ff, or, if that proved impossible, disappeared mysteriously.Another way that King Leopold’s regime committed genocide was through cruel and unusual punishment. This is illegal according to the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment Michael Wakefield 591-70-0031of the Crime of Genocide. According to article two sections a, b, c killing members of the group, causing serious bodily or mental harm, and deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about physical destruction in whole or in part is illegal. Also according to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights article five “ No one shall be subjected to torture or to cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment.” There is numerous evidence that these atrocities were taking place. In one incidence 25 eight year old children were lined up and whipped 25 times each. The children kicked so frightfully that the soldiers were ordered to hold them by the hands and feet and lift them off the ground. The reason for this cruel punishment the children the night before laughed in the presence of a white man. In order not to waste cartridges of ammo for every shot native troops used they were required to bring in a right hand of a human. If they missed or killed game with their ammo the troops would just cut a right hand off a living person and use that to make up the necessary numbers. Native troops also where sent into towns and villages to strike fear into its residents. Most of these natives where cannibals and where ordered to terrorize people and if necessary kill men and women. The result was, according to the estimate of Sir H. Johnston, that in fifteen years the native population was reduced from about twenty million to sc...
