Editing Genocide Convention (section)

==Parties==
{{Main|List of parties to the Genocide Convention}}
[[File:Genocide Convention Participation.svg|right|300px|thumb| Participation in the Genocide Convention
{{legend|#00aa00|Signed and ratified}}
{{legend|#008000|Acceded or succeeded}}
{{legend|#eeee00|Only signed}}
]]
{{As of|2024|6}}, there are 153 state parties to the Genocide Convention—representing the vast majority of sovereign nations—with the most recent being [[Zambia]] in April 2022; one state, the Dominican Republic, has signed but not ratified the treaty. Forty-four states have neither signed nor ratified the convention.<ref name="United Nations Treaty Collection"/>

Despite its delegates playing a key role in drafting the convention, the United States did not become a party until 1988—a full forty years after it was opened for signature<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Korey |first1=William |date=March 1997 |title=The United States and the Genocide Convention: Leading Advocate and Leading Obstacle |journal=[[Ethics & International Affairs]] |volume=11 |pages=271–290 |doi=10.1111/j.1747-7093.1997.tb00032.x |s2cid=145335690}}</ref>—and did so only with reservations precluding punishment of the country if it were ever accused of genocide.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Bradley |first1=Curtis A. |last2=Goldsmith |first2=Jack L. |date=2000 |title=Treaties, Human Rights, and Conditional Consent |url=https://dash.harvard.edu/bitstream/handle/1/12956321/Treaties%20Human%20Rights%20and%20Conditional%20Consent.pdf?sequence=1&isAllowed=y |journal=[[University of Pennsylvania Law Review]] |doi=10.2139/SSRN.224298 |s2cid=153350639 |ssrn=224298 |quote=The United States attached a reservation to its ratification of the Genocide Convention, for example, stating that 'before any dispute to which the United States is a party may be submitted to the jurisdiction of the International Court of Justice under [Article IX of the Convention], the specific consent of the United States is required in each case.'}}</ref> These were due to traditional American suspicion of any international authority that could override US law. U.S. ratification of the convention was owed in large part to campaigning by Senator [[William Proxmire]], who addressed the Senate in support of the treaty every day it was in session between 1967 and 1986.<ref>{{Cite web |title=U.S. Senate: William Proxmire and the Genocide Treaty |url=https://www.senate.gov/about/powers-procedures/treaties/proxmire-and-the-genocide-treaty.htm |access-date=2021-06-03 |website=www.senate.gov}}</ref><!-- interesting, if true (Indeed!) -->

===Reservations===

====Immunity from prosecutions====
Several parties conditioned their ratification of the Convention on [[Treaty#Reservations|reservations]] that grant [[immunity from prosecution (international law)|immunity from prosecution]] for genocide without the consent of the national government:<ref>Prevent Genocide International: [http://www.preventgenocide.org/law/convention/reservations/ Declarations and Reservations to the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide]</ref><ref>United Nations Treaty Collection: [http://treaties.un.org/Pages/ViewDetails.aspx?src=TREATY&mtdsg_no=IV-1&chapter=4&lang=en Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20121020233944/http://treaties.un.org/Pages/ViewDetails.aspx?src=TREATY&mtdsg_no=IV-1&chapter=4&lang=en|date=20 October 2012}}, STATUS AS AT: 1 October 2011 07:22:22 EDT</ref>
{| class="wikitable"
|+
!Parties making reservations from prosecution
!Note
|-
|{{flagicon|Bahrain}} Bahrain
|
|-
|{{flagicon|Bangladesh}} Bangladesh
|
|-
|{{flagicon|PRC}} China
|
|-
|{{flagicon|India}} India
|
|-
|{{flagicon|Malaysia}} Malaysia 
|Opposed by Netherlands, United Kingdom
|-
|{{flagicon|Morocco}} Morocco
|
|-
|{{flagicon|Myanmar}} Myanmar
|
|-
|{{flagicon|Singapore}} Singapore
|Opposed by Netherlands, United Kingdom
|-
|{{flagicon|UAE}} United Arab Emirates
|
|-
|{{flagicon|USA}} United States of America 
|Opposed by Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Greece, Ireland, Italy, Mexico, Netherlands, Norway, Spain, Sweden, Turkey, and United Kingdom
|-
|{{flagicon|Venezuela}} Venezuela
|
|-
|{{flagicon|Vietnam}} Vietnam 
|Opposed by United Kingdom
|-
|{{flagicon|Yemen}} Yemen 
|Opposed by United Kingdom
|}

====Application to non-self-governing territories====
{{blockquote|Any Contracting Party may at any time, by notification addressed to the Secretary-General of the United Nations, extend the application of the present Convention to all or any of the territories for the conduct of whose foreign relations that Contracting Party is responsible|Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, Article 12<ref name="Convention-text" />}}

Several countries opposed this article, considering that the convention automatically also should apply to Non-Self-Governing Territories:
*{{flagicon|Albania}} Albania
*{{flagicon|Belarus}} Belarus
*{{flagicon|Bulgaria}} Bulgaria
*{{flagicon|Hungary}} Hungary
*{{flagicon|Mongolia}} Mongolia
*{{flagicon|Myanmar}} Myanmar
*{{flagicon|Poland}} Poland
*{{flagicon|Romania}} Romania
*{{flagicon|Russia}} Russian Federation
*{{flagicon|Ukraine}} Ukraine

The opposition of those countries were in turn opposed by:
*{{flagicon|Australia}} Australia
*{{flagicon|Belgium}} Belgium
*{{flagicon|Brazil}} Brazil
*{{flagicon|Ecuador}} Ecuador
*{{flagicon|PRC}} China
*{{flagicon|Netherlands}} Netherlands
*{{flagicon|Sri Lanka}} Sri Lanka
*{{flagicon|UK}} United Kingdom

(However, exceptionally, Australia did make such a notification at the same time as the ratification of the convention for Australia proper, on 8 July 1949, with the effect that the convention did apply also to all territories under Australian control simultaneously, as the USSR ''et alii'' had demanded. The European colonial powers in general did not then make such notifications.)