Chris Law, MP for the Scottish National Party, has accused British Foreign Secretary David Lammy of taking a position that “outrageously diminishes and minimises the seriousness of the crime of genocide”.
The UK’s Foreign Office declined to comment earlier on Tuesday after Lammy was accused of implying that atrocities in Srebrenica, Myanmar and elsewhere did not constitute genocides because fewer than millions of people were killed.
In a letter to Lammy on Tuesday evening, seen by Middle East Eye, Law urged the foreign secretary to retract his remarks, saying: “Your words have caused offense to groups that have experienced, are affected by, and who are currently experiencing atrocity crimes and genocide.”
He added that Lammy’s statement “reveals blatant contempt for the fundamental rights and the very lives of Palestinians”.
“Why is it that you only seem to have a problem with the use of such terms when it comes to what is being perpetrated against the Palestinian people and not others?”
In parliament on Monday, opposition Conservative MP Nick Timothy urged Lammy to clarify that “there is not a genocide occuring in the Middle East”, adding that terminology like “genocide” referring to Gaza was “not appropriate” and was “repeated by protesters and law breakers”.
Lammy said in response: “These are, quite properly, legal terms that must be determined by international courts.”
A International Court of Justice preliminary ruling in January said that Israel was plausibly committing genocide in Gaza, though is yet to give a full ruling on a case brought by South Africa.
However, Lammy then proceeded to lay out his own views, saying: “I do agree with the honourable gentleman [Timothy].
“Those terms were largely used when millions of people lost their lives in crises like Rwanda, the Second World War, the Holocaust, and the way that they are used now undermines the seriousness of that term.”
Approximately 800,000 people were killed in Rwanda in 1994. The British government recognises the atrocities as constituting genocide.
Lammy’s statement appeared to say that the designation of genocide should apply only when millions have been killed – placing his remarks in opposition to official British policy, which recognises that genocides have been committed in Srebrenica and against the Yazidi people in Iraq.
During the Bosnian war in the 1990s, more than 8,000 men and boys were killed in the town of Srebrenica.
And over 5,000 Yazidis were killed in the 2010s by the Islamic State group.
Middle East Eye asked the Foreign Office whether Lammy considers those atrocities to constitute genocide in light of his remarks on Gaza. It declined to comment.
Refik Hodzic, a Bosnian transitional justice expert who served as a spokesperson for the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia, told Middle East Eye that the foreign secretary’s statement “directly negates the Srebrenica genocide of Bosniaks, which has been adjudicated by numerous international and national courts, including the International Court of Justice”.
“Absurdly, his comment also negates the decision taken by the UK government itself,” he added.
In his letter to Lammy, MP Law said: “It is impossible that you are unaware of how genocide is defined in international law, and that you specifically know that the term isn’t limited to describe situations where millions of people have been killed.”
Contradicting past statements
In opposition, Lammy attended an event commemorating the atrocities in Srebrenica as a genocide.
“Perhaps the foreign secretary could explain how these genocides have all of a sudden lost their ‘seriousness’ now that the genocide of Palestinians by Israel is being addressed in the International Court of Justice,” Hodzic said.
Since the war on Gaza began nearly 13 months ago, Israeli forces have killed more than 43,000 Palestinians and wounded over 100,000. More than 10,000 are missing and presumed dead under the rubble.
At least 17,000 children and nearly 12,000 women are among the deceased, according to the Gaza-based government media office.
In throwing scorn on claims of genocide in Gaza, Lammy also appeared to contradict a statement he posted on social media platform X, then known as Twitter, in 2017 – in which he said the Rohingya in Myanmar “are facing genocide”.
Approximately 10,000 Rohingya men, women and children were killed in Myanmar in the 2010s.
Hodzic told media: “David Lammy illustrates well the double standard applied to the interpretation of facts when it comes to the genocide of Palestinians in Gaza committed by Israel.”
Lammy’s comments also come after he dropped plans to designate China’s treatment of its Uyghur minority as genocide when he travelled to Beijing earlier this month.
In March 2023, Lammy said that if Labour was elected, Labour would pursue legal routes to declare that China is committing genocide against the Uyghurs, and would “act multilaterally with our partners” to do so.
The party’s position was that international courts could not be relied on to make a determination of genocide, since they would require China’s consent.
In April 2021, the British parliament voted to declare that China is committing genocide, although the Conservative government did not do so. Labour backed the motion.
Uyghur rights activist Rizwanagul NurMuhammad told MEE that Lammy’s comments in parliament were “profoundly troubling, especially following his recent visit to China”.
“By downplaying the term ‘genocide’, the UK risks granting oppressive regimes greater impunity, even as diplomatic ties remain complex. Lammy’s role is crucial in shaping the UK’s stance on human rights,” he added.
“For Uyghur families enduring the daily trauma of separation and loss, this shift perpetuates an unacceptable dismissal of our plight.”
Gary Spedding, an independent cross-party consultant on Israel-Palestine, told MEE: “I think that the question that was posed to Lammy by Timothy was designed to deter politicians from using legally correct terms when describing Israel’s crimes.
“In his haste to go along with the pro-Israel groups in Parliament, Lammy has ended up causing great offence by shifting the definition of genocide to having a reliance on the number of people killed.
“This puts us in dangerous territory when it comes to our international standing and position when it comes to addressing crimes against humanity,” he warned.
