Role of the international community in the Rwandan genocide

The role of the international community in the Rwandan genocide refers to the infamously insignificant action taken by the international community in responding to a period of mass slaughter in Rwanda in 1994 against the Hutu and the Tutsi peoples.

The United Nations and peacekeeping forces stationed in Rwanda at the time made little effort to suppress the massacre. They would eventually be ordered to leave, prior to the conclusion of the genocide, even though many peacekeepers were providing protection to Tutsis who sought refuge.[1][2]

Background

As the Tutsi had historically been the ruling class of Rwanda (as enforced by Belgian colonialism), centuries of Hutu hostility toward the elite minority had made politics a tense arena in the country. In 1959, the Tutsi elite were overthrown by a Hutu revolution, after which a Hutu government was established in 1961 with the support of European powers.

President Juvénal Habyarimana, a moderate Hutu who came to power in 1973, increased divisions between the Tutsi and Hutus. On 6 April 1994, Habyarimana was shot down in a plane, thereby sparking what began the 100 days of genocidal violence against the Tutsi and moderate Hutu.

The population of Rwanda in 1994 was approximately seven million people, composed of 85% Hutu, 14% Tutsi, and 1% Twa (a Pygmy tribe). It is estimated that about 800,000 people—three-quarters of the Tutsi population in Rwanda—were killed in the genocide. Anyone suspected of being a Tutsi was killed while fleeing the roadblocks and leaving the country. Proclaimed to be traitors, Hutus opposing the genocide were also killed.[2]

The Hutu extremists, Interahamwe, were successful in their genocide, as the lives of hundreds of thousands of Rwandans were claimed, with 2 million refugees (mostly Hutus) having fled Rwanda further exacerbating a humanitarian crisis.[2] The massacre would only cease after the Rwandan Patriotic Front, the rebel group of Tutsis based in Uganda, stopped the Interahamwe. Paul Kagame, the leader of the RPF, subsequently became the president of Rwanda.[1]

Response

Much of the international community infamously took little action in preventing the Rwandan genocide, hoping to avoid the loss of life and political entanglement that the American debacle in Somalia had created a few years prior.

As reports of the genocide spread through the media, the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) supplied more than five thousand troops to provide a strong force; however the delay and denial of recommendations prevented the force from reaching there on time, arriving months after the genocide was over. A UNSC vote in April 1994 led to the withdrawal of most of the United Nations Assistance Mission for Rwanda (UNAMIR) peacekeeping operation.[2]

In the events that took place after the genocide, government officials in the community mourned over the loss of many and were surprised about the world’s obliviousness to the situation that could have prevented the massacre from taking place. Just as the atrocities in Yugoslavia, the Rwandan genocide did not seem to interest the outside world.[3]

Belgium

Belgium was a colonial power in Rwanda and had a deep political connection with their government even after decolonization, their main connection being the United Nations Assistance Mission for Rwanda (UNAMIR), which was initially mostly composed of Belgian soldiers.

Out of the 2,548 troops authorized by the United Nations in October 1993, initially only 800 were deployed, half of which were Belgian.[4] Concerned about the continued armament of militia in February 1994, Belgium warned the UN of the potential for a massacre and urged the international community to strengthen UNAMIR's peacekeeping force. These warnings fell on deaf ears:[5][6] soldiers were told that they were in Rwanda for purposes of a peace mission and were not allowed to fight, as this was not their assignment.[5]

After the attack of 6 April 1994, the Radio des milles collines spread the rumor that Belgian soldiers from UNAMIR were the source. The Rwandan presidential guard captured and assassinated Prime Minister Agathe Uwilingiyimana and her husband, as well as the ten Belgian soldiers assigned to protect them. Lt. Thierry Lottin had contact with General Dallaire about the serenity of the situation while protecting the Prime Minister, but Dallaire initially did not see the urge to retreat.[7] This dramatic episode drove Belgium into a depressive consternation which entailed its disengagement from UNAMIR. As to justify its decision, Belgium carried the UN along with a spiraling number of countries who were leaving UNAMIR. An informer, known as "Jean-Pierre" by General Dallaire, had revealed to Dallaire that the people behind the genocide were counting on the fact that western nations couldn't tolerate their own casualties and thus would pull out of the mission.

