Rwanda Genocide: 20 years on

waltky · Jun 7, 2014

20 years after the Rwandan genocide...

Rwanda 20 years on: the tragic testimony of the children of rape
7 Jun 2014: Two decades after the 1994 genocide, a television journalist returns to hear the extraordinary testimony of women who were raped during the violence and of the children born as a result

When Josiane Nizomfura was 12, she wanted to get a glimpse of her father, so she sneaked out of school and went to the public trial where her mother was testifying against him for rape. Levine Mukasakufu had never told Josiane the circumstances of her birth. "I couldn't face it, so she found out from the neighbours," she said. Levine a tiny, delicate woman like a brightly coloured bird in her traditional wrap skirt is one of the half a million women raped during Rwanda's 1994 genocide, when the country's ethnic Hutus, under orders from their leaders, tried to wipe out the minority Tutsis.

A Hutu Interahamwe militiaman in central Rwanda in June 1994

Then aged 21, Levine and other young women in Kibilizi, 80 miles south of the capital, Kigali, were forced to assemble on the village playing field. The Interahamwe, the Hutu militia that spearheaded the massacres of Tutsis, picked those they wanted, forcing them into the surrounding banana and millet patches to be gang-raped. "Rape was a reward the leaders gave those who killed," said Levine. "This is why I didn't love my daughter her father was the one who killed my family. I wanted to kill her, too." When Levine discovered that her daughter had watched her testify, she beat her all night long. It was one of many assaults. After failing to abort the baby, she frequently lashed out at Josiane when she was a child. "If she misbehaved at all I would say, 'she's like her father, she's an Interahamwe'. I would chase her away saying, 'this is a Tutsi house, and you don't belong here'," she said.

Olivier Utabazi, 19, and his mother, Epiphane Mukamakombe, 44, outside their home in Kibilizi. The son of rape, he is her only close surviving relative, after her family were killed in the genocide.

This week's Global Summit to End Sexual Violence in Conflict, hosted by the British foreign secretary, William Hague, and actress Angelina Jolie, aims to put victims such as Levine and Josiane at the centre of war crimes investigations. Governments are expected to sign a new protocol for documenting wartime sexual assaults and adopt programmes to educate their soldiers that rape is a war crime rather than an inevitable consequence of conflict. Although rape occurs in all wars, it was especially widespread in Rwanda, and the consequences are felt to this day. The International Criminal Tribunal on Rwanda concluded that rape was an integral part of genocide. "Sexual violence was a step in the process of destruction of the Tutsi group destruction of the spirit, of the will to live, and of life itself," said the verdict on the Hutu leaders who organised the genocide in the Butare region, which includes Kibilizi.

Adeline Uwasi was born after her mother was repeatedly raped. Withdrawn and nervous, she is now her mothers sole carer.

The UN initially estimated that 5,000 children were born of rape in the 1994 genocide, but the Survivors' Fund a British charity working in Rwanda believes the number might be nearer 20,000. Unlike genocide orphans, children of rape do not qualify for government assistance and many live in poverty. Aid programmes have tended to concentrate on the plight of the raped women, paying little attention to the children, who have grown up feeling rejected by their mothers and stigmatised by the wider community. In Rwanda, ethnicity comes through the father's line, so Tutsi survivors call the children Interahamwe and "son of a snake", while the relatives of the Hutu rapists often tell the children that their mothers are wicked for testifying against their fathers and putting them in jail.

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waltky · Dec 12, 2015

Ladislas Ntaganzwa, long sought suspect of Rwandan genocide killings, arrested...

Rwandan genocide suspect accused of thousands of deaths arrested
Dec. 11, 2015 -- A prime suspect in the Rwandan genocide of the 1990s, who is accused of organizing the massacre of more than 20,000 people, was arrested this week, the United Nations announced.

Ladislas Ntaganzwa, 53, was one of nine suspects still at large and sought by the U.N. Mechanism for International Criminal Tribunals for Rwanda, based in The Hague, Netherlands, until his arrest in the Democratic Republic of Congo.

As mayor of the Nyakizu Commune in 1994 and a leader in the Hutu ethnic group, he allegedly oversaw the murder of thousands of the Tutsi population in his jurisdiction, a UN statement said. He also is accused of numerous incidents of rape and sexual violence against women.

Ladislas Ntaganzwa, left, accused of Rwandan genocide in 1994, was arrested in the Democratic Republic of Congo. Photo courtesy the United Nations Mechanism for International Criminal Tribunals

Ntaganzwa was first indicted in 1996 for crimes against humanity. The indictment mentions incidents in which he distributed weapons to civilians who shot into crowds of Tutsis at his direction. "He personally participated in these crimes," the indictment says.

Rwanda has requested Ntaganzwa be extradited to stand trial. More than 1 million people were killed in the Rwanda genocide, and the United States offered up to $5 million for information leading to the arrest of any of the nine suspects, including Ntaganzwa.

http://www.upi.com/Top_News/World-N...-deaths-arrested/5501449834016/?spt=sec&or=tn
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FromTurkey · Dec 27, 2015

i'm sadness. rest in peace.

waltky · Jan 4, 2016

Kagame plans to run for a third term...

