Category Archives: Genocide

Sen. Corker holds key to genocide prevention

Claude Gatebuke

It was April 1994 in Rwanda, and I was a 14-year-old boy running for my life. While neighbors and strangers helped save my mother, sisters and me, I can still hear the screams of family members and neighbors who were either hacked to death with machetes or killed by bombs and bullets raining on us like a tropical storm. At the time, we hoped the screams would be loud enough for the whole world to hear. However, the world did nothing until the killing was over.

The Rwandan genocide did not happen in an instant. Rather, it was the tragic culmination of decades of tensions, violence and repression. It was much deeper than Hutu versus Tutsi ethnicity — it was about unresolved grievances and about ignoring the clear warning signs that violence was on its way. A four-year war for control of the country that had displaced more than 1 million people was a clear sign of more violence to come — the genocide could have been prevented.

Twenty-two years later, we found ourselves marking the annual tribute to the victims of Rwanda during Genocide Awareness Month in April. We know now more than ever what the lead-up to mass violence and the outbreak of mass atrocities looks like. We also know how the effects ripple out to the whole world, including the United States, where I moved as a refugee in 1995.

And yet the global community, including the United States, is still very much focused on responding to crises rather than preventing them from breaking out in the first place.

As overwhelming as genocide prevention sounds, something can be done. Right now, the U.S. Senate is considering the Genocide and Atrocities Prevention Act (GAPA), a bipartisan bill that would allow the U.S. government to respond quickly and efficiently to the warning signs of violent conflict.

Our own Sen. Bob Corker is chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, which has jurisdiction over this bill. Senator Corker has been a champion of a strong U.S. foreign policy and national security and should work to pass this bill out of his committee and send it to the full Senate for a vote.

If passed, GAPA would establish a framework for government agency coordination, training and flexibility that is crucial to stop smoldering tensions from erupting into full-fledged atrocities. GAPA would help ensure the U.S. government takes prevention seriously, and it would save taxpayer dollars, save lives and bolster U.S. national security interests.

However, this is about more than just preventing atrocities or the outbreak of mass violence. By focusing energy on preventing global violence instead of responding to it, we can keep more American soldiers and peacekeepers safe at home rather than immersed in violent conflict.

Every day, I live with the screams and cries for help of Rwandan genocide victims. So do other survivors of mass atrocities, like my friends from the Democratic Republic of Congo, who suffered through a preventable war born out of the Rwandan genocide that devastated that country and took more than 6 million lives.

We can’t change decades-old failures, but we can work to end the screams of mass atrocities and genocide happening around the world right this very minute. We may never be able to completely prevent every outbreak of mass violence in the world. But if one fewer person is exposed to the aftermath of atrocities and mass violence because the right actions created a peaceful solution rather than a violent one, then the Genocide and Atrocities Prevention Act is a strategy worth investing in.

Claude Gatebuke is a survivor of Rwandan war and genocide, and is executive director and co-founder of the African Great Lakes Action Network (AGLAN) in Nashville.

Col MARCHAL écrit à Hérvé Féron sur la commémoration du génocide rwandais.

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Monsieur le Député-Maire,

Dans le contexte de la commémoration annuelle du génocide de 1994, vous avez récemment effectué une visite au Rwanda. Soyons clair, par votre présence vous avez cautionné le système de pensée unique que le pouvoir en place à Kigali tente, depuis 1994, d’imposer à la communauté internationale et à sa propre population, en excluant du devoir de mémoire collectif les innombrables victimes n’appartenant pas à la communauté des Tutsis.

C’est, précisément, pour avoir rappelé cette réalité que Madame Victoire Ingabire Umuhoza, candidate à l’élection présidentielle en 2010, a été condamnée à 15 ans de réclusion et ce, à l’issue d’une parodie de justice, ce que n’a pas manqué de dénoncer la Fondation Jean Jaurès.

Je tiens à préciser, sans la moindre ambiguïté, que je considère le génocide des Tutsis comme un fait incontestable. Cette matérialité ne peut, toutefois, servir d’épouvantail et occulter les massacres à grande échelle perpétrés par le Front patriotique rwandais, au Rwanda et dans le Congo voisin, à l’égard des Hutus et des Congolais.

Je prends l’initiative de vous exprimer mon sentiment parce que si certains ont pu être abusés en toute bonne foi au début, quant à la nature exacte du régime de Paul Kagame, par contre, ensuite et depuis de nombreuses années, les preuves objectives se sont à ce point accumulées que toute compromission avec ce régime liberticide et mortifère ne peut être considérée que comme un appui, si pas un encouragement, à ses multiples dérives totalitaires.

Je citerai comme éléments objectifs : les rapports Hourigan, Gersony, Garreton, Pillay, ceux relatifs au pillage des richesses de la République démocratique du Congo. Cette liste est malheureusement loin d’être exhaustive. Je suis convaincu que vous en connaissez la teneur.

Tout comme vous n’ignorez sans doute pas les diverses résolutions prises par le Parlement européens au sujet du Rwanda. Notamment celle du 23 mai 2013, prise en session plénière à Strasbourg. Celle-ci était présentée par cinq groupes parlementaires européens dont deux groupes de gauche : les Socialistes et démocrates au PE et la Gauche unitaire européenne/Gauche verte nordique.

Tout lecteur du texte de la résolution notera que son contenu et les termes utilisés sont sans la moindre ambiguïté à l’égard de Paul Kagame et de son total mépris pour la démocratie et les droits de l’homme. Nous sommes très loin du politiquement correct, style généralement adopté par ce genre d’assemblée.

En guise d’illustration, voici quelques-unes des formulations utilisées dans la résolution :

(…) le FPR demeure le parti politique dominant au Rwanda sous le président Kagame et contrôle la vie publique dans le contexte d’un système de parti unique où les personnes formulant des critiques à l’encontre des autorités rwandaises font l’objet de harcèlements, d’intimidations et sont mises en prisons.

(…) le droit et le système judiciaire rwandais enfreignent les conventions internationales auxquelles le Rwanda est partie (…) notamment ses dispositions sur la liberté d’expression et de pensée.

(…) le respect des droits de l’homme fondamentaux, y compris le pluralisme politique et la liberté d’expression et d’association, sont gravement restreints au Rwanda (…).

(…) le procès en première instance de Victoire Ingabire qui ne respectait pas les normes internationales, en premier lieu en ce qui concerne son droit à la présomption d’innocence, et était basé sur des preuves fabriquées et des aveux de co-accusés qui ont été placés en détention militaire au Camp Kami où on aurait eu recours à la torture pour leur extorquer lesdits aveux.

(…) la nature politiquement motivée du procès, la poursuite d’opposants politiques et l’issue décidée à l’avance du procès.

(…) les libertés de réunion, d’association et d’expression sont des composantes essentielles de toute démocratie, et estime que ces principes font l’objet de graves restrictions au Rwanda.

(…) condamne toute forme de répression, d’intimidation et de détention à l’égard de militants politiques, de journalistes et de défenseurs des droits de l’homme ; demande instamment aux autorités rwandaises de libérer immédiatement toutes les personnes et tous les militants emprisonnés ou condamnés pour le seul exercice de leurs droits à la liberté d’expression, d’association et de réunion pacifique.

(…) rappelle que les déclarations obtenues en employant la torture et autres formes de mauvais traitements ne sont admissible dans aucune procédure.

(…) rappelle aux autorités rwandaises que la démocratie se fonde sur un gouvernement pluraliste, une opposition effective, des médias et un système judiciaire indépendants, le respect des droits de l’homme et des droits de réunion et d’expression (…).

Monsieur le Député-Maire, je suis intiment convaincu que vous ne partagez en aucune façon les principes de gouvernance stigmatisés par le Parlement européen. Pourtant par votre récente démarche au Rwanda, vous vous faites complice d’un régime qui n’a de cesse de reléguer la grosse majorité de sa population à l’état de citoyens de seconde zone et ce, au mépris le plus total des droits les plus élémentaires de la personne humaine.

Je me permets, au nom des millions de victimes rwandaises et congolaises pour lesquelles justice n’a toujours pas été rendue, de vous présenter mes salutations distinguées.

Luc Marchal
ancien commandant du Secteur Kigali
Mission des Nations unies pour l’assistance au Rwanda

Source: http://www.musabyimana.net

Rwandan Genocide: What really happened in 1994?

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Christian Davenport and Allan C. Stam

In 1998 and 1999, we went to Rwanda and returned several times in subsequent years for a simple reason: We wanted to discover what had happened there during the 100 days in 1994 when civil war and genocide killed an estimated 1 million individuals. What was the source of our curiosity? Well, our motivations were complex. In part, we felt guilty about ignoring the events when they took place and were largely overshadowed in the U.S. by such “news” as the O.J. Simpson murder case. We felt that at least we could do something to clarify what had occurred in an effort to respect the dead and assist in preventing this kind of mass atrocity in the future. We were both also in need of something new, professionally speaking. Although tenured, our research agendas felt staid. Rwanda was a way out of the rut and into something significant.

Although well-intentioned, we were not at all ready for what we would encounter. Retrospectively, it was naïve of us to think that we would be. As we end the project 10 years later, our views are completely at odds with what we believed at the outset, as well as what passes for conventional wisdom about what took place.

We worked for both the prosecution and the defense at the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda, trying to perform the same task — that is, to find data that demonstrate what actually happened during the 100 days of killing. Because of our findings, we have been threatened by members of the Rwandan government and individuals around the world. And we have been labeled “genocide deniers” in both the popular press as well as the Tutsi expatriate community because we refused to say that the only form of political violence that took place in 1994 was genocide. It was not, and understanding what happened is crucial if the international community is to respond properly the next time it becomes aware of such a horrific spasm of mass violence.

Like most people with an unsophisticated understanding of Rwandan history and politics, we began our research believing that what we were dealing with was one of the most straightforward cases of political violence in recent times, and it came in two forms: On the one hand was the much-highlighted genocide, in which the dominant, ruling ethnic group — the Hutu — targeted the minority ethnic group known as the Tutsi. The behavior toward the minority group was extremely violent — taking place all over Rwanda — and the objective of the government’s effort appeared to be the eradication of the Tutsi, so the genocide label was easy to apply. On the other hand, there was the much-neglected international or civil war, which had rebels (the Rwandan Patriotic Front or RPF) invading from Uganda on one side and the Rwandan government (the Armed Forces of Rwanda or FAR) on the other. They fought this war for four years, until the RPF took control of the country.

We also went in believing that the Western community — especially the United States — had dropped the ball in failing to intervene, in large part because the West had failed to classify expeditiously the relevant events as genocide.

Finally, we went in believing that the Rwandan Patriotic Front, then rebels but now the ruling party in Rwanda, had stopped the genocide by ending the civil war and taking control of the country.

At the time, the points identified above stood as the conventional wisdom about the 100 days of slaughter. But the conventional wisdom was only partly correct.

The violence did seem to begin with Hutu extremists, including militia groups such as the Interahamwe, who focused their efforts against the Tutsi. But as our data came to reveal, from there violence spread quickly, with Hutu and Tutsi playing the roles of both attackers and victims, and many people of both ethnic backgrounds systematically using the mass killing to settle political, economic and personal scores.

Against conventional wisdom, we came to believe that the victims of this violence were fairly evenly distributed between Tutsi and Hutu; among other things, it appears that there simply weren’t enough Tutsi in Rwanda at the time to account for all the reported deaths.

We also came to understand just how uncomfortable it can be to question conventional wisdom.

We began our research while working on a U.S. Agency for International Development project that had proposed to deliver some methodological training to Rwandan students completing their graduate theses in the social sciences. While engaged in this effort, we came across a wide variety of nongovernmental organizations that had compiled information about the 100 days. Many of these organizations had records that were detailed, identifying precisely who died where and under what circumstances; the records included information about who had been attacked by whom. The harder we pushed the question of what had happened and who was responsible, the more access we gained to information and data.

There were a number of reasons that we were given wide-ranging access to groups that had data on the 100 days of killing. First, for their part of the USAID program, our hosts at the National University of Rwanda in Butare arranged many public talks, one of which took place at the U.S. embassy in Kigali. Presumably put together to assist Rwandan NGOs with “state-of-the-art” measurement of human rights violations, these talks — the embassy talk, in particular — turned the situation on its head. The Rwandans at the embassy ended up doing the teaching, bringing up any number of events and publications that dealt with the violence. We met with representatives of several of the institutions involved, whose members discussed with us in greater detail the data they had compiled.

Second, the U.S. ambassador at the time, George McDade Staples, helped us gain access to Rwanda government elites —directly and indirectly through staff members.

Third, the Rwandan assigned to assist the USAID project was extremely helpful in identifying potential sources of information. That she was closely related to a member of the former Tutsi royal family was a welcome plus.

Once we returned to the U.S., we began to code events during the 100 days by times, places, perpetrators, victims, weapon type and actions. Essentially, we compiled a listing of who did what to whom, and when and where they did it — what Charles Tilly, the late political sociologist, called an “event catalog.” This catalog would allow us to identify patterns and conduct more rigorous statistical investigations.

Looking at the material across space and time, it became apparent that not all of Rwanda was engulfed in violence at the same time. Rather, the violence spread from one locale to another, and there seemed to be a definite sequence to the spread. But we didn’t understand the sequence.

