The article considers the urgent and important issues that arose during the comparative legal analysis of the norms on genocide in the 1948 Convention and Article 357 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation. It is shown that the provisions of Article 357 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation insufficiently exercise the legal regulation of such a complex legal phenomenon as genocide, in terms of a limited list of protected groups, the absence of liability for legal entities and officials, as well as insufficient detailing of the methods of committing the crime.