By the time of the Genocide against the Tutsi in 1994, media in the West often portrayed Rwanda as consisting of warring tribes. But this was not so. Hutu and Tutsi and the smaller Twa minority have lived in Rwanda for many centuries. Hutu were largely agricultural people, Tutsi were mainly cattle herders and the Twa, hunter-gatherers.
“When they started macheting [the children,] the mothers fell to the ground. The interahamwe started beheading the women…. If they found someone was alive, down came the machete which ended their life. They could not see me…. soaked in blood, they thought I was dead.”
Genocide victims with their hands tied behind their backs on a road out of Kigali on 14 April 1994. While people like this rotted in the sun, Jean Kambanda, the Prime Minister of Rwanda (left), continued to orchestrate this horrific orgy of killing throughout the country.
Images © Bhasker Solanki
President Habyarimana’s plane was shot down on 6 April at 8.30 pm Kigali time. Immediately, Prime Minister Agathe Uwilingiyimana and other moderate ministers were barricaded in their homes. Within an hour of the plane crash, Hutu militia had set up road blocks to stop Tutsi or moderate Hutu escaping. The killing of prominent Tutsi who had been on death lists was carried out immediately by some 1500 elite members of the Rwandan armed forces.
On 7 April, Prime Minister Uwilingiyimana sought protection with the UN. The Prime Minister and her husband were found by the Presidential Guard and both were murdered. The ten Belgian UN peacekeepers protecting her were removed, tortured and shot. Belgium recalled its UN troops.
In parallel with their primary objective, the extermination of all Tutsi, the first wave of killing was instigated to secure the power base of the radical Hutu leaders, who took only several days to make their position safe. Their targets included:
Moderate government members and opposition party leaders.
Moderate Hutus of significance.
Critical voices within Rwandan society including journalists, jurists and human rights activists.
Heavily armed members of the Presidential Guard dismount from a pick-up truck, Gitarama, 13 April 1994. Along with the Interahamwe militia, they played a central role in the implementation of the Genocide, acting with brutality and extreme violence. Image © Bhasker Solanki
Many survivors in Rwanda today bear scars from machete wounds or amputated limbs. Image © Bhasker Solan
The genocide started in Kigali, but quickly spread through the network of Prefects, Burgomasters and local administrators. The efficient system of local government, and the chain of command from central government, worked effectively.
Threats were issued to all non-compliant Hutu, followed by the killing of a number of prefects, burgomasters, priests, nuns, professionals and officials who disobeyed the instructions.
From 12 April the focus of killing was on the Tutsi. Large-scale massacres took place in churches, hospitals, schools and village streets.
Tutsi were made to dig large graves and were buried alive.
Many sought shelter in churches. Grenades were thrown in, and then the killers would walk in and shoot or hack the wounded.
Machetes, clubs with nails, axes, knives, poles, grenades and guns were used.
Achilles tendons were cut to leave victims writhing in agony, awaiting their fate immobilised.
Guns were available, but rarely used as they were considered a painless means of killing.
The genocide was to be complete; no survivors were to remain.
Fields, forests, swamps and hills were all searched for escapees and survivors.
Road block south of Kigali, 14 April 1994. Interahamwe (left) check the identity papers of these civilians fleeing the city. Obscured by oncoming refugees in the foreground, a woman and child have already been taken to the side of the road. Image © Bhasker Solanki
Spring 1994: Rwanda’s rivers were filled with bodies which polluted the lakes of neighbouring countries. More than 40,000 corpses washed up on the Ugandan shore of Lake Victoria, where they were buried. Image © Bhasker Solanki
A last refuge of hope: but even churches were no longer respected as places of prayer and sanctuary. Image © Bhasker Solanki
Most Rwandans were members of the Catholic Church or other Christian denominations. The spiritual and moral leadership of the clergy was important in conditioning the response of Christian people to the incitement to kill.
There were a small number of clergy who carried out heroic acts of goodness. However, the virtual absence of any denunciation from Christian leaders on the whole demonstrated tacit support for the genocide from the Christian Churches. The only religious community that refused to participate was the small Muslim community.
