Ethnic cleansing in Yugoslavia was a very tragic moment that should have been avoided especially after the Universal Declaration of Human Rights stated that "ethnic cleansing' was no longer going to happen due to this declaration. Obviously the tragic events of World War 2 and the Holocaust had not as much of an effect on the world and human rights for this to be happening again in the early 1990's. Ethnic cleansing took place in Yugoslavia because there were many different ethnic groups and each group was trying to over power the other. This event is very much like the Holocaust. Hitler wanted a "pure" German society so any other ethnic races should removed, taken out of society. Hitler referred to anyone who was not a "pure" German as a "verman", as in a posion that would destroy society. The Holocaust and ethnic cleansing in former Yugoslavia both clearly violated the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and was a tragic event in our history.
The ethnic cleansing in Yugoslavia with out a doubt denied the point of Human Rights. For example the Croatians group did some pretty drastic things to move out the Serbs. Some of the things they did were seeing them as lower people, removal of their rights, and removing them and giving them unnecessary punishment. Yugoslavia was breaking apart with all this cruelty and discrimination against different ethnicities. The rights of humanism were clearly denied, not only by the example of Croatia that I just gave you but in so many ways through out Yugoslavia.
I feel the government is surely to blame for the ethnic cleansing that happened in former Yugoslavia. Once the Soviet Union broke up, the Siberian government was able to use its plan to rule the whole country of Yugoslavia. This act allowed Serbians to continuously make attacks against the Muslims, Croatians, and Bosnians as they tried to keep their faith to rule the country. I think it is cruel and disgusting that people would try to hurt people of there own kind. I thought that after people learned the devastation Hitler caused this type of event would no happen again but apparently the message wasn’t strong enough. The Serbian government clearly disobeyed the Declaration of Human rights and they were surely wrong.
Ethnic Cleansing in former Yugoslavia has a lot of similarities with the Holocaust. The Holocaust was a very harsh time in Germany. The Holocaust was used to mistreat the Jews, homosexuals and other groups during World War 2. They did cruel and unusual punishment to these groups and killed thousands and thousands of people. Basically the holocaust got rid of any person who was not a "pure" German, kind of like how the Serbians tried to ethnically cleanse former Yugoslavia. The Serbian people had many of the same practices the Germans did to the Jews. One thing both groups did was create concentration camps. The only real diffrence these countries had when it cam to ethnic cleansing was 1 race. In Germany there was one race pretty much and any other race was known as "verman", where as in Yugoslavia there were many diffrent races trying to rule over former Yugoslavia. All in all both countries were wrong for doing what they did.
United Nations was defiantly not helpful in the efforts to end the killings that were taking place in Yugoslavia. The United Nations Protective Force went into Yugoslavia and tried to keep peace but was not allowed to use any violence to do so the violence continued. The only good thing the UN did was the set up of the International Criminal Tribunal of Yugoslavia.
Wednesday, June 13, 2007
Personal Reflection By Sarina Peters
To start off with, I really thought this project was okay, but I really didn’t like our topic which was “Ethnic Cleansing “in the former Yugoslavia.
I think this topic was a little challenging because there wasn’t a lot of research on his topic and we such time. I really didn’t know any other type of websites to look up so I had to stick with one website.
I felt really bad when the Muslims were being tortured by the Serbian Military. These Muslims were considered “sub-human” and were forced out there homes to either work some where in a death camp with their children.
These Muslims got their rights taken away from them and some were even killed for that; even little babies were killed that. I think it’s unfair for them to have to live the way they ended up living because of an immature rule.
I think this topic was a little challenging because there wasn’t a lot of research on his topic and we such time. I really didn’t know any other type of websites to look up so I had to stick with one website.
I felt really bad when the Muslims were being tortured by the Serbian Military. These Muslims were considered “sub-human” and were forced out there homes to either work some where in a death camp with their children.
These Muslims got their rights taken away from them and some were even killed for that; even little babies were killed that. I think it’s unfair for them to have to live the way they ended up living because of an immature rule.
