THE TOPIC OF war crimes has been visited repeatedly during the past few weeks after Russia invaded Ukraine and made its away to different towns and cities.

It’s a topic that has permeated discussion of the killings and treatment of people in places like Bucha, where bodies were discovered with their hands bound behind their backs.

Investigators are on the ground in Ukraine, exhuming bodies during their search for information as to whether war crimes occurred. 

But what are war crimes, and how many people have been convicted of them? And where do war crimes and genocide differ, if at all? What about the evidence for Russia perpetrating them?

To explain more, we turned to Professor Ray Murphy of the Irish Centre for Human Rights at NUI Galway for this episode. He speaks to presenter Michelle Hennessy about what war crimes are, who investigates them, what genocide is, and what countries have perpetrated such crimes.

Listen here for more:

The Explainer / SoundCloud

This episode was put together by presenters Michelle Hennessy and Gráinne Ni Aodha, and producers Nicky Ryan and Aoife Barry.

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