What will we do when our turn comes to meet this kind of situation in our own personal life?
Are we willing to be faithful unto death?
"Be thou faithful unto death, and I will give thee a crown of life."
Revalation 2:10
Rwanda's Genocide
In the early 1990’s, one of the most horrible events in the history of the world occurred, the genocide in Rwanda. In that genocide Hutus battling against Tutsis, a million people were killed in less than 9 months. When the genocide began there were 380,000 Adventist in Rwanda, when it ended a hundred thousand were dead. In six months a thousand Adventist were slain not because they were Adventist but because they were a part of that tribe. In recent years I traveled through that part of the country on a number of occasions, speaking widely in stadiums. There are trials going on now trying the killers. As we traveled there I talked to my host... did anyone that you know die in the genocide? He said...I was out preaching the day the radio announcement came and cut down the... and when the radio announcement came and cut down the...tens of thousand of militia came in, largely young people with machetes were entering the streets killing every person they could see. The killing was so great that the bodies were stacked up in the streets and the dogs came and ate them. The killing was so great they threw thousands of bodies into the river. And the river was clogged with bodies. The ...president was out preaching. The militia came into the church and brought out his wife, three children and grand-children and threw them out by the church. I talked to the conference president and asked him if he knew anybody? And he said “yes, my wife and my seven children.” I talked to my driver, “did you lose anybody?” “Yea well, 27 members of my family, I’m the only one that survived. As I talked to them the ... pastor said I want you to meet a woman, and when you meet her, your life will be changed forever. Her name is Adell Sofu. So we went out and got on this truck and went out on this rough road, back country, outside valley of Rwanda. The pastor told me this story as we went; This woman had been with her husband when the killer came and she held his hand as he put a machete to his head and split his head open and they hit him in the neck, and they murdered him. She was there. And the Pastor said I believe she will tell you the story. As I walked into the house, I saw a picture of her Seventh-day Adventist pastor husband, on the wall. And in respect I walked over and simply stood and looked at the picture. And I thought of what it would be like if I was holding my wife’s hand and somebody ran to me with horror and split my head open with a machete. After we sat down... Mrs. Adell Sofu came into the room. And I approached the subject very carefully. I said sister Sofu, I understand you were with your husband when the militia hacked him to death. It may be very difficult to talk about it, but would you like to share it with me? She began to cry and said pastor, I’ll share it with you. She said we got word that the militia was coming closer and closer to our village. We fled with 45 others to a Catholic church in the basement. It was a good place as they went by. As we were in the basement the militia came in with machetes and they began to hack and hack and hack. Actually there were 60 people in the room, 45 were killed immediately. She said I held my husbands hand and somebody came and hit him with a machete and the blood from his head just splat all over me. She said it was horrible pastor, and then the person took the machete, hit her in the head. She pulled back her beautiful black hair. I saw a scar that began here and went down the center of her head. She said, pastor, they then hit me on my wrist and started chopping up my wrist. She held up her wrist, it was just flapping around. She said pastor, they hit me on the shoulder, she pulled down her dress a little on her shoulder and I saw the scar on the shoulder. She said they left me for dead and my body lay among the dead bodies for three days. At the end of three day the militia had moved on, so, she said villagers had come to bury the dead. Somebody before they buried me felt my pulse and I still had pulse and they took me, I was unconscious, they began to nurse me back. Pastor, I was in and out of hospitals for three years. By this time the forces, that were outside Rwanda that were in the Congo fought their way back, liberated the country and they built eighteen prisons for the murderers and put 180 thousand people in prison. Mrs. Sofu took three years to get back to health but by now there was stability in the country. And she said to me Pastor, I had to make up my mind whether I am going to be a bitter old woman or not and she said I made a decision that my husbands death would not be in vain. I had the assurance beating in my heart, that Jesus Christ was coming again and the thing that my husband would want is for me to go to minister to the killers. So pastor there’s a prison not far from this village, and I became the mother of that prison. I would go in and bring blankets to the prison to keep them in the cold nights. I would bring food to the prison. I began studying the Bible with the prisoners. These were killers. One day... I was in the prison and a young man fell at my feet, and he began to kiss my feet. And I looked at his face and he said “Do you remember me?” And she said I wish I could get that face out of my mind, it was a young man in his early twenties that had a machete in his hand that chopped my husband’s head in half. It was the young man, I never knew he was in that prison. I never thought that I would ever see him again. It was the young man that put the machete to my head and put that scar in my head and gave me such pain. And he said, “Would you forgive me.” And she said, I picked him up and hugged him and said, “I will forgive you”.
