The dictator Kagame at UN

The dictator Kagame at UN
Dictators like Kagame who have changed their national constitutions to remain indefinitely on power should not be involved in UN high level and global activities including chairing UN meetings

Why has the UN ignored its own report about the massacres of Hutu refugees in DRC ?

The UN has ignored its own reports, NGOs and media reports about the massacres of hundreds of thousands of Hutu in DRC Congo (estimated to be more than 400,000) by Kagame when he attacked Hutu refugee camps in Eastern DRC in 1996. This barbaric killings and human rights violations were perpetrated by Kagame’s RPF with the approval of UK and USA and with sympathetic understanding and knowledge of UNHCR and international NGOs which were operating in the refugees camps. According to the UN, NGO and media reports between 1993 and 2003 women and girls were raped. Men slaughtered. Refugees killed with machetes and sticks. The attacks of refugees also prevented humanitarian organisations to help many other refugees and were forced to die from cholera and other diseases. Other refugees who tried to return to Rwanda where killed on their way by RFI and did not reach their homes. No media, no UNHCR, no NGO were there to witness these massacres. When Kagame plans to kill, he makes sure no NGO and no media are prevent. Kagame always kills at night.

7 May 2014

[AfricaWatch] Taking Sides in Rwanda – By Steve Terrill

 


Taking Sides in Rwanda – By Steve Terrill

Posted on  by 

SteveTerrill

We are pretty familiar with Rwanda: It is paradise….or it's a prison. President Paul Kagame is a savior and a visionary…or Kagame is a tyrant and a war criminal. What you hear varies widely depending on whom you ask. Why is the Rwanda conversation so polarized?

As the year of the 20th Anniversary of the Rwanda genocide approached, many journalists and observers–both in and outside Rwanda–remarked that no outlet existed for unbiased news on the country. Last year I tried to create an online newswire for unbiased reporting on post-genocide Rwanda. Though I had been impressed with Rwanda's leadership and have long been considered a pro-government, even pro-Kagame journalist, I was aware that more balance was needed. Growing discontent with the status quo required a space for multiple points of view.

Too Close for Comfort

I've run into plenty of roadblocks while writing about Rwanda. But perhaps because I was viewed as sympathetic to the government, I found officials to be somewhat cooperative. Government communications staffers often contacted me wanting to be sure I had what they saw as the complete picture on big stories. We had a friendly, if sometimes tense, relationship. When I tried to become more nuanced, there was noticeable pushback, but it was not completely rejected. In fact, my contact at the government communications office told me to contact him directly if anyone in Rwanda ever tried to interfere with my work.

As I began aggregating Rwanda news, I noticed some strange online trends. It seemed that anonymous websites and social media accounts were dominating the Rwanda conversation. I kept watching.

After the murder of Rwanda's former spy chief in South Africa in January, I accidentally uncovered a program of online harassment of journalists, human rights workers and diplomats. The program was being run from inside the Office of the President of Rwanda. This was quite a story. I doubted I could report on it without having problems in Rwanda. Instead, I wrote directly to the president's office. I told them what I was seeing and suggested they shut down this program before it became a larger story. They declined that suggestion.

Then in March, one of the harassing accounts tweeted to me directly from the official account of President Paul Kagame. That tweet was quickly deleted, but not before the secret was out and, ironically, many had the misimpression that I was the one who had exposed it. When the Washington Post and BBC picked up the story they contacted me for comments and I obliged. After that, I assumed– even hoped–the story would fade. The 20th Anniversary of the Genocide was approaching. I was to cover the commemorations for multiple outlets (including Al Jazeera Digital Magazine). No story was more deserving of undivided media attention. But that was not to be.

Entry Denied

When I arrived to cover the commemorations, I was blocked from entering Rwanda. Despite a holding a valid passport with a visa waiver, I was told I would have to return to the United States. When I phoned my contact in the Rwanda Government's Communications Office, he hung-up on me. I then tweeted that I was being denied entry to Rwanda and called the US Embassy in Kigali. The American consular asked me to call him back after five minutes. As I waited to make that call from the gate in the Kigali airport, a strange tweet came from the official account of the Rwanda Immigration Service. It said I was being blocked because of a drug arrest two years earlier in the US. The tweet linked to an outdated news report.

I had in fact been arrested two years earlier in the United States on drug charges.  Prosecutors later said they had been mistaken and the original charges were dismissed. However, I did admit to having possessed drugs for personal use at one-point years ago. This was a misdemeanor. Despite misleading news reports, complete details of the case remain sealed. I hope one day soon I have all the facts and will be able to publish them.

Shortly after immigration sent that tweet, I was surrounded by police, handcuffed and placed in a jail cell. My phone was taken. Someone didn't want me tweeting or calling the embassy until I had left Rwanda. When I told the plain clothed officer who stood outside my cell that I was worried it might not be great PR for Rwanda to lock up a visiting journalist, he smirked and replied, "So what."

