1.1 Our Rwanda
Rwanda is a country of hills, mountains, forests, lakes, laughing children, markets of busy people, drummers, dancers, artisans and craftsman. We manage to squeeze thousands of hills and eight million people into our 26,338 square kilomètres. Our land is rich and fertile, the climate pleasant. This has been our home for centuries. We are one people. We speak one language. We have one history.
In recent times, though, genocide has cast a dark shadow over our lives and torn us apart. This chapter is a bitter part of our lives, but one we must remember for those we lost, and for the sake of the future.
This is about our past and our future;
Our nightmares and dreams;
Our fear and our hope;
Which is why we begin where we end…
with the country we love…
1.2: Colonial Times
We did not choose to be colonised. The Germans arrived first (1895-1916). During World War One, the country was occupied by Belgian troops, who in 1923 were granted a mandate by the League of Nations to govern Rwanda-Urundi, which it ruled indirectly. They turned their mandate into a colonial occupation until our independence in 1962.
There were some benefits to their presence here. Christianity was integrated into society, schooling and medicine developed, as did the infrastructure. Useful export markets for our produce also opened up.
However, we did not share good times together. Initially, we did try to resist the influence of colonialism, fighting the first Germans in 1875. But the colonial powers were stronger and their influence greater.
The primary identity of all Rwandans was originally associated with eighteen different clans. The categories Hutu, Tutsi and Twa were socio-economic classifications within the clans, which could change with personal circumstances. Under colonial rule, the distinctions were made racial, particularly with the introduction of the identity card in 1932. In creating these distinctions, the colonial power identified anyone with ten cows in 1932 as a Tutsi and anyone with less than ten cows as Hutu, and this also applied to his descendants.
We had lived in peace for many centuries, but now the divide between us had begun…
Main Photo: [Face-measuring picture] European explorers and anthropologists said that Tutsis had originated from a race in the Nile valley. According to these theories, known as ‘Hamitic ideology’, Tutsis were more like the European whites.
[Family photo – 100 nights] Major Declerq, Belgian military representative, hosted in 1919 with his family by King Yuhi V Musinga. King Musinga was forcibly removed for his resistance to colonial rule, and replaced by his son, Mutara III Rudahigwa , in 1931.
[Photo] Belgium’s King Baudouin welcomed by King Mutara III Rudahigwa (1931-1959) who worked in the beginning in close cooperation with the coloniser. His consecration of Rwanda to Christ in 1946 enabled the Belgian authorities to reshape Rwandan society according to European and Church values.
[school photo with priests in the middle of school class] The Catholic Church influenced education in Rwanda. Teaching increasingly conveyed the racist ‘Hamitic’ ideology, largely accepted by the Church. Hamitic ideology portrayed the Tutsis as a superior group.
[pic showing either identity card (pic 28) or some form of division between tribes]
The Belgian authorities introduced identity cards to Rwanda in 1932, indicating incorrectly 15 per cent as Tutsi, 84 per cent as Hutu and 1 per cent, Twa. An imposed identity began to determine an individual’s opportunity in Belgium’s reshaped Rwanda.
[picture of people in professional life] By 1957, while nearly all chiefs and sub-chiefs were Tutsi, only a minority of Tutsi actually derived direct benefit from an elevated status. It was generally they, and not Hutus, who were given privileged positions.
[pic of priest reading with choir boy in foreground] Under the tutelage and patronage of Msgr. Perraudin, Gitera wrote the “Ten Commandments of the Bahutu”, which were precursors of the “Ten Commandments of Hutu Power”, produced by Kangura in December 1990.
[priests at picnic] Priests from Kicukiro take a break from duties. The Catholic Church became the predominant religion during this time.
1.3 : Divided Society
In 1959 King Rudahigwa died; thereafter massacres of Tutsi were organized.
Many thousands of Tutsis were killed, others fled to neighbouring states for refuge.
In 1961 we held elections. The first government's Prime Minister was Grégoire Kayibanda, founder of the Parmehutu, a party for the emancipation of the Hutu.
A year later, Rwanda gained independence.
Rwanda became a highly centralised, repressive state with a single-party system.
The regime was characterised by the persecution and ethnic cleansing of Tutsis. In addition to ethnic divisions, the Kayibanda regime created regional divisions which contributed to the coup d’état by Major General Juvénal Habyarimana in 1973.
[photos of massacres] Massacre of Tutsis [1963, 1966, 1967]. The notion of an internal enemy developed during this period. The word ‘Inyenzi’, meaning ‘cockroach’, was coined to demonise the Tutsi population.
[photo] Grégoire Kayibanda.
"The Hutu and the Tutsi communities are two nations in a single state. Two nations between whom there is no intercourse and no sympathy, who are ignorant of each other's habits, thoughts and feelings as if they were the inhabitants of different zones or planets."
[Pic of Habyarimana] Juvénal Habyarimana refined and codified Kayibanda’s
fascist policies. The Mouvement Révolutionnaire et National pour le Développement (MRND) was the only party, and Habyarimana declared that all Rwandans were members.
[girl picking coffee beans] Development aid from the West came in for ten years. Then, in 1986, coffee prices collapsed. As the economy deteriorated, the ruling Hutu elite – the Akazu – tightened its grip on available wealth and political power.
[photo tin mine] In the 1980s, there were three main sources of funding: coffee, tin and aid. Tin mining collapsed and with the coffee slump, there was a political scramble by the elite to make sure that they held positions with access to foreign aid.
[Habyarimana and Mitterrand] Aid reinforced division and persecution, and so international donors began demanding financial and democratic accountability. Following the La Baule Summit organised by François Mitterrand and pressure from the Rwanda Patriotic Front in 1990, Habyarimana declared the establishment of a multi-party system.
Most of the new political parties created later developed extremist wings. The CDR was a radical Hutu extremist party.
[interahamwe] Habyarimana’s MRND was responsible for establishing the Interahamwe, a flamboyant and potentially dangerous Hutu youth militia that gained enormous popularity. Advocating Hutu Power and Hutuness at the expense of Tutsi lives, their message was reinforced and spread by an extremist media. By 1990 the genocidal ideology of Hutu Power had been perfected.
1.4 : Path to a Final Solution
Over 700,000 Tutsis were exiled from our country between 1959-1973 as a result of the ethnic cleansing encouraged by the Belgian colonialists.
The refugees were prevented from returning, despite many peaceful efforts to do so.
Some then joined the Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF) who, on 1 October 1990, invaded Rwanda.
Civil war followed, which resulted in the internal displacement of Rwandans, many of whom were held in internal refugees camps by the Government of Rwanda.
Times were tense.
[photo][Caption: The RPF were intent on re-establishing equal rights and the rule of law, as well as the opportunity for refugees to return. Habyarimana used the tension to exploit divisions in the population, launching campaigns of persecution and fuelling fear among the people.
The war on the Tutsi minority was going largely unnoticed, even though many Tutsi and Hutu opponents of the divisive ideology were in prison, tortured or murdered.
[pull quote] “We... say to the Inyenzi [cockroaches] that if they lift up their heads again, it will no longer be necessary to go fight the enemy in the bush. We will... start by eliminating the internal enemy... They will disappear.”
Hassan Ngeze, Kangura, January 1994
Hassan Ngeze, Kangura, janvier 1994
[photo massacres] Genocide was being rehearsed. Massacres of Tutsis were carried out in October 1990, January 1991, February 1991, March 1992, August 1992, January 1993, March 1993 and February 1994. None of the massacres constituted spontaneous outbreaks of violence. Despite knowing about these atrocities, the French Government continued to support the Habyrimana regime.
[photo French soldier on road block]
French soldiers participated in identifying Tutsis on behalf of the Government.
Panel 1.5: Propaganda
An intense propaganda campaign began, to persuade and compel the majority of the population as to why they should see their compatriots, their neighbours, even their own families, as enemies, and distrust them.
When the genocide was underway, Radio Télévision Libre des Mille Collines was used to incite hatred, to give instructions and justify the killings.
The population were being conditioned to accept and to join the plan to act before it was too late.
[montage panel of Kangura] As early as December 1990, Kangura had published the “Hutu Ten Commandments”, which stated that any Hutu associating with or carrying out any business with Tutsi neighbours and friends was a traitor.
[inset panel] “The Ten Commandments of the Bahutu” (published in Kangura, December 1990).
[cartoon] “Inyenzi, eminent Inkotanyi [the tough fighters] let’s go! We are coming to live by force with those from whom we have robbed everything.” Kangura, July 1993, depicts Paul Kagame leading the RPF over the coffins of Hutus ‘Inyenzi’, meaning ‘cockroach’, was used by Hutu radicals to dehumanise the Tutsis.
[cartoon] “-I am sick doctor!! -What is your sickness?! -The Tutsi...Tutsi...Tutsi.” Hassan Ngeze portrayed in cartoon in Rwanda Rushya in January 1992. The RPF are demonised as controlling the Arusha peace process. Cartoon published in Le Courrier du Peuple in March 1993.
[Photo] Ferdinand Nahimana (left), former director of Radio Télévision Libre des Mille Collines. Radio Télévision Libre des Mille Collines was a hate radio station, initiated by members of the government to spread hate propaganda. It broadcast a highly inflammatory message.
[photo] More than twenty newspapers and journals incited hatred of the Tutsis. Hassan Ngeze was editor of Kangura, one of the leading propaganda papers, which suggested that the Hutus needed to protect themselves as the Tutsis were planning a war that would ‘leave no survivors’.
[panel of major donors to RTLM] Table of principal donors who helped to establish RTLM.
Zone 2: Title: Warning Signs
2:1: Arusha Process
In August 1993, the Rwandan Government and RPF signed an agreement known as the Arusha Peace Accords.
Rwanda was to have a transitional government leading to a democratically elected government.
A neutral force was to be deployed. French troops were to leave and make way for UNAMIR. The RPF and Rwandan army were intended to integrate, demobilise and disarm. Refugees were to be allowed home and an RPF battalion was to be stationed in Kigali.
Habyarimana and his political allies did not want the Arusha Accords to work. The transitional government was not established. Habyarimana and his extremist allies saw it as surrender to the RPF.
Meanwhile, Habyarimana’s regime entered the largest-ever Rwandan arms deal with a French company for $12 million, with a loan guaranteed by the French government.
[Pull quote] “Human rights workers… were not fooled. We did not think that someone capable of organising massacres would suddenly turn into a democrat. We saw what was happening.” Eric Gillet, Belgian lawyer
[Photo – negotiating table] Participants negotiate the Accords in Arusha.
2.2: Flight from Persecution
Tutsi in Rwanda began to suffer ever more intense waves of persecution from 1990. Tutsi men and women were jailed and tortured. Waves of massacres acted as a precursor to the genocide.
The persecution was so extreme that some Tutsi and Hutu moderates began to leave their homes and became refugees in neighbouring countries.
The persecution, though barely recognised by the outside world, was an early indication of what was to come.
2.3: Foreign Press
(Awaiting text –ref. Ben Walker). ( We know dates of articles and newspapers in which they were printed but do not have the text yet. Getting it from Le Monde & De Standaard )
[photo – newspaper facsimile]
[photo – newspaper facsimile]
2.4: ‘Jean Pierre’
On 10 January 1994 an informant, code-named ‘Jean-Pierre’, who was a former member of the president’s security guard, came forward with information.
He told Colonel Luc Marchal of the UN that 1,700 Interahamwe had been trained in Rwandan army camps and training was taking place at about 300 people per week. He informed Marchal that his political superior was Matheu Ngirumpatse, who was president of MRND, President Habyrimana’s party.
He reported that the Interahamwe was registering all Tutsi in Kigali for an extermination plan, which would kill up to 1,000 people every 20 minutes.
Jean-Pierre believed that the President had lost control of the extremists.
He was willing to warn about the dangers of Hutu Power and to go to the press in exchange for his security. UNAMIR was not able to secure this protection.
Jean-Pierre disappeared.
His fate remains unknown.
[photo: Belgium peacekeeper] Jean Pierre describes a plan to kill Belgian peacekeepers to force the UN to withdraw.
[photo – weapons] Jean-Pierre was willing to provide the location of the secret weapon caches in exchange for UN protection.
[photo] Interahamwe in training.
2.5: Cables to New York
Head of UNAMIR, Lt. General Roméo Dallaire, had expected the peacekeeping in Rwanda to be a relatively straightforward operation.
