The Rwandan Genocide Essay

Genocides happen when ethnic divisions become apparent. Many times, these ethnic divisions were due to colonization from people of different race. These cases are especially true in Africa when Europeans colonized their territory, with clear racial divisions between them (Gavin). These genocides go on because of nations acting on ignorance and refusing to help out the nations in turmoil, allowing the genocides to continue, without wasting their own resources. These nations purposefully ignoring the slaughter of people cause the nations to also be guilty of the genocide underway (“The Heart”). The genocide occurred in Rwanda in Central Africa during 1994. The decades of Tutsi oppression of Hutus and the assassination of President Habyarimana in 1994 led to the genocide in Rwanda.

On April 6, 1994, a plane carrying Habyarimana and Burundi’s president Cyprien Ntaryamira was shot down over Kigali their were no survivors. They did not know who shot the plane down but they are blaming Hutu extremists and the leaders of the RPF. An hour after the plane went down the Rwandan armed forces and the Hutu militia groups had started setting up roadblocks and barricades, and started killing Tutsis and moderate Hutus. the first victims of the genocide were the moderate Hutu Prime Minister Agathe Uwilingiyimana and her 10 Belgian bodyguards, with that happening it started more conflict and interim government of extremist Hutu Power leaders from the military high command had stepped in on april 9. The killing in Rwanda had spreaded to the rest of the country, up to 800,000 or more had been slaughtered within 3 months.

The documentary “Ghost in Rwanda” illustrates the devastation of the 1994 Genocide where approximately eight hundred thousand Rwandans were exterminated by their own government. The genocide was a result of ongoing conflicts between the Hutu, the ethnic majority in Rwanda, and the Tutsi the ethnic minority. The United Nation assisted in the establishment of a peace agreement between the two warring parties and sent General Romeo Dallaire, UN Force Commander, to Rwanda to ensure the terms of the agreement were honored. Dallaire had never seen action and welcomed opportunity to make a difference supporting peace in Africa. The peace mission was especially important to Dalliaire in light of recent U.N. failures to maintain peace in Somalia and Bosnia.

Through the months, April to July in 1994, approximately 800,000 to 1 million Tutsis and some moderate Hutus were massacred in the Rwandan genocide. More than 67% of women, who were raped during the genocide were infected with HIV and AIDS. In many cases, this resulted from a systematic and planned use of rape by HIV+ men as a weapon of genocide. Due to poverty, over half the children who survived stopped their schooling. 40,000 survivors are still without shelter, many whose homes were destroyed in the genocide. In July 1993 General Roméo Dallaire was provided with little information on the background of the conflict in Rwanda. When requested for current intelligence, he was denied and given little access to the information. Romeo went into the mission of Rwanda as what they call “a blind man”. Due to the lack of information Canada was given, the mission was planned poorly as they were provided with inexperienced experts in economic, political and human rights operational

The United Nations failed Rwanda, in a time of need they abandoned the Rwandan people giving them no physical protection. Sadly, things go wrong with the slaughter of almost 800,000 Rwanda people, left defenseless in a country where no one outside cared. U.N. troops were present as only “peace-keepers.” The dispute was between the Hutus and Tutsis people could of been controlled if the U.N. changed their position, but the result could bring more consequences. This conflict between the two social groups in Rwanda,was left to be resolved on its own with many lives lost.

Rwanda is a country located in the middle of the African continent. The two ethnic groups present in the country lived in peace under their monarch until the arrival of Europeans. The Belgians arrival into Rwandan is what split the two ethnic groups of the Tutsi and Hutus, making them identify themselves with ID cards. This caused tension between the two groups as the Belgians favored the ethnic Tutsi, and made them the head of the government. Decade’s later Hutu extremists would take over the government and have revenge on the Tutsi. The new government would send out broadcasts calling on Hutus to kill their friends and neighbors. The Rwandan genocide would become the worst genocide to ever happen in Africa and one of the worst in the world. Today Rwanda’s recovery is surprisingly fast with the help of multiple nations and organizations. Rwanda’s recovery is nothing short of a miracle and is an amazing story of a war between two peoples.

On the day of April 6th 1994, the mass murders sparked a ferocious wave of bloody reprisals as thousands of ethnic Tutsis and moderate Hutus were slaughtered over the next three months, killing almost 10,000 people everyday. Hutu extremists were told to load up on weapons like knives, guns, axes, whatever they could find so they could kill tutsis. They could do whatever they wanted to the Tutsis. The Hutu government said “Spare no one, especially the babies.” The Hutus goal was to kill every Tutsi in Rwanda. As told by Border guards, people have been floating down the river in hundreds everyday for weeks. Many bodies had their hands tied behind their backs. They were either shot, hacked, clubbed, burned, or drowned.

The final reason why the United Nations is to blame for Rwanda’s Genocide is because of the fact that they ignored evidence of planned genocide and abandoned Rwandans in need of protection. The United Nations failed trying. The independent report, commissioned by UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan ( who was in charge at the time of the Rwandan Genocide), says the UN peacekeeping operation in Rwanda was hopeless from the start by an poor consent and destroyed by the Security Council's unwillingness to strengthen it once the slaughters, murders and rape began. UN officials, together with Annan and then-Secretary-General

Peace talks to settle disputes between the Tutsi and the Hutu set up by the US, France, and Organisation of African Unity had tried to establish a peaceful government between the two groups. That went up in flames fast as the President of the Rwanda was killed as his plane was shot down. The next day the genocide began even with UN peacekeepers in the country. I was astonished to see that the UN peacekeepers just left without taking any military action. The UN was founded after the holocaust in Europe, one of the worst events in human history. Still, rather than the UN intervening and preventing another genocide from occurring they simply left. The UN failed to do one of its most important jobs and it was deeply