At no time did the Government of Rwanda ask to see a copy of my official arrest record. Instead, they used Google news search, found an old, inaccurate news article from another country and tweeted a link to it. It was a quick way to justify preventing the entry of a journalist they saw as critical. The incident attracted international attention and became sad distraction from the real story: Rwanda's remarkable renaissance and the complex challenges the country continues to face.

I received hundreds of emails in the hours after I was being blocked from entering Rwanda. Suddenly, opposition people–who had never before trusted me–saw me as their friend, even referring to me as their "ambassador". Meanwhile, pro-government Rwandan friends and colleagues saw me as a pariah (and they told me as much). I had tried to stand in the middle, to be neutral and objective journalist, but I was pushed to one side.

The tweet by immigration was never explained. Despite repeated requests, Rwanda immigration officials have not explained any of the actions around my deportation. Mine is just one of many cases where it is determined that, even a person who admires the Rwandan government, is not quite friendly enough. Rwanda blocks countless journalists, researchers and even officials if they perceive them to be critical. They rarely take issue with anything specific. Instead, propaganda blogswork to cast doubt on people the government views as hostile. The idea is to create an impression of unreliability and control the way journalists are perceived. These attacks are more effective than challenging what is being said. They have a chilling affect on people working in Rwanda. Controlling the perceived character of critics, and of the government itself, requires enormous resources. Impression management is an obsession in Kigali.

Between Two Extremes

Conflicting narratives tower over Rwanda. No middle path exists through the land of a thousand hills. Moderates searching for a center find little room between political extremes. The country appears peaceful and prosperous; no battles rock the hills; there is no blood in the streets. Yet the subject of Rwanda remains a hotbed of controversy. Vitriol comes from all sides.

When journalists write positive articles about President Paul Kagame, small armies of detractors accuse them of being naïve or corrupt. When researchers publish criticism of the current Rwandan Government, they are denounced by legions of pro-government supporters who accuse them of bias, racism and even genocidal tendencies. It is hard to talk honestly about Rwanda without getting kicked out of the discussion.

Foreigners are pushed into these strict pro-government and opposition categories. For many, the Hutu-power movement of the early 90's was so evil, choosing a stance which seems to confront bigotry is an obvious choice. For others, hearing accounts of the brutality of the Tutsi led Rwandan Patriotic Front against unarmed Hutu civilians–before and after the genocide—necessitates opposition to the RPF, regardless of its other accomplishments.

It often comes down to first impressions. If one begins by meeting Tutsi survivors of the genocide in Kigali, they tend to support the RPF. If one starts by meeting survivors of RPF carnage in Eastern Congo, they tend to be more sympathetic to Hutu refugees. But nearly all who look long enough see that every group involved has the blood of countless innocent victims on its hands. Stark first impressions are powerful but for honest observers a more complex reality emerges. Pointing this out means being accused of promoting 'double-genocide' theories, 'negation' or 'false equivalency'. But recognizing one tragedy does not trivialize another. In fact nothing trivializes genocide more than using the memory of victims as a tool to suppress discussion of other atrocities.

The idea that one group is inherently good while the other is inherently evil doesn't hold up either. It holds all the groups back. Loyalty to the first set of victims we meet fades when we are presented with another set.

So why can't we talk about this with the candor it deserves?

Bipolar Disorder

There is no ethical middle ground on the subject of genocide. It is the ultimate crime and can never be justified. But there is a need for open dialogue on questions of development, democracy and how a post-conflict society moves forward. Extremists on all sides of the Rwanda discussion try to force neutral observers into categories. For some, any praise of Paul Kagame is delusional. For others, to accommodate a balanced view is to harbor genocidal ideology. This prevents scholars, journalists and ordinary people from understanding reality. Instead we are locked into repeating habitual, scripted reportage.

We are left with a bipolar conversation. I and other reporters are guilty of perpetuating this. The first thing we do when talking to someone about Rwanda is try to figure out which side they are on. Then we know what we're dealing with. No one is served by this false dichotomy. We need to be allowed to be neutral or we waste our time and the time of our readers. No criticism or praise can be credible without objectivity.

No leader, no matter how competent or benevolent, is worthy of being followed or supported blindly without being held accountable. No institution can succeed in the long-term without the benefit of listening to those who disagree with it. History has shown it never works.

Steve Terrill is an independent journalist and editor of Rwanda Wire. This article is republished from Al Jazeera Digital magazine.

If you enjoyed this post, please consider leaving a comment or subscribing to the RSS feed to have future articles delivered to your feed reader.

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-“The enemies of Freedom do not argue ; they shout and they shoot.”