Pastor, I studied the Bible with him for six months. He stood up before the whole prison and he assembled all the prisoners in the prison yard the day of his baptism and he confessed his sin...He got amnesty after a few years and was let out of the prison. But here’s the problem, his father and mother were killed in the genocide and he had no place to live. Pastor, I adopted him as my son, would you like to meet him? My heart was beating. Beads of perspiration stood on my head and I looked at the picture of the pastor, whom this man had killed. I thought a killer was going to walk through the door and Louis walked through the door, a gentle smile on his face and a sparkle in his eyes and Mrs. Sofu walked over and put her arms around him and said let me introduce you to my adopted son. One day when Jesus comes. One day when Jesus comes all the suffering will be worth it all. One day when Jesus come all the heart-ach will be worth it all. One day when Jesus comes all the burdens will be worth it all. One day when Jesus comes the past will be gone. What inspires me is the forward look, Jesus is coming again.
M. F.
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Dallaire blames France at genocide trial
Published: Thursday, October 04, 2007
MONTREAL -- Retired Canadian general Romeo Dallaire slammed France Wednesday during testimony at a landmark war crimes trial, saying the country helped those responsible for Rwanda's genocide escape to freedom.
Dallaire, who was commander of the ill-fated United Nation's peacekeeping force in the Central African country in 1994, said he vehemently opposed France's offer to bring a humanitarian force separate from the UN.
Now a senator, Dallaire argued that it would have been more helpful if the French reinforced the under-equipped troops already on the ground, but he was overruled by the UN headquarters in New York.
Testifiying at the trial of Desire Munyaneza, a failed refugee claimant on trial for participating in the genocide, Dallaire said the French "push-back" force ended up helping the killers escape into neighbouring Congo.
An estimated 800,000 Tutsis and moderate Hutus were slaughtered in 100 days by extremist members of the majority Hutu ethnic group.
Montreal Gazette
CANADA'S FIRST WAR-CRIMES TRIAL
Rwandan rivers choked with bodies, Dallaire says
'Saw them. Touched them. Smelled them. Moved them. Of all ages,' retired general tells a Montreal courtroom
TU THANH HA
October 3, 2007
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“The Rwandan Genocide was a genocidal mass slaughter of the Tutsis by the Hutus that took place in 1994 in the East African state of Rwanda. Over the course of approximately 100 days (from the assassination of Juvénal Habyarimana and Cyprien Ntaryamira on April 6 through mid-July) over 500,000 people were killed, according to a Human Rights Watch estimate. Estimates of the death toll have ranged from 500,000–1,000,000, or as much as 20% of the country's total population. It was the culmination of longstanding ethnic competition and tensions between the minority Tutsi, who had controlled power for centuries, and the majority Hutu peoples, who had come to power in the rebellion of 1959–62.
In 1990, the Rwandan Patriotic Front, a rebel group composed mostly of Tutsi refugees, invaded northern Rwanda from Uganda in an attempt to defeat the Hutu-led government. They began the Rwandan Civil War, fought between the Hutu regime, with support from Francophone Africa and France, and the RPF, with support from Uganda. This exacerbated ethnic tensions in the country. In response, many Hutu gravitated toward the Hutu Power ideology, with the prompting of state-controlled and independent Rwandan media.
As an ideology, Hutu Power asserted that the Tutsi intended to enslave the Hutu and must be resisted at all costs. Continuing ethnic strife resulted in the rebels' displacing large numbers of Hutu in the north, plus periodic localized Hutu killings of Tutsi in the south. International pressure on the Hutu-led government of Juvénal Habyarimana resulted in a cease-fire in 1993. He planned to implement the Arusha Accords.
