Both government and rebel forces have committed atrocity crimes.

Other representatives left once they realised what kind of atrocity they d blundered into.

In July, the European Union again suffered the horror of a major terrorist atrocity.

For several days now I wondered who will have the power to translate this atrocity.

I spent the better part of a decade looking at American responses to mass atrocity and genocide.

NEW YORK One of the worst atrocity crime stories of recent decades has barely registered in the world s collective conscience.

But memories of atrocity never seem to fade, as the government fanned anti Japanese riots now taking place in China remind us.

And the primary emphasis of the entire R2P enterprise should continue to be prevention of mass atrocity crimes both their occurrence and their recurrence.

In terms of getting serious about saying never again to mass atrocity crimes, that is about as positive a development as anyone could hope for.

The strain on Syria s neighbors is immense, and the conflict is inexorably seeping into the wider region. Both government and rebel forces have committed atrocity crimes.

The visual politics of atrocity and terror is only as strong as we imagine it. That is why exorcising its demons will require more than military might.

And worst of all is to be perceived as being soft on those who, like Egypt s current military rulers, commit mass atrocity crimes against their own citizens.

LONDON So what does 2009 hold in store for us? As ever, the unpredictable a terrorist atrocity or a rash decision by a national leader will take its toll.

When such means are not sufficient, the Security Council has the responsibility to take action under the Charter, with authority, with efficiency and without hesitation in situations of mass atrocity.

As ever, the unpredictable a terrorist atrocity or a rash decision by a national leader will take its toll. But much of what happens tomorrow will be a result of history.

Taken together, they offer reason for confidence that it may be possible to recreate international consensus, so long missing in Syria, about how to deal with the hardest mass atrocity cases.

But mass atrocity crimes did happen in Sri Lanka, there was moral default all around, and if we do not learn from this past, we will indeed be condemned to repeat it.

Had it been possible to bring some of the offenders to justice? Did the world care to remember what had happened in the worst atrocity to be committed in Europe since 1945?

He is disturbed by reports of the ongoing practice of atrocity demining whereby civilians are forced to act as human mine sweepers by the military, resulting in severe mutilation and sometimes death.

In 2005, on the UN s 60th anniversary, the General Assembly, convening at head of state and government level, unanimously endorsed the concept of states responsibility to protect populations at risk of genocide and other mass atrocity crimes.

Underlying this argument is the idea that the attack was an explicitly religious act carried out by an enemy faith, whose believers even those who denounced the atrocity are tainted and deserve to have their constitutional rights restricted.

It is too late now for non military tools of coercion to have much effect, although Security Council threats of International Criminal Court prosecution for atrocity crimes including any use of chemical weapons must remain on the table .

In fact, this trend of dehumanization is apparent in almost every epic of genocide, massacre, war, and atrocity including the Cambodian genocide massacres, the the massacres of Serbs and Bosnians in the Yugoslav wars, the Armenian genocide, and the Holocaust.

Russia s invocation of the responsibility to protect to justify its 2008 invasion of Georgia was met with incredulity at the time, and rendered even more cynical by its resolute failure since 2011 to condemn the Syrian regime for mass atrocity crimes against its own people.

Moreover, the UN should not only condemn, but without further delay put a stop to today s greatest atrocity the regime s obstruction of foreign assistance to victims of the cyclone. Their deaths are the sole responsibility of the military junta, which deliberately and with knowledge of the likely consequences has closed the door to humanitarian aid and workers from all over the world.