Part 1 of 2 - Understanding the Rwanda Genocide of 1994.

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In 1994, in the East African country of Rwanda, approximately 800,000 people lost their lives within 100 days.

Kofi Annan, former Secretary General of the United Nations, said on the tenth anniversary of the genocide in 2004 - "The international community failed Rwanda and that must leave us always with a sense of bitter regret."

What happened in Rwanda in 1994? This article will firstly cover the backdrop to the genocide in Rwanda in 1994, followed by a discussion of the genocide itself. Part 2 will discuss the international response to the genocide, and why it is widely held to be a 'failure'.

Backdrop
In the 1800's, before the arrival of the colonial era, Rwanda lived in relative peace. The two largest clans identified themselves as the Hutus and the Tutsis. The Hutus made up a majority of the population (around 80%) while the Tutsis were a minority. The division of Hutus and Tutsis back then was only based on socio-economic status, if anything. The Tutsis held power over Rwanda in a monarchy, but this did not exclude Hutus from having positions of power as well. Hutus and Tutsis often married one another, and it was certainly possible for one to switch from Hutu to Tutsi and vice versa, depending on status and relations. All-in-all, apart from the normal political tensions that any state would have, the Hutu-Tutsi divide never meant anything close to what it would mean in coming years.

Germany took control of Rwanda in the late 1800s as part of its colonial conquest. For reasons still in dispute, German colonialists segregated Hutus and Tutsis according to different factors. The colonizers had an outwards preference towards Tutsis due to their apparent lighter skin, taller body structures and finer facial features compared to Hutus. They also found the Tutsis to be more inclined to convert to Roman Catholicism, and were impressed by their apparently "honorable and eloquent personalities". Tutsis were appointed to positions of power, while Hutus were fixed as a lower class.

Germany was driven out of Rwanda during the first World War, and authority of the country was handed to Belgium. Belgian colonialists maintained Tutsi power in the country but sought to make the racial division between Hutus and Tutsis more distinct than ever. Like their German predecessors, Belgian colonizers believed that Tutsis, by their appearance, were the 'superior' race and claimed they held Caucasian ancestry. The colonialists used questionable techniques such as having scientists measure the size of people's skulls to determine the size of their brains, concluding that Tutsis had larger brains and were therefore more intelligent. The Belgians also introduced identity cards which would indicate the name of an individual, his/her profession, his/her spouse, the names of his/her children and, most notably, whether he/she was a Hutu or a Tutsi according to the Belgians' criteria.

A Tutsi Identity Card | Credit: United States Holocaust Memorial Museum

From the time the Belgians arrived in 1916, Tutsis were given preferential treatment in all realms, from jobs to educational opportunities to positions of authority. Over the next few decades, Hutus built great resentment towards Tutsis and sought to take control of the country by the middle of the century. In 1959, a frustrated Hutu population rebelled against its Tutsi superiors killing approximately 20,000 of them and forcing 100,000 more into neighboring countries. Before leaving the country to its independence, the Belgians held a vote and the Tutsi monarchy was abolished - It was 1962, and Rwanda was under Hutu control.

It was Gregoire Kayibanda, a Hutu, who led the Rwandan struggle for independence from Belgium and replaced the former Tutsi monarchy with a Hutu-majority government. However, another Hutu by the name of Juvenal Habyarimana claimed that Kayibanda was favoring southern Hutus over northerners which led to corruption, amidst other claims of ineffectiveness and government-sponsored violence. Kabiyanda's reign lasted just over a decade until 1973 when Habyarimana seized power of the government in a military coup. Compared to Kabiyanda's, Habyarimana's regime saw far less Hutu-Tutsi violence but tension between the two still remained high.

Meanwhile, Tutsi refugees in Uganda (which borders Rwanda to the north-west) banded together to form the Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF) in 1987, founded and led by Paul Kagame and Fred Rwigema, committed to overthrowing the Hutu government and reclaiming their right to live in Rwanda. The RPF invaded Rwanda in 1990 which marked the beginning of the Rwandan Civil War, a three-year long affair that paved way to the horrific events of 1994. Habyarimana's army initially drove the RPF out, having them outnumbered and outpowered, but the RPF regrouped and engaged the Rwandan army to a point where neither side could achieve a clear victory.