Rwandan president to seek third term
Jan. 1, 2016 -- Rwandan president Paul Kagame announced in a televised New Years address that he plans to run for a third term.

"You requested me to lead the country again after 2017. Given the importance and consideration you attach to this, I can only accept," he told the nation in his address. "But I don't think that what we need is an eternal leader." Thanks to a referendum last month on changes to Rwanda's constitution, Kagame is able to run for one more seven-year term, and then two more five-year terms, meaning he could stay in power until 2034.

Rwandan President Paul Kagame has announced his plans to run for a third term in 2017.

Although Kagame became acting president in 2000, he has effectively been in power since 1994 when his rebel army took the capital city of Kigali in 1994, ending the Rwandan Genocide. Kagame was then elected in 2003 after Rwanda's new constitution was adopted, and was re-elected in 2003 and 2010. The referendum last month was denounced by the United States and the European Union as too speedy for voters to have made informed decisions on constitutional changes. The United States and the EU have also called for Kagame to step down in 2017 to allow for new leadership.

Although Kagame has been praised for sparking economic development in Rwanda, the BBC reported many accuse him of being a heavy-handed ruler, stifling opposition as well as the media. Two other presidents in the region are seeking third terms. President Pierre Nkurunziza of Burundi won a third term in July, sparking widespread violence throughout the country. Kkurunziza survived an attempted coup in May. The BBC reported President Joseph Kabila of the Democratic Republic of Congo is widely believed to attempt a third term, despite a constitutional requirement that he must step down at the end of 2016.

http://www.upi.com/Top_News/World-N...-seek-third-term/8961451682441/?spt=sec&or=tn
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waltky · Apr 16, 2016

Instigator of Rwanda genocide jailed for life...

Rwandan jailed for life for inciting genocide
Saturday 16th April, 2016 - A Rwandan court on Friday sentenced former politician Leon Mugesera to life in prison for inciting the 1994 genocide.

Judge Antoine Muhima said Mugesera had taken part in "public incitement to commit genocide" as well as inciting torture and ethnic hatred, though he was found not guilty of planning and conspiracy to commit genocide.

Mugesera, 63, the former head of the party of assassinated President Juvenal Habyarimana, denied all charges and appealed the verdict. He said he was in Canada when the killings began in Rwanda in 1994.

The prosecution said that Mugesera, a linguist, called Tutsis "cockroaches" and "scum", and encouraged his fellow Hutus to kill them in a 1992 speech. Lawyers argued the speech helped trigger the Rwandan genocide two years later in which an estimated 800 000 people, mainly Tutsis, died.

Mugesera, however, challenged the authenticity of the recording of the speech. Canada deported him in January 2012 after 15 years of court battles. His trial opened in Kigali in January 2013.

http://www.bignewsnetwork.com/news/243231523/rwandan-jailed-for-life-for-inciting-genocide
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scarlet witch · Apr 22, 2016

This is why I didn't love my daughter her father was the one who killed my family. I wanted to kill her, too." When Levine discovered that her daughter had watched her testify, she beat her all night long. It was one of many assaults. After failing to abort the baby, she frequently lashed out at Josiane when she was a child. "If she misbehaved at all I would say, 'she's like her father, she's an Interahamwe'. I would chase her away saying, 'this is a Tutsi house, and you don't belong here'," she said.
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Suppose this is why they allow rape victims abortion... not for the mother's sake but the childs... heartbreaking to punish an innocent child for the crimes of the father

JoakimFlorence · Apr 22, 2016

You can bet if Rwanda had an oil industry that was being threatened, the U.S. would have occupied the country.

waltky · May 11, 2016

Mayors on trial for their role in genocide...

Rwanda mayors on trial in France over 1994 genocide
Wed, May 11, 2016 - TRANSITIONAL JUSTICE:Octavien Ngenzi and Tito Barahira are on trial for allegedly playing a direct role in the massacre of hundreds of Tutsi refugees in a church

Two former Rwandan mayors went on trial in France yesterday facing charges of crimes against humanity and genocide over the 1994 massacres in the central African country. The second trial in Paris by a special court created to go after suspected Rwandan killers who fled to France is expected to lay bare the strained relations between the two countries. Two decades on, Rwanda accuses France of complicity in the genocide in which at least 800,000 people died in an 100-day slaughter because of its unwavering support for the Hutu nationalist government at the time. On the 20th anniversary of the mass killings two years ago, Rwandan President Paul Kagame, a Tutsi, openly accused French soldiers of not only complicity in the genocide, but of actually taking part in it.

Yesterday, Octavien Ngenzi, 58, and Tito Barahira, 64, went on trial for allegedly playing a direct role in the massacre of hundreds of Tutsi refugees in a church in the eastern town of Kabarondo on April 13, 1994. The pair were sentenced in absentia to life imprisonment by Rwandan peoples courts, known as gacaca, in 2009. They were both mayors of Kabarondo, Ngenzi having succeeded Barahira in 1986. They deny accusations of carrying out massive and systematic summary executions and implementing a concerted plan aimed at the annihilation of the Tutsi minority. The killings in Kabarondo, a town near the border with Tanzania, took place with great speed.

