Letter of the IRGC

January 12, 2011.

Dear International Network of Genocide Scholars (INOGS),

The Institute for the Research of Genocide Canada {IRGC} would like to voice concern over the proposed merger of your organization with the International Association of Genocide Scholars (IAGS).[1]

IAGS's membership numbers remain highly questionable and they are certainly not representative of the majority of international scholars. IAGS is an obscure organization led by Prof. William Schabas, an academic who regrettably reduced himself to the position of being a genocide denier.

Please be advised that the IAGS president, Prof. Schabas, offered his expertise to Serbian defendants at the Hague Tribunal, who had been charged with crimes of genocide. His proposed testimony - in which he aimed to deny genocide in Srebrenica - was rejected on the grounds that there were conflicts of interest[2] with specific respect to the close friendship that he enjoyed with the Judges Carmel Agius and Kimberly Prost.[3][4]

In his book, entitled "Genocide in International Law: The Crimes of Crimes" (Cambridge University Press, 2d ed., 2009), Prof. Schabas denies that the killing of Slav citizens under Nazi occupation constituted genocide. The same book denies genocide during the Bosnian war of the 1990's.

We wish to draw attention to the following facts:

[i] That the killings of Serbs by the Ustasha forces and the killings of Bosniaks by the Chetnik forces during World War II were and are, indeed, widely recognized as acts of genocide.

[ii] With respect to the Bosnian war of 1992-1995, three cases were legally validated as genocide; they included:

[a] the Srebrenica massacres (Prosecutor v. Radislav Krstic),

[b] the Doboj massacres (Prosecutor v. Nikola Jorgic), and

[c] the Foca massacres (Prosecutor v. Novislav Djajic).

In 2005, both Houses of the United States Congress passed resolutions asserting that the policies of aggression and the internationally referred to 'ethnic cleansing' as implemented by  Serb and Croatian Ustasha forces in Bosnia and Herzegovina between 1992 and 1995 - including the Srebrenica massacre - constituted genocide.

A leading holocaust researcher, Dr. Robert Jay Lifton - author of several books, including "The Nazi Doctors: Medical Killing and the Psychology of Genocide" and "The Genocidal Mentality: Nazi Holocaust and the Nuclear Threat", agrees that what happened to the Bosniaks "merits the use of the word genocide." He is recipient of a 'Nobel Lectureship', 'the Holocaust Memorial Award' and the 'Gandhi Peace Award'.  Since the 1960s, Dr. Lifton has been internationally recognized for his research into the diverse aspects of genocide.

According to Dr. Lifton,

"What's happening there [in Bosnia and Herzegovina] merits the use of the word 'genocide'. There is an effort to systematically destroy an entire group. It's even been conceptualized by Serbian nationalists as so-called 'ethnic cleansing'. That term signifies mass killing, mass relocation, and that constitutes genocide."[5]

Furthermore, the former leader of the Bosnian Serbs is currently defending himself against charges of genocide in connection with terrible crimes committed in and across 11 Bosnian and Herzegovian municipalities.

After due consideration and with reference to the above text, IRGC ascertains that nothing short of irreparable damage will permeate the credibility of any  organization seriously concerned with genocide, who might decide to merge with this association.

Respectfully,

Professor Emir Ramic

Director IRGC

[1] Letter from Prof. William Schabas, 7 October 2010.

http://www.genocidescholars.org/wp-content/uploads/2010/10/membership-schabas-101006.pdf

[2] ICTY, "Decision on the Admissibility of the Expert Report and Proposed Expert Testimony of Professor Schabas" 1 July 2008 http://www.icty.org/x/cases/popovic/tdec/en/080701.pdf

[3] ICTY, "Decision on the Request for Reconsideration of the Decision on the Admissibility of the Expert Report and Proposed Expert Testimony of Professor Schabas," 30 July 2008.

http://www.icty.org/x/cases/popovic/tdec/en/080730a.pdf

[4] Prosecutor v. Popovic, Pre-Defence Conference, 22 May 2008.

http://www.icty.org/x/cases/popovic/trans/en/080522ED.htm

[5] Toledo Blade, "Slavic Horror Termed Genocide" 28 February 1993.

http://news.google.ca/newspapers?id=rCcxAAAAIBAJ&;sjid=aAMEAAAAIBAJ&pg=6761,7117418&dq