Ethnic Cleansing and the Responsibility to Protect
In a series of cases involving the war in Yugoslavia, notably at Srebrenica in 1992 and at Kozarac in 1993, the phrase ‘ethnic cleansing’ has been used to describe the violent and terror-inspiring tactics employed by one group against another to force its members to flee. This compulsion to flee may in itself constitute additional human rights violations and crimes including rape and sexual violence, murder, arbitrary detention, and the violation of the right to return (see ICTY First Interim Report paras 55-57). Ethnic cleansing is a gross violation of international law.
Although it has been criticized as a euphemism for genocide and thereby might hinder adequate public recognition of ongoing mass atrocities, the term ethnic cleansing has largely become accepted by international actors. The inclusion of ethnic cleansing in the ambit of the responsibility to protect represents a significant normative shift in attitude towards this practice.
The term has been defined rather broadly and encompasses any policy intended by a dominant ethnic or religious group to remove, by force or terror-inspiring means, the population of the other groups from specific geographic areas. It has also been interpreted to cover any forcible transfer irrespective of whether it occurs within or outside a State.
However, the definition seems to leave room for a number of indirect discriminatory measures which might not necessarily meet the threshold of ethnic cleansing. The ICJ has noted that the concept of ethnic cleansing is open to more than just physical removal such as ‘forcible displacement by other means which might include the prohibition of ethnic associations or the use of the minority language; economic restrictions such as restrictions on work, housing, access to food, medical services and medicine; political violence including pogroms’ (J. Preece, ‘Ethnic Cleansing as an Instrument of Nation-State Creation: Changing State Practices and Evolving Legal Norms’ (1998) 20 HumRtsQ 817).
