RWANDAN GENOCIDE
SHOULD NOT BE FORGOTTEN
G'day folks,
Over a period of 100 days in 1994, in the small but densely populated East African country of Rwanda, one of the worst and most brutal genocides in modern history occurred.
More than 800,000 Tutsi people, Twa and moderate Hutu were murdered
by Hutu extremists. The genocide came at the climax of the Rwandan
Civil War, which had been raging since 1990, but followed a long history
of tension between the groups.
Rwandan President Juvénal Habyarimana
had signed peace accords with the rebels in 1993, since neither side
was able to gain an advantage in the conflict. His assassination on
April 6, 1994, created an immediate power vacuum in the country and
ended the accords. The Rwandan crisis committee that took power
following his death, led by Théoneste Bagosora, immediately began
issuing orders to kill Tutsi. The killings were large-scale and highly
organized, perpetrated primarily through the Interahamwe, originally a
far-right Hutu paramilitary group. Many believe the genocide had been
planned for over a year.
Road blocks were set up throughout Rwanda and any person showing Tutsi
identification was killed immediately. Hutu extremists went from house
to house slaughtering Tutsi, regardless of age. Churches were burned
with people in them, such as at Ntarama were killed by guns, grenades,
fire or machete.
The international community has long been criticized for its failure to
intervene. The genocide caused worldwide revulsion and shock, but the
killings only stopped when the Rwandan Patriotic Front led by Paul
Kagame (still the President of Rwanda as of 2020) enacted a swift
military victory over the Rwandan government and ended the civil war.
Many responsible for the genocide were never punished given the vast
number of participants, though some of the main organizers were
imprisoned by the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda.
Clancy's comment: Shameful stuff!
I'm ...