The stalemate between the two sides finally led to a cease-fire, which ultimately turned into a peace agreement called the Arusha Accords (signed in Arusha, Tanzania), organized by the governments of the United States and France as well as the Organization of African Unity (OAU). The Accords set out a power-sharing agreement between the RPF and the government of Rwanda, including
* an integrated army (one that would include soldiers from both sides),
* the repatriation (that is, the return to one's country of origin) of Tutsi refugees, and
* provisions for the RPF and Tutsi representation in government which stemmed the absolute power of Habyarimana.

Genocide
Although the civil war ended with the Arusha Accords, Hutu-Tutsi tension remained incredibly high. To make matters worse, Hutus were plunged into internal disagreement amongst themselves, as moderates preferred to power-share with Tutsis via the peace agreements while extremists were furious that Habyarimana would agree to yield power to the Hutus' sworn enemies. Realizing these problems, the United Nations provided assistance to guide the peace process and ensure that both sides met their obligations under the Arusha Accords. UNAMIR, the United Nations Assistance Mission for Rwanda, was dispatched in 1993 and was comprised of 2,500 personnel at its peak, borrowed from different countries.

The Arusha Accords met a fatal end in April 1994, when Habyarimana's airplane was struck by a missile from source unknown. Accusations were tossed in every direction, but Hutu extremists seized the opportunity to pin the President's murder (along with the murder of several Rwandan politicians and the President of Rwanda's neighbor Burundi who were all on board) on the Tutsis. The genocide was directed by a Hutu extremist group called the Akazu.

Hutu extremists seized the government and turned Rwanda into a slaughterhouse for 100 days. The most notable Hutu extremist group was called the Interahamwe and is estimated to have been 30,000 strong. Using the identity cards (explained above), Tutsis were filtered out from the Hutu population and murdered by the hundreds and thousands. Mass murdering began with bullets and grenades but were substituted with clubs and machetes. Men, women and children were murdered indiscriminately, their bodies tossed onto roadsides and into ditches. Victims were often tortured sexually or otherwise, having limbs cut off and genitalia mutilated, before being killed. In some situations, victims were given the option of paying the murderer for their death by bullet, to make it faster and less painful. In one episode of the genocide now referred to as the Nyarubuye Massacre, 20,000 Tutsis and moderate Hutus seeking refuge inside a church in Rwanda's capital, Kigali, were murdered over the course of two days by Hutu extremists. The few that survived only did so by faking their death under the blood and bodies of those around them.

BBC - In Pictures: Remembering The Genocide

The genocide was assisted by a Rwandan radio station called RTLM - Radio Television Libre de Mille Collines. It began as a music station playing contemporary music, but quickly turned into a means for Hutu extremists to voice hate speech against Tutsis, constantly referring to them as "cockroaches". It called on Hutus to exterminate Tutsis and would name locations where it heard Tutsis and moderate Hutus were hiding.

Continue to 'Part 2 of 2 - Did the world fail Rwanda?'

Ponder:
* What do you think was the motive of the colonial powers in separating the two clans the way they did?
* How should the innocent population of a country react when it is being attacked by government forces?
* What do you think a country without properly established law is like to live in?

Works used for this article, and further information:
[Harvard Law Black Students Association Africa Summit; Rwanda Guide]
[Dr. Orville Jenkins - 'Tutsi, Hutu and German']
[British Broadcasting Corporation - Rwanda; How the Genocide Happened]
[About.com - The Rwandan Genocide] 
[About.com - Rwandan Genocide History]
[Britannica.com - Juvenal Habyarimana]
[U.S. Dept. of State - Files on Arusha Accords]
[United Nations - Rwanda, UNAMIR Mandate]
[Transcript - 'Ghosts of Rwanda']