The bloodshed was over by the end of April 1994, when Tutsi rebels in the armed wing of what is now the ruling Rwandan Patriotic Front (FPR) took control of the area. Elsewhere in the former Belgian colony, the slaughter would continue until the FPR fighters finally prevailed in July. The mayors trial, which is set to last eight weeks, comes two years after that of Pascal Simbikangwa, a former Rwandan army captain who was jailed for 25 years for his role in the genocide. The defense has denounced that verdict as political and is appealing it.

Witnesses have said that on the morning of April 13, they saw Barahira, wielding a spear, at a rally at the soccer field where he called for work code for killing Tutsis. Soon afterward, hundreds of refugees who had arrived in recent days were hacked or beaten to death or blown up with hand grenades within the space of a few hours, according to survivors. Kigali broke off ties with Paris in 2006 after a French judge issued arrest warrants against nine Rwandan officials over the assassination of then-Rwandan president Juvenal Habyarimana, a Hutu. The shooting down of the presidential plane on April 6, 1994, was blamed on the Tutsis and is considered to be the event that sparked the genocide. The diplomatic freeze lasted for three years.

http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/world/archives/2016/05/11/2003646021
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waltky · Jul 9, 2016

Two former Rwandan mayors sentenced to life in prison for 1994 genocide...

French court sentences Rwandan mayors to life in prison for 1994 genocide
July 7, 2016 -- Two former Rwandan mayors received life imprisonment sentences Thursday for their roles in a 1994 genocide in which they were found to be responsible for the deaths of 2,000 people.

Tito Barahira, 65, and Octavien Ngenzi, 58, each a former mayor of Kabarondo, Rwanda, heard their sentences announced in Paris' Cour D'Assises. The ruling followed an eight-week trial on charges of genocide and crimes against humanity. Each denied the charges. The men were accused of organizing a massacre, by Hutu tribe extremists, of members of the Tutsi tribe, who sought refuge in a Kabarondo church. Survivors of the assault testified at the trial, with stories of killings by machetes and guns. More than 800,000 people died in Rwanda during the genocide.

The French activist group Collectif des Parties Civiles, a non-governmental organization also identified as CPCR, pushed for the trial. Johnston Busingye, Rwandan Justice Minister, praised the decision but told the Rwandan newspaper New Times, "The context makes us choose a cautious welcome. "It's 22 years after the genocide, 39 indictments seated in France, 15 extradition applications systematically denied on a strange brand of legal reasoning, 28 cases are pending before French courts, all initiated by the CPCR, not French prosecution. The rate of three trials in 22 years seems to be a French-specific phenomenon. France shelters probably the highest concentration, per capita, of genocidaires than any other country in Europe and the French state is itself yet to come to terms with the sad reality of its role in the genocide."

France supported Rwanda's Hutu-led government against the primarily Tutsi Rwandan Patriotic Front during insurrections beginning in 1990. After the fighting, French troops were deployed to establish a buffer zone, which allowed many Hutus who participated in the 100-day genocide to escape to Zaire; some eventually settled in France.

http://www.upi.com/Top_News/World-N...or-1994-genocide/6691467903564/?spt=sec&or=tn
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waltky · Oct 12, 2016

Probe into assassination that triggered Rwandan genocide...

Probe revisits mystery of assassination that triggered Rwandan genocide
Wednesday 12th October, 2016 - A confidential 12-page statement by a former close aide of Rwandan President Paul Kagame has sparked the reopening of a formal investigation into one of the greatest mysteries of the 20th century: the assassination that triggered the Rwandan genocide.

The document, obtained by The Globe and Mail, accuses Mr. Kagame of direct involvement in the 1994 missile attack that killed former president Juvénal Habyarimana, leading to the genocide in which an estimated 800,000 people died. The sworn statement has been submitted to French investigating magistrates, who have decided to reopen their probe. The decision has provoked fury from Mr. Kagame, who told military and judicial officials on Monday that he is ready for a showdown with France, including a freeze in diplomatic relations, if the investigation continues.

More than two decades after the assassination, nobody has settled the question of who fired two surface-to-air missiles into the Dassault Falcon 50 private jet that carried Mr. Habyarimana and Burundi president Cyprien Ntaryamira, along with seven other officials and a three-man French crew, as their jet approached Kigalis airport on the night of April 6, 1994, after peace negotiations in Tanzania.

Rwanda's former army chief Faustin Kayumba Nyamwasa walking into the court.

Immediately after the assassination, Hutu extremists began slaughtering Hutu moderates and Tutsis in the violence that became known as the Rwandan genocide. Various inquiries have reached different conclusions on whether the assassination was carried out by Hutu extremists or the Tutsi rebel army, led by Mr. Kagame.

Canadian general Romeo Dallaire was the commander of a small United Nations peacekeeping force in Rwanda at the time of the genocide. The United Nations force, which also included about a dozen Canadian troops, was credited with saving thousands of lives during the genocide by securing a few places of shelter. Gen. Dallaire asked the UN to send reinforcements after the mass killings began, but his request was turned down, and the peacekeepers were unable to prevent the genocide.

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