Teachers betrayed their own students and in some cases even murdered them. Doctors often refused to treat wounded Tutsi or dismissed them prematurely. Hospitals were known hunting grounds for the killers, who knew that injured escapees were likely to go there.
“The massacres are systematic in nature. Whole families are exterminated – grandparents, parents and children. No one escapes, not even newborn babies … the victims are pursued to their very last refuge and killed there.
U.N. Special Rapporteur of the Commission on Human Rights, 25 May 1994
The reaction of the international community was typified by its evacuation of foreign nationals at the beginning of the genocide, the evacuation of Belgian UN peacekeepers and the reluctance of national governments and international bodies to commit resources to relieve the suffering of the victims.
General Romeo Dallaire, head of the UN Assistance Mission in Rwanda – UNAMIR – cabled New York shortly after the plane crash and stated, ‘Give me the means and I can do more’.
Dallaire calculated that he needed 5,000 troops to contain the potential violence that could erupt. At that time he had 1,260 troops under his command.
On 12 April the UN Security Council passed a resolution stating that it was appalled at the ensuing large scale of violence in Rwanda, which had resulted in the deaths of thousands of innocent civilians, including women and children. However, the same meeting voted to reduce the UNAMIR force to 270 personnel and to limit its mandate.
Two weeks into the genocide, the Red Cross identified this as a tragedy on a scale rarely witnessed. At this time Rwanda had a seat on the Security Council at the UN, and was even able to vote on issues pertaining to Rwanda, while its own government was carrying out the genocide. Secretary General Boutros-Ghali realised a week after the decision to scale down forces that the focus had to be on stopping massacres, not brokering a ceasefire.
Too late: Not one additional peacekeeper or APC arrived in Rwanda before the victory of the RPF in July ended the genocide. In the meantime, 1,000,000 lives had been lost.
On 17 May, the Security Council agreed to establish UNAMIR II with 5,500 men and the mandate to use all necessary force. It also imposed an arms embargo on Rwanda.
A critical feature of UNAMIR II was the provision by the United States of armoured personnel carriers (APCs). The transfer of the 50 vehicles became bogged down in leasing, shipping, painting and sticker arrangements, to the extent that it took more than one month for them to arrive in Uganda.
Hutu refugees (above) receive medical care in Goma, Zaire. As Hutus crossed the border, thousands of machetes were confiscated from them (see background). Below: Very little aid reached surviving Tutsis in Rwanda’s IDP camps.
Images © Bhasker Solanki
“The people who are guilty are the World Powers… For their self-interest, they had decided at the very outset of the mission that Rwanda was unimportant… there is the Security Council, but my belief is that there is something above all of these… there is a meeting of like-minded powers, who decide before anything gets to the Security Council.”
General Dallaire, speaking to the Panel of the OAU Report, May 2000.
Many analysts, journalists and policy-makers saw the killings as the result of a civil war between the Rwandan Government and the RPF. In reality, when the genocide began on 7 April, there was no war.
The RPF resumed fighting in order to stop the massacres. The move by Hutu leaders to kill 1,000,000 unarmed civilians was a conscious decision distinct from, and preceding, subsequent military engagement. The Organisation for African Unity report on the Rwandan Genocide states of this:
‘Instinctively it was taken for granted that the killings were the by-product of the war. Let a neutral UN help stop the fighting and the massacres of innocents would stop. Those closest to the scene understood and tried to convey a different reality: an outright genocide had been launched that was quite independent of the war.’
The report continues:
‘The automatic reflex was to call for a ceasefire and negotiations…. In reality, anything that slowed the march of the RPF to victory was a gift to Hutu Power…. In the end victory alone ended the genocide…. We count Rwanda fortunate that military truce – the single consistent initiative pursued by the international community – was never reached.’
The Rwandan Patriotic Front advances on government forces during the Genocide. Only their victory put an end to the slaughter.
Images © Bhasker Solanki
The Rwandan Patriotic Front advances on government forces during the Genocide. Only their victory put an end to the slaughter.
Images © Bhasker Solanki
The Rwandan Patriotic Front advances on government forces during the Genocide. Only their victory put an end to the slaughter.
Images © Bhasker Solanki
When they said ‘Never Again’ after the Holocaust, was this just a statement or was it meant for some people and not for others?
Apollon Kabahizi
