victims of the Crime of Genocide and of the Prevention of this Crime“. The event was held at the United Nations in New York on 8 December 2023.
Under the heading “A Living Force in World Society: The Legacy of the 1948 Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide” Professor Safferling participated in the first panel on the issue of accountability, next to the Chief Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court, Karim A.A. Kahn and the two members of the Nuremberg Academy’s Advisory Counsel, the President of the Assembly of States to the Rome Statute, Silvia Fernández de Gurmendi, and Prosecutor of the International Residual Mechanism for Criminal Tribunals, Serge Brammertz.
Professor Safferling pointed to the fact and explained why the crime of genocide had not been included in the Charter of the International Military Tribunal at Nuremberg in 1945. It nevertheless was confirmed as being an international crime on the same day the Nuremberg Principles were confirmed by the UN General Assembly. Today, Professor Safferling added, it is important to focus on human rights education, capacity building for domestic criminal justice systems and the prevention of genocide denial and incitement to genocide in order to avoid further attacks on national, ethnical, racial or religious groups. The Nuremberg Academy stays committed to contribute to these fields and thus help to punish and prevent genocide. (The video of the entire event can be found here) (cs)
©Photo: UN SA Prevention of Genocide