Personal reflection By Bridget Onthank
Bridget Onthank
Period 6
June 12, 2007
While studying this topic I didn’t know how I would relate ethnic cleansing to human rights and their freedom. During this time of ethnic cleansing people were treated unfairly and very cruel. The research I did made me realize how important human rights are, no one deserves to be kicked out of their own country. This event relates to the holocaust very much so. People were killed because they were against what they knew was wrong and they got punished for it, which was how the holocaust was except they didn’t have a choice it they were against something or not. Many people were killed in both of these events because they didn’t have the freedom that people are entitled to have.
Ethnic Cleansing denies humanism. It denies it because there were no human rights at all. It wasn’t fair that you had to be this one ethnicity to stay in the country where they lived all or most of their lives. Evidence shows that the Serbs felt that no individual mattered. It was only them who could rule and have the freedom and rights of Yugoslavia.
This event makes me feel that the leadership wanted nothing to do with anyone else who lived in Yugoslavia. They just wanted the Non Serbs out and that’s it nothing else. I feel really bad for the victims none of them deserved to be treated how they were treated. Some people were killed because they weren’t Serbs, well a lot of people were killed and that is not right to do to the freedom of the people. The actions of this state were not at all justified no one had the freedom or rights they deserved.
Yes, I do feel that the peacekeeping efforts are acceptable. The adaptation of human rights was a big step up from what was going on in Yugoslavia before hand. If the United Nations wanted to step into the United States soventry I think that it would almost make us weaker as a country. I feel this way because we already have a strong human right law and with the help of other groups or people would basically cause hatred and the loss of freedom in the United States.
I feel that I learned a lot while doing and researching this project. I never knew how much of a major problem this was in Yugoslavia in fact I never knew that Ethnic Cleansing was a problem overall. At the beginning of this assignment I wasn’t sure what I was doing or what I was learning about. Until finally some of my group members helped me to understand the key concept of Ethnic Cleansing and why it was so important to adopted the Human rights policy.
Period 6
June 12, 2007
While studying this topic I didn’t know how I would relate ethnic cleansing to human rights and their freedom. During this time of ethnic cleansing people were treated unfairly and very cruel. The research I did made me realize how important human rights are, no one deserves to be kicked out of their own country. This event relates to the holocaust very much so. People were killed because they were against what they knew was wrong and they got punished for it, which was how the holocaust was except they didn’t have a choice it they were against something or not. Many people were killed in both of these events because they didn’t have the freedom that people are entitled to have.
Ethnic Cleansing denies humanism. It denies it because there were no human rights at all. It wasn’t fair that you had to be this one ethnicity to stay in the country where they lived all or most of their lives. Evidence shows that the Serbs felt that no individual mattered. It was only them who could rule and have the freedom and rights of Yugoslavia.
This event makes me feel that the leadership wanted nothing to do with anyone else who lived in Yugoslavia. They just wanted the Non Serbs out and that’s it nothing else. I feel really bad for the victims none of them deserved to be treated how they were treated. Some people were killed because they weren’t Serbs, well a lot of people were killed and that is not right to do to the freedom of the people. The actions of this state were not at all justified no one had the freedom or rights they deserved.
Yes, I do feel that the peacekeeping efforts are acceptable. The adaptation of human rights was a big step up from what was going on in Yugoslavia before hand. If the United Nations wanted to step into the United States soventry I think that it would almost make us weaker as a country. I feel this way because we already have a strong human right law and with the help of other groups or people would basically cause hatred and the loss of freedom in the United States.
I feel that I learned a lot while doing and researching this project. I never knew how much of a major problem this was in Yugoslavia in fact I never knew that Ethnic Cleansing was a problem overall. At the beginning of this assignment I wasn’t sure what I was doing or what I was learning about. Until finally some of my group members helped me to understand the key concept of Ethnic Cleansing and why it was so important to adopted the Human rights policy.
Ethnic cleansing in Yugoslavia By: Brittany Lajoie , Bridget Onthank, Sarina Peters, Shannon Mason
Ethnic cleansing in Yugoslavia By: Brittany Lajoie , Bridget Onthank, Sarina Peters, Shannon Mason
There were a lot of things that happened in Yugoslavia during the War that comprised human rights. One of them being that more than two hundred thousand civilians were killed in Bosnia and Croatia since the beginning of the war. Tens of thousands of women were raped, some of them more than a hundred times. Their sons and husbands were beaten and tortured in concentration camps like Omarska and Manjaca. Whole families were forced to become refugees or lose their lives. Millions lost their homes due to a process called "ethnic cleansing."
