As some of you may know following my brief study of Human Rights in an International context during my Human Rights module at university I have been conducting some research into some of the most serious criminal offences we have in the world.

I’ve been researching crimes such as Genocide for a while now and in particular Genocide. I find myself awake in the early of the hours pondering “why?” Why does it happen? Why do we let it happen? Why do we do nothing?

Almost every part of the world has been touched by Genocide at some time. After the Jewish holocaust we vowed never to let it happen again, but we have and continue to.

I’ve blogged before on the dire situation in Darfur and came to the conclusion that what is going on there is more or less Genocide. Since 2003 the International Community, the same International community that vowed never to let it happen again, has turned a blind eye and done little or nothing at all to intervene in the situation.

I cannot comprehend why we continue to let it happen. We know it happens and we know that it is abhorrent and utterly repugnant, yet we sit back and do nothing. Nothing!

When will these terrors end? When will we do something to help before it is too late? I cannot stop asking myself these questions and I can never seem to answer them. Is there even an answer?

Sometimes I wonder if we block it out for our own sanity. Sometimes I wonder if we ignore it to protect ourselves. Do we ignore it to pretend that it is not happening? I don’t know, I just really don’t know.

When I’m not thinking about why it happens and why we allow it to happen, I’m having nightmares about what I’ve read. The graphic descriptions form into pictures in my mind. I cannot begin to imagine how these people must feel who suffer these atrocities, nor can I begin to imagine how those who uncover the mass graves and the terror when we do finally intervene feel. How do they cope?

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