The principal key root causes that lead to the Rwandan genocide of 1994 that affected all Rwandan ethnic groups were:

1)The majority Hutu community’s fear of the return of the discriminatory monarchy system that was practiced by the minority Tutsi community against the enslaved majority Hutu community for about 500 years

2)The Hutu community’s fear of Kagame’s guerrilla that committed massacres in the North of the country and other parts of the countries including assassinations of Rwandan politicians.

3) The Rwandan people felt abandoned by the international community ( who was believed to support Kagame’s guerrilla) and then decided to defend themselves with whatever means they had against the advance of Kagame’ guerrilla supported by Ugandan, Tanzanian and Ethiopian armies and other Western powers.

-“The enemies of Freedom do not argue ; they shout and they shoot.”

-“The hate of men will pass, and dictators die, and the power they took from the people will return to the people. And so long as men die, liberty will never perish.”

-“The price good men pay for indifference to public affairs is to be ruled by evil men.”

-“I have loved justice and hated iniquity: therefore I die in exile.”

The Rwanda war of 1990-1994 had multiple dimensions.

The Rwanda war of 1990-1994 had multiple dimensions. Among Kagame’s rebels who were fighting against the Rwandan government, there were foreigners, mainly Ugandan fighters who were hired to kill and rape innocent Rwandan people in Rwanda and refugees in DRC.

READ MORE RECENT NEWS AND OPINIONS

SUMMARY : THE TRAGIC CONSEQUENCES OF THE BRITISH BUDGET SUPPORT AND GEO-STRATEGIC AMBITIONS

United Kingdom's Proxy Wars in Africa: The Case of Rwanda and DR Congo:

The Rwandan genocide and 6,000,000 Congolese and Hutu refugees killed are the culminating point of a long UK’s battle to expand their influence to the African Great Lakes Region. UK supported Kagame’s guerrilla war by providing military support and money. The UK refused to intervene in Rwanda during the genocide to allow Kagame to take power by military means that triggered the genocide. Kagame’s fighters and their families were on the Ugandan payroll paid by UK budget support.


· 4 Heads of State assassinated in the francophone African Great Lakes Region.
· 2,000,000 people died in Hutu and Tutsi genocides in Rwanda, Burundi and RD.Congo.
· 600,000 Hutu refugees killed in R.D.Congo, Uganda, Central African Republic and Rep of Congo.
· 6,000,000 Congolese dead.
· 8,000,000 internal displaced people in Rwanda, Burundi and DR. Congo.
· 500,000 permanent Rwandan and Burundian Hutu refugees, and Congolese refugees around the world.
· English language expansion to Rwanda to replace the French language.
· 20,000 Kagame’s fighters paid salaries from the British Budget Support from 1986 to present.
· £500,000 of British taxpayer’s money paid, so far, to Kagame and his cronies through the budget support, SWAPs, Tutsi-dominated parliament, consultancy, British and Tutsi-owned NGOs.
· Kagame has paid back the British aid received to invade Rwanda and to strengthen his political power by joining the East African Community together with Burundi, joining the Commonwealth, imposing the English Language to Rwandans to replace the French language; helping the British to establish businesses and to access to jobs in Rwanda, and to exploit minerals in D.R.Congo.


Thousands of Hutu murdered by Kagame inside Rwanda, e.g. Kibeho massacres

Thousands of Hutu murdered by Kagame inside Rwanda, e.g. Kibeho massacres
Kagame killed 200,000 Hutus from all regions of the country, the elderly and children who were left by their relatives, the disabled were burned alive. Other thousands of people were killed in several camps of displaced persons including Kibeho camp. All these war crimes remain unpunished.The British news reporters were accompanying Kagame’s fighters on day-by-day basis and witnessed these massacres, but they never reported on this.

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25,000 Hutu bodies floated down River Akagera into Lake Victoria in Uganda.

25,000 Hutu bodies floated down River Akagera into Lake Victoria in Uganda.
The British irrational, extremist, partisan,biased, one-sided media and politicians have disregarded Kagame war crimes e.g. the Kibeho camp massacres, massacres of innocents Hutu refugees in DR. Congo. The British media have been supporting Kagame since he invaded Rwanda by organising the propaganda against the French over the Rwandan genocide, suppressing the truth about the genocide and promoting the impunity of Kagame and his cronies in the African Great Lakes Region. For the British, Rwanda does not need democracy, Rwanda is the African Israel; and Kagame and his guerilla fighters are heroes.The extremist British news reporters including Fergal Keane, Chris Simpson, Chris McGreal, Mark Doyle, etc. continue to hate the Hutus communities and to polarise the Rwandan society.

Kagame political ambitions triggered the genocide.

