ABSTRACT
The chapter examines how international and humanitarian organizations participated and positioned themselves in relation to discourses on genocide during the Nigeria-Biafra war (1967-1970). During the first half of the conflict, the powerful Biafran propaganda regularly accused the Nigerian government of genocide against the Biafran population. The chapter looks at the way in which the International Committee of the Red Cross, one of the main humanitarian organizations present on the ground, reacted to Biafran accusations. In doing so, it analyzes how information received from delegates in the field were apprehended and used—or not—by the headquarters. It shows that the ICRC attitude towards public denunciation was more nuanced than as it is often presented. Furthermore, the chapter also sheds light on the involvement of the United Nations (UN) in the promotion of the counter-discourse developed by the Nigerian government to deny the genocide accusations. With a focus on the outcomes in the field, it fathoms the leeway the organization had in this situation—a civil war—and how it used it. The limits of the counter-discourse, illustrated by the persistence of the accusation of genocide by groups like the French doctors, reveal the complexities involved in the usage of this term by relief workers. Finally, in studying the way in which these international and humanitarian organizations dealt with genocide claims, this chapter contributes to the history of the violence that took place during the war.
