Launching Event

On April 3, 2008, the Online Encyclopedia of Mass Violence (OEMV) was launched and made accessible to the wider public. An inauguration conference took place at Sciences Po Paris, gathering more than 200 historians, journalists, researchers, experts in the field, partners of the project and students.

Introduced by Richard Descoings, Head of Sciences Po, the Conference was chaired by Christophe Jaffrelot, Head of the Center for International Research and Studies (CERI). On that particular occasion, we had the honor to listen to Mrs. Simone Veil and Esther Mujawayo, followed by a presentation of the OEMV project by Professor Jacques Semelin. Honorary President of the Foundation for the Memory of the Shoah, Past Minister and Past President of the European Parliament, Simone Veil is a Holocaust survivor. Sociologist and Psychotherapist, Esther Mujawayo survived the genocide in Rwanda.

Mr. Semelin explained the specific nature of the Online Encyclopedia, its purpose and the type of documents that are to be found on the website. He furthermore insisted on the importance of such an initiative for the writing of history as well as for healing and reconciliation processes. He then expressed his gratitude towards the academic and financial partners of the Encyclopedia and especially thanked the small team working on the project from its very beginning: Nathalie Tenenbaum, Project Manager and Coordinator, the Editing Team with Martine Alonso Marquis and Leslie Piquemal.

After a short demonstration of the website by Charles Tenenbaum (one of the Webmasters together with Mathieu Bouquet), the audience had the opportunity to ask questions, resulting in a fruitful exchange with the panelists and several members of the Steering Committee who attended the event.

The success of that launching day went far beyond the Sciences Po conference. More than 20,000 persons from 118 countries including China, Iran, Russia and Ukraine visited the website on that very first day.

Newspapers in France and abroad, main national radios and internet blogs as well as web-tv contributed to open the project to the widest public. Please feel free to consult them by having a look at the Headlines page of the website.

Also check the following link to watch the Launching Event videos. Or, have direct access to some selected videos:
Mr. Richard Descoing,
Mrs. Simone Veil,
Mrs. Esther Mujawayo,
Mr. Jacques Semelin,Part 1
Mr. Jacques Semelin,Part 2
Mr. Charles Tenenbaum

Other movies by some of the OEMV Partners :
Mr. Gerd Hankel, Hamburger Institute für Sozialforschung,
Mr. Stéphane Grimaldi, Director, Le Mémorial de Caen

We thank you for your interest and hope that you will appreciate the OEMV website,

The Online Encyclopedia of Mass Violence Team.