A/HRC/FMI/2014/2 I. Introduction and background to the Forum on Minority Issues 1. The seventh session of the Forum on Minority Issues will focus on the topic of preventing and addressing violence and atrocity crimes targeted against minorities. 2. Violence against minorities ranges from small-scale or localized incidents and attacks against communities to large and widespread and often systematized intercommunal conflicts, including conflicts that result in mass atrocity crimes such as genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity. They can also result in ethnic cleansing. Minorities, often because of their small numbers and their non-dominant and excluded status, frequently become the targets of violence. Many situations around the world demonstrate that minorities may be targeted with impunity. The impact of violence against them is far-reaching and devastating. Such violence at times includes the killing of civilians, rape and other forms of sexual violence, the destruction of homes, property and sites of cultural importance, displacement from lands and territories, and humanitarian crises that result in deprivation of food, shelter, water and sanitation, health care and education. Minorities are frequently ill-equipped to defend themselves against violence and inadequately protected by State authorities, including law-enforcement officials. 3. The tragic events in Rwanda and the former Yugoslavia gave a new impetus to United Nations efforts to protect vulnerable minorities — described by former SecretaryGeneral of the United Nations Kofi Annan as “genocide’s most frequent targets”. Attacks against minorities do not always occur in the context of conflict. The 2013 report of the present Secretary-General on the responsibility to protect mentions that “not all armed conflict generates atrocity crimes and not all atrocity crimes occur within a context of armed conflict. What distinguishes atrocity crimes is the deliberate targeting of specific groups, communities or populations.”1 4. The United Nations has repeatedly emphasized the importance of a culture of prevention and response. Its Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination, for example, places emphasis on the importance of preventing violence at the early stages and has drawn up early-warning indicators and urgent measures to prevent threats from escalating into mass violence or genocide.2 Among the key elements of strategies to prevent violence and atrocity crimes are the promotion and protection of minority rights, good and inclusive governance, and the effective management of diversity. In this connection, the Forum will consider problems, as well as positive practices, from all regions and will seek to identify some of the major causes of violence against minorities. It will also consider action that can and should be taken by States and other actors to prevent such violence, to protect the physical security of minorities, and to appropriately address violence and conflict to ensure that it does not persist or escalate into atrocity crimes. 5. The Forum on Minority Issues was established by the Human Rights Council in its resolution 6/15 of 28 September 2007 and was renewed in resolution 19/23 of 23 March 1 2 “Responsibility to protect: State responsibility and prevention”. Report of the Secretary-General, A/67/929–S/2013/399, para. 12. See “Prevention of racial discrimination, including early warning and urgent procedures: working paper adopted by the Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination”, A/48/18, annex III; also “Revised guidelines on the early warning and urgent action procedure”, Annual Report, A/62/18, annexes, chapter III, August 2007 and “Decision on follow-up to the declaration on the prevention of genocide: indicators of patterns of systematic and massive racial discrimination”, Official Records of the General Assembly, sixtieth session, supplement No. 18 (A/60/18). 3