Genocide of indigenous peoples is the genocidal destruction of indigenous peoples, understood as ethnic minorities whose territory has been occupied by colonial expansion or the formation of a nation state,^{[Note 1]} by a dominant political group such as a colonial power or a nation state.^[1]

While the concept of genocide was only formulated by Raphael Lemkin in the late 20th century, the occurrence of acts of genocidal violence against indigenous groups have frequently taken place in the Americas, Australia, Africa and Asia with the expansion of various European colonial powers such as the Spanish and British empires, and the subsequent establishment of Nation States on indigenous territory.^[2] According to Lemkin colonization was in itself "intrinsically genocidal". He saw this genocide as a two stage process, the first being the destruction of the indigenous populations way of life. The second, is the newcomers imposing their way of life on the minority group.^[3][4] Imperial and colonial forms of genocide have taken two basic forms, either through the deliberate clearing of territories of their original inhabitants in order to make them exploitable for purposes of resource extraction or colonial settlements, but also through enlisting indigenous peoples as forced laborers in colonial or imperialist projects of resource extraction.^[5] It is often controversial whether specific events should or should not be considered genocidal.^[6]

Some commentators argue that another form of genocide that should be recognized is Cultural genocide (sometimes called ethnocide) where the people are not killed but prevented from perpetuating their group identity by prohibiting them from practicing the cultural and religious practices that are the basis for their distinct identity, such as the Chinese have been accused of doing during the occupation of Tibet.^[7][8][9]

Genocide debate

The concept of Genocide was defined in 1944 by Raphael Lemkin, after World War II it was adopted by the United Nations in 1948.

For Lemkin genocide was broadly and included all attempts to destroy a specific ethnic group whether strictly physical through mass killings or whether cultural or psychological through oppression, and destruction of indigenous ways of life.^{[Note 2]}

The UN definition of Genocide which is the one used in International Law, is narrower than Lemkin's definition and states that: "...any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, as such:

(a) Killing members of the group;

(b) Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group;

(c) Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part;

(d) Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group;

(e) Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group. Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, Article 2"

However, most attempts to define specific events as genocidal are disputed to various degrees, with some arguing for or against a specific event being an example of genocide - this is even more prevalent when the victims are minority groups such as indigenous peoples and the alleged perpetrator is a modern nation state rather than a colonial empire. In these cases the question of whether something is or is not genocide is a legal question to be settled in International human rights courts.

When discussing historical cases where legal liability is no longer in question historians also debate whether specific events in the past should or should not be described as genocide. In such discussions the UN definition is not necessarily used, and often a broader definition such as Lemkin's which sees colonialist violence against indigenous peoples as inherently genocidal. For example, in the case of the colonization of the Indigenous peoples of the Americas where 90% of the indigenous population was wiped out in the 500 years from the beginning of European colonization, many argue that because the main factor in the population decline was disease introduced sometimes deliberately but more often without intent, this should not be considered genocide. Others counter that because large part of the colonization of the Americas was aimed at systematically exploiting, removing and destroying specific ethnic groups the process should be recognized as genocide in spite of the fact that the greater part of the actual deaths were due to disease and not violence. Westward expansion of the Eastern states of America being a given example.^[10][11] In such cases some scholars argue that intent is not necessary and that genocide may be the cumulative result of minor conflicts in which settlers, or colonial or state agents perpetrate violence against minority groups^[1], and some argue that the fact that the dire consequences of European diseases among many New World populations were exacerbated by different forms of genocidal violence and that intentional and unintentional deaths cannot easily be separated.^[12][13]

Pre-1948 examples

In the 16th century, the expansion of the European empires led to the conquering of the Americas, Africa, Australasia and Asia. This period of expansion saw massacres, systematic annihilation and genocide in several instances. Many of the indigenous peoples such as the Yuki, Beothuk the Pallawah and Herero, were brought to the brink of extinction and in some cases entire tribes were completely annihilated.^[14][15] The expansion of the Zulu under Shaka was marked by genocide: it is estimated that up to one million died in what has come to be called, the Great Crushing which was a result of the expansionist policies of the Zulu;^[16] by the middle of the 1840s, the regions between the rivers of Thuleka and Mzimvubu had been virtually depopulated.^[17]