At National University of Rwanda, we spent a week preparing students to conduct a household survey of the province. As we taught the students how to design a survey instrument, a common question came up repeatedly: “What actually happened in Butare during the summer of 1994?” No one seemed to know; we found this lack of awareness puzzling and guided the students in building a set of questions for their survey, which eventually revealed several interesting pieces of information.

First, and perhaps most important, was confirmation that the vast majority of the population in the Butare province had been on the move between 1993 and 1995, particularly during early 1994. Almost no one stayed put. We also found that the RPF rebels had blocked the border leading south out of the province to Burundi. The numbers of households that provided information consistent with these facts raised significant questions in our minds regarding the culpability of the RPF relative to the FAR for killing in the area.

During this period, we confirmed Human Rights Watch findings that many killings were organized by the Hutu-led FAR, but we also found that many of the killings were spontaneous, the type of violence that we would expect with a complete breakdown of civil order. Our work further revealed that, some nine years later, a great deal of hostility remained. There was little communication between the two ethnic groups. The Tutsi, now under RPF leadership and President Paul Kagame, dominated all aspects of the political, economic and social systems.

Lastly, it became apparent to us that members of the Tutsi diaspora who returned to Rwanda after the conflict were woefully out of touch with the country that they had returned to. Indeed, one Tutsi woman with whom we spent a day in the hills around Butare broke down in tears in our car as we drove back to the university. When asked why, she replied, “I have never seen such poverty and destitution.” We were quite surprised at the degree of disconnect between the elite students drawn from the wealthy strata of the Tutsi diaspora, who were largely English-speaking, and the poorer Rwandans, who spoke Kinyarwanda and perhaps a bit of French. It was not surprising that the poor and the wealthy in the country did not mix; what struck both of us as surprising was the utter lack of empathy and knowledge about each other’s condition. After all, the Tutsi outside the country claimed to have invaded Rwanda from Uganda on behalf of the Tutsi inside — a group that the former seemed to have little awareness of or interest in. Our work has led us to conclude that the invading force had a primary goal of conquest and little regard for the lives of resident Tutsis.

As the students proceeded with the survey, asking questions that were politically awkward for the RPF-led government, we found our position in the country increasingly untenable. One member of our team was detained and held for the better part of a day while being interrogated by a district police chief. The putative reason was a lack of permissions from the local authorities; permissions were required for everything in Rwanda, and we generally had few problems obtaining them in the beginning. The real reason for the interrogation, however, seemed to be that we were asking uncomfortable questions about who the killers were.

A couple of weeks later, two members of our team were on a tourist trip in the northern part of the country when they were again detained and questioned for the better part of a day at an RPF military facility. There the questioners wanted to know why we were asking difficult questions, what we were doing in the country, whether we were working for the American CIA, if we were guests of the Europeans and, in general, why we were trying to cause trouble.

On one of our trips to Rwanda, Alison Des Forges, the pre-eminent scholar of Rwandan politics who has since died in an airplane crash, suggested that we go to the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda in Tanzania to seek answers to the questions we were raising. Des Forges even called on our behalf.

With appointments set and with Mount Kilimanjaro in the distance, we arrived in Arusha, Tanzania, for our meeting with Donald Webster, the lead prosecutor for the political trials, Barbara Mulvaney, the lead prosecutor for the military trial, and others from their respective teams. As we began to talk, we initially found that the prosecutors in the two sets of cases — one set of defendants were former members of the FAR military, the other set of trials focused on the members of the Hutu political machine — had great interest in our project.

Eventually, Webster and Mulvaney asked us to help them contextualize the cases that they were investigating. Needless to say, we were thrilled with the possibility. Now, we were working directly with those trying to bring about justice.

The prosecutors showed us a preliminary database that they had compiled from thousands of eyewitness statements associated with the 1994 violence. They did not have the resources to code all of the statements for computer analysis; they wanted us to do the coding and compare the statements against the data we had already compiled. We returned to the U.S. with real enthusiasm; we had access to data that no one else had seen and direct interaction with one of the most important legal bodies of the era.

Interest by and cooperation with the ICTR did not last as long as we thought it would, in no small part because it quickly became clear that our research was going to uncover killings committed not just by the Hutu-led former government, or FAR, but by the Tutsi-led rebel force, the RPF, as well. Until then, we had been trying to identify all deaths that had taken place; beyond confidentiality issues, it did not occur to us that the identity of perpetrators would be problematic (in part because we thought that all or almost all of them would be associated with the Hutu government). But then we tried to obtain detailed maps that contained information on the location of FAR military bases at the beginning of the civil war. We had seen copies of these maps pinned to the wall in Mulvaney’s office. In fact, during our interview with Mulvaney, the prosecutor explained how her office had used these maps. We took detailed notes, even going so far as to write down map grid coordinates and important map grid sheet identifiers.

After the prosecution indicated it was no longer interested in reconstructing a broad conception of what had taken place —prosecutors said they’d changed their legal strategy to focus exclusively on information directly related to people charged with crimes — we asked the court for a copy of the maps. To our great dismay, the prosecution claimed that the maps did not exist. Unfortunately for the prosecutors, we had our notes. After two years of negotiations, a sympathetic Canadian colonel in a Canadian mapping agency produced the maps we requested.

As part of the process of trying to work out the culpability of the various defendants charged with planning to carry out genocidal policies, the ICTR conducted interviews with witnesses to the violence over some five years, beginning in 1996. Ultimately, the court deposed some 12,000 different people. The witness statements represent a highly biased sample; the Kagame administration prevented ICTR investigators from interviewing many who might provide information implicating members of the RPF or who were otherwise deemed by the government to be either unimportant or a threat to the regime.

All the same, the witness statements were important to our project; they could help corroborate information found in CIA documents, other witness statements, academic studies of the violence and other authoritative sources.

As with the maps, however, when we asked for the statements, we were told they did not exist. Eventually, defense attorneys —who were surprised by the statements’ existence, there being no formal discovery process in the ICTR — requested them. After a year or so, we obtained the witness statements, in the form of computer image files that we converted into optically readable computer documents. We then wrote software to search through these 12,000 statements in our attempts to locate violence and killing throughout Rwanda.

The first significant negative publicity associated with our project occurred in November 2003 at an academic conference in Kigali. The National University of Rwanda had invited a select group of academics, including our team, to present the results of research into the 1994 murders. We had been led to believe that the conference would be a private affair, with an audience composed of academics and a small number of policymakers.

As it turned out, the conference was anything but small or private. It was held at a municipal facility in downtown Kigali, and our remarks would be simultaneously translated from English into French and the Rwandan language, Kinyarwanda. There were hundreds of people present, including not just academics but members of the military, the cabinet and other members of the business and political elite.

We presented two main findings, the first derived from spatial and temporal maps of data obtained from the different sources already mentioned. The maps showed that, while killing took place in different parts of the country, it did so at different rates and magnitudes — begging for an explanation we did not yet have. The second finding came out of a comparison of official census data from 1991 to the violence data we had collected. According to the census, there were approximately 600,000 Tutsi in the country in 1991; according to the survival organization Ibuka, about 300,000 survived the 1994 slaughter. This suggested that out of the 800,000 to 1 million believed to have been killed then, more than half were Hutu. The finding was significant; it suggested that the majority of the victims of 1994 were of the same ethnicity as the government in power. It also suggested that genocide — that is, a government’s attempts to exterminate an ethnic group — was hardly the only motive for some, and perhaps most, of the killing that occurred in the 100 days of 1994.

Halfway into our presentation, a military man in a green uniform stood up and interrupted. The Minister of Internal Affairs, he announced, took great exception to our findings. We were told that our passport numbers had been documented, that we were expected to leave the country the next day and that we would not be welcomed back into Rwanda — ever. Abruptly, our presentation was over, as was, it seemed, our fieldwork in Rwanda.

The results of our initial paper and media interviews became widely known throughout the community of those who study genocides in general and the Rwandan genocide in particular. The main offshoot was that we became labeled, paradoxically, as genocide “deniers,” even though our research documents that genocide had occurred. Both of us have received significant quantities of hate mail and hostile e-mail. In the Tutsi community and diaspora, our work is anathema. Over the past several years, as we have refined our results, becoming more confident about our findings, our critics’ voices have become louder and increasingly strident.

Of course, we have never denied that a genocide took place; we just noted that genocide was only one among several forms of violence that occured at the time. In the context of post-genocide Rwandan politics, however, the divergence from common wisdom was considered political heresy.

Following the debacle at the Kigali conference, the ICTR prosecution teams of Webster and Mulvaney let us know in no uncertain terms that they had no further use of our services. The reasons for our dismissal struck us as somewhat outrageous. From the outset, the prosecution claimed it was not interested in anything that would prove or disprove the culpability of any individuals in the mass killings. Now, they said, the findings we’d announced in the Kigali conference made our future efforts superfluous.

Shortly after our dismissal, however, Peter Erlinder, a defense attorney for former members of the FAR military who were to be tried, contacted us. This was after several others from the defense had also attempted to contact us, with no success.

We had misgivings about cooperating or working with the defense, the gravest being that such work might be seen as supporting the claim we were genocide deniers. After months of negotiating, we finally met Erlinder at a Starbucks in Philadelphia, Pa. The defense could have made a better choice for roping us in. Erlinder, a professor at the William Mitchell College of Law, was an academic turned defender for the least likable suspects.

After we obtained lattes and quiet seats in the back of the coffee shop, Erlinder came straight to the point: He was, of course, interested in establishing his client’s innocence, but he felt it would help the defense to establish a baseline history of what had taken place in the war in 1994. As he explained, “My client may be guilty of some things, but he is not guilty of all the things that any in the Rwandan government and military during 1994 is accused of. They have all been made out to be devils.”

What he asked was reasonable. In fact, he made the same essential offer the prosecution had: In exchange for our efforts at contextualizing the events of 1994, Erlinder would do the best he could to assist us in getting data on what took place. With Erlinder’s assistance, we were able to obtain the maps we’d seen in Mulvaney’s office and the 12,000 witness statements. With this information, we were able to better establish the true positions of both the FAR and RPF during the civil war. This greater confidence of the location of the two sides’ militaries made — and makes — us more certain about the culpability of the FAR for the majority of the killings during the 100 days of 1994. At the same time, however, we also began to develop a stronger understanding of the not insignificant role played by the RPF in the mass murders.

About this time, we were approached by an individual associated with Arcview-GIS, a spatial mapping software firm that wanted to take the rather simplistic maps that we had developed and improve them, thereby showing what the company’s program was capable of. Our consultant at Arcview-GIS said the software could layer information on the map, providing, among other things, a line that showed, day by day, where the battlefront of the civil war was located, relative to the killings we had already documented.

This was a major step. In line with the conventional wisdom, we had assumed that the government was responsible for most all of the people killed in Rwanda during 1994; we initially paid no attention to where RPF forces were located. But it soon became clear that the killings occurred not just in territory controlled by the government’s FAR but also in RPF-captured territory, as well as along the front between the two forces. It seemed possible to us that the three zones of engagement (the FAR-controlled area, the RPF-controlled area and the battlefront between the two) somehow influenced one another.

In his book, The Limits of Humanitarian Intervention, Alan Kuperman argued that given the logistical challenges of mounting a military operation in deep central Africa, there was little the U.S. or Europe could have done to limit the 1994 killings. To support his position, Kuperman used U.S. Defense Intelligence Agency information to document approximate positions of the RPF units over the course of the war. We updated this information on troop locations with data from CIA national intelligence estimates that others had obtained through the Freedom of Information Act and then updated it again, incorporating interviews with former RPF members, whose recollections we corroborated with information from the FAR.

Our research showed the vast majority of the 1994 killing had been conducted by the FAR, the Interahamwe and their associates. Another significant proportion of the killing was committed not by government forces but by citizens engaged in opportunistic killing as part of the breakdown of civil order associated with the civil war. But the RPF was clearly responsible for another significant portion of the killings.

In some instances, the RPF killings were, very likely, spontaneous retribution. In other cases, though, the RPF has been directly implicated in large-scale killings associated with refugee camps, as well as individual households. Large numbers of individuals died at roadblocks and in municipal centers, households, swamps and fields, many of them trying to make their way to borders.

Perhaps the most shocking result of our combination of information on troop locations involved the invasion itself: The killings in the zone controlled by the FAR seemed to escalate as the RPF moved into the country and acquired more territory. When the RPF advanced, large-scale killings escalated. When the RPF stopped, large-scale killings largely decreased. The data revealed in our maps was consistent with FAR claims that it would have stopped much of the killing if the RPF had simply called a halt to its invasion. This conclusion runs counter to the Kagame administration’s claims that the RPF continued its invasion to bring a halt to the killings.

In terms of ethnicity, the short answer to the question, “Who died?” is, “We’ll probably never know.” By and large, the Hutu and the Tutsi are physically indistinct from one another. They share a common language. They have no identifiable accent. They have had significant levels of intermarriage through their histories, and they have lived in similar locations for the past several hundred years. In the 1920s and 1930s, the Belgians, in their role as occupying power, put together a national program to try to identify individuals’ ethnic identity through phrenology, an abortive attempt to create an ethnicity scale based on measurable physical features such as height, nose width and weight, with the hope that colonial administrators would not have to rely on identity cards.

