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.