Portuguese colonial expansion in Africa and Brazil

Genocide against the indigenous peoples began during the Portuguese colonization of the Americas, started in 1549 by Pedro Álvares Cabral on the coast of what is now the country of Brazil. It has continued into the modern era with the ongoing destruction of the Jivaro, Yanomami and other tribes.^[18][19] Over 80 indigenous tribes were destroyed between 1900 and 1957, and of a population of over one million during this period 80% had been killed through disease, deculturalization or murder.^[20]

Spanish colonization of the Americas

Such was the brutality in the Caribbean by the Spanish during their conquest of the Americas, and the systematic annihilation occurring on the Caribbean islands, Dominican friar Bartolomé de las Casas wrote Brevísima relación de la destrucción de las Indias in 1552. Las Casas wrote that on the Spanish colony of Hispaniola the indigenous population had been reduced by over 80%,^[21] and his works gave rise to the name "Leyenda Negra" (Black Legend).^[22] It is estimated that up to eight million died during the Spanish conquest of the Americas.^[23]

With the initial conquest of the Americas completed, the Spanish implemented the Encomienda system. In theory, this system was to help convert the indigenous peoples to Christianity, but actually lead to the conquerors acquiring further lands and more slaves. Though the Spaniards did not set out with the intent to exterminate the indigenous peoples, believing the supply to be inexhaustible, their actions lead to the complete annihilation of entire tribes such as the Arawak.^[24] In the 1760s, an expedition despatched to fortify California, led by Gaspar de Portolà and Junípero Serra was marked by slavery, forced conversions and genocide through the introduction of disease.^[25]

British Empire

The British Empire has been accused of several genocides.^[26] The doctrine of terra nullius was used by the British to justify their seizure of territory in Australia and Tasmania. The destruction of the 3,000–15,000 Aboriginal Tasmanians has been called an act of genocide.^[27][28]

United States colonization, westward expansion, and Indian Removal

In the late 16th century, England, France, Spain and the Netherlands launched colonization efforts in the part of North America that is now the United States.^[29] In the Americas as a whole, between 1492 (when Christopher Columbus arrived) and 1650, it is estimated that the indigenous population of the hemisphere fell by 80% (from around 50 million in 1492 to eight million in 1650.)^[30] The United States was formed in the late 18th century by a large part of the English-North American colonists, and over the ensuing century it spread west, often in conflict with remaining indigenous peoples, as well as the English and Spanish.

The United States has not been legally admonished by the international community for genocidal acts against its indigenous population, but many commentators and academics argue that events such as The Trail of Tears, the Sand Creek Massacre and the Mendocino War were genocidal in nature.^[31] The colonists and settlers of the United States justified their actions towards the Native American tribes through their use of biblical scripture, such as Samuel 15:3.^{[Note 3]} The settlers viewed the indigenous population as Canaanites and Hittites who needed to be driven out and exterminated. They viewed the territory of the Pequot, Narragansetts, Tsalagi and the Sioux as a "promised land" and as the settlers were God's chosen people, the indigenous tribes had no rights, and the settlers were only doing gods will.^[32]

American Indian Wars

During the American Indian Wars, the American Army carried out a number of massacres and forced relocations of Indigenous peoples that are sometimes considered an example of genocide. An example of a genocidal massacre that even caused outrage in its own time was the Sand Creek Massacre. General John Chivington lead a 700-man force of Colorado Territory militia in a massacre of 70–163 peaceful Cheyenne and Arapaho – about two-thirds of whom were women, children, and infants. Chivington and his men took scalps and other body parts as battle trophies, including human fetuses and male and female genitalia.^[33] In defense of his actions Chivington stated,

Damn any man who sympathizes with Indians! ... I have come to kill Indians, and believe it is right and honorable to use any means under God's heaven to kill Indians. ... Kill and scalp all, big and little; nits make lice.

— - Col. John Milton Chivington, U.S. Army^[34]

In 1867 General Philip Sheridan was appointed by President Grant to "pacify" the Indians of the plains, and his approach to the Indians was encapsulated in the saying "The only good Indian is a dead Indian", although he himself denied having said this when criticized by his political opponents.^[35]

Colonization of Australia, New Zealand and Tasmania

Lemkin himself and most comparative scholars of genocide and many general historians, such as Robert Hughes, Ward Churchill, Leo Kuper and Jared Diamond, basing their analysis on previously published histories, present the extinction of the Tasmanian Aborigines as a text book example of a genocide.^[36] The Australian historian of genocide, Ben Kiernan, in his recent history of the concept and practice, Blood and soil: a world history of genocide and extermination from Sparta to Darfur, (2007) treats the Australian evidence over the first century of colonization as an example of genocide.^[37] Similarly the Australian practice of removing the children of Australian Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander descent from their families, has been described as genocidal.^[38][39]

Rubber Boom in Congo and Putumayo

From 1879 to 1912 the world experience a rubber boom during which rubber prices skyrocketed and it became increasingly profitable to extract rubber from rainforest zones in South America and Central Africa. Rubber extraction was labor intenstive and the need for a large workforce had a significant negative effect on the indigenous population across Brazil, Peru, Ecuador and Columbia and in the Congo. The owners of the plantations or rubber barons were rich, but those who collected the rubber made very little as a large amount of rubber was needed to be profitable. Rubber barons rounded up all the Indians and forced them to tap rubber out of the trees. One plantation started with 50,000 Indians and when discovered of the killings, only 8,000 were still alive. Slavery and gross human rights abuses were widespread, and in some areas 90% of the Indian population was wiped out. These rubber plantations were part of the Brazilian rubber market which declined as rubber plantations in Southeast Asia became more effective.^[40]

Roger Casement, an Irishman travelling the Putumayo region of Peru as a British consul during 1910-1911 documented the abuse, slavery, murder and use of stocks for torture against the native Indians: ^[41]

"The crimes charged against many men now in the employ of the Peruvian Amazon Company are of the most atrocious kind, including murder, violation, and constant flogging."

Congo Free State

It is estimated that under Leopold II of Belgium in the Congo Free State there was a population loss of sixty percent.^[42]

Herero and Namaqua genocide

The mass killings and extreme violence against the indigenous African population by the German colonial empire can be dated to the earliest German settlements on the continent. It was reported that, between 1885 and 1918, the indigenous population in German South-West Africa (GSWA), Togo, German East Africa (GEA) and the Cameroons suffered from genocide, starvation, forced relocation for use as labour and of being incarcerated in concentration camps. The German Empire also carried out atrocities in their colonies in Samoa and New Guinea.^[43] The German Empire's action in GSWA against the Herero tribe is considered by Howard Ball to be the first genocide of the 20th century.^[44] After the Herero, Namaqua and Damara began an uprising against the colonial government,^[45] General Lothar von Trotha, appointed as head of the German forces in GSWA by Emperor Wilhelm II in 1904, gave the order for the German forces to push them into the desert where they would die.^[46] In 2004, the German state apologised for the genocide.^[47] While many argue that the military campaign in Tanzania to suppress the Maji Maji Rebellion in GEA between 1905 and 1907 was not an act of genocide, as the military did not have as an intentional goal the deaths of hundreds of thousands of Africans, according to Dominik J. Schaller, the statement ^{[Note 4]} released at the time by Governor Gustav Adolf von Götzen did not exculpate him from the charge of genocide, but was proof that the German administration knew what their scorched earth methods would result in.^[48] It is estimated that between 200,000 and 500,000 Africans died as a result of the campaign with some areas completely and permanently devoid of human life.^[49][50]

