The US Congress is to consider a resolution calling for recognition that ISIS is committing genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes.
However, due to reports that the genocide finding may only apply to Yazidis, 30 bipartisan US lawmakers, led by House Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Ed Royce, have written to the White House demanding that Christians are included in the official designation.
The letter, written on 23 December, and addressed to Secretary of State John Kerry, asks for the US Government to specifically label Christian communities as victims of genocide.
“While it is hardly possible to overstate the brutality of ISIL’s attempts to destroy the Yazidis, an overly narrow finding would wrongly discount similar violence directed against other minorities in the region, with likely dire consequences for those minorities,” notes the letter.
The letter is part of a broad outcry of concern by Congressional leaders, genocide experts and American human rights groups calling for a clear genocide determination regarding atrocities against Christians.
In the UK, momentum is building behind Britain’s equivalent plea to Prime Minister David Cameron.
Following the release of a letter, signed by 75 MPs and peers, urging the British Government to “use all the influence of Her Majesty’s Government at the United Nations to obtain an agreement that the word 'genocide' should be used” in relation to the atrocities being committed in Iraq and Syria, its co-author, Catholic and cross-bench peer, Lord Alton, met with Baroness Anelay of St Johns, Minister of State at the Foreign and Commonwealth Office.
In a one-hour meeting, described by Lord Alton as “positive”, members of the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Religious Freedom or Belief, implored the British Government, despite its policy of not determining Genocide, to recognise that Christians and Yazidis are eligible for consideration.
“It’s clear that the Government is listening to our concerns, said Lord Alton, following the meeting.
“I understand that ministers are now looking at whether UK law and legal structures might provide an effective response and whether a Regional Tribunal to prosecute genocide might be constituted.”
A spokesperson for the Foreign Office said:
“We continue to condemn in the strongest possible terms the atrocities committed by Daesh against all civilians, including Christians, Mandeans, Yazidis, and other minorities, as well as the majority Muslim population.
Any judgements on whether genocide has occurred is a matter for the international judicial system rather than governments or other non-judicial bodies.”
The letter, sent to David Cameron last week, cites evidence of assassinations by Isis of church leaders; mass murders; torture, kidnapping for ransom in the Christian communities of Iraq and Syria; sexual enslavement and systematic rape of Christian girls and women; forcible conversions to Islam; destruction of churches, monasteries, cemeteries, and Christian artefacts; and theft of lands and wealth from Christian clergy and laity.
“Daesh are an evil cult who have unleashed a tide of death on Christians and other minority religions in the areas where they have seized control,” said Rob Flello MP, co-author of the letter.
“We must send a clear and unequivocal message to them that eventually they will be held to account by the international community for their atrocities. We hope the Prime Minister will now act swiftly to encourage the United Nations to describe these killings as the orchestrated genocide they are,” he added.
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