Beginning from 7 April, Belgium demanded an extension of the mandate of UNAMIR in order to evacuate the 1,520 Belgian residents. The intentions of the Belgian ambassador were provided in the Belgian Senate report of 12 April 1996: "We are preoccupied above all with the personnel who have worked for us, of certain people associated with the process of democratization, with clergymen." The report follows: "Finally, operation 'Silver Back' began on April 10 and will be completed on April 15 when the last Belgian civilians will have left Rwanda."

After the genocide, a traumatized Belgium began a parliamentary reflection, with the senate instituting the Commission d'enquête parlementaire ('Parliamentary Inquiry Commission'), which inquired and composed a parliamentary report.[8]

On 6 April 2000, Belgian Prime Minister Guy Verhofstadt attended the ceremony commemorating the 6th anniversary of the genocide in Kigali. He took the occasion to make apologies, taking on "the responsibility of my country, according to what we have learnt afterwards in the name of my country and of my people, I beg your pardon."[9]

Canada

In July 1993, UNAMIR Force Commander General Roméo Dallaire received little information on the background of the conflict in Rwanda. Upon requesting current intelligence, he was denied and given little access to the information. Forced to proceed on his mission blindly due to the lack of information Canada was given, the mission was planned poorly, especially as they were provided with inexperienced experts in economic, political and human rights operational planning. This came as a result of military operations that had ignored requirements for long-term addresses to the cause of the Rwandan conflict. Their mandate allowed them only to monitor the implementation of the Arusha Accords and to support the transitional Government. The mission was also restricted with little funding or time, and force was prohibited except in self-defence.

After the 1994 shooting down of President Habyarimana's plane, Dallaire called for reinforcement and was denied. By April 10, it was clear the non-battle pole strategy had failed to prevent the genocide. Belgium withdrew its forces after a number of their soldiers were massacred and the majority of the UN force followed shortly afterwards. UNAMIR eventually took under protection 40,000 Rwandans despite their strict mandate. The Peacemaking (Chapter VII) UNAMIR II deployed once the airport had been retaken and forces could begin to arrive (UN ARCH). Canadian (Operation Lance), British (Operation Gabriel), and Australian (Operation Tamor) forces were among the first western nations to arrive and join the small UN force and begin assisting Rwandan in achieving peace and healing, including intervening in the genocide.

Canada’s new role in genocide prevention is to take action under the United Nations Charter as they consider appropriate, in an attempt to prevent and suppress the violent acts of genocide. With the use of a bipolar strategy, military defense prevention and suppression, Canadian policy makers can respond when it may be the only practical way of stopping genocides.[10]

China

China’s acute role played two parts within their community: one in being responsible for the horrors that took place, and the other in being remorseful.

Both France and China were responsible for funding/fueling the genocide by supplying the Rwandan government with military arms, which may have been prevented had the United Nations taken the ordeal more seriously.[11] To honor the lost and injured, the Rwandan embassy and Chinese communities organized events in Beijing and in a few Rwandan communities. Memorials were marked with silence, prayers, songs and presentations on the history of Rwanda; they expressed the hope that the world could learn from this tragedy.[12]

France

From October 1990 to December 1993, the French army led Opération Noroit, when the president of the French Republic responded to the Rwandan Republic. France openly supported the regime of Juvénal Habyarimana against the RPF rebels, contributing a 'French presence to the limit of direct engagement' according to the title of a chapter of the report of the French parliamentary mission. This operation allowed the French to organize and train Rwandan troops, who subsequently formed the Interahamwe militias, or even future militiamen.

Oppositely, France, in agreement with the international community, endorsed the peace process of the negotiations of the Arusha accords between the Rwandan government, their opposition, and the exiles of the FPR.

In December 1993, France used the arrival of UNAMIR, who had come to the implementation of the Arusha accords, as a front, while according to diverse sources, some military technicians continued to operate in Rwanda.[13] A couple of Frenchmen were notably assassinated, reportedly by the RPF, in the hours that followed the attack, while they were engaged in setting up sophisticated electronic equipment.

On 8 April 1994, two days after the attack against president Habyarimana, France launched Opération Amaryllis in order to permit the secured evacuation of 1500 residents, mainly westerners. The Rwandan survivors have strongly criticized that operation which, according to numerous testimonials, did not include the evacuation of the Rwandans threatened with the massacres, even when they were employed by the French authorities. France also evacuated dignitaries from the Habyarimana regime, and on 11 April, 97 children from the orphanage protected by Madame Habyarimana were evacuated. According to several sources, several dignitaries close to the Habyarimana family were also evacuated. Operation Amaryllis terminated on 14 April.

UNAMIR's Kigali sector commander, Belgian Col. Luc Marchal, reported to the BBC that one of the French planes supposedly participating in the evacuation operation arrived at 0345 hours on 9 April with several boxes of ammunition. The boxes, weighing about , were unloaded and transported by FAR vehicles to the Kanombe camp where the Rwandese Presidential Guard was quartered. The French government has categorically denied this shipment, saying that the planes carried only French military personnel and material for the evacuation.[14]

France was very active at the UN in the discussions about the reinforcement of the UNAMIR in May 1994. In front of the inertia of the international community, France obtained the backing of the UN to lead Opération Turquoise from June 22 to August 22, 1994. The declared goal was to protect the "threatened populations," both by the genocide and by the military conflict between the FPR and the temporary Rwandan government. No hierarchy between the two types of threatened people was established. The two parties of the military conflict assimilated them and the system was organised to remain neutral between the two different groups. This system was humanitarian in some cases, notably during a cholera epidemic in refugee camps in Zaïre, the modern-day Democratic Republic of the Congo, however it was the source of many distinct controversies surrounding the French role at the time of Operation Noroit and the criticism of having facilitated the desertion of those responsible for the genocide and a massive refugee movement of the population to Congo (around two million people). France has accused the FPR of having provoked half of these movements by refusing the advice of French authorities not to get involved in the northwest of the country.

France, one of the five permanent members of the Security Council of the UN, has been accused of a role that some of those answerable to France refute and who claim that Operation Turquoise was an exemplary humanitarian intervention. Some use as context that in supporting a group that would become genocidal, and who, according to the French parliamentary report, did not hide their genocidal intentions, France would have favoured the launching of the genocide.

As the outgrowth of a press campaign, especially the articles written by the journalist Patrick de Saint-Exupéry which appeared in 1994 and in 1998 in the French newspaper Le Figaro, the French parliament decided to examine the actions of France in Rwanda using a parliamentary information mission for Rwanda.[15] Some French NGOs who specialise in Rwanda would have preferred a parliamentary enquiry mission whose judicial powers would have been more extensive in order to find the truth. After several months of work, the president of the parliamentary mission, the former Defence Minister Paul Quilès, concluded that France was "not guilty" (December 1998).

21st century

Ten years later, during the year 2004, books, films, radio programmes and television shows have brought the controversies surrounding France's role in Rwanda back to life. Unsatisfied by the conclusions of the report from the parliamentary mission for Rwanda, some citizens and NGOs have formed a citizens' enquiry commission. After a week of work in Paris, their "provisional conclusions" were read on 27 March 2004 at a conference that they organised the enclave of the French Assemblée nationale in the presence of one of two of the original people who had publicly stated the findings of the parliamentary mission, the former deputy Pierre Brana. On April 7, 2004 a serious diplomatic incident took place between France and Rwanda during the commemoration of the genocide in Kigali. In the course of the ceremonies, the Rwandan President publicly accused France of not having apologised for its role in Rwanda while desiring to participate in the ceremonies.

In July 2004, the ministers of Foreign Affairs from the two countries convened in order to "share the work of a memory piece" about the genocide. Rwanda announced several days later, according to a dispatch from Agence France-Presse from August 2, 2004, that "the council of ministers has adopted the organic law project to aid in the creation of the independent national commission charged with assembling proof of the implication of France in the genocide perpetrated in Rwanda in 1994." The French minister of Foreign Affairs "took action" for the creation of the Rwandan commission.

On 22 October 2004 the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda officially demanded that the "Republic of France" allow former ambassador Jean Michel Marlaud and one of his military representatives, officer Jean Jacques Maurin to respond to the demand of the defence of the presumed mastermind of the genocide: Colonel Bagosora pending judgement. Colonel Bagosra was the first Rwandan officer to have graduated from the French École des Officiers.[16]

On 27 November 2004 in a televised debate on France 3, after the showing of the French film Tuez les Tous ('Kill Them All'), created by three students of political science, the president of the parliamentary mission for information for Rwanda, Paul Quilès stated for the first time that "France asks to be pardoned by the people of Rwanda, but not by their government."

On 6 April 2014, Rwandan president Paul Kagame repeated the charges against France as "direct role of Belgium and France in the political preparation for the genocide" in an interview with Jeune Afrique magazine.[17] He also accused French soldiers who took part in a military humanitarian mission in the south of the former Belgian colony of being both accomplices and "actors" in the bloodbath.[18]

Rwandan report of 2008

On 5 August 2008, an independent Rwandan commission said France was aware of preparations for the 1994 Rwanda genocide and helped train the ethnic Hutu militia perpetrators. It accuses France of training Hutu militias responsible for the slaughter, helping plan the genocide, and participating in the killings. The report accused 33 senior French military and political officials on Tuesday of involvement in the genocide. Among those named were then-President François Mitterrand, Prime Minister Édouard Balladur, Foreign Minister Alain Juppé, and his then-chief aide, Dominique de Villepin. "French soldiers themselves directly were involved in assassinations of Tutsis and Hutus accused of hiding Tutsis," said the report, which was compiled by a team of investigators from the Justice Ministry.[19][20]

United States

Following the events surrounding the Battle of Mogadishu in Somalia the year prior, the United States refused to provide requested material aid to Rwanda.[21] France, China, and Russia opposed involvement in what was seen as an "internal affair." Dallaire was directly "taken to task," in his words, for even suggesting that UNAMIR should raid Hutu militants' weapons caches, whose location had been disclosed to him by a government informant.[22] The UN failed to respond adequately to Dallaire's urgent requests.[23][24]

The role of the United States was directly inspired by the defeat they had undergone during their 1993 intervention in Somalia. President Bill Clinton and U.S. Ambassador to the UN Madeleine Albright repeatedly refused to take action;[25] government documents that were declassified in 2004 indicate that the Clinton administration knew that Rwanda was being engulfed by genocide in April 1994, but buried the information to justify the United States' inaction. Intelligence reports obtained using the Freedom of Information Act show that the cabinet and (almost certainly) the president had been told of a planned "final solution to eliminate all Tutsis" before the slaughter reached its peak.[26]

For two months, from April to May 1994, the American government argued over the word genocide which is banned by the Convention for the Prevention and the Repression of Crime and Genocide (adopted by the General Assembly of the United Nations on 10 December 1948).[27] Senior US officials privately used the term genocide within 16 days of the beginning of the killings, but chose not to do so publicly as Clinton had already decided not to intervene.

In 2001, the government of the United States declassified documents that confirm the attitude of the United States of not having taken into account the reality of the situation starting in January 1994.[28] Clinton and Albright would both later express regret for their inaction. Clinton would go on to provide major funding for the Genocide Memorial in Kigali. He would also visit Rwanda in 1998 and 2005, apologizing both times, saying that he "expressed regret for what he says was his 'personal failure' to prevent the slaughter of an estimated 800,000 people."[29] Moreover, through the Clinton Foundation, he has attempted amends by sponsoring initiatives to help rebuild Rwanda.

Other African states

The OAU, which has today become the African Union, created a report on the genocide in 2000.[30] Before the UNAMIR mission led by Gen. Roméo Dallaire (military) and Jacques-Roger Booh-Booh (civilian), the OAU had indeed sent a Neutral Military Observation Group, known by its French initials as GOMN.

United Nations

The United Nations Security Council (UNSC) has accepted the failing of their responsibility to prevent the 1994 Rwandan genocide.