Contemporary examples

The genocide of indigenous tribes is still an ongoing feature in the modern world, given examples such as in Brazil, with the ongoing destruction of the Jivaro, Yanomami and other tribes.^[19] The states actions in Bangladesh, against the Jumma have been described internationally as ethnic cleansing and genocide.^[51][52][53] Paraguay has also been accused of carrying out a genocide against the Aché whose case was brought before the Inter-American Human Rights Commission. The commission gave a provisional ruling that genocide had not been committed by the state, but did express concern over "possible abuses by private persons in remote areas of the territory of Paraguay."^[54]

Bangladesh

In Bangladesh, the persecution of the indigenous tribes of the Chittagong Hill Tracts such as the Chakma, Marma, Tripura and others who are mainly Buddhists, Hindus, Christians, and Animists, has been described as genocidal.^{[55][56][57][58][59]} The Chittagong Hill Tracts are located bordering India, Myanmar and the Bay of Bengal, and is the home to 500,000 indigenous people. The perpetrators of are the Bangladeshi military and the Bengali Muslim settlers, who together have burned down Buddhist and Hindu temples, killed many Chakmas, and carried out a policy of gang-rape against the indigenous people. There are also accusations of Chakmas being forced to convert to Islam, many of them children who have been abducted for this purpose. The conflict started soon after Bangladeshi independence in 1972 when the Constitution imposed Bengali as the sole official language, Islam as the state religion - with no cultural or linguistic rights to minority populations. Subsequently the government encouraged and sponsored massive settlement by Bangladeshis in region, which changed the demographics from 98 percent indigenous in 1971 to fifty percent by 2000. The government allocated a full third of the Bangladeshi military to the region to support the settlers, sparking a protracted guerilla war between Hill tribes and the military.^[56] During this conflict which officially ended in 1997, and in the subsequent period, a large number of human rights violations against the indigenous peoples have been reported, with violence against indigenous women being particularly extreme.^[60]

Brazil

In the late 1950s until 1968, the state of Brazil submitted their indigenous peoples of Brazil to violent attempts to integrate, pacify and acculturate their communities. In 1967 public prosecutor Jader de Figueiredo Correia, submitted the Figueiredo Report to the dictatorship which was then ruling the country, the report which ran to seven thousand pages was not released until 2013. The report documents genocidal crimes against the indigenous peoples of Brazil, including mass murder, torture and bacteriological and chemical warfare, reported slavery, and sexual abuse The rediscovered documents are being examined by the National Truth Commission who have been tasked with the investigations of human rights violations which occurred in the periods 1947 through to 1988. The report reveals that the IPS had enslaved indigenous people, tortured children and stolen land. The Truth Commission is of the opinion that entire tribes in Maranhão were completely eradicated and in Mato Grosso, an attack on thirty Cinturão Largo left only two survivors. The report also states that landowners and members of the IPS had entered isolated villages and deliberately introduced smallpox. Of the one hundred and thirty four people accused in the report the state has as yet not tried a single one.^[61] The report also detailed instances of mass killings, rapes and torture, Figueiredo stated that the actions of the IPS had left the indigenous peoples near extinction. The state abolished the IPS following the release of the report. The Red Cross launched an investigation after further allegations of ethnic cleansing were made after the IPS had been replaced. ^[62][63]

Colombia

In the protracted conflict in Colombia, indigenous groups such as the Awá, Wayuu, Pijao and Paez people have become subjected to intense violence by right-wing paramilitaries, leftist guerrillas, and the Colombian army.^[64][65] Drug cartels, international resource extraction companies and the military also use violence to force the indigenous groups out of their territories.^[66][67][68] The National Indigenous Organization of Colombia argues that the violence is genocidal in nature, but others question whether there is a "genocidal intent" as required in international law.^[69][70]

Congo (DRC)