On 11 January 1994, Dallaire wrote a code-cable to New York to inform the Secretary-General’s military adviser and members of the Peacekeeping Office of the presence of the informant and the information that he had.
The cable caused alarm, but mostly due to the arms seizure that Dallaire had proposed.
No action was taken in response to the fax
“No reconnaissance or other action, including response to request for protection, should be taken by UNAMIR until clear guidance is received from HQ.” From Annan to Booh-Booh
Photo: Dallaire’s Fax
Photo: Dallaire head and shoulders
Photo: UN building
2.6: ‘Something Big…’
Hassan Ngeze (CDR) wrote two articles in Kangura, both predicting that President Habyarimana would die in March 1994.
There was a lot of talk about “something very big” happening in both the intelligence community and in the national press and RTLM.
Then on 6 April 1994, President Juvenal Habyarimana and President Cyrien Ntaryamira of Burundi were flying into Kigali, when at 20:23 the plane was shot down on its approach to Kigali airport.
By 21:15 roadblocks had been constructed throughout Kigali and houses were being searched.
Shooting began to be heard within an hour
…the death lists had been pre-prepared in advance…
[Photo Bagasora] In Arusha in January 1993, Bagasora had declared that he was going home to plan ‘an apocalypse’.
[photo] The remains of Habyarimana’s plane which crashed into his own compound on its descent into Kigali airport.
Zone 3
3.1 ‘Apocalypse’
Genocide was instant.
Roadblocks sprang up right across the city with militia armed with one intent – to identify and kill Tutsis.
At the same time interahamwe began house-to-house searches. The names on the death lists were the first to be visited and slaughtered in their own homes.
The perpetrators had promised an apocalypse and the operation which emerged was a devastating frenzy of violence, bloodshed and merciless killing.
The murderers used machetes, clubs, guns, and any blunt tool they could find to inflict as much pain on their victims as possible.
It was genocide from the first day.
No Tutsi was exempt.
[inset panel]
Women were beaten, raped, humiliated, abused and ultimately murdered, often in sight of their own families.
Children watched as their parents were tortured, beaten and killed in front of their eyes, before their small bodies were sliced, smashed, abused, pulverised and discarded.
The elderly, the pride of Rwandan society, were despised, and mercilessly murdered in cold blood.
Neighbours turned on neighbours, friends on friends…even family on their own family members.
Rwanda had turned into a nation of brutal, sadistic merciless killers and of innocent victims, overnight.
[photo – Uwiligiyimana] With the death of the president, Prime Minister Agathe Uwiligiyimana was the titular head of the country. However, she and her husband were executed on 7th April, before she was able to address the nation.
[photo – Jean Kambanda] Jean Kambanda was appointed new prime minister of the ‘interim government.’ In his opening address he promised to ‘restore understanding between the people of Rwanda’ and to ‘provide security’.
[photo – Belgian peacekeepers] Early radio announcements blamed the assassination of the president on the Belgians. On 7th April, ten Belgian peacekeepers were murdered. This was calculated to affect a UN withdrawal.
[photos: Roadblocks] Roadblocks were a principal tool of population control. Any Tutsi who tried to pass was humiliated, beaten, mutilated, murdered, raped and dumped by the roadside.
[photo: Killing in Ntarama] Killing in Ntarama. Genocide started in Kigali, but quickly spread. The efficient system of local government, and the chain of command from central government, worked effectively in carrying out instructions.
[photo : Hutu victim] Hutus who did not comply were threatened with death. A number of Hutus who did not subscribe to the genocidal ideology, as well as those who tried to protect Tutsis were persecuted and killed.
3:2 Genocide
In 100 days more than 1,000,000 people were murdered.
But the genocidaires did not kill a million people. They killed one, then another, then another… day after day, hour after hour, minute by minute. Every minute of the day, someone, somewhere was being murdered, screaming for mercy.
Receiving none.
And the killing went on and on and on…
10,000 each day,
400 each hour,
7 each minute,
That’s approximately 100 murders since you started this exhibition…
another 200 murders before you leave the building…
24 hours a day,
non-stop for 100 days.