One result of the Belgian efforts was to show — convincingly — that there is no observable difference on average between the typical Hutu Rwandan and the typical Tutsi Rwandan. Some clans — such as those of the current president, Paul Kagame, or the earlier Hutu president,Juvenal Habyarimana — do share distinctive physical traits. But the typical Rwandan shares a mix of such archetypal traits, making ethnic identity outside of local knowledge about an individual household’s identity difficult if not impossible to ascertain — especially in mass graves containing no identifying information. (For example, Physicians for Human Rights exhumed a mass grave in western Rwanda and found the remains of more than 450 people, but only six identity cards.)
In court transcripts for multiple trials at the ICTR, witnesses described surviving the killings that took place around them by simply hiding among members of the opposite ethnic group. It is clear that in 1994, killers would have had a difficult time ascertaining the ethnic identity of their putative victims, unless they were targeting neighbors.

Complicating matters is the displacement that accompanied the RPF invasion. During 1994, some 2 million Rwandan citizens became external refugees, 1 million to 2 million became internal refugees, and about 1 million eventually became victims of civil war and genocide.

Ethnic identity in Rwanda is local knowledge, in much the same way that caste is local knowledge in India. With the majority of the population on the move, local knowledge and ethnic identity disappeared. This is not to say that the indigenous Tutsi were not sought out deliberately for extermination. But in their killing rampages, FAR, the Interahamwe and private citizens engaged in killing victims of both ethnic groups. And people from both ethnic groups were on the move, trying to stay out in front of the fighting as the RPF advanced.

In the end, our best estimate of who died during the 1994 massacre was, really, an educated guess based on an estimate of the number of Tutsi in the country at the outset of the war and the number who survived the war. Using a simple method —subtracting the survivors from the number of Tutsi residents at the outset of the violence — we arrived at an estimated total of somewhere between 300,000 and 500,000 Tutsi victims. If we believe the estimate of close to 1 million total civilian deaths in the war and genocide, we are then left with between 500,000 and 700,000 Hutu deaths, and a best guess that the majority of victims were in fact Hutu, not Tutsi.

This conclusion — which has drawn criticism from the Kagame regime and its supporters — is buttressed by the maps that we painstakingly constructed from the best available data and that show significant numbers of people killed in areas under control of the Tutsi-led RPF.

One fact is now becoming increasingly well understood: During the genocide and civil war that took place in Rwanda in 1994, multiple processes of violence took place simultaneously. Clearly there was a genocidal campaign, directed to some degree by the Hutu government, resulting directly in the deaths of some 100,000 or more Tutsi. At the same time, a civil war raged — a war that began in 1990, if the focus is on only the most recent and intense violence, but had roots that extend all the way back to the 1950s. Clearly, there was also random, wanton violence associated with the breakdown of order during the civil war. There’s also no question that large-scale retribution killings took place throughout the country — retribution killings by Hutu of Tutsi, and vice versa.

From the beginning, the ICTR’s investigation into the mass killings and crimes against humanity in Rwanda in 1994 has focused myopically on the culpability of Hutu leaders and other presumed participants. The Kagame administration has worked assiduously to prevent any investigation into RPF culpability for either mass killings or the random violence associated with the civil war. By raising the possibility that in addition to Hutu/FAR wrongdoing, the RPF was involved, either directly or indirectly, in many deaths, we became in effect persona non grata in Rwanda and at the ICTR.

The most commonly invoked metaphor for the 1994 Rwandan violence is the Holocaust. Elsewhere, we have suggested that perhaps the English civil war, the Greek civil war, the Chinese civil war or the Russian civil war might be more apt comparisons because they all involved some combination of ethnic-based violence and the random slaughter and retribution that can occur when civil society breaks down altogether.

Actually, though, it is difficult to make authoritative comparisons when it remains unclear exactly what happened in the Rwandan civil war and genocide.

Contemporary observers — including Romeo Dallaire, the commander of the ineffective U.N. peacekeeping force for Rwanda in 1993 and 1994 — claim that much of the genocidal killing had been planned by the Hutu government as early as two years in advance of the actual RPF invasion. Unfortunately, we have not been able to gain access to the individuals who have information on that score to either corroborate or to refute the hypothesis. The reason? Convicted genocidaires who have been implicated in the planning of the slaughter now reside out of contact with potential interviewers in a U.N.-sponsored prison in Mali.

We wanted to put questions to these planners, specifically to ask them what their goals were. Was the genocide plan an attempt at deterrence, an effort that the FAR leadership thought might keep the RPF at bay in Uganda and elsewhere? Did the FAR government actually hope for war, believing — incorrectly as it turned out — that it would win? Was the scale of the killing beyond its expectations? If so, why do FAR leaders believe events spun so badly out of control, compared to previous spasms of violence in the 1960s, ’70s and ’80s?

Unfortunately, the U.N. prosecutors in Tanzania told us they could not arrange a meeting with the convicted planners and killers, but we were free to go to Mali on our own. We were told we would probably get in to see the prisoners, but the prison is in the middle of nowhere, in a country where we had no contacts. We had to let go.

Even without access to convicted genocidaires, we continued to piece together what had happened in 1994 with the help of a grant from the National Science Foundation. The grant allowed us to be more ambitious in our pursuit of diverse informants who started popping up all over the globe, to refine our mapping and to explore alternative ways of generating estimates about what had taken place. While our understanding has advanced a great deal since our first days in Kigali, it is hard not to see irony in a current reality: Some of the most important information about what occurred in Rwanda in 1994 has been sent — by the very authorities responsible for investigating the violence and preventing its recurrence, in Rwanda and elsewhere — to an isolated prison, where it sits unexamined, like some artifact in the final scene of an Indiana Jones movie.

Christian Davenport and Allan C. Stam

Published first on October 6, 2009 .

BBC rejects complaint over controversial Rwanda genocide documentary

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The BBC’s editorial complaints unit has rejected a complaint about a controversial documentary on Rwanda that questioned official accounts of the 1994 genocide.

The group of scholars, scientists, researchers, journalists and historians who made the complaint now plan to appeal to the BBC Trust over the decision.

Rwanda’s Untold Story, broadcast on 1 October 2014, sparked controversy by suggesting President Paul Kagame may have had a hand in the shooting-down of his predecessor’s plane, which triggered the mass killings.

It also quoted US researchers who suggested that many of the more than 800,000 Rwandans who died in the 1994 genocide may have been ethnic Hutus, and not Tutsis as the government maintains.

Kagame accused the BBC of “genocide denial” in the documentary, which he said had chosen to “tarnish Rwandans, dehumanise them”. The corporation emphatically rejected the claims.

UK urges Rwanda to lift BBC broadcasting ban

Last November, a group of 48 people, including former president of the International Committee of the Red Cross Cornelio Sommaruga, Bishop Ken Barham and investigative journalist and author Professor Linda Melvern, wrote to BBC director general Tony Hall to express concern over the documentary.

Their letter claimed the BBC had been “recklessly irresponsible” in airing the film, said it contained serious inaccuracies, and claimed part of its content promoted genocide denial.

The criticisms were rejected by Jim Gray, deputy head of current affairs, so last month they took their case to the BBC’s editorial complaints unit.

Their complaint claimed the documentary was in breach of BBC editorial guidelines, including its commitment to truth and accuracy, impartiality, serving the public interest and distinguishing opinion from fact.

It was backed by a 15-page document claiming the programme promoted denial of the genocide of the Tutsi, changed the meaning of events, and tried to reinterpret the facts and change reality.

The complainants accused the film of being misleading and biased, saying it had promised “evidence that challenges the accepted story of the Rwandan genocide” but had instead used discredited material produced by defence lawyers in the trials at the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda. They also criticised the BBC journalists for relying on unverified witness testimony in the programme.

Finally, they claimed there had been concerns among BBC staff about the film, and questioned whether, given its sensitivity, it should have been considered at a high level within the corporation.

The editorial complaints unit produced a detailed response to the allegations, but found the film had not breached BBC guidelines.

A BBC spokesperson confirmed: “The BBC’s editorial complaints unit has concluded that the documentary Rwanda’s Untold Story was not in breach of the BBC’s editorial standards.”

One of the complainants, Melvern, said in response: “The ECU determined no breaches in editorial guidelines took place and declared the programme justified for ‘good editorial reasons’, produced in a spirit of ‘journalistic inquiry’.

“None of our concerns was addressed. The ruling failed to provide answers to our questions. No evidence was forthcoming. The ECU wrote that judgments handed down at the ICTR had ‘little relevance’ when considering ‘other accounts’ of the genocide. The programme was simply presenting ‘dissenting views’, ‘alternative perspectives’, and ‘controversial theories’ about the genocide of the Tutsi claiming all the while that this would not mislead viewers.

“The BBC claims that the documentary did not damage the history of the genocide of the Tutsi – we maintain it did just that.”

Melvern said an appeal will be lodged with the BBC Trust next week.

A spokesperson for BBC News said: “Throughout the making of this programme, which we acknowledge raised extremely painful issues, our guiding principle was to respect the immense suffering of the Rwandan people and cover an immensely difficult subject in a measured way, not to downplay nor conceal events.”

Last month, the UK called on the Rwandan government to lift its ban on BBC radio broadcasts in the country’s most common language, which was imposed in the wake of the documentary.

A Foreign office spokesperson said the UK government “recognises the hurt caused in Rwanda by some parts of the documentary”, but it was “concerned” by the move to suspend the BBC’s FM broadcasts and hold an official investigation.

The inquiry, set up by the government-appointed Rwanda Utilities Regulatory Agency, urged its government to take criminal action against the BBC.

Its report said: “The documentary made a litany of claims and assertions that are problematic in a number of ways and which we consider to violate Rwandan law, the BBC’s own ethical guidelines and limitations to press freedom.

“We also find the documentary to be minimising and denying genocide, contravening domestic and international laws.”

A BBC spokesperson said: “We are extremely disappointed by the findings of this commission. While we do not yet know the full implications for the BBC in Rwanda, we stand by our right to produce the independent journalism which has made us the world’s most trusted news source … We strongly reject any suggestion that any part of this documentary constitutes genocide denial.”

Source: The Guardian

Rwandan genocide documents declassified by France on 21st anniversary of the conflict

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PHOTO: Rwandan president Paul Kagame lit the Flame of Remembrance at the Gisozy Genocide memorial in Kigali, marking 21 years since the genocide of 1994.(AFP: Stephanie Aglietti)

France has declassified documents in the presidential archives relating to the 1994 Rwandan genocide, in which the capital Kigali accuses Paris of having an indirect role.

A decision to declassify the papers was signed on Tuesday and concerns “documents in the Elysee relating to Rwanda between 1990 and 1995”, spanning the genocide which claimed at least 800,000 lives, a source in president Francois Hollande’s entourage said.

“The president had announced a year ago that France must provide proof of transparency and facilitate remembrance of this period,” the source said.

The papers, which include documents from diplomatic and military advisers as well as minutes from ministerial and defence meetings, will be available to both researchers and victims’ associations, the French presidency said.

Ties between France and Rwanda are strained after Rwandan president Paul Kagame accused Paris of complicity in the genocide because of its support of the Hutu nationalist government that carried out the mass killings, mainly of ethnic Tutsis.

Paris has repeatedly denied the accusations and insists that French forces had worked to protect civilians. Relations between both countries were completely frozen from 2006 to 2009.

The genocide was sparked by the ouster of the country’s president, a Hutu.

Mr Kagame last year caused a stir by repeating his accusations against France before commemorations to mark the 20th anniversary of the genocide which ran from April to July 1994.

He notably said that France had not “done enough to save lives” and had not only been complicit but “an actor” in the massacre of Tutsis.

He also spoke of “the direct role of Belgium and France in the political preparation of the genocide, and the participation of the latter in its actual execution”.

Former French prime minister Alain Juppe, who was president Francois Mitterrand’s foreign minister at the time of the genocide, termed the accusations “intolerable” and urged Mr Hollande to “defend France’s honour”.

Stung by the repeated accusations, France cancelled plans for the justice minister to attend the 20th anniversary commemorations.

A French parliamentary inquiry set up to try to establish the truth about the French role declared “France was in no way implicated in the genocide against the Tutsis”.

But the two rapporteurs, one of whom was Bernard Cazeneuve, who is currently France’s interior minister, admitted the French authorities made “serious errors of judgement”.

The announcement of the declassification of the Rwanda papers came on the 21st anniversary of the outbreak of the genocide on April 7, 1994.

AFP

Prof Charles Kambanda lambasts claims by Melvern et al. over BBC’s “Rwanda: untold story”

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Professor Charles Kambanda would love to take on Ms. Melvern et al. in an open debate over issues raised on the documentary “RWANDA: UNTOLD STORY”.

