The Worst 100 Days in Rwandan History
By: Chelsea Jenkins
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| Site where Rwandan Genocide Victims were laid to rest Photo Cred: Google |
For 100 days in 1994, the United
States received daily intelligence that people were being slaughtered by the
hundreds of thousands; that the river was turning pink because blood was seeping
through the ground from the systematic round up and slaughter of people in the
soccer stadium. Back then; the
United States did nothing because we could not yet define
"genocide".
“Twenty years ago, Rwanda had no
future, only a past,” said President Kagame at the 20th
Commemoration of Genocide Against the Tutsi. “And if the genocide reveals humanity’s shocking capacity
for cruelty, Rwanda’s choices show its capacity for renewal.”
April 9, 2014 marked the 20th Anniversary of the Rwanda Genocide; a reminder of human cruelty by mass murder and by failure to act. In 1994, Hutu extremists in Rwanda targeted Tutsis and moderate Hutus in a three-month killing spree.
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| Young boy walking through the gravesides Photo Cred: Google |
It all started with the death of
President Juvenal Habyarimana, an ethnic Hutu, who died in a plane crash April
6, 1994. The following day,
soldiers, police and militia quickly and violently murdered key Tutsi and moderate
Hutu leaders. They then placed
checkpoints and barricades using Rwandans’ national identity cards to
systematically kill Tutsi.
The Hutu attackers burned down
churches with hundreds of thousands of Tutsis inside. In some cases, they entered homes and slaughtered men, women and children.
Hutu civilians were pressured by these forces to arm themselves with machetes, clubs, blunt objects
and other weapons to rape, maim and kill their Tutsi neighbors. Neighbors that those people might
have been close to before it all started.
Finally, 100 days later, the armed forces of Kagame’s
Rwandan Patriotic Front eventually defeated the troops, stopping the wave of
genocide.
During these events and in their
aftermath, the United Nations and western countries including the United States
were heavily criticized for their inaction.
“I’m almost glad that I was born
at the beginning of this genocide and can barely remember it,” said Joseph DelGuercio. “I can only imagine how much more
disappointed with my own country I would be for how little they helped.”
Supposedly, The United States
among others knew Rwanda was being overcome by genocide but buried the
information to justify its inaction.
It was known that senior officials used the word genocide shortly after
the start of the killings, but only behind closed doors.
It wasn’t until May 25th
that the administration publicly used the word genocide and even then, they
diluted its impact by saying “acts of genocide”.
Alison des Forges, a Human Rights
Watch researcher and authority on genocide said: “They feared this word would
generate public opinion which would demand some sort of action and they didn’t
want to act. It was a very pragmatic
determination.”
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| A young survivor of the Genocide in Rwanda Photo Cred: Google |
Rightfully so, many people blame Washington and other
western countries not just for failing to support the overwhelmed UN
peacekeepers but also for failing to speak out more forcefully during the
slaughter.
“In their greatest hour of need, the world failed the people
of Rwanda.” Said Secretary-General Kofi Annan.
Now, on the 20th anniversary of the genocide in
Rwanda, survivors are overcome with emotion as they continue to relive these
horrific events every day.
Mourning began three months ago with a flame of remembrance
making its way through the streets and towns across this small African nation,
where it finally arrived and was placed to burn at the national genocide
memorial for 100 days.
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