[audio visual presentation continual loop of genocide images]
[photos images of genocide] (captions should just put the name of the place where the photo was taken)
3.3 Execution of the Genocide
Women and Children
Women and children were a direct target of the genocidaires for murder, rape and mutilation. The killers were determined to ensure that a new generation of Tutsis would never emerge.
Tutsi women were systematically raped and sexually mutilated as a weapon of genocide. This was often by known HIV-infected males. They were then either killed or spared to suffer on another occasion.
Hutu women in mixed marriages were raped as a punishment.
Women and children were not only victims of the genocide, but also perpetrators. Children were frequently forced to participate, often by killing their friends or neighbours.
Victims were sometimes forced to kill their loved ones just before they themselves were killed.
Hutu and Tutsi women were forced to kill their own Tutsi children.
Torture
The genocidaires often mutilated their victims before killing them.
Victims had their tendons cut so they could not run away; they were tied and beaten. They were made to wait helplessly to be clubbed, raped or cut by machete.
Family members were made to watch on as their parents or children were tortured, beaten or raped in front of their eyes.
On occasion, victims were thrown alive down deep latrines and rocks were thrown in one at a time until their screams subsided into silence.
On other occasions, large numbers of victims were thrown down pit latrines. Victims trampled each other to death. The piles were sometimes ten bodies deep.
Death was made a painful, agonising, frightening, humiliating end.
Places Of Worship
People ran to churches for shelter in large numbers.
But churches were not sanctuaries of safety.
The genocidaires moved into the pews and altars and massacred thousands at a time. Believers ended their lives piled in the aisles in pools of blood.
[Photo: Ntarama church] Ntarama, Bugesera: While able-bodied males attempted to stop the genocidaires, women, children and the elderly in Bugesera fled to the church. Hand grenades were thrown into the building. Stunned victims were hacked or shot to death. Thousands were murdered around the church.
[Photo: St Famille] St Famille, Kigali: Fearful people crammed into the large church of St Famille and its precincts. Father Wenceslas was supposed to be a figure of protection, yet is known to have openly collaborated with militia groups. This was in contrast to Father Célestin Hakizimana who made valiant attempts to save as many as he could. Father Hakizimana presided over St Paul’s Pastoral Centre in central Kigali, close to the parish of St Familie, and the centre became a refuge for around 2000 people.
[Photo: Nyange] Nyange: Two thousand congregants were sheltering in the church when Father Seromba gave the order to bulldoze the church building. He murdered his own congregants in his own church.
[Photo: Nyarubuye] Nyarubuye, Kibungo: The church, convent and school at Nyarubuye were turned into a killing centre where around 20,000 people were murdered.
[Photo: Nyamata] Nyamata, Bugesera: At Nyamata, around 10,000 people were murdered in the church and its surroundings. Women were systematically raped and abused in the church during the killing.
3.4 Devastation
The genocide resulted in the deaths of over a million people.
But death was not its only outcome.
Tens of thousands of people had been tortured, mutilated and raped; tens of
thousands more suffered machete cuts, bullet wounds, infection and
starvation.
There was rampant lawlessness, looting and chaos. The infrastructure had
been destroyed, the ability to govern dismantled. Homes had been
demolished, belongings stolen.
There were over 300,000 orphans and over 85,000 children who were heads of
their household, with younger siblings and/or relatives.
There were thousands of widows. Many had been the victims of rape and
sexual abuse or had seen their own children murdered.
Many families had been totally wiped out, with no one to remember or
document their deaths.
The streets were littered with corpses. Dogs were eating the rotting flesh
of their owners.
The country smelt of the stench of death.
The genocidaires had been more successful in their evil aims than anyone
would have dared to believe.
Rwanda was dead.
Resistance to Genocide
Resistance to genocide took various forms. The RPF led the political and armed resistance to genocide. Members of the moderate wings of different political parties made passionate calls for resistance. Some of the victims organized resistance to the killings. A number of Hutus and others hid targeted victims sometime at the risk of their own lives.
4.1 International Response
The genocidaires had control of the country.
As the RPF began to move in on Kigali and engage the Rwandan army in an attempt to gain control and stop the genocide, the crisis was described as ‘civil war’ or ‘ethnic strife’ by commentators.
There was no ethnic war.
There was a civil war.