The term of ethnic cleansing was mainly started used by the 6 diverse group of republics in former Yugoslavia. These six groups were the following Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Serbia, Montenegro, and Macedonia. These six republic groups were formed to bring together all Slovakians. Each group had very diverse ethnicity and all 6 unions wanted theirs to rule. The ethnic cleansing of Yugoslavia was not really like the Nuremburg laws in World War 2 because unlike in the Nuremburg laws the entire country did not make laws to isolate certain ethnicity, each different republican party was trying to eliminate the diverse group of parties. For example the term ethnic cleansing was mainly used to describe when The Serbians tried to remove the Muslims from Bosnia and the Albanians in Kosovo. The Serbians were one of the most dominate groups in taking over the government when it fell apart after the break up of the "Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR)". Each group was responsible for the acts of ethnic cleansing because each group had there own way of removing the ethnicity they didn't want.
Thousands of Muslim people in Yugoslavia were tortured and killed by Ratko Mladic and his Serbian Military. They were tortured because they were considered "sub-human" and not as good. There religion and people were thought by the Serbian Army to be stupid and not needed in the world. They wanted a "pure" Yugoslavia, so they got rid of everyone that stopped that from happening.
This event occurred in the year 1991 in Yugoslavia. People were sure that Yugoslavia would fall apart. Yugoslavia was too small for the nationalism of its different ethnicities. So the Serbs tried to wipe out all the Muslims. The result of this horrifying event was that many people were killed or kicked out of their country Yugoslavia. They then realized that what they were doing wasn’t doing anything good toward their country so they then adopted the Human Rights policy to make their country a better place to have the freedom of the people.
Well first of all, the resolution of this will be that It got a whole lot better as the years past. The people that were part of the government that helped participate In the torturing were penalized for war crimes. Some were put to jail for 25 years to life, or they were hung. After that, people- such as the Muslims got their rights back slowly and a couple years later they were back to their normal lives even though their experiences remain in their memories. Today, these people are now citizens again, and they are no longer considered "sub humans" (of course). BUT just because things were handle/settled very strictly, there still are Muslims living they way they lived when they were controlled.
There were a lot of things that happened in Yugoslavia during the War that comprised human rights. One of them being that more than two hundred thousand civilians were killed in Bosnia and Croatia since the beginning of the war. Tens of thousands of women were raped, some of them more than a hundred times. Their sons and husbands were beaten and tortured in concentration camps like Omarska and Manjaca. Whole families were forced to become refugees or lose their lives. Millions lost their homes due to a process called "ethnic cleansing."
The term of ethnic cleansing was mainly started used by the 6 diverse group of republics in former Yugoslavia. These six groups were the following Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Serbia, Montenegro, and Macedonia. These six republic groups were formed to bring together all Slovakians. Each group had very diverse ethnicity and all 6 unions wanted theirs to rule. The ethnic cleansing of Yugoslavia was not really like the Nuremburg laws in World War 2 because unlike in the Nuremburg laws the entire country did not make laws to isolate certain ethnicity, each different republican party was trying to eliminate the diverse group of parties. For example the term ethnic cleansing was mainly used to describe when The Serbians tried to remove the Muslims from Bosnia and the Albanians in Kosovo. The Serbians were one of the most dominate groups in taking over the government when it fell apart after the break up of the "Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR)". Each group was responsible for the acts of ethnic cleansing because each group had there own way of removing the ethnicity they didn't want.
Thousands of Muslim people in Yugoslavia were tortured and killed by Ratko Mladic and his Serbian Military. They were tortured because they were considered "sub-human" and not as good. There religion and people were thought by the Serbian Army to be stupid and not needed in the world. They wanted a "pure" Yugoslavia, so they got rid of everyone that stopped that from happening.
This event occurred in the year 1991 in Yugoslavia. People were sure that Yugoslavia would fall apart. Yugoslavia was too small for the nationalism of its different ethnicities. So the Serbs tried to wipe out all the Muslims. The result of this horrifying event was that many people were killed or kicked out of their country Yugoslavia. They then realized that what they were doing wasn’t doing anything good toward their country so they then adopted the Human Rights policy to make their country a better place to have the freedom of the people.