Following the death of ten Belgium soldiers, the United Nations reported the removal of most 2,500 peacekeepers. Canadian Foreign Minister Lloyd Axworthy stated "none present could look back without feeling guilt and devastation at the lack to help the Rwandan civilians at their time in need" (BBC News).[31] Even as the council stopped short and delivered an apology, 15 council members focused on a report about lessons to be learned. It was based on the lack of support and help in Africa. The United Nations presents a core policy and a great challenge to prevent another round of genocidal violence. The councils have already evidently learned how to bring peace from lessons of past failures. The Rwandan ambassador Joseph Mutaboba has welcomed the report and its apologies stating that the council could do more, it’s not too late. In 1994, the UNSC had appointed General Kofi Annan to the Council and to the Head of United Nations Peacekeeping operations. Annan commissioned the report and was publicly criticized for not delivering warnings about the upcoming genocide. Kofi Annan has accepted the conclusions based on recorded reports.[31]

The United Nations has been criticized for inaction. In terms of responsibility, the UN is retrospectively considered to be followed by France, who moved in too late and ended up protecting the genocidaires thereby permanently destabilizing the region; and the United States, who actively worked against an effective UNAMIR and became involved only to aid the same Hutu refugee population and the genocidaires as France, leaving genocide survivors to flounder.

On April 12, 1994, The Guardian stated that when viewing a woman "being hauled along the road by a young man with a machete":[32]

...none of the troops moved. 'It's not our mandate,' said one, leaning against his jeep as he watched the condemned woman, the driving rain splashing at his blue United Nations badge. The 3,000 foreign troops now in Rwanda are no more than spectators to the savagery which aid workers say has seen the massacre of 15,000 people.

Michael Barnett, who was a senior official at the UN at that time, has provided evidence that the UN Department of Peacekeeping Operations (DPKO) failed to pass on to the Security Council information that could have bolstered a case for intervention. This information included the location of Interhamwe arms caches and information preceding the genocide that the Interhamwe were compiling a list of all the Tutsis in Kigali. The informer was Jean-Pierre Twatzinze, who has been asked to compile the list. According to Barnett, UN inaction stemmed from its desire not to get involved in a potentially PR-risky operation which could damage the prospects for future peacebuilding operations, given that 18 UN troops had recently been killed in Somalia, even though UN troops had the capacity to save thousands of lives.[33] "For many at the UN", Barnett writes, the moral compass pointed "away from and not toward Rwanda." [34]

Arms shipments

From France

In the early morning of January 22, 1994, a DC-8 aircraft loaded with armaments from France, including 90 boxes of Belgian-made 60 mm mortars, was confiscated by UNAMIR at Kigali International Airport. The delivery was in violation of the cease-fire clauses of the Arusha Accords, which prohibited introduction of arms into the area during the transition period. General Dallaire put the arms under joint UNAMIR-Rwandan army guard. Formally recognizing this point, the French government argued that the delivery stemmed from an old contract and hence was technically legal. Dallaire was forced to give up control over the aircraft.[35]

From Mil-Tec Corporation Ltd (UK)

Mil-Tec Corporation Ltd, a UK company, was involved in arms supplies to the Hutu regime at least from June 1993 to mid-July 1994. Mil-Tec had been paid $4.8 million by the regime in return for invoices of $6.5 million for the arms sent. The manager of Mil-Tec, Anoop Vidyarthi, was described as a Kenyan Asian who owned a travel company in North London and was in business with Rakeesh Kumar Gupta. They both fled the UK shortly after the revelations.[36]

• 6 June 1993 ($549,503 of ammunition from Tel Aviv to Kigali);
• 17–18 April 1994 ($853,731 of ammunition from Tel Aviv to Goma);
• 22–25 April 1994 ($681,200 of ammunition and grenades from Tel Aviv to Goma);
• 29 April - 3 May 1994 ($942,680 of ammunition, grenades, mortars and rifles from Tirana to Goma);
• 9 May 1994 ($1,023,840 of rifles, ammunition, mortars and other items from Tirana to Goma);
• 18–20 May 1994 ($1,074,549 of rifles, ammunition, mortars, rocket propelled grenades and other items from Tirana to Goma);
• 13–18 July 1994 ($753,645 of ammunition and rockets from Tirana to Kinshasa).[37]

From Israel

Israeli bullets, rifles, and grenades were reportedly used in Rwanda during the genocide.[38]

