War Crimes Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1500 words

War Crimes - Essay Example Genocides and crimes against humanity have occurred in the past too but its form and content have profoundly changed in the new century so the agency of international community in its preventive and punitive measures. The Preamble of the Rome Statute limits the jurisdiction of the Court to only to "the most serious crimes of concern to the international community as a whole" (Article 5(1) Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court). Genocide, crimes against humanity, and war crimes are considered to be the type of most serious crimes which affect the international community as a whole. The definitions of genocide and crimes against humanity are elaborated in the articles 6-8 are based on provisions in the preceding treaties. The term crimes against humanity appeared well before 1945 to describe the extermination of the Armenian community by the Ottoman Turkish state. The Nuremberg Charter and the negotiations on it led to the making of a provision named as "crimes against humanity". Besides the war crimes, Article 6 (c) of the Nuremberg Charter enumerates crimes against humanity as "murder, extermination, enslavement, deportation, and other inhumane acts committed against anu civilian population, before or during the war or persecutions on political, racial, or religious grounds". The novelty of the conception of crimes against humanity lies in the fact that it includes the aggression caused by a state on its own citizens. There exists a dilemma in the existing conception of crimes against humanity as to whether to link these crimes with international armed conflict or not. If there is no nexus between crimes against humanity and international armed conflict, human rights violations of all types would c ome under the purview of crimes against humanity and thereby, loosing its specificity. Importantly, the Statute of the Rwanda Tribunal does not include an inherent link between crimes against humanity and armed conflict (Article 3 ICTR Statute). As a result of various reforms through tribunals and ad hoc committees, apartheid, enforced disappearances, rape, imprisonment, persecution too are enlisted as crimes against humanity and a loose concern of "other inhumane acts". It means that genocide and crimes against humanity thus defined are closely related to international human rights law and international humanitarian law. The definition of genocide delineated in the article 6 of the Rome Statute is based on its portrayal by Genocide convention of 1948. It does not differentiate between crimes committed at the times of peace and war. The law of genocide is essentially group based. To take account of genocide, the intent of the crime is duly considered. The legal definition of genocide includes crimes such s killing of the members of a group, causing bodily or mental harm to members of a group, measures for the destruction of a community in whole or in part, programmed prevention of births within a group and forceful transfer of children of one group to another.In crimes against humanity, the perpetrator possesses knowledge about the specific attack, it would be used to target a community, and the violence would be employed as part of widespread and systematic attack. The enforcement of the international law against genocide and crimes against humanity thus effectively challenges the notion that the app lication of violence by nation states is a priori legitimate and activates a

Omnipresence of Water Research Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Omnipresence of Water - Research Paper Example Water is the medium for chemical reactions in the body (Barney Harris, Jr. and H. H. VanHorn). Water is the only pure substance found naturally in all the three states of matter i.e., gaseous state, liquid state and solid state. The density of water changes with temperature, as the temperature of water, is lowered it becomes dense and at 4C it reaches maximum density, on further cooling the volume of water expands by about 9% to become less dense and form ice. Thus the ice floats on water and doesn't sink..(Explanation of the Anomalies of Water (1-10) - Shrinks on melting) If water were solid when denser in an artificial scenario, then the ice wouldn't float and sink to the bottom consequently the oxygen content in the water at the bottom would increase (Since at lower temperatures the oxygen content is increased) then the metabolic activity of microorganisms near surface would increase because of increased temperatures but face oxygen deficiency (Since at higher temperatures the oxygen content is decreased). Oxygen depletion is also due to a buildup of organic materials from human activity, thus causing oxygen deficiency to the fish, invertebrate, plant and aerobic bacteria. Oxygen levels below 3 parts per million would mean a grave situation for all these aquatic organisms and an aquatic ecosystem imbalance. (Exploring Environment Water Quality- Dissolved Oxygen) If the water was denser then all the oceans, water bodies, lakes and drinking water sources would be frozen or solidified and only a few inches would melt in summer. The oceans frozen portions would essentially be salt-free.( Water (molecule) – from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia)