ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses how the crime of persecution developed and what distinguishes persecution from genocide and from apartheid. It presents the crime of persecution in relation to the crime of genocide and the crime of apartheid. The crime of persecution is considered instrumental to and a ‘key chapter in the development of international criminal law’ in that it lifted widespread or systematic discrimination from being a matter of concern to the territorial state to the level of the international community as a whole. A series of discriminatory laws was passed, which limited the offices and professions permitted to Jews; and restrictions were placed on their family life and their rights of citizenship. Counts alleging persecution have captured the serious dimension of the conflict in the former Yugoslavia, the historical backdrop of which is reviewed in the acclaimed Tadic trial judgment. Persecution is a label attached to underlying offences characterised by discrimination against particular groups of persons.
