What must be proven to establish that genocide occurred?

To establish that genocide has occurred under international law, it must be proven that specific acts were committed with the intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial, or religious group as such.12

Required Elements

The Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide and the Rome Statute define genocide through two primary components:

• Specific Intent (Mens Rea): The perpetrator must act with the deliberate intent to destroy a protected group because of its identity. This "intentionality clause" is the primary factor distinguishing genocide from other crimes against humanity, which do not require this specific motive.12
• Prohibited Acts (Actus Reus): The commission of one or more of the following acts:
  • Killing members of the group.1
  • Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group.12
  • Deliberately inflicting conditions of life calculated to bring about the group's physical destruction.12
  • Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group.12
  • Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group.12

Establishing this intent can be difficult, as perpetrators rarely admit to genocidal motives. However, legal experts argue that a pattern of purposeful action leading to the destruction of a significant part of the targeted group is sufficient to establish genocidal intent.3