In October 1993, the United Nations deployed a peacekeeping force, called United Nations Assistance Mission (UNAMIR), to Rwanda for the purpose of monitoring the cease-fire accord between the RFP and the Rwandan government. The UNAMIR consisted of 2,500 soldiers from 23 countries, with Canadian General Romeo Dallaire as the Commanding Officer. In December 1993, Dallaire received a letter from a Hutu informant revealing plans of mass murder of the Tutsis by the Hutus. Dallaire sent a cable to the United Nations warning of a potential genocide risk, however, the cable was disregarded. On April 8th, 1994, two days after the genocide began, Dallaire sent a message to the UN characterizing the killings as mass extermination. Again, his message was disregarded. After the death of 10 Belgium soldiers, 2230 UNAMIR troops were withdrawn, leaving only 270 unarmed troops under the command of Dallaire and hundreds of thousand Tutsis at the mercy of the Interahamwe. Chris McGreal, a senior writer for Guardian US and witness to the genocide, recalls Helena Nwitizina, a Rwandan survivor stating, "We knew the UN was abandoning us. We cried for them not to leave. Some people even begged for the Belgians to kill them because a bullet would be better than a machete" (McGreal 2). The Tutsis knew the UN could help, yet the UN decided to abandon them. Fortunately, with the onset of the genocide, the RPF

On April 6, 1994, Rwanda experienced a period of great turmoil as thousands of people fell victim to the horrors of the Rwandan genocide. The main targets of the genocide were Tutsis and Hutu moderates. Though the main cause of the genocide was a conflict between two ethnicities, the genocide was also fueled by political factors and social conditions. Rwanda is the smallest sub-Saharan country with a population of about 7 million inhabitants. Although the indigenous peoples of Rwanda are the Twa, they are now the minority. 90% of Rwanda's population is comprised of Hutus, and the rest of the population's majority consists of Tutsi people. Hatred between the two ethnic groups had begun in the pre-colonial era, which was long before the 20th

UNAMIR was given a mandate to help guide and overlook the Arusha Accords [what are the arusha accords] which was meant to stop the Rwandan civil war, signed August 4th 1993. The mandate is made very limited by the UN. Before the genocide, early warning by General Dallaire and his plead to expand the mandate went ignored and rejected many times (Caplan, 2004). It is pure ignorance by the UN to reject the call to expand the mandate by General Dallaire. Had the UN took the early warning and pleas to expand the mandate to allow intervention and force, many Rwandans would still be alive today and the situation would have been under control with the perpetrators fearing and backing away from the inhumane plot. The UN Department of Peacekeeping Operations gave UNAMIRauthorization to excel the already narrow mandate, only to help evacuate foreign nationals from the country which turned out to be a major mistake and seemed racist for only saving white lives (Melvern, 2000). The new mandate that is authorized made the situation worse. The Belgian UN troops guarding the Kigali ETO school were told to abandon the school, leaving 2500 Tutsis and Hutu opposition leaders looking for UN protection

The Belgians also decreed that Tutsis should be the only ones in power and thus removed Hutus from positions of power and excluded them from higher education (Arraras). “By assuring the Tutsis’ monopoly of power the Belgians set the stage for future conflict in Rwanda” (Arraras). The Tutsis were enjoying their status as being superior to the Hutus but all that changed in 1959 with the Hutu revolution and so in 1960 and 1961 the Hutus won the elections. Since then, ethnic tensions had always been brewing between the Hutus and the Tutsis. However the tensions escalated when Rwandan President Juvenal Habyarimana, a Hutu, was shot down above Kigali airport on April 6, 1994. I consider this to be a form of political violence because someone or a group that opposed this President which represented only the political interests as well as the viability of the Hutus had to be killed in order for another group possibly the Tutsis to fill the vacuum of power left by the Hutu president. The Hutus blamed the assassination of their president on the Tutsis and in turn sparked an all out massacre waged on to the Tutsi people.

The assassination of Habyarimana in April of 1994 set off even more violence during which Hutu groups conducted mass killings of Tutsis. The genocide was supported and coordinated by the national government as well as local military. Along with the local military, primary responsibility for all of the Tutsi killings lies with two Hutu militias that were organized for this purpose by political parties, the Interahamwe and the Impuzamugambi. Although once the genocide began, a great number of Hutu civilians took parts in the murders as well. There was no peace agreement in place at this point, the Tutsi rebels started their offensive, defeating the army and seizing control of the country.

The Rwandan president, Habyarimana and the president of Burundi, Cyprien Ntaryamira, are killed when the president’s plane is shot down near Kigali Airport, on April 6th, 1994. That night on the 6th of April, 1994, the genocide begins. Hutu people take to the streets with guns and machetes. The Hutus set up roadblocks and stopped anyone that looked Tutsi or suspected of helping Tutsi people to hide. On April 7th, 1994 the Rwandan Armed Forces set up roadblocks and went house to house to kill any Tutsis found. Thousands of people die on the first, while the U.N. just stands by and watches the slaughter go on. On April 8th, 1994 the U.N. cuts its forces from 2,500 to 250 after ten U.N. soldiers were disarmed and tortured and shot or hacked to death by machetes, trying to protect the Prime Minister. As the slaughter continues the U.N. sends 6,800 soldiers to Rwanda to protect the civilians, on May 17th, 1994, they were meant to be the peacekeepers. The slaughter continues until July 15th, 1994, in the 100 days that the genocide lasted 800,000-1,000,000 Tutsis and Hutus