See also

• Mogadishu Line

References

1. "Genocide in Rwanda." The United Human Rights Council. 4 May 2012. Archived from the original on 2013-08-27.
2. "Rwandan Genocide." History. A&E Television Networks. [2009] 2019. Retrieved 14 August 2020.
3. Lorch, Donatella. 20 September 1995. "Pope Calls for End to Killings in Rwanda". New York Times. EBSCO Host.
4. United Nations. "UNAMIR". Retrieved 14 April 2013.
5. Adelman, Howard. 2009. "The role of non-African states in the Rwandan Genocide." YorkSpace. US: Centre for Refugee Studies, York University. hdl:10315/2662.
6. Belgian Senate. "De pogingen van België om het mandaat of de ROE te wijzigen of om de troepensterkte te verhogen". Retrieved 14 April 2013.
7. Klep, Chris. 2009. Somalië, Rwanda, Srebrenica: De nasleep van drie ontspoorde vredesmissies. Boom.
8. "Commission d'enquête parlementaire concernant les événements du Rwanda" (Parliamentary document n° 1-611/7). Sénat de Belgique, Session de 1997-1998. 6 December 1997.
9. "Le mond durant le génocide: l'ONU, la Belgique, la France et l'OUA [The world during the genocide: the UN, Belgium, France, and the OAU]." Ch. 15 in Rapport de l'OUA sur le génocide au Rwanda. § 52.
10. Beardsley, Brent. 2010. "Responding to the Terror of Genocide: Learning from the Rwandan Genocide of 1994." Pp. 197–216 in Understanding Terror: Perspectives for Canadians, edited by K-A. S. Kassam. Calgary: University of Calgary Press. JSTOR j.ctv6gqvkq.13. doi:10.2307/j.ctv6gqvkq.13.
11. "Prevention of Rwandan Genocide". Prevention of the Rwandan 1994 Genocide. Students In Solidarity. Trinity College.
12. "Rwandans in China mark Genocide." The New Times. Ebsco Host.
13. "France and genocide: the murky truth". The Times. 8 August 2008. Retrieved 20 September 2011.
14. "Chapter 3". Retrieved 14 April 2017.
15. "Rapport : Mission d'information sur le Rwanda". Retrieved 14 April 2017.
16. "International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda". Retrieved 14 April 2017.
17. <https://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/apr/06/rwandan-president-france-genocide>
18. <http://www.english.rfi.fr/africa/20140405-kagame-repeats-charges-french-part-1994-genocide>
19. "France accused in Rwanda genocide". BBC News. 5 August 2008. Retrieved 22 May 2010.
20. "Rwanda: French Accused in Genocide". The New York Times. 6 August 2008. Retrieved 22 May 2010.
21. Evidence of Inaction: A National Security Archive Briefing Book, ed. Ferroggiaro
22. Barnett, 'Eyewitness to a Genocide'. The informer was Jean-pierre Twatzinze
23. "Statement of the Secretary-General on Receiving the Report," Report of The Independent Inquiry into the Actions of the UN During the 1994 Genocide in Rwanda, 1999
24. "Frontline: interview with Philip Gourevitch". Retrieved 2007-04-09.
25. "Frontline: the triumph of evil". Retrieved 2007-04-09.
26. Carroll, Rory. 31 March 2004. "US chose to ignore Rwandan genocide Classified papers show Clinton was aware of 'final solution' to eliminate Tutsis." The Guardian.
27. "CONVENTION POUR LA PRÉVENTION ET LA RÉPRESSION DU CRIME DE GÉNOCIDE". Retrieved 14 April 2017.
28. "The US and the Genocide in Rwanda 1994".
29. "Clinton Global Initiative. Voice of America. August 1, 2005". Retrieved 2007-04-09.
30. "Rapport de l'OUA sur le génocide au Rwanda." Organisation of African Unity. 2001.
31. "UN Admits Rwanda genocide failure." BBC News. UK: BBC News Broadcasting. 15 April 2000.
32. Huband, Mark (12 April 1994). "UN troops stand by and watch carnage". Retrieved 14 April 2017 – via The Guardian.
33. Feil 2005, 'Could 5000 Peacekeepers Have Saved 500,000 Rwandans?'
34. Barnett 2006, Eyewitness to a Genocide
35. Arms Shipments and the Rwandan Genocide. Online posting. Never Again.
36. "Brokering Arms for Genocide." Chap. 3 in The Arms Fixers: Controlling the Brokers and Shipping Agents, by Brian Wood and Johan Pele man.
37. "Arms shipments and the Rwandan Genocide." Online posting. Never Again International Niki.

External links

• "Tous complices du génocide au Rwanda"
• Voices of Rwanda The Rwanda Testimony Film Project