Summary
Genocide Warning Issued for UK Trans Community: The Lemkin Institute issued a "Red Alert for Genocide." It is the first and only country in Europe to have been issued a Red Flag.
Genocide Warning Issued for UK Trans Community
On Monday, the 30th of June, the Lemkin Institute posted a “Red Alert for Genocide” regarding the human rights of trans people in the UK. It is the first and only country in Europe to have been issued a Red Flag.
But who is the Lemkin Institute? When did Lemkin start issuing “Red Alerts”, and what is a “Red Alert?”
The Lemkin Institute for Genocide Prevention is a multinational, non-governmental human rights organisation based in the United States. It aims to identify genocide as a process with ten patterns, which allows for a broader definition than the 1948 Genocide Convention.
Genocide does NOT necessarily mean the mass killing of people. A “Red Flag Alert” is part of a broader framework of genocide prevention, not declarations of genocide per se.
Lemkin first issued a Red Alert for Genocide in December 2021 regarding a situation in Azerbaijan, and they have been particularly vocal regarding human rights issues in Azerbaijan, Bangladesh and Palestine.
Other countries have also had “Red Alerts” issued against them. They include Iran, Russia, Turkey, Syria, Israel and more recently (as fascism rears its ugly head), the United States.
The Red Alert against the UK, issued on June 30th, was a shameful moment in the history of a nation that was once seen as leading the world on LGBT+ human rights.
So, what was the essence of the UK Red Alert?
The Lemkin Institute for Genocide Prevention and Human Security has issued a grave warning regarding recent developments in the United Kingdom, expressing deep concern over judicial and governmental actions that they believe are attempting to harm transgender and intersex people by stripping them of privacy and segregating them as ‘others’.
The Institute views these moves as part of a broader process of erasure, fuelled by both government actions and a hostile media narrative that disregards the voices of these communities. This alarming trend shows evidence of genocidal intent and actions targeting transgender and intersex individuals.
A pivotal moment in this escalating crisis was the UK Supreme Court (UKSC) judgment in April, which declared that, for the purposes of the Equality Act (2010), “sex” refers to “biological sex”.
This ruling means that individuals are now protected from discrimination based on their sex assigned at birth, irrespective of their gender identity, lived gender, or sex characteristics. Protections are still available from the protected characteristic of gender reassignment.
Brought by the “gender critical” group For Women Scotland, which is financially backed by author J.K. Rowling, often together with the evangelical far-right, this decision has created dual legal categories for people with Gender Recognition Certificates (GRCs).
Despite assurances from the UKSC that the ruling would not disadvantage trans individuals, the practical repercussions are severe, with analysts warning it could render single-sex spaces like toilets, hospital wards, sports facilities, and domestic violence shelters off-limits for trans people.
For a group particularly vulnerable to domestic violence, exclusion from shelters could be life-threatening.
Transgender and intersex people may find themselves excluded from spaces corresponding to both their current sex and their sex assigned at birth.
The situation has only worsened in the months since the UKSC decision, with the Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) playing a significant role in eroding these rights.
The EHRC, explicitly confirmed by Kemi Badenoch, leader of the UK’s Official Opposition, has taken a restrictive interpretation of the ruling in its interim guidance, neglecting the welfare of intersex and transgender people.
This guidance dictates that anyone not strictly male or female is excluded from single-sex spaces, from public toilets to choirs. The Good Law Project has noted that this guidance may be either legally incorrect or a breach of human rights.
Although not yet law, it has already led many organisations to exclude transitioned individuals from spaces aligning with their lived gender, and often from spaces aligning with their birth-assigned sex as well.
Intersex people have been notably ignored throughout these discussions. Baroness Falkner, Head of the EHRC, stated that intersex people were not considered in the guidance because they are not included in the Equality Act (2010).
This lack of consideration is mirrored by the UK’s 0.0 score on the Rainbow Map for intersex bodily integrity, and the continued legality of genital mutilation of intersex babies, highlighting overt interphobia.
Beyond legal definitions, the UK’s approach to gender-affirming care is also in crisis.
The government-commissioned “Cass Report” on youth gender-affirming care, despite being internationally criticised as methodologically flawed and not peer-reviewed, forms the basis for a permanent ban on puberty blockers for transgender youth.
Adults also face incredibly long wait times for care, with one tragic instance leading to the death of a transgender woman whose life-saving cancer treatment was fatally delayed due to clinicians disagreeing on where to place her.
These actions, including proposed amendments like NC21, which would force public institutions to record sex assigned at birth and out transitioned people, fit neatly into the 9th Pattern of Genocide: “Denial and/or Prevention of Identity”.
The Lemkin Institute emphasises that genocide isn’t solely about mass killings; it can also manifest by making it impossible for individuals to exist as their true selves.
The erasure of a group from public life is a step towards attempting to erase their very existence.
Lemkin stated that this hostile environment, often cloaked in “feminism” or other ideologies by groups like For Women Scotland and Sex Matters, is a “subtle, pernicious and clear attempt to eradicate transgender and intersex people from British life because their existence causes ideological discomfort to some”.
The Lemkin Institute joins organisations like Human Rights Watch, the United Nations, and hundreds of historians in raising the alarm about this slow commencement of a genocidal process.
They underscore that trans and intersex people have always existed and will always exist, and that attempts to erase them as a class constitute an intent to commit genocide.
The Institute urges courts and governments to reject the fearmongering of groups seeking to harm trans individuals in the name of “women’s rights,” affirming that trans individuals pose no threat to cis women.
13/07/25 Editor’s note: In this post, we state that the UK is the only European country to have been issued a Lemkin “Red Flag Alert”. It has been pointed out that Turkey has a similar warning, and that 3% of Turkey’s landmass is in Europe.
