After Aleppo: Prospects for Preventing Mass Atrocities in the new Administration

The Shirazi Foundation attended a participatory symposium hosted by New America titled, After Aleppo: Prospects for Preventing Mass Atrocities in the Trump Administration. Experts elaborated on aspects of the report titled, “A Necessary Good: U.S. Leadership on Preventing Mass Atrocities “. Experts suggested that in terms of atrocity prevention that it is not only a Human Rights issue but rather it is also a national security issue as well. Conflict prevention in many places throughout Africa was used as a model and suggested that prevention and intervention can be a success. Rich Fontaine President of The Center for a New American Security suggested that the voices in the public need to remain loud to articulate that there are things out there to prevent mass atrocities, and this can be done with an acceptable cost. Akshaya Kumar Deputy United Nations Director, Human Rights Watch mentioned that human rights abuse violations are warning signs and that the recommendations in the report and some of the structures that are in place such as the atrocity prevention board can work as mechanisms to flag places at risk for future atrocities by tracking Human Rights violations.