In the Democratic Republic of Congo genocidal violence against the indigenous Mbuti, Lese and Ituri peoples has been endemic for decades. During the Congo Civil War (1998–2003), Pygmies were hunted down and eaten by both sides in the conflict, who regarded them as subhuman.^[71] Sinafasi Makelo, a representative of Mbuti pygmies, has asked the UN Security Council to recognize cannibalism as a crime against humanity and also as an act of genocide.^[72] According to a report by Minority Rights Group International there is evidence of mass killings, cannibalism and rape. The report, which labeled these events as a campaign of extermination, linked much of the violence to beliefs about special powers held by the Bambuti.^[73] In Ituri district, rebel forces ran an operation code-named "Effacer le tableau" (to wipe the slate clean). The aim of the operation, according to witnesses, was to rid the forest of pygmies.^[74][75][76]

East Timor

Guatemala

During the Guatemalan Civil War (1960 - 1996) the state forces carried out violent atrocities against the [[Maya peoples|Maya]. The government considered the Maya to be aligned with the communist insurgents, which they sometimes were but often were not. Guatemalan armed forces carried out three genocidal campaigns. The first was a scorched earth policy which was also accompanied by mass killing, including the forced conscription of Mayan boys into the military where they were sometimes forced to participate in massacres against their own home villages. The second was to hunt down and exterminate those who had survived and evaded the army and the third was the forced relocation of survivors to "reeducation centers" and the continued pursuit of those who had fled into the mountains.^[77] The armed forces used genocidal rape of women and children as a deliberate tactic. Children were bludgeoned to death by beating them against walls or thrown alive into mass graves were they would be crushed by the weight of the adult dead thrown atop them.^[78] An estimated 200,000 people, most of them Maya, disappeared during the Guatemalan Civil War.^[76] After the 1996 peace accords a legal process was begun to determine the legal responsibility of the atrocities, and to locate and identify the disappeared. In 2013 former president Efraín Ríos Montt was convicted of genocide and crimes against humanity, and was sentenced to 80 years imprisonment.^[79] Ten days later, the Constitutional Court of Guatemala overturned the conviction.^[80][81]

Irian Jaya

Myanmar

In Myanmar (Burma), the long running civil war between the Military Junta and the insurgents has resulted in widespread genocidal atrocities against the indigenous Karen people some of whom are allied with the insurgents.^[82] Burmese General Maung Hla stated that one day Karen would only exist "in a museum"^[83] The government has deployed 50 battalions in the Northern sector systematically attacking Karen villages with mortar and machine gun fire, and landmines. At least 446,000 Karen have been displaced from their homes by the military.^[82][84] Karen are also reported to have been be subjected to forced labor, genocidal rape, child labor and the conscription of child soldiers.^[85]

Paraguay

There are 17 indigenous tribes who live primarily in the Chaco region of Paraguay. In 2002, their numbers were estimated at 86,000. During the period between 1954 and 1989, when the military dictatorship of General Alfredo Stroessner ruled Paraguay, the indigenous population of the country suffered from more loss of territory and human rights abuses than at any other time in the nation's history. In early 1970, international groups claimed that the state was complicit in the genocide of the Aché, with charges ranging from kidnapping and the sale of children, withholding medicines and food, slavery and torture.^[86] During the 1960s and 1970s, 85% of the Aché tribe died, often hacked to death with machetes, in order to make room for the timber industry, mining, farming and ranchers.^[18] According to Jérémie Gilbert, the situation in Paraguay has proven that it is difficult to provide the proof required to show "specific intent", in support of a claim that genocide had occurred. The Aché, whose cultural group is now seen as extinct, fell victim to development by the state who had promoted the exploration of their territories by transnational companies for natural resources. Gilbert concludes that although a planned and voluntary destruction had occurred, it is argued by the state that there was no intent to destroy the Aché, as what had happened was due to development and was not a deliberate action.^[87][88]

Phillipines

Footnotes

References

Bibliography