October, 15th, 2014

RE: MY ANALYSIS OF Ms. MELVERN, THE THIRTY-EIGHT RESEARCHERS AND JOUNALISTS’ REBUTTAL OF RWANDA’S UNTOLD STORY BBC DOCUMENTARY:

Introduction:

I am writing to you as a Rwandan researcher, human rights defender and an Officer of Court in New York State; I am bound by the Constitutional Oath of Office. I taught at the National University and other institutions of higher learning in Rwanda for over a decade after the 1994 massacres. I am writing from my firsthand and lived experience of the unfortunate Hutu/Tutsi conflict. I am a Rwandan who was born to a Rwandan refugee family in Uganda. I supported RPF before, during and after the 1990 war. Like many other Rwandans, I lost countless family relations to the massacres in Rwanda. I am a Rwandan scholar – based in the United States of America – who is interested in sustainable peace and co-existence between and/or among the diverse people of Rwanda. I belong to no Rwandan political party. It is my submission that no side to the insane Tutsi vs. Hutu conflict is exclusively for victims or perpetrators of the senseless crimes that have characterized these two, generally, hostile groups. Both sides to the armed conflict committed horrible massacres before, during and after the 1994 massacres.

Accept my heartfelt gratitude and respect for the BBC team that prepared the famous Rwanda’s Untold Story documentary. The BBC team that worked on this documentary did a tremendous job documenting the background and the intricate web of the crimes both sides allegedly committed during, before and after the 1994 horrific massacres. What your team did is investigative journalism; Descartes (the great French philosopher) called it the Methodical doubt. In the Holy Scriptures, Jesus Christ says “the Truth will set us free”. The producer of the documentary dug deep into the truth which different parties to the Rwandan conflict do not want the world to know because that truth will set people free. The BBC, as an institution, deserves credit for the great film. It is my submission that Ms. Melvern and her group’s “rebuttal” of the BBC documentary should be treated with the contempt it deserves.

A. Inquiry into the causes, manner, perpetrators and victims of the long and bloody Hutu vs. Tutsi conflict in Burundi and Rwanda before, during and after the 1994 massacres in Rwanda is not a closed chapter as Ms. Melvern’s missive appears to suggest.

The 1994 massacres occurred within the context of a bloody ethnic civil war between the Hutu (a Hutu dominated government) and Tutsi (Tutsi dominated rebels). There are well documented ethnic based massacres between the Hutu and Tutsi before and after the 1994 massacres. The well documented Tutsi/Hutu massacres include:

(i) The 1993 Burundian massacres where the Tutsi butchered the Hutu.

(ii) The Gersony, UNCHR sponsored report which detailed the insane massacred RPF /A perpetrated against the Hutu under the then Tutsi rebels held territory.

(iii) RPF/A (predominantly Tutsi) slaughter of internally displaced Hutu refugees camp.

(iv) Some Tutsi and some Hutu militia on-slaughter of the Tutsi and the Hutu during the 1994 massacres.

(v) RPF/A slaughter of the Hutu in Congo (both native DRC Hutu and Rwandan Hutu refugees as documented by the UN Mapping Report).

Investigating the similarities and differences between these reoccurring insane massacres between the Hutu and Tutsi without favor is, in my opinion, not only necessary but also a noble cause. The documentary does exactly that. Apparently, any objective inquiry into these crimes is what Ms. Melvern and her group of journalists and researchers call “[using] current events to either negate or to diminish the genocide… to promote genocide denial”. All the above well documented crimes, committed by the same people against the same people in different places and time, create an unequivocal need for social research. Social research is a continuum. Unfortunately, Ms. Melvern and her group appear to suggest that their research finding on these complex social political phenomena in the Hutu vs. Tutsi conflict is conclusive.

B. Ms. Melvern and her team resort to name calling instead of addressing the substantive issues the interviewees, individually, and the entire documentary raised. In most instances, Ms. Melvern and her group do not substantiate their generalized attacks on the individual interviewees, the BBC and the documentary producers

Ms. Melvern and her group characterize the BBC documentary as “old claims […] similar material using similar language [that is] part of an on-going Hutu power campaign of genocide denial”. This is an absurd approach especially for social science researchers and journalists for various reasons:

(i) The BBC documentary, as the title of the documentary suggests, was intended to interview different people with rarely mentioned personal experience of what happened in Rwanda during, before and after the 1994 massacres. Such statements must be as old as the events the statements describe if those statements are proper representation of what happened. Therefore, whether those statements are “old claims” is a tautology. How would statements explaining what happened 20 or so years ago be “brand-new” statements for every BBC viewer of the program?

(ii) Ms. Melvern and her group deliberately apply “Hutu power”, term with no known definition to confuse their readers. What’s Hutu power? What is the composition of Hutu power? Where is Hutu power? Research methodology and formal logic prohibit use of unknown and undefined terms for any purpose, especially while addressing critical social problems.

Ms. Melvern and her group of journalists and researchers claim that “the parts of the film which concern the 1994 genocide, far from providing BBC viewers with an ‘Untold Story’ as the title promises, are old claims”. This is a serious allegation against the BBC “on behalf of BBC viewers”. This allegation implies that Ms. Melvern and her group met “BBC viewers” and Ms. Melvern and her group are authorized agents of the “BBC viewers” to complain to the BBC on behalf of what Ms. Melvern calls the BBC viewers. Is Ms. Melvern or any individual signatory to their letter the “BBC viewers” and so the signatory are complaining to the BBC for having viewed “old claims”? Are these researchers who signed the letter presenting their perception of the BBC documentary as “old claims”? Is Ms. Melvern presenting “some” or “all” BBC viewers’ perception of documentary? Did Ms. Melvern and the researchers who signed the letter purposively fail to distribute their term “BBC viewers” properly? Is Ms. Melvern unfamiliar with the rules on distribution of terms? Why didn’t they distribute their term “BBC viewers” so that the readers know, with substantial certainty, the scope of the “BBC viewers” these researchers are referring to?

Ms. Melvern and her group argue that “at the heart of this [Hutu power] campaign are convicted génocidaires, some of their defen[s]e lawyers from the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR), and their supporters and collaborators … like the programme … The BBC programme Rwanda’s Untold Story recycles their arguments and provides them with another platform to create doubt and confusion about what really happened”. This is absurd ad hominem because:

(i) A reasonable person would not confuse the person, ideas and research, of defense counsel with the client’s real or alleged crimes. Ms. Melvern and her fellow researchers appear to impute the ICTR “convicted genocidaire” some ICTR defense counsels.

(ii) Carl Del Ponte, the former ICTR prosecutor, Michael Hourigan who was an investigator and prosecutor at ICTR, among others scholars wrote widely about the ICTR’s cover up of the RPA/F crimes during the 1994 massacres.

(iii) Ms. Melvern and her group know or they should know for sure, that the BBC documentary producer did not interview any ICTR convict. How do the distinguished researchers, who signed the letter, relate the BBC documentary interviewees’ testimony with ICTR “convicted genocidaires”?

(iv) Courtesy and common sense requires Ms. Melvern and her group to explain how the ICTR “convicted genocidaires” exercised undue influence and pressure over the documentary interviewees. Is it rational that the ICTR “convicted genocidaires”, as Ms. Melvern and the group put it, would influence a significant number of society as to form what Ms. Melvern appears to call a global campaign of supporters and collaborators to create doubts and confusion about what happened?

(v) The documentary producer interviewed Rwandans and other nationals. Some of the interviewees are Tutsi and former RPF/A members. How did the ICTR “convicted genocidaires” recruit these Tutsi 1990/1994 war opponents into supporters and collaborators? Aren’t Ms. Melvern and her group oversimplifying very complex issues under cover over of their deliberate ad hominem?

(vi) The documentary features prominent non-Rwandan scholars and legal practitioners. Ms. Melvern and her group conveniently dismiss all these prominent professionals’ views under a terribly sweeping statement “all of those professionals are supporters and collaborators of the ICTR convicted genocidaire”. Ordinarily, social researchers and journalists avoid sweeping statements. How do the “convicted genocidaire” influence a cross section of people – including prominent professionals like lawyers and academics the documentary producers interviewed?

C. What Ms. Melvern and her group calls the three lies of the documentary are real controversies among Rwandans and social science researchers. These contentious issues are proper subject matter for social research and investigative journalism.

Ms. Melvern and her group cite what they call lies in the BBC Documentary as “[…] lie about the true nature of the Hutu Power militia […] an attempt to minimize the number of Tutsi murdered in the genocide, […] an effort to place the blame for shooting down President Habyarimana’s plane on April 6, 1994 on the Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF)”. Each of the three accusations, which Ms. Melvern and her group call “BBC Documentary lies”, deserves thorough analysis for validity and truth.

1. On the true nature of the Hutu power militia

Ms. Melvern and her groups argue that “the BBC documentary allows a witness to claim that ‘only ten percent of the Interahamwe (militia) were killers. In fact, the majority of Hutu Power militia forces – estimated to have been 30,000 strong – were trained specifically to kill Tutsi at speed, and indoctrinated in a racist ideology, part of genocide planning. There is eyewitness testimony by several militia leaders who cooperated with the ICTR”.

First, it is absurd to discredit the entire documentary or issue therein because “one of the interviewees made a mistake in [his] quantitative estimation” of the internahamwe who allegedly perpetrated the massacres. Interestingly, Ms Melvern protests the BBC interviewee’s estimation of the number of the Interahamwe by introducing her own estimation about the number of the internahamwe. Why does Ms. Melvern want her readers to believe her estimates, not the BBC interviewee’s estimations of the interahamwe numbers? Second, Ms. Melvern and her group miss on some important facts about the militia, including the internahame, some of who committed the horrible massacres.

(i) It is wrong to think that all interahamwe were Hutu. Some interahamwe were Tutsi. Referring to all interahamwe as Hutu militia is a misstatement of fact. The interahamwe boss in charge of recruitment and politics – Robert Kajuga – was Tutis and so were a significant number of the interahamwe

(ii) When Rwanda embraced multiparty politics in 1991, each political party had its own “Youth Wing to animate party meetings, organize and mobilize for the party. MRND (the then ruling party’s Youth Wing was called Interahamwe. PSD (another political party) had Abakombozi as its Youth Wing. MDR’s Youth Wing was called Inkuba. PL’s Youth Wing was called Jeunes liberaux. As the war and party politics progressed, each Rwandan community -including political parties and their youth wings – developed “radical groups”.

(iii) There is overwhelming evidence that some members of each political youth wing/militia participated in the 1994 massacres and that each political party militia was hostile against others. Reducing these militia groups to “Hutu militia” is distortion of facts.

(iv) There is proof of, and the type of war RPA/F was engaged in against the then government dictate that, RPA/F cadres infiltrated all political parties’ militia as early as 1991. Probably, some of these RPA/F infiltrators engaged in the 1994 massacres.

(v) There is sufficient evidence that by the time of the 1994 massacres, all political parties of that time, including RPF, had some ‘radicalized’ members and militia. Therefore, simplifying the phenomenon of who killed who during such circumstance, like Ms. Melvern appears to suggest, is inconsistent with qualitative research approach.

2. Ms. Melvern and her group’s argument on Rwanda’s population statistics before the 1994 massacres is false and invalid. Ms. Melvern and her group use inadmissible evidence to support their argument

Ms. Melvern and her group argue that “the programme [the BBC documentary] attempts to minimize the number of Tutsi murdered, a typical tactic of genocide deniers. The false figures cited are provided by two US academics who worked for a team of lawyers defending the génocidaires at the ICTR. They even claim that in 1994 more Hutu than Tutsi were murdered – an absurd suggestion and contrary to all the widely available research [reports]”.

Inconsistent statistics argument:

Ms. Melvern and her group know or should know that the entire post-independence Rwandan population census reports indicated the ethnic and religious affiliation of each Rwandan. The last population census before the 1994 massacres took place in 1991. The 1991 Rwanda population census indicate that the total population was 6.2 million people; 14% Tutsi, 84% Hutu and 1% Twa and others. No post-independence Rwandan population census report had bigger figures than the 1991 population census report. However, after the 1994 massacres, the total number of the people butchered is put at 1.3 million people – in any case, well above 1 million people were brutality butchered. The number of Tutsi survivors of the massacres stood at around 350,000 people. The proper equation, for purposes of determining the number of the Tutsi who died during the1994 massacres should be: 14% of the total population – (minus) the total number of Tutsi survivors of the massacres.

For unknown reasons, Ms. Melvern wants her audience to rely on reports and/or stories, made/told after the 1994 massacres, to ascertain the country’s population’s statistics before 1994. The only proper authority when in issue is the population statistic of a country, is that country’s population census. How does the world end up with over one million Tutsi dead and about 350,000 Tutsi survivors yet the Tutsi were only 14% of a population of 6.2 million people? Even if all the 14% Tutsi had been killed, it was impossible to have the over 1 million human skulls “Tutsi victims” that are paraded in genocide memorial centers. Is it possible that the Hutu set out to exterminate the Tutsi but they ended up killing themselves more than they killed their “target”, the Tutsi? Seeking for answers to such clear statistical inconsistences is called “genocide denial” in Ms. Melvern and his fellow researchers’ world. Ms. Melvern and her group are determined to push all these inconsistences down their readers’ throat because “some reports say so”. This, in my considered view, is undermining human intelligibility.