Well first of all, the resolution of this will be that It got a whole lot better as the years past. The people that were part of the government that helped participate In the torturing were penalized for war crimes. Some were put to jail for 25 years to life, or they were hung. After that, people- such as the Muslims got their rights back slowly and a couple years later they were back to their normal lives even though their experiences remain in their memories. Today, these people are now citizens again, and they are no longer considered "sub humans" (of course). BUT just because things were handle/settled very strictly, there still are Muslims living they way they lived when they were controlled.
Personal Reflection By Shannon Mason
Shannon Mason Reflection Period 6 6/12/07
I was in a group with Sarina, Brittany, and Bridget. Our group’s topic was “Ethnic Cleansing” in former Yugoslavia. When I first saw the topic I was shocked to see that these kinds of events are still recently happening, even after the Holocaust and the Nuremburg Trials. As I was looking up I was surprised and sad about what “ethnic cleansing” was.
The people behind it were Serbian Military and Ratko Mladic- The commander of the whole Serbian Army-I thought it was horrible how someone could do this kind of stuff to another person/ group of people. Ratko had his soldiers torture and kill as many Muslims as they could. Then had their homes and businesses looted for valuables. And they didn’t even care. They forced the Muslims out of their homes and towns. It made me want to cry when I was reading about it and looking pictures up of women, men and children dead in the streets.
I think one of the worst things about the “Ethnic cleansing”, besides the torturing, killing and moving out of the Muslims, was the fact that it happened so recently. This was going on from 1991 to 1995. That’s four years of blood shed, and nobody was stopping it. The United States was still powerful then and they didn’t stop it, even though they could’ve. Thousands of people were killed before the end of it.
It made me upset to read about what happened during this “ethnic cleansing” of former Yugoslavia. Women were raped, some more than 100 times. Men were tortured and killed. I saw one picture pictures of a man getting alcohol poured on him, after being thrown out of a window by some Serbian soldiers. Also, whole families were forced to become refugees or die.
I kind of didn’t and kind of did like doing this Blog. I learned about the mistreatment of groups of people by other people, because they were considered not as good or sub-human. A lot of the information I learned about made me want to cry, but I liked learning something new.
I was in a group with Sarina, Brittany, and Bridget. Our group’s topic was “Ethnic Cleansing” in former Yugoslavia. When I first saw the topic I was shocked to see that these kinds of events are still recently happening, even after the Holocaust and the Nuremburg Trials. As I was looking up I was surprised and sad about what “ethnic cleansing” was.
The people behind it were Serbian Military and Ratko Mladic- The commander of the whole Serbian Army-I thought it was horrible how someone could do this kind of stuff to another person/ group of people. Ratko had his soldiers torture and kill as many Muslims as they could. Then had their homes and businesses looted for valuables. And they didn’t even care. They forced the Muslims out of their homes and towns. It made me want to cry when I was reading about it and looking pictures up of women, men and children dead in the streets.
I think one of the worst things about the “Ethnic cleansing”, besides the torturing, killing and moving out of the Muslims, was the fact that it happened so recently. This was going on from 1991 to 1995. That’s four years of blood shed, and nobody was stopping it. The United States was still powerful then and they didn’t stop it, even though they could’ve. Thousands of people were killed before the end of it.
It made me upset to read about what happened during this “ethnic cleansing” of former Yugoslavia. Women were raped, some more than 100 times. Men were tortured and killed. I saw one picture pictures of a man getting alcohol poured on him, after being thrown out of a window by some Serbian soldiers. Also, whole families were forced to become refugees or die.
I kind of didn’t and kind of did like doing this Blog. I learned about the mistreatment of groups of people by other people, because they were considered not as good or sub-human. A lot of the information I learned about made me want to cry, but I liked learning something new.
