| Genocide Awareness Campaign: Rwanda |
 Jeneration, in association with Aegis Students,
will be raising awareness on Facebook about a different genocide each
day from Monday 21st – Friday 25th February, giving suggestions of
specific action points.
EDUCATE – learn more about the issues surrounding genocide Today's focus is on Rwanda.
RWANDA In just one hundred days in 1994, approximately 800,00 people were killed in Rwanda, some 20% of the total population, in the culmination of decades of interethnic tension between the Hutu and Tutsi groups. Conflict between these two groups had already accounted for the deaths of tens of thousands of people in the neighbouring country of Burundi in events later described as genocides by the UN. A civil war had also broken out in 1990 between the two groups, which had lasted a further three years. The international committee did have a peacekeeping force in Rwanda prior to the genocide, as part of peace agreements that ended the 1990-93 Rwandan Civil War. However, this UN force consisted of just 2,500 troops in a country roughly the size of Belgium. These forces were only able to protect limited numbers of civilians, leaving the remainder of Tutsi and moderate Hutus to be killed by both the Rwandan army and irregular paramilitary forces. These killings were barbaric; they often involved massacres at sites where people had gathered seeking safety, in churches, schools and hospitals. Many courageous Hutus sheltered those being targeted, but shockingly, those who carried out the killings often knew their victims; accounts of neighbours attacking their neighbours are well documented. The legacy of the Rwandan genocide continues to be felt to this day. Besides the obvious psychological trauma that those exposed to violence experienced, there are particular problems that women continue to face. As part of the campaign of violence, rape was used as a weapon against Tutsi women; estimates of the total number of women attacked range from 250,000 to 500,000. Many of these women continue to suffer as a result of this; some were infected with HIV, whiles others suffered miscarriages or the consequences of unsafe abortions. Children were also affected; some 400,000 became orphans, of whom 85,000 became the principle breadwinner for their remaining family. This genocide could have been prevented. The few soldiers from the international community present during the genocide were able to save several tens of thousands of civilians. Had the international will to intervene existed, hundreds of thousands could have been saved; in the words of Bill Clinton, the US President during a visit to Rwanda in 1998: “We in the United States and the world community did not do as much as we could have and should have done”. Here is a list of small steps that you can take to become better informed about the causes of genocide, as well as supporting survivors of the Rwandan genocide: ACTION POINTS
There are lots of resources available at the Genocide Archive Rwanda website including interviews with survivors and perpetrators.
PARTICIPATE
Visit Rwanda yourself! Aegis Students run programs that allow you to visit Rwanda and to engage with survivors, providing practical assistance. For more information, email
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Find out more about the Jeneration and Aegis Trust Genocide Awareness Campaign. |
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