But the genocide happened and it was something different.
UN commander Lt. Gen. Dallaire estimated that as few as 5,000 troops with
authority to enforce peace could stop the genocide.
Instead, the UN mission was recalled.
Not one additional peacekeeper or armoured personnel carrier arrived in
Rwanda before the RPF victory in July.
The world withdrew…
and watched as a million people were slaughtered.
[photo - Dallaire] General Roméo Dallaire, head of the UN Assistance Mission in Rwanda (UNAMIR). Dallaire cabled New York shortly after the President’s plane crashed and stated, “Give me the means and I can do more.”
Zone 5: Aftermath
5.1 Refugee Crisis
As the genocide neared its end, chaos reigned across the country.
People were fleeing for different reasons.
Perpetrators were on the move to avoid capture by advancing RPF troops.
Victims were on the move towards RPF-liberated zones. Large numbers of Hutus fled across Rwanda’s borders in fear of revenge killings which RTLM had consistently claimed would happen; either that or they were held hostage by the leaders of the genocide.
As the Hutu population fled, returnees from Uganda a generation earlier
were entering RPF zones. Millions were internally displaced due to the
genocide and widespread insecurity.
Refugee camps were set up in Burundi, Tanzania, Uganda and Zaire. The
number of refugees was over 2,000,000.
It was estimated that over two thirds of the population of Rwanda was
displaced, fleeing out of guilt, fear or confusion, or held hostage.
[caption] Refugees organised themselves in the camps along the Rwandan
border according to their previous prefecture, commune and section. This
was the same system which propagated violence during the genocide. MRND
members retained control of the camps.
[caption] Genocidal political parties in the camps used persuasion and
intimidation to prevent refugees from returning to their homes, to recruit
combatants and organise financing for operations against Rwanda.
[caption] Red Cross at Goma, 1994. Many humanitarian aid agencies and
news-gathering organisations mistook the refugee camps as being the only
crisis. Survivors left behind in Rwanda were overlooked.
5.2 Survivors
Searching
A large number of victims had been torn apart from their families and did
not know whether family members were alive or dead. Some were the only
survivors of their immediate family, and did not know if more distant
relatives were still alive.
Children had lost their parents.
Parents separated from their children presumed they were dead, but hoped
otherwise.
Most did not expect to find survivors.
Many did not.
[caption] Family search-boards like this one were erected for survivors and
others to try to locate family and friends after the genocide.
The genocidaires had intended to kill the whole of the Tutsi population.
They failed.
After the genocide, it is estimated that Rwanda had around 100,000 widows
and widowers of the genocide.
Five years after the genocide, over one third of all survivor households in
the country were still headed by a female, with no male adult in it.
Orphans
Many parents had been separated from children. Hundreds of thousands of
children were orphaned.
Orphanages emerged quickly to cope with the huge number of vulnerable
children who had just experienced the worst excesses of human behaviour.
Many survivors offered to take orphans into their homes on the grounds that
they would have wanted someone to do the same if their own children had been
orphaned.
It is not untypical to find homes with large numbers of young people living
with distant relatives or complete strangers.
5.3 Long-term Consequences
AIDS/HIV
Many women were raped brutally and repeatedly, often by men who were known
to be HIV+. This genocidal weapon has had devastating effects for many
women who developed the disease.
There are at least 500,000 women who were victims of rape during the genocide and in the refugee camps, where Rwandans were trained by the genocidaires who had fled.
Female survivors have died from the effects of AIDS or live under its
debilitating influence.
Anti-retroviral medication has not been made available in a timely or sufficient
way to save lives. HIV+ planners of the genocide and perpetrators of rape
have, however, had access to medication in Arusha.
Burying the dead in dignity
[caption pile of bones] Large numbers of corpses were found in shallow
mass graves, latrines and just lying in the open.
[caption] In many cases there were no surviving family members, no means of
identification, and many mass graves remained undiscovered.
[public exhumation] The cost of exhumation, identification and reburial was
also out of the reach of many poor survivors living well below subsistence
levels. A decade after the genocide, mass graves are still being discovered
daily, and public exhumations and burials carried out.
Trauma
[caption] Post-traumatic support has been minimal, considering the vast
numbers of people who witnessed multiple deaths of close family members.
