The term internment is used to refer to the confinement or imprisonment of large groups of people within the context of warfare. Typically, nonnaturalized immigrants are the subject of internment; however, at times this practice has been extended to those who hold different political convictions, belong to a group considered undesirable, or who the government perceives as a threat to wartime security. Such individuals are typically held without the benefit of a trial and with no specific charges, thus distinguishing internees from prisoners who are held for punishment after being found guilty of a crime and typically have access to a trial within the civil or military courts of the country.

In North America the best-known case of internment was that of Japanese-Americans during World War II. President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed Order 9066 into law on February 19, 1942 leading to the evacuation and relocation of an estimated 112,000 ethnic Japanese, most of whom were first and second...