Ireland urged to lead fight to save persecuted Christians

Irish lawmakers have been urged to take the lead in pushing for Islamist persecution of Christians and other minorities in the Middle East to be formally declared as a genocide.

Fianna Fáil foreign affairs spokesperson Brendan Smith told The Irish Catholic that politicians and governments cannot use the excuse that they are unaware of the targeted attacks carried out by so-called Islamic State. “The whole world knows about it… we’re not living in an era where you only learn about atrocities post the committing of them – we’re up to date with the atrocities”.

Britain became the latest country where MPs voted to define the ISIS campaign against Christians, Yazidis and other minorities as a genocide. The House of Commons voted unanimously to adopt the motion.

Mr Smith now wants Ireland to use its international influence to have the United Nations refer the issue to the International Criminal Court meaning that countries would have a responsibility to prevent and punish the genocidal attacks.

Genocide

“There would be no point in having these atrocities declared as genocide 20 years from now,” Mr Smith said in a Dáil debate on the issue, continuing, “Such a declaration should be made now.”

Dromore’s Bishop John McAreavey, Chairman of the Church’s Council for Justice and Peace, welcomed the move.

“The call to work towards pushing the UN Security Council to tackle the genocide issue is very welcome.

“It would be a way of signalling to those responsible for the brutal treatment of civilians that they would have to answer for it in the future,” the bishop told The Irish Catholic.

According to Mr Smith, Ireland “has a responsibility as a member of the European Union and as a member of the United Nations to speak up and to push for the UN Security Council to engage the International Criminal Court on this issue.”

Judged

Ireland will be judged badly by future generations if we don’t confront the genocide on Europe’s doorstep, Mr Smith told The Irish Catholic, explaining that “the whole world knows about it” and that “we’re not living in an era where you only learn about atrocities post the committing of them – we’re up to date with the atrocities”.

The UN’s 1948 Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide defined genocide as acts committed with intent to destroy, “in whole or in part”, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group, he continued, saying that this was “happening on a daily basis” in the Middle East.

With the media reporting daily on the horrors being inflicted on ethnic and religious groups in Syria and Iraq, he said: “There’s no excuse for the international community pleading that the extent of the barbarity, the extent of the murder, the extent of the killings were not known.”