Ms. Melvern and her group should inquire, from the government of Rwanda, about the 2004/2005 household-to-household nationwide survey of the Tutsi who died during the massacres. Why did the government of Rwanda and donors invest so much money in a survey whose findings were never made public? Who had interest in not publishing that survey? Wouldn’t have made a good argument for Kagame, who has paraded human skulls for tourists throughout the country, to show a breakdown of village by village Tutsi who died during the massacres? Interestingly, every apart of Rwanda has skulls of the 1994 massacres victims. However, by April 1994 when the massacres started, RPF had significant territory under their control. How did the “Hutu” penetrate RPA/F held territory to massacre the “Tutsi”? Why there isn’t any District in Rwanda without the 1994 massacres victim skulls yet a significant chunk of Rwandan territory was under RPF control? Inquiring into these and other critical questions is what Ms. Melvern calls “genocide denial” in Ms. Melvern’s world. Ridiculous

3. Ms. Melvern and her group twist facts about shooting down the plane of the then Hutu president, which is widely believed to have triggered the 1994 massacres

Ms. Melvern and her group claim that the BBC film “argues that the shooting down of the plane on April 6, 1994 was perpetrated by the RPF. This same story was promoted by Hutu Power extremists within a few hours of the president’s assassination and promoted ever since by génocidaires and a few ICTR defense lawyers. The film pays no heed to a detailed expert report published in January 2012 by a French magistrate Judge Marc Trévidic. This contains evidence from French experts, including crash investigators, who proved scientifically that the missiles that shot down the plane came from the confines of the government-run barracks in Kanombe on the airport’s perimeter – one of the most fortified places in the country, and where it would have been impossible for the RPF, armed with a missile, to penetrate”. This argument is a deliberate set of twisted facts and lies that the journalists and researchers cannot have appended their signature to naked lies if their motive had been justice, fairness and good faith rebuttal of the BBC documentary. The following are the nasty twisted facts and lies in Ms. Melvern’s argument “shooting down the president’s plane”:

(i) Ms. Melvern and her group know or should know that shooting down President Habyarimana’s plane is the legal and proximate cause of the 1994 massacres in Rwanda. Shooting down of the plane has been investigated by two distinct and separate courts; the French and Spanish courts. Both courts indicted and issued arrest warrants for Kagame and his top RPF commanders for their alleged criminal responsibility for shooting down the plane. Unfortunately, Ms. Melvern appears to argue that the ICTR “convicted genocidaires” and some of the ICTR defense attorneys “influenced” both the French and Spanish court to indict and issue arrest warrants for Kagame and his former bush war top commanders. Really!

(ii) Ms. Melvern and her group do not inform their readers that the ICTR former prosecutor carried out thorough investigations into Kagame and his then rebel leaders’ role in the massacres. The ICTR prosecutor was ready to prosecute Kagame and his fighters who allegedly committed crimes under the ICTR jurisdiction; war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide. Shooting down the plane was part of the charges against Kagame and his then rebel fighters. Instead of accepting to face justice at the ICTR, Kagame rushed to President Bush for “rescue”. President Bush ordered the then ICTR prosecutor – Carl Del Ponte – to desist prosecuting Kagame and his former rebel fighters because Kagame is a USA ‘ally’. The prosecutor chose to resign than compromising our professional ethnics because selective justice is not justice. These facts are well documented.

(iii) The French court indicted, and/or issued arrest warrants for, Kagame and his top rebel commanders for the shooting down of the plane. Ms. Melvern and her friends know or should know that a court decision is not overturned by a mere report of experts. A court decision is overturned by another superior court’s decision in form of an appeal or the same court’s review of its decision. Ms. Melvern knows or should know that the French Court indictments and/or arrest warrants for Kagame and his alleged partners-in-crime are on file. It is absurd that Ms. Melvern and her group seek to abuse the purpose and character of expert reports the way they use Judge Marc Trévidic report in their argument. In any case, the French Court has not pronounced itself on the experts’ report Ms. Melvern and her group uses for their argument. This is academic dishonesty of the highest order.

(iv) Ms. Melvern and her group appear to ignore the fact that the BBC documentary features some of Kagame’s former top rebel commanders who testify that Kagame ordered the shooting of the plane. These former top rebel commanders’ testimony is admissible evidence in courts of law; it is an “admission”. Some of the former RPA/F top leaders who testified in the documentary are Tutsi and they incriminate themselves. Linda and her fellow researchers should have analyzed these central facts before dismissing the BBC Documentary as “lies”. It is true these former rebels’ testimony may be subject to impeachment for bias. However, since we are not in court yet – and it is court’s exclusive powers to conclude on whether or not a witness is biased against the accused – Ms. Melvern and her group cannot sweep these former RPA/F top leaders’ testimony under the carpet. In any case, Melvern and a significant number of the signatories to the letter can also be impeached for bias in favor of Kagame because of their constant, sometimes bordering with insanity, defense for Kagame at all costs, including telling lies for that purpose. Whatever the case, the BBC is not reasonably expected to go into the intricate law of evidence on impeachment of witnesses’ rules before selecting their interviewees.

D. Ms. Melvern and her group are determined to present evidence of “planning genocide” to BBC yet; the ICTR prosecutor needed, but failed to get, sufficient evidence to prove “planning” the 1994 massacres with intent to destroy the Tutsi in whole or part.

Ms. Melvern and her group give an impression that they have, and are presenting, evidence of “ genocide planning” yet in the famous Military 1 and Military 11 which prosecuted all the top military and national security officials found that all that evidence did not prove “ planning” genocide. The ICTR indictments of all the accused in Military 1 and Military 11 alleged that the accused had pre-made lists of the Tutsi to be killed, the accused had a well laid strategy to exterminate the Tutsi and that the accused had trained and distributed militia to perpetrate the Tutsi genocide. There was no evidence at the ICTR to prove these allegations and court acquitted all the accused on genocide account. Unfortunately, Ms. Melvern recycles these allegations, which the ICTR examined and found baseless, for her argument to attack the BBC documentary. If Ms. Melvern had the evidence she claims to prove that the Hutu “planned” the genocide, why didn’t Ms. Melvern take her evidence to the ICTR in the Military 1 and Military 11 which examined ‘planning’ the genocide allegation?

Ms. Melvern and her team, fallaciously, argue that “Jane Corbin, who presented the programme, even tries to raise doubts about whether or not the RPF stopped the genocide. The authority on this subject is Lt.-General Roméo Dallaire … Dallaire is categorical. ‘The genocide was stopped because the RPF won and stopped it’”. Ms. Melvern and her group ignore that the then very powerful and one of the top RPA/F commander, General Nyamwasa Kayumba said that “Kagame’s concern was not to stop the genocide. Kagame’s intention was to take power”. Without efforts to reconcile these critical and diverse positions by different actors, Ms. Melvern makes very disturbing conclusion, “RPF stopped genocide because Gen. Romeo Dakkaire said it”. Is that academic honesty as she claims she is?

Ms. Melvern and her group agree that the BBC documentary lasted for less than an hour. The film features some scholars and people with firsthand information about what happened. What Ms. Melvern and the group blames the BBC documentary for is that the BBC documentary producer did not feature the group’s favorite scholars, practitioners including Dallaire, Philippe Gaillard and Dr. James Orbinski. In my considered view, Ms. Melvern and her group are probably mistaken about how investigative journalism and social research operates. The purpose of the film was to bring to light the “Untold story” about the massacres in Rwanda. It follows that the “popular account of events” was not the subject matter of the documentary. What value would the BBC add to its diverse viewers if the BBC was to avoid controversial social issues for “popular” views? It is impossible to interview everybody for one single research project.

E. The 1994 massacres cannot be detached from Rwanda’s social political culture. A researcher that seeks to close investigations and/or research into the culture that gave birth to the 1994 horrible massacres is probably naive

The 1994 Rwandan massacres were a logical sequence of a complex unresolved social and political dynamics. At the core of this insane conflict is each side’s failure to perceive the other side as a legitimate group with equal rights. In this conflict, the “other group” has no legitimate history, story and existence. Each group’s heroes are the other group’s evil men. Vengeance, dehumanizing the ‘other group’ and exterminating “our” enemy is spontaneous characteristic of an ordinary Hutu or Tutsi. “Secrets and lies” in “our” group against the “other” group are the major features of the Hutu vs Tutsi troubled co-existence. Settling for one group or side’s narrative, without critical thinking and reexamination of these two groups’ co-existence history and crimes, is settling on a appallingly slippery cliff.

Unfortunately, the current government of Rwanda and its complex network of lobbyists consider any critical reflection on RPA/F role in the horrific crimes “genocide denial”. This undesirable Government of Rwanda position is clear in its draconic laws, including “genocide revisionism laws”. Kigali government, its lobbyists and, surprisingly, some academics are inclined to refer to the BBC documentary – a very critical inquiry into the different events during, before and after the 1994 massacres – as “genocide denial”.

Conclusion

What happened during, before and after the 1994 massacres is extremely complex that any social researcher who claims to have perfect and conclusive knowledge of the 1994 Rwandan massacres, like Ms. Melvern and fellow researchers claim, must be treated with the contempt they deserve. “Genocide denial” should not become a social-political tool to suppress critical thinking, human intelligibility and human freedoms.

The BBC has a choice to make. Remain critical and investigative or become a morale booster for those who hold power and lose the trust and confidence of the ordinary people who are yarning for justice and fairness. The Hutu/Tutsi conflict has caused way too many horrible massacres in Burundi, Rwanda and DRC. The victor vs. Vanquished narrative, like Ms. Melvern and her group appear to suggest, should be discarded. For BBC’s credibility and very long history of service, a critical approach to the Hutu/Tutsi conflict is the only sustainable and value adding way to go.

I would be happy to take on Ms. Melvern and her group in an open debate over all the issues they raised in their letter.

Dr Charles Kambanda, PhD

La BBC confirme la macabre supercherie

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arution: Thursday 16 October 2014, 17:26
Par: Bernard DESGAGNÉ

Bernard DESGAGNÉ

Le mur du mensonge vient de se lézarder sérieusement. Pour la première fois en 20 ans, un média de masse réécrit l’histoire du génocide rwandais telle qu’elle aurait toujours dû être racontée. Le 1er octobre 2014, dans le cadre de son émission Panorama, la BBC a diffusé « Rwanda’s Untold Story », un documentaire d’une heure réalisé par la journaliste vedette Jane Corbin. Ceux qui connaissent bien le dossier du Rwanda n’ont rien appris, car la plupart des informations que contient le documentaire circulent depuis longtemps. Certaines étaient même dans Ça ne s’est pas passé comme ça à Kigali, le livre de Robin Philpot. Candidat du PQ en 2007, ce courageux auteur a été trainé dans la boue par Radio-Canada et La Presse pour avoir écrit en 2003 ce que la BBC a fini par comprendre en 2014.

Pour ma part, j’ai déjà diffusé l’information contenue dans le documentaire au fil de nombreux articles à propos du Rwanda publiés depuis 2008. On les retrouve sur Vigile, dans le site du Québécois, dans le Huffington Post et dans plusieurs autres médias. J’ai également communiqué cette information à des dizaines de journalistes de Radio-Canada ainsi qu’à des centaines de députés et de sénateurs du Parlement d’Ottawa et de l’Assemblée nationale à Québec, sans qu’aucun d’entre eux n’y donne suite autrement que de manière symbolique. Finiront-ils par écouter maintenant que c’est la BBC qui parle ?

Le dictateur et tueur en série Paul Kagame est un grand ami du gouvernement d’Ottawa, comme le démontre cette photo où la souriante Michaëlle Jean, envoyée par Stephen Harper en 2010, lui transmet les respectueuses salutations du gouvernement conservateur. Cette amitié transcende les partis politiques fédéraux, puisque Kagame peut compter aussi, parmi les néodémocrates et les libéraux, sur de grands défenseurs de la mythologie officielle, par exemple, Paul Dewar et Irwin Cotler.

Stam, Davenport et les autres experts interdits à Radio-Canada

« Ce que le monde croit et ce qui s’est vraiment passé sont deux choses très différentes », nous dit Allan Stam dans le documentaire, qui défait un à un quelques-uns des principaux mythes sur le génocide rwandais. Premier constat : si l’on tient compte uniquement de l’année 1994 et si l’on se fie aux données fournies par l’ONU et le gouvernement de Kigali eux-mêmes, le nombre de Hutus tués est quatre fois plus élevé que le nombre de Tutsis. Et si l’on calcule le nombre de personnes qui, entre 1990 et aujourd’hui, sur une période de 24 ans, ont été massacrées par les exterminateurs aux ordres de Paul Kagame ou qui sont mortes de faim ou de maladie en tentant de fuir, on arrive à un bilan similaire à celui de l’Holocauste, où l’immense majorité des victimes sont des Hutus ou d’autres populations bantoues. Les morts tutsis ne constituent même pas 5 % du total.

Pourtant, les Tutsis exerçant aujourd’hui sans partage le pouvoir à Kigali sont les seuls qui ont le droit de pleurer leurs morts, selon Kagame et ses parrains occidentaux chaque année faussement contrits pour la galerie. Autour du 7 avril dernier encore, Radio-Canada nous a asséné des dizaines de fois que « les Hutus ont tué les Tutsis au Rwanda ». Ses journalistes grassement rémunérés avec notre argent s’en sont donné à coeur joie dans le copier-coller des litanies habituelles et dans les entrevues avec des survivants spécialistes du parjure et de la comédie. Jamais ces sinistres carriéristes n’ont mentionné en ondes les noms d’Allan Stam ou de son collègue Christian Davenport, que je leur ai pourtant indiqués à maintes reprises, depuis des années. Une courageuse journaliste de la BBC vient d’interrompre leur bal costumé.

