On World Genocide Prevention Day, calls to stop ‘systematic’ killing of Hazaras in Afghanistan

On this International Day of Commemoration and Dignity of the Victims of the Crime of Genocide and of the Prevention of this Crime, which falls on December 9, the World Hazara Council called on the international community to recognize “the ongoing Hazara genocide” committed by the Taliban movement in Afghanistan.

Under the hashtag #StopHazaraGenocide, social media users have taken to Twitter since October 2022 to denounce the “systematic genocide” against the Hazaras, a Shiite Muslim minority in Afghanistan. The campaign calls for putting an end to “torture and persecution” by the Taliban against the Hazara population, which represents more than 25% of the Afghan people, according to the council.

Last week, thousands of people took to streets in Germany to protest the persecution and attacks against the Hazaras in Afghanistan. The last attack occurred on September 30, when the Kaj Educational Center in Kabul was targeted by a suicide attack, killing more than 50 people, the majority of whom were female students, and injuring 112 others.

Also, the Afghanistan National Movement for Peace and Justice (ANMPJ) sent an open letter to the UN Special Advisor on Genocide Prevention on November 21, saying that there is an increase in “targeted violence against the Hazara population” due to their ethnic identity and beliefs.

It added that more than 300 violent attacks were committed against this this minority across the nation. The letter also said that the Hazaras have been subjected to “suppressive and discriminatory policies” besides “arbitrary arrests, execution and forced eviction” by the Taliban.

“We have endured systematic marginalization, discrimination, and persecution under Afghan rulers since the nineteenth century. The Hazara people have been collectively subjected to slavery, systematic eviction from ancestral homes and lands, and genocidal massacres,” said the spokesperson for the World Hazara Council, Sitarah Mohammadi, in a speech at the UN Forum on Minority Issues on December 2.

“More than 70 years after the adoption of the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, the threat of genocide remains present in many places around the world. Discrimination and hate speech, the early warning signs of genocide, are on the rise everywhere,” said UN Chief Antonio Guterres on Friday.