Tuesday, June 12, 2007
Personal Reflection by Susan Orsini
The “ethnic cleansing” in the former Yugoslavia is a key example that proves that the Universal Declaration of Human Rights did the complete and total opposite thing than what it was created for. The Universal Declaration of Human Rights was created to defend the basic rights and freedoms to which all humans are entitled, often held to include the right to life and liberty, freedom of thought and expression, and equality before the law. In addition, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights was created to prevent another tragedy such as the Holocaust. Unfortunately, in the many years since it was approved, tragedies concerning the human rights of people have occurred all over the world. These very incidents that occurred after the sanction of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, proves that the United Nations is ineffective when it comes to the prevention and halting of these horrid events. The one example of human rights violations that occurred after the approval of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights is the vile actions that happened in former Yugoslavia. In this particular case, the ethnic groups chose violence as an escape from their hatred of the other ethnicities in their country, and for their desire of liberty from the country. Due to the hatred of the many different ethnic groups living in the same country, each ethnic background would kill the others for domination of former Yugoslavia. The Serbs would drive the Bosniaks out of their territories, the Croats would force the Serbs out of the territory they were in, the Serbs would fight the Albanians in many places such as Kosovo, and the Bosniaks would continually kill the Serbs that were found in the area that they occupied. The world basically sat back and watched as the human rights of the thousands of people who were living in former Yugoslavia were being violated. At one point, the UN and NATO stepped in to try and get the different ethnic backgrounds to agree to a peace settlement, but all of their attempts only ended up in more hatred of the other ethnic backgrounds and more bloody fights. There were no safe areas in former Yugoslavia. Thousands of people, including civilians, were forced to leave their homes, if they had not been killed already. There was no mercy, there was no safe hideout. What could be said as the most safe area was the NATO "secured safe areas”, but even those were not completely safe from enemy attack.
This “ethnic cleansing” was similar to Holocaust in many ways, but it was on a much smaller scale. The killings were carried out on purpose, based solely on personal identity. When the Germans were discriminating against people based on their personal identity, to kill them, traits such as Jewish, Homosexual, Gypsies and so on were the targeted points. In the case of former Yugoslavia, it was done for the same reasoning as the Germans eliminated the Jews in the Holocaust—their ethnicity. In former Yugoslavia being a Serb to the Bosnians, Slovenians, Croatians and Albanians, and being Muslim to the Serbs was their form of “ethnic cleansing” like the Jews were to the Germans. Another example was in the case of the Srebrenica Massacre. Muslim males were singled out for the sole reason that they were not of the same religion, and they were murdered by the thousands, unlike the mass murders of the Jews and other minorities by the Nazis in the Holocaust. Yet another example in former Yugoslavia was Srebrenica. It was genocide, due to the fact that the Serbs had methodically planned to eliminate all the Bosniaks in Srebrenica. In other areas, civilians were murdered individually during their daily routines and were singled out to be sniped for no other reason than they were racially different. Many similarities can be found between the Yugoslav conflicts and the Holocaust, except for one main topic. In Yugoslavia both sides were giving and receiving hits, where in the Holocaust, the only side that was taking hits was the Jews, along with the Homosexuals, Gypsies and so on. Nazi Germany had no one that they were targeting, like the Jews, fight back.
In this case involving the republic of former Yugoslavia, humanism was no present or did it seem to matter in this horrifying event. Humanism and the properties that it holds were clearly denied during the Yugoslav wars. This concept of how all individuals matter with their dignity and worth protected, was rarely, if at any time, seen during the Yugoslav wars. For illustration, even though the Croatians and other ethnic backgrounds believed it was in the best interest of their race to exile the Serbs from their state, while they were trying to accomplish that goal, they ignored all the principles of humanism. The people that were living in the former Yugoslavia got so caught up in exiling the other ethnic groups that they forgot the meaning of individuality. Most of the Serbs saw was a Bosniak, not a person with feelings, or a valuable life, just a worthless Bosniak. Generally, in former Yugoslavia, when people were determining who would die and who would live, all they looked at was their ethnic background to decide. All of the individuals rights were lost during this time, so in former Yugoslavia, the idea of humanism was denied.