[caption] Sustaining psychological, physical and emotional support for the
victims of trauma has been almost impossible to provide because of the
numbers of survivors and the prioritisation of resources.
[caption pic of young survivors] Many survivors are young and will carry
the trauma of their childhood through the rest of their lives and probably
the lives of their descendants.
5.4 Justice
The International Criminal Tribunal For Rwanda
The International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) was established in
November 1995, based in Arusha,Tanzania. After almost a decade of work, 81
indictments have been issued. Seventeen of the accused have been convicted.
One person has been acquitted.
[caption] Jean Kambanda in the dock. The ICTR is judging the main
architects of the Tutsi genocide.
[caption] Théoneste Bagasora in Arusha. Bagasora was Chief of Cabinet at
the Ministry of Defence at the beginning of genocide. The alleged
mastermind of the genocide, he provided weapons and coordinated the
Interahamwe.
[caption] On 2 September 1998, Jean-Paul Akayesu, former burgomaster of Taba commune, became the first person ever to be convicted by an international tribunal for the crime of genocide, as well as rape as a crime against humanity.
Rwandan Tribunals
The bulk of indictments have been left to Rwanda’s national legal system. In 1996, Rwanda passed a law specifically to punish the crimes of genocide. To do this, it first of all put an end to the reserve on crimes of genocide issued by Rwanda with the signature of the International Convention on Genocide. At the end of 2001, Rwandan courts have tried 7,331 indicted genocidaires, of whom 6,500 were convicted.
Gacaca
Despite the above, it has become evident that the classical justice system
would only be able to handle the number of cases within 100 years.
In order to resolve this impasse, the Government has resorted to the traditional Gacaca system, modernised to incorporate contemporary norms of jurisprudence.
[caption] The local Gacaca courts meaning ‘Justice on the Grass’ combine
traditional local justice with modern jurisprudence.
[caption] Judges at work: Gacaca was originally developed for settling
community disputes and transgressions. Its adaptation to judging
genocidaires makes it a unique experiment in post-genocide justice.
[caption] On its completion it will have been the most thorough process
ever in bringing the rank and file of genocide to justice. Over 100,000
inmates were indicted for crimes of genocide. They are expected to stand
trial at Gacaca.
5.5 Confronting the Past
Memory
Almost every corner of Rwanda was touched by the genocide in some way.
In Kigali alone, there were thousands of mass graves and roadblocks.
Many families have someone who was either a victim, a perpetrator or a
collaborator.
The genocidaires made sure that as many people as possible were implicated.
It is impossible for us to forget the past.
It is also extremely painful to remember.
We remember the victims of the past, because they were our family and
friends,
…they should still be here.
We also remember the events of the past,
…it is a terrible and unavoidable warning for our future if we do not take
active steps to avoid it all over again.
[photo Gisozi] The Kigali Memorial Centre is a cemetery and place of
remembrance of the dead. It is also a research and teaching centre.
[Photo Murambi] At Murambi in Gikongoro, the genocide site where some
50,000 people were murdered also houses a genocide prevention centre, for
training and research.
[Photo Ceremony] Memorial Days have become a part of the national annual
calendar. During this time, there is a period of national mourning and
reflection.
Education
Education has become our way forward.
The main memorial sites all have education programmes to ensure that coming
generations understand the mistakes of their forebears, so that they are
given the chance to think about their own values and actions.
We need to learn about the past…
…we also need to learn from it.
[photo: electoral commission at Murambi] The Electoral Commission conducts
a seminar at Murambi on the importance of democratisation…
[photo : school at Gisozi by graves] (still need to take this…)
[photo:commission électorale à Murambi ] La Commission Electorale dirige un séminaire à Murambi sur l’importance de la démocratisation…
Reconciliation
Rwanda is determined to work toward reconciliation.
First we have to reckon with the past, to make reconciliation a possibility.
Victims need to feel secure.
Perpetrators have to face justice, engaging in open and honest discussion
about the past, agreeing about it, admitting it… These are fundamentals to
achieve a secure enough trust to live together.
It took two generations to destroy trust.
It will take at least the same again to restore it in our society.
Trust will not be rushed.
Foundations are laid now.