On pourrait réaliser un documentaire de 100 heures s’il fallait faire entendre tous les témoignages étayés de preuves photographiques et d’autres preuves matérielles queRadio-Canada occulte systématiquement au profit des caisses de résonance de Kagame. C’est pareil dans les autres grands médias québécois, à quelques rares exceptions près, dont celle du critique littéraire du Devoir Louis Cornellier, qui fait bande à part et dont je salue l’intégrité. Mais, tandis que les journalistes de TVA ont l’excuse de ne pas être capables de situer le Rwanda sur une carte de l’Afrique, ceux de Radio–Canada mentent souvent en toute connaissance de cause, surtout les grands « spécialistes » comme les mythomanes François Brousseau et Léo Kalinda, un sympathisant du FPR qui en aurait même été membre, à ce qu’on dit.

Bien que ce ne soit pas le coeur du propos, le documentaire de la BBC parle, au début, d’un « rétablissement remarquable » et de la prospérité retrouvée du Rwanda. Là-dessus, Jane Corbin aurait dû pousser son enquête un peu plus loin. Peut-on vraiment parler d’une réussite économique ?

En fait, Kigali n’est qu’une façade. Dans les campagnes, la population crève. La moitié du budget de l’État vient de l’aide étrangère. Et le PIB était de 633 $ par habitant en 2013. Le Rwanda est non seulement l’un des pays les plus pauvres au monde ; c’est aussi l’un des plus pauvres d’Afrique. Kagame est un dictateur impitoyable qui ne peut même pas prétendre avoir fait faire des gains matériels à son peuple. Il se contente d’emprisonner et de tuer ceux qui ne lui obéissent pas, tout en permettant à une petite clique de vivre dans l’opulence.

Les anciens du FPR traqués par Kagame parlent à la caméra

En plus de Stam et Davenport, Jane Corbin nous fait entendre plusieurs acteurs du drame rwandais dont le public de Radio-Canada, les yeux rivés sur les mensonges dont il est abreuvé tous les jours, ne connait même pas l’existence. Qui d’autre parait dans le documentaire de la BBC ? La journaliste Corbin fait appel notamment à deux témoins de taille, Théogène Rudasingwa et Kayumba Nyamwasa, respectivement ancien chef de cabinet de Kagame et ancien chef d’état-major de l’Armée patriotique rwandaise, qui ont tous les deux vu de l’intérieur les crimes de masse orchestrés par leur patron.

Nyamwasa ne mâche pas ses mots : « Kagame n’a jamais eu l’intention d’arrêter le génocide. Jamais. Son intention était de gagner la guerre pour accéder au pouvoir. Que des gens meurent dans le génocide ou se fassent tuer était le cadet de ses soucis. […] Paul Kagame est sans l’ombre d’un doute [celui qui a fait abattre l’avion transportant les présidents du Rwanda et du Burundi, le 6 avril 1994]. Je suis bien placé pour le savoir, et il sait que je le suis. »

Kayumba Nyamwasa, qui est sous haute protection en Afrique du Sud, a fait l’objet de trois tentatives d’assassinat récentes, toutes commises par des hommes de main de Kagame. Son ami Patrick Karegeya, un autre ancien militaire du FPR ayant fait défection, n’a pas été aussi chanceux que lui. Il a été tué dans la nuit du 31 décembre 2013 au 1er janvier 2014.

Nyamwasa a lui-même participé au complot pour commettre l’attentat du 6 avril 1994 et a dirigé les troupes de Kagame pendant qu’elles commettaient d’immenses massacres. Il est parfaitement au courant. Il affirme que Paul Kagame était pleinement conscient des conséquences aussi inéluctables que dramatiques qui devaient résulter de l’attentat : « Si nous sommes en pleine saison sèche et que vous jetez une allumette dans l’herbe, vous viendra-t-il à l’idée de penser que l’herbe ne brûlera pas ? »

Pas de planification du génocide

M. Nyamwasa dit par ailleurs être convaincu que le pouvoir hutu avait un plan d’extermination, mais s’il fait cette affirmation, c’est peut-être pour se dédouaner lui-même de l’horrible traque des Hutus à Goma et ailleurs en République démocratique du Congo, au cours des années 1996 et 1997. Le prétexte de cette traque était d’éliminer les « génocidaires ». N’en déplaise à M. Nyamwasa, le Tribunal pénal international pour le Rwanda (TPIR) n’a jamais retrouvé l’ombre d’une preuve de planification du génocide, même après s’être acharné sur l’ancien pouvoir hutu pendant 19 ans, avec un budget annuel qui, par exemple, était de 227 millions de dollars en 2010-2011. Une partie de cet argent a été puisé dans les poches des contribuables canadiens.

L’historien Bernard Lugan a bien démontré l’absence de planification dans son ouvrage Rwanda — Un génocide en question (Éditions du Rocher, 2014), où il s’appuie sur un bilan exhaustif des travaux du TPIR. Les massacres de Tutsis ont été spontanés et se sont terminés bien avant que le FPR ne s’empare du territoire, comme le précise Allan Stam. La fureur a été déclenchée par l’attentat, véritable allumette que Kagame a jetée non pas dans de l’herbe sèche, mais plutôt dans une grosse poudrière créée par trois années et demie de souffrances infligées aux Hutus, qui avaient de très bonnes raisons pour être révoltés contre le FPR et ses partisans, essentiellement des Tutsis.

Comme l’explique le documentaire, la guerre et l’occupation du territoire par les tueurs de Kagame, à partir de septembre 1990, avaient donné lieu à des massacres de masse de la population civile hutue. Un million de réfugiés essentiellement hutus, chassés de leurs terres, s’étaient agglutinés autour de Kigali, dans des camps de la mort d’où l’on sortait une centaine de cadavres par jour, à cause des maladies et de la faim. De plus, un grand nombre de réfugiés en provenance du Burundi avaient afflué au Rwanda en 1993 pour fuir les massacres dont étaient victimes les Hutus dans ce pays, aux mains de l’armée et de civils tutsis. Voir leurs frères burundais ainsi persécutés ne fit rien pour rassurer les Hutus du Rwanda devant l’armée tutsie du FPR et le sadique Paul Kagame.

Lorsque l’avion transportant les deux présidents hutus fut abattu, les Hutus, déjà martyrisés, en vinrent à la conclusion que le FPR et ses partisans ne voudraient jamais de la démocratie, ce que confirment d’ailleurs le documentaire de la BBC ainsi que beaucoup de témoignages et de faits avérés. Pour Kagame, le pouvoir a toujours été au bout du fusil, et non dans les urnes. Certains Hutus, désespérés et fous de rage, prirent des machettes et décidèrent de tuer ceux qu’ils percevaient comme les responsables de leurs souffrances. Qu’on le qualifie de génocide ou non, le massacre des Tutsis, en avril 1994, n’était pas le résultat d’un plan diabolique du pouvoir hutu. Il a sans doute été horrible, mais il a duré quelques jours seulement et était essentiellement terminé à la fin d’avril. Par comparaison, les massacres de Hutus et d’opposants politiques, eux, sont systématiques et bien organisés par le FPR. Ils se sont étirés sur 24 ans, jusqu’à aujourd’hui. Ils se poursuivent encore, sous le regard indifférent ou complice des thuriféraires de Kagame et du public berné par eux.

Par ailleurs, en supposant qu’il y aurait eu malgré tout planification du génocide des Tutsis, il faudrait plutôt regarder du côté du FPR, surtout quand on sait que le chef de la milice Interahamwe était un Tutsi, Robert Kajuga, et qu’il était un agent du FPR selon Aloys Ruyenzi, un ancien membre de la garde rapprochée de Paul Kagame qui apparaît également dans le documentaire de la BBC. Il est possible qu’une minorité de jeunes Hutus révoltés aient été poussés à tuer des Tutsis par des manipulateurs à la solde de Kagame qui voulaient justement lui fabriquer un alibi en vue des massacres de Hutus qui allaient venir. Cette hypothèse reste à vérifier, mais elle est plausible.

Ottawa complice comme Londres

Le documentaire de la BBC traite bien entendu des accointances britanniques de Kagame, notamment Tony Blair, qui, comme son copain de Kigali, a refusé de donner son point de vue à Jane Corbin. Comment pourrait-il justifier l’injustifiable devant la caméra, de toute manière ? En avouant qu’il est un psychopathe ? Or, Ottawa est, comme Londres, un repaire de gens affairés à consolider le pouvoir tutsi absolutiste de Kigali. Le documentaire nomme une Canadienne, Louise Arbour, ancienne juge de la Cour suprême du Canada et ancienne procureure du TPIR. Mme Arbour n’a pas daigné rappeler la journaliste Corbin, elle non plus. Mieux vaut répondre aux questions uniquement quand elles sont posées par des journalistes à gages obéissants.

L’icône canadienne Arbour, présentée par les médias comme une grande philanthrope, a ordonné la fin des enquêtes sur l’attentat du 6 avril 1994 lorsque ses enquêteurs lui ont dit que toutes les pistes menaient au FPR et à Paul Kagame. Jim Lyons, qui était enquêteur à l’époque, en témoigne dans le documentaire de la BBC. Symbole de la relativité de la justice d’Ottawa, Louise Arbour est, de toute l’histoire du Canada, la seule juge de la Cour suprême à avoir démissionné de son poste avant la fin de son mandat. Rien de plus normal après avoir commis une faute d’une extrême gravité : corrompre une procédure judiciaire pour protéger le plus grand meurtrier de masse que la terre ait porté depuis Hitler. Jamais plus Mme Arbour ne réintègrera la magistrature, ni même le Barreau. On lui a trouvé une petite job peinarde à l’International Crisis Group, où elle se spécialise dans la propagande de guerre déguisée en travail humanitaire.

Évidemment, comment parler des relations d’Ottawa avec Kagame sans mentionner saint Dallaire, l’ex-sénateur aux neuf pilules et chouchou des émissions d’infodivertissement de Radio-Canada ? Il n’est pas question de lui dans le documentaire, car Jane Corbin lui a préféré un militaire plus crédible, le colonel Luc Marchal, qui n’est pas programmé pour raconter l’histoire convenue et qui déplait donc souverainement à Radio-Canada et à Hollywood.

De son propre aveu, Roméo Dallaire est encore aujourd’hui un habitué de Kigali. Il fréquente assidument le FPR et n’hésite pas à se livrer à toutes les contorsions imaginables pour justifier en public les horreurs du régime de Kagame. Roméo Dallaire aime les vrais hommes qui savent résoudre les problèmes avec une mitraillette. N’appelle-t-il pas encore constamment le gouvernement du Canada à déployer des troupes pour « éviter les génocides » ?

Au Mali, en Centrafrique et en Irak, l’ex-général voit partout des génocidaires qui méritent une sévère correction. Quand il était au Rwanda, Roméo Dallaire aidait le FPR et son ami Kagame à stocker des armes et à préparer la prise du pouvoir à l’abri des regards indiscrets de la communauté internationale. Les armes rentraient à la tonne, y compris les missiles sol-air qui allaient servir à abattre l’avion de Juvénal Habyarimana. C’est que, voyez-vous, il fallait être équipé pour mâter ceux qui allaient devenir des génocidaires, conformément au scénario écrit d’avance. Pour de plus amples renseignements sur ce grand héros canadien, j’invite les habitués de la propagande médiatique à lire « Saint Dallaire », la série de 6 articles que j’ai publiée en juin dans le Huffington Post.

Le comportement pro-Kagame d’Ottawa n’est pas seulement l’oeuvre de quelques vedettes du génocide et de politiciens trop heureux de se draper dans la vertu en épousant publiquement la cause des détenteurs exclusifs du droit de pleurer ses morts. Ottawa recèle également des juges profondément marqués par les fictions cinématographiques, des procureurs dévorés par leur ambition de devenir les nouveaux justiciers de Nuremberg ainsi que des fonctionnaires bien dressés par leurs collègues infiltrés du FPR, qui sont positionnés stratégiquement dans certains ministères canadiens. Tous ces gens généreusement rétribués déploient constamment des efforts considérables pour traquer les Hutus ciblés par Kigali. Ils leur font des simulacres de procès avec des faux témoignages secrets, comme le procès de Désiré Munyaneza. Ils envoient en pâture à Kagame des innocents comme Léon Mugesera, qui croupit aujourd’hui dans une geôle de Kigali, après avoir dû abandonner au Québec sa femme et ses enfants. Nombreux sont les Hutus qui ont été harcelés par Ottawa ou qui le sont encore, sur la foi des mensonges propagés par le FPR à l’aide de ses syndicats de délateurs affabulateurs.

Mais, au-delà de toutes ces magouilles des serviteurs empressés de Kagame, une forfaiture nous montre que l’hypocrite gouvernement d’Ottawa ne s’intéresse que superficiellement aux droits de la personne, à la justice, aux victimes de crime et à la sécurité des citoyens canadiens : son mutisme absolu concernant les assassinats, par le FPR, des prêtres québécois Claude Simard et Guy Pinard, en 1994 et 1997. Ottawa n’a jamais levé le petit doigt pour que les responsables soient traduits devant la justice. Tout pour plaire à Kagame, conformément, bien sûr, aux ordres qui viennent de Washington.

