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In the 20th century, genocides and state mass murder have killed more people than have all wars.
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26 December 2008

To the Editor, The New York Times:

We are genocide scholars gravely concerned about signs of genocide and political murder in Zimbabwe. President Robert Mugabe, through discrimination and terror, has created an economic catastrophe. State-created hyper-inflation has caused famine, though not for Mugabe's partisans. Now cholera is sweeping a country that lacks medicines.
Mugabe's troops committed genocide in 1983 in Matabeleland. Mugabe is now committing genocide by attrition, which falls under Article 2(c) of the UN Genocide Convention: "Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction, in whole or in part." Mugabe's apparent intention is to destroy his political and ethnic enemies in Zimbabwe.
In 2005, Mugabe called slum dwellers "garbage." An estimated 700,000 were forcibly removed in Operation Murambatsvina ("Clean Out the Garbage").
Now children searching through garbage for food catch cholera. Merely drinking tap water can be deadly. The UN Children's Fund estimates that there are 24,000 cases of cholera in Zimbabwe, with over 1100 deaths so far.
The United Nations Security Council should refer Robert Mugabe to the International Criminal Court for crimes against humanity, and recognize the winners of the last free election in Zimbabwe in March 2008 as the legitimate representatives of Zimbabwe's people.
Can anyone trust a President who claims that "Zimbabwe is mine"?

Professor Gregory H. Stanton, J.D., Ph.D.
President, The International Association of Genocide Scholars
President, Genocide Watch
POB 809
Washington, DC 20044
703-448-0222
IAGSPresident@aol.com
Genocidewatch@aol.com

Dr. Helen Fein, Ph.D.
Executive Director, The Institute for the Study of Genocide
John Jay College of Criminal Justice
899 Tenth Avenue, Room 325
New York, NY 10019
617-354-2785
feinhelen@comcast.net

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