After researching and becoming very emotional connected to the unfortunate story wit former Yugoslavia, I was filled with many feelings towards the leadership, the perpetrators, and the victims. First off, I think that the leadership may not be the only people to blame. Maybe, like in the case of the Holocaust, these people where taught their whole lives to hate the other ethnic backgrounds, like the Germans were taught to hate the Jewish peoples. These leaders, of all sides of ethnic backgrounds, thought they were doing what was right. It isn’t completely their fault if they honestly and truly believe that what they were doing was justified and right. Secondly, I feel the same way about the perpetrators of the crimes. I mean maybe they were in fact taught to hate the other ethnic groups, but I don’t agree with what they did. Lighting people on fire, raping all women, throwing people out of windows, and so on is not the way to handle your hate for others. Violence is such a horrible thing. How can someone be filled up with so much hate that they do those horrid things to the others? Furthermore, I feel bad for the extreme measures that were taken to “ethnic cleanse” the other ethnicities, but all sides were guilty here. All sides had the blood on their hands. I am not saying that any of them deserved what happened because that is not what I believe at all, but two wrongs don’t make a right. Lastly, these actions taken on by all sides were not justified at all. Violence isn’t the answer to problems, or a way to release hate towards anyone. It is just so sad how people didn’t realize that they even though they all had different religions and so on, that life is deeper than skin or in this case beliefs. They had had blood coursing threw their veins, they all need the same necessities to live and they all come from the one true creator of life, God. If they just realized that there was more in common than not, I believe that that whole crisis could have been avoided. This is just a case of pure ignorance, and ignorance isn’t justified.
I strongly believe that peacekeeping efforts by the United Nations in sovereign countries are not acceptable. One example is the one that I have been mentioning this whole time, the former Yugoslavia crisis. The involvement of the United Nations was not even close to being successful or productive when it came to the ending of the killings in Yugoslavia. The UN proved futile in enforcing the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in former Yugoslavia. The protection of human rights is way more important than a country’s sovereignty. These horrible crimes against others rights is not only unfair and cruel, but it has no justice. Every country has the right to enforce and create their own laws, but there is no justification for violation of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights If the UN had stepped into the crisis in former Yugoslavia sooner, many lives could have been saved. By the time it was too late, the UN decided to step in, and when they did there was no response. The only reason why they were there was to be like a peacekeeper, which forced them not to use violence on either side. They might have just as well sat home and watched it all go down on TV. As a result, the different types of ethnicities just ignored the UN and continued its violence, with no care of the newest spectators. They would sit back and watch as Serbs rounded up hundreds of Muslims and massacred them in places like Srebrenica. If the United States was violating the Universal Declaration of Human Rights I would hope that the UN would step in and stop it. There should be no toleration for any discrimination based on race, sex, orientation, religion, etc. Yes, national sovereignty is an important thing, but only to the extent of everyone’s rights being protected and honored. Sovereignty is something that can be held until a further time, unlike human rights. If human rights are not protected then turmoil starts to brake loose. I truly believe the sovereignty of nations should always be respected, but that there can be exceptions when human rights are being violated.
This “ethnic cleansing” was similar to Holocaust in many ways, but it was on a much smaller scale. The killings were carried out on purpose, based solely on personal identity. When the Germans were discriminating against people based on their personal identity, to kill them, traits such as Jewish, Homosexual, Gypsies and so on were the targeted points. In the case of former Yugoslavia, it was done for the same reasoning as the Germans eliminated the Jews in the Holocaust—their ethnicity. In former Yugoslavia being a Serb to the Bosnians, Slovenians, Croatians and Albanians, and being Muslim to the Serbs was their form of “ethnic cleansing” like the Jews were to the Germans. Another example was in the case of the Srebrenica Massacre. Muslim males were singled out for the sole reason that they were not of the same religion, and they were murdered by the thousands, unlike the mass murders of the Jews and other minorities by the Nazis in the Holocaust. Yet another example in former Yugoslavia was Srebrenica. It was genocide, due to the fact that the Serbs had methodically planned to eliminate all the Bosniaks in Srebrenica. In other areas, civilians were murdered individually during their daily routines and were singled out to be sniped for no other reason than they were racially different. Many similarities can be found between the Yugoslav conflicts and the Holocaust, except for one main topic. In Yugoslavia both sides were giving and receiving hits, where in the Holocaust, the only side that was taking hits was the Jews, along with the Homosexuals, Gypsies and so on. Nazi Germany had no one that they were targeting, like the Jews, fight back.
In this case involving the republic of former Yugoslavia, humanism was no present or did it seem to matter in this horrifying event. Humanism and the properties that it holds were clearly denied during the Yugoslav wars. This concept of how all individuals matter with their dignity and worth protected, was rarely, if at any time, seen during the Yugoslav wars. For illustration, even though the Croatians and other ethnic backgrounds believed it was in the best interest of their race to exile the Serbs from their state, while they were trying to accomplish that goal, they ignored all the principles of humanism. The people that were living in the former Yugoslavia got so caught up in exiling the other ethnic groups that they forgot the meaning of individuality. Most of the Serbs saw was a Bosniak, not a person with feelings, or a valuable life, just a worthless Bosniak. Generally, in former Yugoslavia, when people were determining who would die and who would live, all they looked at was their ethnic background to decide. All of the individuals rights were lost during this time, so in former Yugoslavia, the idea of humanism was denied.