À l’instar des Hutus traqués et accusés collectivement d’être des génocidaires par une bande de menteurs et d’assassins, les familles des pères Simard et Pinard n’ont pas le droit de faire entièrement leur deuil. Elles n’ont pas le droit à la justice. Elles doivent comprendre que les assassins de Claude Simard et Guy Pinard sont les protégés d’Ottawa, donc qu’ils ont la permission de continuer de tuer en toute liberté.

Si je vivais au Rwanda, le présent article me vaudrait soit d’être exécuté sommairement, soit d’être emprisonné pendant 8 ou 15 ans, comme l’opposante Victoire Ingabire, peut-être même pendant plus longtemps. Pourquoi ? Parce que je serais coupable d’avoir contesté les vérités officielles. Je serais coupable du délit de refus de se prosterner devant le chantage des supposés survivants qui s’arrogent l’exclusivité des larmes de la communauté internationale, sous prétexte qu’ils ont subi le crime suprême de génocide. Ce crime devrait effacer tous les autres, qui ne méritent même pas qu’on s’y arrête. Sa seule évocation devrait suffire pour nous rendre sourds, muets et aveugles et même pour nous faire perdre tout esprit critique et tout sens moral.

« Rwanda’s Untold Story », le documentaire de la BBC qui dit la vérité pour la première fois dans les médias de masse, après plus de 20 ans de mensonges. Une réalisation de Jane Corbin diffusée seulement au Royaume-Uni le 1er octobre 2014, à l’émission Panorama, puis rediffusée le 2 octobre à l’émission This World. À voir absolument.

Source: http://www.vigile.net/La-BBC-confirme-la-macabre

Coup d’Etat 1973 : Abishyize hamwe ntakibananira. “Nta ngoma yarusha ubugome iya Kagame na FPR ye”

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Par:Jean de Dieu Musemakweli

Nta ngoma yarusha ubugome n’urugomo iya FPR na Kagame .

UMWANZURO

Ingoma ya Habyarimana (1973-1994) yatangiye imena amaraso y’abanyapolitiki bari baradukijije ingoma ya cyami na gihake. Bikwiye kugawa n’abashyira mu gaciro bose. Ingoma ya Habyarimana kandi yarangirije mu mivu y’amaraso menshi kurushaho. Kuvuga ko ingoma ya Habyarimana yarangirije mu mivu y’amaraso bisobanura ko ingoma ya Kagame (1994-?) yatangiriye muri iyo mivu y’amaraso nyine. Kuva mu w’1994 kugeza ubu, ayo maraso akomeje kumeneka. Ibimenyetso 2 bya nyuma biherutse kubyerekana ku mugaragaro (publiquement) kandi ku buryo budasubirwaho ni uko ngo “abantu ibihumbi 40 bakoraga imirimo nsimburagifungo baburiwe irengero”. Ikindi kimenyetso ni imirambo 40 abantu babonye ireremba mu kiyaga cya Rweru.

Iyo ingoma igiyeho imena amaraso, igumaho imena andi, ikazavaho nanone mu mivu y’andi menshi kurushaho. Twakora iki, Banyarwanda, Banyarwandakazi ngo dukumire ayo mahano, kugirango ingoma ya Kagame na FPR IVEHO itagombye kwisasira izindi nzirakarengane zitagira ingano?

Kuba abatsikamiwe n’ingoma ya Kagame na FPR bakomoka mu turere no mu moko anyuranye bisa n’aho ari kimwe mu bibabuza gushyira ingufu zabo hamwe ngo bayikize. Nyamara ni nacyo cyakagombye kubatera imbaraga !

Muri uru ruhererekane rw’inyandiko twise “Abishyize hamwe ntakibananira” twibanze ku iyicwa rubozo ry’abategetsi bo kuri repubulika ya mbere (1962-1971). Nabyo bikwiye kuvugwa, ni ukuri kw’amateka yacu mabi. Bikwiye kwaturwa bikavugwa bityo abakora icyunamo bakagikora mu mutuzo, abibuka ababo bakabikora ntawe ubannyega. Ni uburenganzira bwabo. Twese twiboneye ukuntu iryo yicwa rubozo ryajyanye na Coup d’Etat yo mu 1973 ryabyaye ikintu kimeze nk’inzigo gituma Abahutu bo mu majyepfo y’u Rwanda (Abanyanduga) n’abo mu majyaruguru (Abakiga) bakomeje kurebana ay’ingwe. N’iyo batari gusubiranamo ku mugaragaro, nta cyo bakora ngo bahuze ingufu zabo birwaneho, bagamije kwikiza ingoma y’Inkotanyi ibarembeje. Nibakomeza guheranwa n’inzigo ishingiye ku byabaye mu 1973, ntibagerageze kubirenga, ngo bagire ikindi kizima bubaka, Kagame azabamarira ku icumu urusorongo nk’ubushwiriri.

“Kora ndebe iruta vuga numve”.

Abayobozi b’amashyaka n’abafasha babo (les cadres) baramutse batanze urugero rwiza, abayoboke b’ayo mashyaka, ndetse n’abandi Banyarwanda benshi bakurikiza urwo rugero. Kugirango abayobozi b’amashyaka n’abafasha babo babashe kurenga iyo nzitizi, bagomba kwiyibutsa no kwicengezamo ihame rigira riti “Icyaha ni gatozi”. Niba umuntu Kanaka yarishe, ntabwo ari umwana, umwuzukuru, umuturanyi we cyangwa ukomoka muri ako karere wese wabikoze. Abakomoka ku bishe no ku biciwe, abakomoka mu turere tunyuranye kabone n’ubwo twaba dufite ibyo dupfa, bashobora kuba intwari, bagakorana. None se muri politiki kwigomwa (sacrifice) si ikintu ngombwa ? Ntibyoroshye, ariko birashoboka. Ubishoboye aba yerekanye ko yashobora n’ibindi bikomeye kurushaho agamije ineza y’u Rwanda rwamubyaye. Uwo muntu n’abandi bamugirira icyizere.

“Abishyize hamwe ntakibananira”.

Kimwe mu biranga umuyeshuri w’umuswa ni uko atamenya no gukopera. Naho uw’umuhanga aba azi n’aho yajya gukopera bibaye ngombwa. Dufate urugero rw’igihugu cy’igihangange cyitwa ko cyakataje no muri demokarasi ari cyo Leta zunze ubumwe z’Amerika. Kirimo amashyaka manini ya politiki 2 gusa : Abademokarate (démocrates) n’Abarepubulike (républicains). Ariko burya buri shyaka riba ririmo ibice nibura 3 : Abatavangiye (démocrates de gauche et républicains de droite -Tea Party-), abo hagati (centre) n’aboroshya bashobora no kugendera ku cyiza babonye mu ishyaka rihanganye n’iryabo. Buri gice kiba gifite leta cyiganjemo. Kugirango ishyaka ritsinde muri rusange (niveau fédéral), biba ngombwa ko buri gice cyigarurira amajwi y’aho cyiganje. Icyo gihe rero, mu kugabana imyanya, mu kugena politiki izagenderwaho mu ngamba izo ari zo zose, umukandida watsinze yita kuri ayo mashyaka agize impuzamashyaka (démocrates ou républicains) yatsinze.

Abanyapolotiki bacu rero n’abafasha babo (cadres des partis) nibakoreshe ubwenge, ubushishozi, gushyira mu gaciro n’izindi mpano bafite, bakurikize urwo rugero cyangwa urundi bazi kandi babonye rwiza. Kwigomwa ukifatanya n’abandi bituma ugira icyo ukiza, naho kudafatanya bibyara guhomba byose. Hagize ishyaka rimwe rukumbi riba “nyamwigendaho nk’ubugi bw’intorezo” rikagira ingufu zihagije (uretse ko bikomeye, bikaba ndetse bitanashoboka) zo gukiza u Rwanda ingoma ya FPR, naryo ryagwa mu gishuko ryo gukoresha igitugu kugirango rirambe ku ngoma. Ubwo rero u Rwanda rwaba ari “ntaho ruvuye, ntaho rugiye”.

Ubutaha tuzabagezaho urundi ruhererekane rw’inyandiko zerekana IBYIZA byinshi Repubulika ya mbere n’iya kabiri zagejeje kuri rubanda. Ibyo byiza nibyo Kagame na FPR ye bahora bashaka gusibanganya kugira ngo berekane ko Repubulika zombi nta kindi zakoze uretse gutegura no gushyira mu bikorwa jenoside. Sibyo.

Icyakora, mu ngoma zabayeho mu Rwanda kugeza ubu, iya Kagame na FPR ni yo mbi kuzirusha zose ; kandi birakomeye, uwashaka yavuga ko bitanashoboka, kugirango hazabeho indi iyirusha ububi, ububisha, urugomo n’ubugome. Abayirwanya nibishyire hamwe, maze barebe ngo barayibirindura mu kanya ko guhumbya ijisho.

Jean de Dieu Musemakweli

i Kigali

Second Genocide in Rwanda? Slow, Silent, and Systematic?

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What is happening in Rwanda? On Aug. 26, the BBC reported that Burundian officials are investigating to determine why Rwandan bodies have been found floating in Lake Rweru, on Burundi’s border with Rwanda.

The discovery is not only gruesome but also ominous because both East African nations suffer from extremely volatile Hutu-Tutsi ethnic rivalries rooted in centuries of Hutu oppression by a feudal Tutsi aristocracy, which became a colonial elite in the 18th and 19th centuries.

Attempts to institute European democracy, between 1959 and 1961 in Rwanda, and in 1993 in Burundi, turned the existing social order upside down, giving electoral advantage to the Hutu majorities, which the Tutsi minorities refused to accept. War, genocide and massacres ensued and both nations, neither of which is yet 100 years old, are commonly described as tinderboxes awaiting a match.

Rwanda’s President Paul Kagame is a Tutsi, Burundi’s President Pierre Nkurunziza a Hutu. Despite past alliances of convenience, they are now antagonists. In 1993, Burundi’s Tutsi military elite assassinated that country’s first democratically elected president, Hutu Melchior Ndadaye, triggering genocidal massacres of both ethnicities in Burundi and escalating fears of the same – which did indeed follow – in Rwanda.

In 1994, near the end of a four year war of aggression, Kagame ordered the assassination of both Rwanda and Burundi’s Hutu presidents by shooting their plane out of the sky on April 6, 1994, and then launched a carefully planned, U.S. backed military offensive to seize power and restore Tutsi rule in Rwanda, even as the country sank into chaos and genocidal massacres of both ethnicities.

Any conclusion that the bodies floating in the lake are victims of state execution, genocidal execution or both could be incendiary within the two countries and/or between them. That incendiary potential has been manipulated by both foreign and domestic elites, who are no doubt following this story closely, and most likely attempting to control its outcomes.

These bound and bagged bodies certainly have the look of state execution, genocidal or not, and the simple conclusion that they were state executions has incendiary potential in itself. Rwandan President Paul Kagame arrested three of his own top military officers last week, as resistance continued to rise within his own Tutsi elite.

Rwandan or Burundian bodies?

Burundian official Jean Berchmans Mpabansi told the BBC that, ‘‘The victims are not Burundian citizens because the bodies are coming from Akagera River flowing from Rwanda.”

The Voice of Burundi reported, translated here from the French: “In recent days corpses wrapped in plastic bags are found floating on Lake Rweru on the border between Burundi and Rwanda in Muyinga Province.

“More than 40 bodies floating in the Rweru Lake town of Giteranyi have been seen and counted since the month of July by the fishermen, as confirmed by the local administration and police. This week, these fishermen, accompanied by a unit of the Navy, saw two bodies on the mouth of the Akagera.”

Rwandan Police said that no one has been reported missing in Rwanda, and Burundian Police said the same about Burundi. Both claims are unlikely because the national police of any country of 10 or 11 million people is sure to have a list of missing persons at any given time.

It’s particularly unlikely in the case of Rwanda, because on May 16, Human Rights Watch reported that “an increasing number of Rwandans have been forcibly disappeared or reported missing” and that some were known to have been forcibly disappeared by Rwanda’s army, the Rwandan Defense Force. HRW detailed 14 cases of missing persons.

In mid-July HRW spoke to the anniversary of the murder of Gustave Makonene, coordinator of Transparency International Rwanda’s Advocacy and Legal Advice Center in Rubavu, Rwanda:

“The details of Gustave Makonene’s death are gruesome. His body was found outside the lakeside town of Rubavu, in northwestern Rwanda, on July 18, 2013. The police medical report indicated he was strangled. Local residents who saw his body gave Human Rights Watch more graphic detail. They believed his body may have been thrown from a car on a road above the lake and ended up twisted around a large tree, which had blocked its fall into the water.“

There have been neither investigations nor charges. Another HRW essayist asked, “Why is the whole world still silent on the murder of Rwandan activist Makonene?” On August 1 Transparency International issued a press release saying that the staff of all five of their Rwandan offices are in danger.

President Paul Kagame’s plausibility problem

Rwandan President Paul Kagame has never been noted for plausible or consistent explanation. After 18 years of Rwandan invasion, occupation, assassination and resource plunder in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, all copiously documented, he continues to tell Western television audiences that he cannot be held responsible for the problems of Congo, that Congo’s problems began with colonialism long before his birth.

