This week, the world has joined with the people of Rwanda to commemorate the genocide of 10 years ago. The media have been filled with images and stories that tear at our hearts and leave us reeling at the horrors that human beings are capable of inflicting and surviving. These things we must never forget. But remembering is not enough because it does nothing to ensure that such horrors never happen again, anywhere.

In 2000, the Canadian government took a significant step to help prevent another Rwanda when it created an international commission to look at the issues of intervention and state sovereignty. The resulting report, Responsibility to Protect, puts forward the principle that the international community has a responsibility to intervene in situations where states are unable or unwilling to protect their own citizens from massive violations of human rights. It proposes that sovereignty should not be permitted to prevent internationally authorized intervention in cases of massive human rights violations or genocide.

The Canadian government continues to promote this principle in international forums and Prime Minister Martin made reference to it in the recent Throne Speech. In his address to our parliament in March, UN Secretary General Kofi Annan praised Canada for initiating and leading this debate. Other international leaders have also endorsed this approach. Nevertheless, 10 years after the genocide and more than two years since the release of Responsibility to Protect, we are no closer to putting in place a system to prevent another genocide.

This week, we are remembering the dead, more than 800,000 of them. We pray the images from Rwanda give urgency to this agenda and prompt those reluctant to act, to find their humanity and work to ensure this never happens again.

World Vision is an international Christian humanitarian relief and development organization which advocates with governments and the United Nations for the protection of civilians caught in situations of violent conflict.