After researching and becoming very emotional connected to the unfortunate story wit former Yugoslavia, I was filled with many feelings towards the leadership, the perpetrators, and the victims. First off, I think that the leadership may not be the only people to blame. Maybe, like in the case of the Holocaust, these people where taught their whole lives to hate the other ethnic backgrounds, like the Germans were taught to hate the Jewish peoples. These leaders, of all sides of ethnic backgrounds, thought they were doing what was right. It isn’t completely their fault if they honestly and truly believe that what they were doing was justified and right. Secondly, I feel the same way about the perpetrators of the crimes. I mean maybe they were in fact taught to hate the other ethnic groups, but I don’t agree with what they did. Lighting people on fire, raping all women, throwing people out of windows, and so on is not the way to handle your hate for others. Violence is such a horrible thing. How can someone be filled up with so much hate that they do those horrid things to the others? Furthermore, I feel bad for the extreme measures that were taken to “ethnic cleanse” the other ethnicities, but all sides were guilty here. All sides had the blood on their hands. I am not saying that any of them deserved what happened because that is not what I believe at all, but two wrongs don’t make a right. Lastly, these actions taken on by all sides were not justified at all. Violence isn’t the answer to problems, or a way to release hate towards anyone. It is just so sad how people didn’t realize that they even though they all had different religions and so on, that life is deeper than skin or in this case beliefs. They had had blood coursing threw their veins, they all need the same necessities to live and they all come from the one true creator of life, God. If they just realized that there was more in common than not, I believe that that whole crisis could have been avoided. This is just a case of pure ignorance, and ignorance isn’t justified.
I strongly believe that peacekeeping efforts by the United Nations in sovereign countries are not acceptable. One example is the one that I have been mentioning this whole time, the former Yugoslavia crisis. The involvement of the United Nations was not even close to being successful or productive when it came to the ending of the killings in Yugoslavia. The UN proved futile in enforcing the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in former Yugoslavia. The protection of human rights is way more important than a country’s sovereignty. These horrible crimes against others rights is not only unfair and cruel, but it has no justice. Every country has the right to enforce and create their own laws, but there is no justification for violation of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights If the UN had stepped into the crisis in former Yugoslavia sooner, many lives could have been saved. By the time it was too late, the UN decided to step in, and when they did there was no response. The only reason why they were there was to be like a peacekeeper, which forced them not to use violence on either side. They might have just as well sat home and watched it all go down on TV. As a result, the different types of ethnicities just ignored the UN and continued its violence, with no care of the newest spectators. They would sit back and watch as Serbs rounded up hundreds of Muslims and massacred them in places like Srebrenica. If the United States was violating the Universal Declaration of Human Rights I would hope that the UN would step in and stop it. There should be no toleration for any discrimination based on race, sex, orientation, religion, etc. Yes, national sovereignty is an important thing, but only to the extent of everyone’s rights being protected and honored. Sovereignty is something that can be held until a further time, unlike human rights. If human rights are not protected then turmoil starts to brake loose. I truly believe the sovereignty of nations should always be respected, but that there can be exceptions when human rights are being violated.
Monday, June 11, 2007
Reflection - Steve Loukellis
The events that occurred in former Yugoslavia prove the United Nation’s incapability to intervene when human rights are being violated. The definition of human rights is “The basic rights and freedoms to which all humans are entitled, often held to include the right to life and liberty, freedom of thought and expression, and equality before the law.” The Universal Declaration of Human Rights was made to preserve these rights and ensure the freedoms of the people. The horrific displays of hatred that took place in former Yugoslavia clearly violated the Declaration and stripped the people of their given rights.
The war that took place in Yugoslavia undoubtedly denied the principle of Human Rights in many ways. In Croatia, the Croats took extreme measures to drive out the Serbs including stripping them of their rights, seeing them as unequal persons, banishing them and giving them unjustified punishment. Throughout the constant battles for independence people were forced out of their homes, killed, raped, massacred, and looted. Yugoslavia fell apart with the loathing of different ethnicities and the discrimination and hatred led to killing. This is only a mere example of the cruelty that took place that violated the Declaration in numerous ways.
