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Easier To Punish Muggers Than Monsters

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  • Easier To Punish Muggers Than Monsters

    EASIER TO PUNISH MUGGERS THAN MONSTERS

    Winnipeg Free Press
    http://www.winnipegfreepress.com/opinion/fyi/easier--to-punish--muggers-than-monsters-138251199.html
    Jan 28 2012
    Canada

    CLOSE to one million people died in the Rwandan genocide in the 1990s,
    and this week, after a 17-year legal battle in Canada, Leon Mugesera,
    who is accused of inciting that slaughter, was finally handed over to
    Rwandan authorities for trial. Canadian authorities apparently believed
    this alleged author of that tribal massacre might be mistreated in
    Rwandan jail and so he lived comfortably in Montreal while his appeal
    ran its seemingly endless course.

    Had he been accused of robbing a convenience store in Kigali, Mr.
    Mugesera might have been sent back years ago, but somehow the enormity
    of the crime of genocide seems to be beyond our grasp unless it is
    useful for political reasons. There are, for example, about 500,000
    Armenians in France, many of them eligible to vote in next year's
    presidential election.

    It may be then, as some French commentators are suggesting, that is
    not just coincidence or a pure act of historical humanitarianism on
    the part of President Nicholas Sarkozy's government that France this
    week made it a criminal act to publicly deny the killing of as many
    as 1.5 million Armenians was an act of genocide.

    The Armenian genocide, as Armenians, at least, refer to it, took
    place in 1915, one of the last ugly death rattles of an Ottoman
    Empire that would soon be transformed into the modern, secularist,
    democratic Turkey that we know today, a staunch Western ally and a
    prominent member of NATO.

    Armenians say the killings were deliberate and systematic. The Turks
    say otherwise. The Turkish government, in condemning France's decision,
    argues the killings were the result of the chaos that accompanies
    the collapse of empire, that the deaths of hundreds of thousands
    of Armenian Christians and Turkish Muslims were caused by communal
    violence and disease.

    In a sense, it hardly seems to matter anymore. The Armenian genocide
    -- Canada risked the wrath of Turkey by officially recognizing it as
    such in 2004 -- is just one of many in 100 years of slaughter that
    marked the 20th century as the Age of Genocide.

    What happened in Armenia, however, did set the pattern for what would
    follow in Germany, in Ukraine, in Cambodia, in Rwanda and so many
    other places. And just as most of the world refuses to acknowledge
    the Armenian genocide -- only about 20 nations recognize it for what
    it was -- the Canadian immigration system refused to acknowledge the
    gravity of the crimes committed in Rwanda for 17 years as Mr. Musegera
    enjoyed life in this country.

    Immigration Minister Jason Kenney now promises to reform the
    immigration appeal system for people charged with serious crimes. Most
    Canadians say it's about time, although, curiously, Musegera still
    has some supporters in this country, which perhaps goes to prove the
    more monstrous the crime, the more difficult it is to comprehend. A
    mugging we can understand, a massacre may elude us.

    ...by Tom Oleson Republished from the Winnipeg Free Press print
    edition January 28, 2012 J2

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