And, of course, he continues to say that his destiny is to save and forever protect the Rwandan people from genocide, because, as he tells the story over and over, the world abandoned Rwanda in 1994. It’s a matter of record that Kagame himself threatened to fire on U.N. troops if they attempted to intervene in Rwanda in 1994, but that’s never been of concern to corporate broadcast anchors. Neither has Kagame’s U.S-backed invasion of Rwanda, commanding a detachment of the Ugandan army in October 1990. Nor has the four year war that those Ugandan troops waged in Rwanda between October 1990 and July 1994. Nor has the active intervention of the Clinton Administration to prevent the UN from intervening in Rwanda in 1994.

The story of four years of war and mass killing in Rwanda has instead been shortened and simplified into a 100-day morality play about genocide ending with “Never again!” And, Kagame has been allowed to trump all evidence and reason by playing the genocide card for so long that he feels in no way compelled to offer a plausible or consistent explanation of anything.

Nearly 50,000 people reported missing in Rwanda this year

Although Rwandan officials denied, on August 26th, that anyone is missing, the government has, on other days, acknowledged that nearly 50,000 people have disappeared this year. The government says they’re missing, but dissident Rwandan refugees and exiles say they’re dead – and that they are Hutu victims of Kagame’s slow, silent, systematic Hutu genocide – genocide by exclusion, poverty, starvation, sterilization and execution.

Rwandans whom the government acknowledges are missing include 16,000 Hutu villagers from the country’s northwestern Ngororero District. Rwandan Interior Minister James Musoni acknowledged, in the country’s Kinyarwanda language, that these villagers are missing but said that the government has no idea where they’ve gone and fears they may have crossed Rwanda’s border with DR Congo to join the Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda (FDLR).

Rwandan refugee Ambrose Nzeyimana translated the English into Kinyarwanda and posted “Kigali acknowledges the disappearance of 16,000 of its citizens” to his British-based blog, The Rising Continent. Rwandans in exile write that these people have been massacred by the Kagame regimeas part of its program to slowly, quietly, and systematically eliminate the Hutu population. Their belief is based on their own experience, their contact with extended family in Rwanda, and their attention to the Kinyarwanda press.

Rwandan prison authorities acknowledge that 30,000 Hutu prisoners sentenced to “community service” (hard labor) have also disappeared, Rwandan exiles, again, write that they’ve been executed by Kagame’s genocidal government.

It’s difficult to imagine how a government with one of the best trained, best equipped African military and security forces, including local forces everywhere, in one of the most tightly controlled, dictatorial regimes in the world, could lose track of 30,000 state prisoners. However, the government, again, and the Ibuka Tutsi survivors’ group, claim to fear that these people may have escaped across the border to join the FDLR in DR Congo, where they now constitute a threat to genocide survivors.

As with so much in Rwanda, including the history of the 1990-1994 war and genocide, there is a Tutsi version of the truth and a Hutu version, but the Tutsi version is legally enforced and championed worldwide by rich and powerful people, including Bill Clinton, Tony Blair, Rev. Rick Warren and Howard Buffett. Despite wholesale de facto discimination against Hutu people, they join Kagame in proclaiming that truth and reconciliation have been achieved in Rwanda, and ethnicity is no longer important.

Prisoners incinerated?

More Rwandan Hutu prisoners may have perished in a fire on June 5, 2014, in Rwanda’s largest prison, Muhanga Central Prison in Gitarama, and then in a second prison fire at Nyakiriba Prison in Rubavu (Gisenyi) on July 7.

Rwandan exiles write that prisoners in both Muhanga Central Prison and Nyakiriba Prison were intentionally incinerated in their cells, once again as part of a slow, silent, systematic Hutu genocide.

Is it likely that two, geographically distant Rwandan prisons would be destroyed or badly damaged by fire in barely more than one month? All we know is what Rwandan authorities say, and all they say is that there were two prison fires but no prisoners died.

Muhanga Prison, formerly known as Gitarama Central Prison, was known to be one of the most hellish prisons on earth. In 1995, a London Independent headline about it read, “Hutus held in ‘worst prison in world’: 7,000 suspects of Rwanda massacre are kept in jail built for 400.“

On June 6, the International Red Cross reported that “the accommodations” of 3,500 prisoners went up in flames in Gitarama but that the Rwandan government said no prisoners were in their cells at the time.

Hard evidence?

There will be no hard evidence of the truth behind any of these missing persons reports, except perhaps those few filed by Human Rights Watch, unless the U.N. Security Council deems the situation in Rwanda so dangerous to international security and stability that an independent U.N. investigative team must be allowed in, as when U.N. investigator Hans Blix’s team was allowed into Iraq before the 2003 U.S./U.K. invasion.

Of course, the U.S. and U.K. ignored Blix’s conclusion that there were no weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, as the U.S. and allied states will ignore any evidence counter to the security interests now defined by their executive corporate, military and foreign policy elites, not by popular democracy.

However, that’s no reason not to call for investigation. It’s better that Hans Blix’s team was allowed into Iraq than not, for the sake of history and global consciousness, and we can continue to work for just outcomes. Independent U.N. investigations should be undertaken, post haste, into each instance of individual and mass disappearances in Rwanda, and into why bound, bagged bodies were found floating in Lake Rweru between the shores of Rwanda and Burundi.

Why has the U.S. renewed support for Kagame’s Rwanda?

Why did the U.S. renew its political and military support of Rwandan President Paul Kagame’s dictatorship at the U.S.-Africa Summit? Why is the U.S. threatening the Hutu refugees organized as the FDLR with military action if they refuse to disarm and surrender unconditionally?

The FDLR may be armed in self-defense, but Special Envoy to the Great Lakes Region Russ Feingold has acknowledged that they pose no credible threat to Rwanda. The majority of Rwandan Hutu refugees in eastern Congo are simply that – refugees – who dare not return to Rwanda for fear of having their names added to these long lists of missing persons that the Rwandan government says it’s unable to explain.

Rwandan opposition leaders, Hutu and Tutsi alike, and Tanzanian President Jakaya Kikwete have all called upon the Rwandan government to negotiate with the FDLR for safe repatriation to a Rwanda in which they will not be a de facto Hutu underclass threatened with elimination. ,

On January 4th, former Rwandan General Kayumba Nyamwasa told KPFA: “I understand the guiltiness that maybe some could be feeling about their failure to stop the genocide. But you don’t support somebody who’s in the process of creating another genocide. And I think they should be able to examine their consciences, look at what is happening in Rwanda, and see exactly what is taking place.”

Many Rwandan Hutus, refugees and exiles believe that if the regime now headed by Paul Kagame remains in power for another 50 years, there will be no Hutu people left in Rwanda.

Oakland writer Ann Garrison writes for the San Francisco Bay View, Counterpunch, Global Research, Colored Opinions, Black Agenda Report, and Black Star News, and produces radio news and features for Pacifica’s WBAI-NYC, KPFA-Berkeley and her own YouTube Channel. She can be reached at anniegarrison@gmail.com. If you want to see Ann Garrison’s independent reporting continue, please contribute on her website, anngarrison.com.

Source: Globalresearch

Apartheid of another kind sustained by the US in Rwanda

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“Based on the recent change of Rwandan Genocide’s name to Genocide against Tutsis, this emphasizes that the International Community (UN) behavior towards Rwanda is very crooked and corrupted by President Kagame’s regime. This is absolutely senseless. The 1994 Rwandan genocide recorded victims to be more than 800,000. These victims were not Tutsis only; the majority of them were Hutus and Twas, therefore to rename it as if it was against Tutsis only, this is to discriminate Hutus and Twas victims of that genocide. This is too foolish that the world is writing wrong history. This is the product of impunity because the RPF after 1994 continued a genocide against Hutus and Congolese people until now and the perpetrators were never brought to book ; instead they continue to commit atrocities against Hutus”.

The following is an extract from a long article initially published by Global Research News. It is authored by The Rwanda Youth for Leadership and Change Initiative. The piece points out the state of discrimination against Hutus and their oppression in Rwanda despite president Kagame claiming reconciliation and economic progress. And sad is the reality that US and UK continue sustaining the regime unconditionally like at the time of South African apartheid when the two countries persisted doing business with Pretoria until the wind of change became irreversible. Rwandans, Africans and the rest of the world need to stand strongly firm against Kagame’s apartheid in Rwanda, because not only does it affect the lives of more than 90% of Rwandans, but because it also jeopardize regional peace. More than 8 millions, particularly in Democratic Republic of Congo, Burundi, Rwanda and Uganda have died since his movement unleashed its hordes of terror all other the Great Lakes area since 1st October 1990 up to now.

The Rwanda Youth for Leadership and Change Initiative (RY4LCI) strongly condemns the United States of America (USA) for its inconsistent and fallacious behavior opposing the long-lasting pacification of the Great Lakes Region of Africa by SADC (Southern African Countries Development Community) initiative and FDLR (Democratic Forces for Liberation of Rwanda) bravery to peacefully finding solutions through negotiations with Rwandan dictatorial regime led by war criminal and genocidaire President Paul Kagame.

Following the recent speech of President Obama’s special envoy to central Africa Russell Feingold at the USA president’s summit with African leaders in Washington; “We have to get rid of the FDLR, not so much because of their military capacity, but because of what they represent and the destabilizing effect that they have with regard to relations with Rwanda. That is our top priority,” he said. “I’ve been involved with efforts to communicate to them that it’s time for them to surrender. That they will be attacked militarily if they don’t. That there will be no political dialogue,” he also added.

The latter utterances show that the USA is undermining the values of democracy, freedom and peace in Africa as well as worldwide by supporting the malicious ideas and acts of dictatorship in Africa where it denies political dialogue between FDLR and Kigali dictatorial regime of president Paul Kagame. It appears bizarre for the USA which urged Democratic Republic of Congo to have political talks with the defeated M23 rebels who were fully supported by Rwanda and Uganda, and now it denies the political dialogue between Rwanda and FDLR for regional pacification.

This is a shame on the USA to intimidate the FDLR by continuing to help the Rwandan regime to exterminate these Hutus refugees, survivors of Rwanda RPF (Rwanda Patriotic Front) regime massacres in its systematic extermination of Hutu ethnic group people. These are abandoned refugees by international community in the forests of Democratic Republic Congo and when they found they were to be completely exterminated by the RPF army, they formed FDLR (Democratic Forces for Liberation of Rwanda) a politico-military party in order to protect themselves against these RPF systematic and sponsored massacres against Hutus, and also to find how to help to return these refugees in their home country with dignity.

FDLR does not advocate for only these refugees hunted by Tutsis RPF regime in the forests of DR Congo for over two decades but also for other Hutus refugees scattered in African countries like the Central African Republic, Congo Brazaville, Zambia, Malawi, Uganda, Mozambique, Zimbabwe… as well as worldwide in general. These refugees are living in plight conditions with no international aid for basic subsistence, health or education. They are abandoned and everyone knows that the Rwandan regime has extensively propagandized that these Hutus are genocidaires and that they don’t deserve any international help. Instead they must return in Rwanda to be tortured, oppressed, imprisoned and killed.

It is a shame on the International community to have abandoned Rwandans and partnered with the dictatorial regime of President Kagame, hence helping him to make Rwanda increasingly divisive, oppressive, bloodstained and totalitarian than any other regime in its history.
For over the last 20 years, the UN and different human rights organizations have released many documented reports on how the President Kagame’s regime has committed war crimes, crimes against humanity and crimes of genocide against Hutus inside and outside Rwanda, and against Congolese where more than 6 million people perished. Those reports were half released, hidden, thrown in the cupboards of UN Offices or probably suppressed because the current regime in Rwanda is backed by USA and UK who are allied Kagame clique’s system instead of partnering Rwandans which is in contrary to what USA president Obama preaches where he said that “Africa does not need strong men, it needs strong institutions”.

Based on the recent change of Rwandan Genocide’s name to Genocide against Tutsis, this emphasizes that the International Community (UN) behavior towards Rwanda is very crooked and corrupted by President Kagame’s regime. This is absolutely senseless. The 1994 Rwandan genocide recorded victims to be more than 800,000. These victims were not Tutsis only; the majority of them were Hutus and Twas, therefore to rename it as if it was against Tutsis only, this is to discriminate Hutus and Twas victims of that genocide. This is too foolish that the world is writing wrong history. This is the product of impunity because the RPF after 1994 continued a genocide against Hutus and Congolese people until now and the perpetrators were never brought to book ; instead they continue to commit atrocities against Hutus.

To read the full article, please click HERE.

source: http://therisingcontinent.wordpress.com/2014/08/25/apartheid-of-another-kind-sustained-by-us-in-rwanda-of-kagame/

GAHUNDE

Luttons contre l'injustice – Let's fight against injustice – Turwanye akarengane

Category Archives: Genocide

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La BBC confirme la macabre supercherie

Coup d’Etat 1973 : Abishyize hamwe ntakibananira. “Nta ngoma yarusha ubugome iya Kagame na FPR ye”

Second Genocide in Rwanda? Slow, Silent, and Systematic?

Apartheid of another kind sustained by the US in Rwanda