Researching about this event filled me with many emotions. In this situation everyone is a victim. All of the different ethnicities in former Yugoslavia fought each other and gave their lives for their independence and freedom. It made me sad that this conflict couldn’t have been solved peacefully and that there are still many refugees from the war today. The hatred and crimes against humanity reminds me of how cruel and unjust the world can be. If I didn’t know any better I would assume that an event like this happened fifty to a hundred years ago. It’s pathetic and disgusting how the world can’t handle problems without the shedding of blood.
The war in former Yugoslavia is similar to the Holocaust in a very minor form. During the Holocaust Jews, gypsies, homosexuals, and other “enemies of the state” were treated as sub-humans and were “ethnically cleansed”. The Holocaust took ethnic cleansing to a whole new level and wiped out millions in concentration and extermination camps. In a way the Serbs were similar to the Germans and wanted to ethnically cleanse the other ethnicities for a better Serbia. The main difference between the holocaust and the ethnic cleansing in former Yugoslavia was that there wasn’t one dominant race in Yugoslavia. In the Holocaust the Germans were performing the ethnic cleansing on the “sub-humans” but in Yugoslavia it was all of the ethnicities that were killing.
I believe that the peacekeeping efforts by the United Nations in sovereign countries are not acceptable. The UN has failed in enforcing the Declaration of Human Rights and the events that took place in former Yugoslavia prove it. Protecting human rights outweighs the country’s sovereignty. No one has the justification to kill people because of their ethnic background. The UN should have stepped in and stopped the crimes that occurred in former Yugoslavia. Every country has the right to obtain their own laws but there is no excuse for violated the Declaration of Human Rights. If the United States was violating the Declaration I would hope that the UN would step in and stop it. There should be no toleration for any discrimination or hatred based on race, sex, orientation, occupation, education, or religion.
The war that took place in Yugoslavia undoubtedly denied the principle of Human Rights in many ways. In Croatia, the Croats took extreme measures to drive out the Serbs including stripping them of their rights, seeing them as unequal persons, banishing them and giving them unjustified punishment. Throughout the constant battles for independence people were forced out of their homes, killed, raped, massacred, and looted. Yugoslavia fell apart with the loathing of different ethnicities and the discrimination and hatred led to killing. This is only a mere example of the cruelty that took place that violated the Declaration in numerous ways.
Researching about this event filled me with many emotions. In this situation everyone is a victim. All of the different ethnicities in former Yugoslavia fought each other and gave their lives for their independence and freedom. It made me sad that this conflict couldn’t have been solved peacefully and that there are still many refugees from the war today. The hatred and crimes against humanity reminds me of how cruel and unjust the world can be. If I didn’t know any better I would assume that an event like this happened fifty to a hundred years ago. It’s pathetic and disgusting how the world can’t handle problems without the shedding of blood.
The war in former Yugoslavia is similar to the Holocaust in a very minor form. During the Holocaust Jews, gypsies, homosexuals, and other “enemies of the state” were treated as sub-humans and were “ethnically cleansed”. The Holocaust took ethnic cleansing to a whole new level and wiped out millions in concentration and extermination camps. In a way the Serbs were similar to the Germans and wanted to ethnically cleanse the other ethnicities for a better Serbia. The main difference between the holocaust and the ethnic cleansing in former Yugoslavia was that there wasn’t one dominant race in Yugoslavia. In the Holocaust the Germans were performing the ethnic cleansing on the “sub-humans” but in Yugoslavia it was all of the ethnicities that were killing.
I believe that the peacekeeping efforts by the United Nations in sovereign countries are not acceptable. The UN has failed in enforcing the Declaration of Human Rights and the events that took place in former Yugoslavia prove it. Protecting human rights outweighs the country’s sovereignty. No one has the justification to kill people because of their ethnic background. The UN should have stepped in and stopped the crimes that occurred in former Yugoslavia. Every country has the right to obtain their own laws but there is no excuse for violated the Declaration of Human Rights. If the United States was violating the Declaration I would hope that the UN would step in and stop it. There should be no toleration for any discrimination or hatred based on race, sex, orientation, occupation, education, or religion.
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