Twenty-eight years ago today, the Rwandan Genocide started, which would see as many as 800,000 people, mostly of the Tutsi minority, murdered over a period of 100 days. Assistant Dean Phillip Drew, Law’00, LLM’12, was deployed to that country as the intelligence officer for the Canadian UN peacekeeping contingent and the Force Commander, General Roméo Dallaire. Recently, Drew and three of his Australian academic colleagues published Rwanda Revisited: Genocide, Civil War, and the Transformation of International Law (BRILL), a co-edited book of articles contributed by leading international experts on Rwanda and the genocide. Assistant Dean Drew explains how lessons learned from Rwanda can apply to Russia’s actions in Ukraine.

In 1994, the world was witness to two concurrent genocides: one was in the Balkan republics of Serbia, Croatia, and Bosnia and Herzegovina (the former Yugoslavia); and the other was in Rwanda. At the time these conflicts started there was no international criminal court, leaving the perception that there was no way of holding individuals accountable for violations of international law. It was a period in which perpetrators believed they could operate with impunity. Our book shows that if we do not have effective deterrents for individual behavior in international law, some will believe that they can violate international laws and norms without fear of punishment. The 1994 events that resulted in the creation of the Rwanda and Yugoslav Tribunals, and ultimately the International Criminal Court, demonstrated to the world that when there is a will to act at the international level, those who commit war crimes, crimes against humanity, and genocide can and will be punished.

Currently, in the case of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, we are witnessing war crimes and crimes against humanity at a scale that has not been seen in Europe since the end of the Second World War. In spite of Russia being a signatory to the Geneva Conventions and Additional Protocol One, its military has been conducting relentless and indiscriminate attacks against civilians and civilian property, including the utter destruction of the city of Mariupol, deliberate attacks against civilians taking refuge in shelters, and interference with humanitarian relief efforts. The images of civilians who have been murdered with their hands tied behind their backs revive vivid memories from my experience in Rwanda, and leaves me wondering how anyone can engage in, or permit their soldiers to engage in, such heinous and senseless murder. This level of depravity is shocking. 

On March 2, the Prosecutor for the International Criminal Court announced that his office will investigate allegations of war crimes, crimes against humanity, or genocide committed on any part of the territory of Ukraine by any person.  The investigations and potential prosecution of war crimes in Ukraine by the International Criminal Court will be incredibly important to the reputation and continuation of international criminal law. Hopefully those who are responsible for crimes against humanity and war crimes in Ukraine will be brought to justice, just as those who perpetrated the Rwandan Genocide 28 years ago ultimately were. 

Phillip Drew, who holds a JD and an LLM from Queen’s and a Doktor der Rechte (PhD in Law) from Frankfurt-Oder is the Assistant Dean of Juris Doctor and Graduate Studies at Queen’s Law and is an Honorary Associate Professor at the Australian National University College of Law. He spent 31 years in the Canadian Armed Forces as an Intelligence Officer and a Legal Officer.