Kagame political ambitions triggered the genocide.
Kagame’s guerrilla war was aimed at accessing to power at any cost. He rejected all attempts and advice that could stop his military adventures including the cease-fire, political negotiations and cohabitation, and UN peacekeeping interventions. He ignored all warnings that could have helped him to manage the war without tragic consequences. Either you supported Kagame’ s wars and you are now his friend, or you were against his wars and you are his enemy. Therefore, Kagame as the Rwandan strong man now, you have to apologise to him for having been against his war and condemned his war crimes, or accept to be labelled as having been involved in the genocide. All key Kagame’s fighters who committed war crimes and crimes against humanity are the ones who hold key positions in Rwandan army and government for the last 15 years. They continue to be supported and advised by the British including Tony Blair, Andrew Mitchell MP, and the British army senior officials.

Aid that kills: The British Budget Support financed Museveni and Kagame’s wars in Rwanda and DRC.

Aid that kills: The British Budget Support financed Museveni and Kagame’s wars in Rwanda and DRC.
Genocide propaganda and fabrications are used by the so-called British scholars, news reporters and investigative journalists to promote their CVs and to get income out of the genocide through the selling of their books, providing testimonies against the French, access to consultancy contracts from the UN and Kagame, and participation in conferences and lectures in Rwanda, UK and internationally about genocide. Genocide propaganda has become a lucrative business for Kagame and the British. Anyone who condemned or did not support Kagame’s war is now in jail in Rwanda under the gacaca courts system suuported by British tax payer's money, or his/she is on arrest warrant if he/she managed to flee the Kagame’s regime. Others have fled the country and are still fleeing now. Many others Rwandans are being persecuted in their own country. Kagame is waiting indefinitely for the apologies from other players who warn him or who wanted to help to ensure that political negotiations take place between Kagame and the former government he was fighting against. Britain continues to supply foreign aid to Kagame and his cronies with media reports highlighting economic successes of Rwanda. Such reports are flawed and are aimed at misleading the British public to justify the use of British taxpayers’ money. Kagame and his cronies continue to milk British taxpayers’ money under the British budget support. This started from 1986 through the British budget support to Uganda until now.

Dictator Kagame: No remorse for his unwise actions and ambitions that led to the Rwandan genocide.

Dictator Kagame: No remorse for his unwise actions and ambitions that led to the Rwandan genocide.
No apologies yet to the Rwandan people. The assassination of President Juvenal Habyarimana by Kagame was the only gateway for Kagame to access power in Rwanda. The British media, politicians, and the so-called British scholars took the role of obstructing the search for the truth and justice; and of denying this assassination on behalf of General Kagame. General Paul Kagame has been obliging the whole world to apologise for his mistakes and war crimes. The UK’s way to apologise has been pumping massive aid into Rwanda's crony government and parliement; and supporting Kagame though media campaigns.

Fanatical, partisan, suspicious, childish and fawning relations between UK and Kagame

Fanatical, partisan, suspicious, childish and fawning relations between UK and Kagame
Kagame receives the British massive aid through the budget support, British excessive consultancy, sector wide programmes, the Tutsi-dominated parliament, British and Tutsi-owned NGOs; for political, economic and English language expansion to Rwanda. The British aid to Rwanda is not for all Rwandans. It is for Kagame himself and his Tutsi cronies.

Paul Kagame' actvities as former rebel

Africa

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UN News Centre - Africa

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The Africa Report - Latest

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IRIN - Great Lakes

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This blog reports the crimes that remain unpunished and the impunity that has generated a continuous cycle of massacres in many parts of Africa. In many cases, the perpetrators of the crimes seem to have acted in the knowledge that they would not be held to account for their actions.

The need to fight this impunity has become even clearer with the massacres and genocide in many parts of Africa and beyond.

The blog also addresses issues such as Rwanda War Crimes, Rwandan Refugee massacres in Dr Congo, genocide, African leaders’ war crimes and crimes against humanity, Africa war criminals, Africa crimes against humanity, Africa Justice.

-The British relentless and long running battle to become the sole player and gain new grounds of influence in the francophone African Great Lakes Region has led to the expulsion of other traditional players from the region, or strained diplomatic relations between the countries of the region and their traditional friends. These new tensions are even encouraged by the British using a variety of political and economic manoeuvres.

-General Kagame has been echoing the British advice that Rwanda does not need any loan or aid from Rwandan traditional development partners, meaning that British aid is enough to solve all Rwandan problems.

-The British obsession for the English Language expansion has become a tyranny that has led to genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity, dictatorial regimes, human rights violations, mass killings, destruction of families, communities and cultures, permanent refugees and displaced persons in the African Great Lakes region.

- Rwanda, a country that is run by a corrupt clique of minority-tutsi is governed with institutional discrmination, human rights violations, dictatorship, authoritarianism and autocracy, as everybody would expect.