The assassination of Habyarimana in April 1994 set off a violent reaction, during which Hutu groups conducted mass killings of Tutsis (and also pro-peace Hutus, who were portrayed as "traitors" and "collaborators"). This genocide had been planned by members of the Hutu power group known as the Akazu, many of whom occupied positions at top levels of the national government; the genocide was supported and coordinated by the national government as well as by local military and civil officials and mass media. Alongside the military, primary responsibility for the killings themselves rests with two Hutu militias that had been organized for this purpose by political parties: the Interahamwe and Impuzamugambi, although once the genocide was underway a great number of Hutu civilians took part in the murders. It was the end of the peace agreement. The Tutsi RPF restarted their offensive, defeating the army and seizing control of the country.
Rwanda today has two public holidays commemorating the incident, with Genocide Memorial Day on April 7 marking the start, and Liberation Day on July 4 marking the end. The week following April 7 is designated an official week of mourning.
One global impact of the Rwandan Genocide is that it served as impetus to the creation of the International Criminal Court, so that ad hoc tribunals would not need to be created for future incidents of genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes. The Rome Statute is the treaty that established the ICC, and was adopted at a diplomatic conference in Rome on 17 July 1998.
For over 20 years prior to German and then Belgian colonization, a Tutsi monarchy had controlled most of Rwanda. This monarchy continued under colonial rule. Past practices remained part of the culture of Rwanda: e.g., King Rwabugiri (1853–95) instituted the hated corvée labor, which targeted mainly the majority Hutu. In addition, he elevated the use of violence as standard practice against domestic and external foes.
During the 1950s, the Hutu majority became more restive. In 1957, the Hutu Emancipation Movement (Parmehutu) published the "Hutu Manifesto" (sometimes called "Bahutu Manifesto"). It alleged that the Tutsi minority held a monopoly of power in Rwanda. By 1962, the Hutu overthrew the monarchy and established a republic headed by president Grégoire Kayibanda. His regime persecuted the Tutsi, especially those previously in power, and many of the most educated fled the country for refuge in Uganda and other countries. Hutu general Juvénal Habyarimana seized power in a coup in 1973, killing Kayibanda and promising progress.
Belgian colonialism played a role in maintaining the divide between the Tutsi and Hutu peoples. While both the Hutu and Tutsi ethnic groups existed before colonialism, Belgian rule recognized and affirmed this preexisting distinction.[10] The word Tutsi means those "rich in cattle" and the word Hutu means "servant" or "subject". The Belgians introduced separate ID cards for the two tribes. When Belgian rule ended, most of the land and power were in the hands of Tutsi while the Hutu were relegated to positions of forced laborers, or Akazi. The presence of the colonialists emboldened the ruling Tutsi against the Hutus, who then proceeded to independently embark on a genocidal massacre against their fellow countrymen.
In neighboring Burundi, two episodes of mass violence had taken place since the country's independence in 1962: the army's mass killings of Hutu in 1972, which was considered a Tutsi-initiated genocide because the ethnic group had controlled the government army. In 1994, the Hutu population arose and killed many Tutsi in Burundi.
At 408 inhabitants per square kilometre (1,060 /sq mi), Rwanda's population density is amongst the highest in Africa. Rwanda's population had increased from 1.6 million people in 1934 to 7.1 million in 1989, leading to competition for land. Historians such as Gérard Prunier believe that the 1994 genocide can be partly attributed to the population density.
The Rwandan military (known as the Rwandan Defence Forces (RDF)), Hutu rebel groups such as the Army for the Liberation of Rwanda, and Hutu militia groups, notably the Interahamwe, systematically set out to murder all the Tutsis they could reach, regardless of age or sex, as well as the political moderates among the Hutu. They incited Hutu civilians to participate in the killings or be shot in turn, using radio broadcasts to tell them to kill their Tutsi neighbors. Most nations evacuated their nationals from Kigali and abandoned their embassies in the initial stages of the violence.
As the situation worsened, the national radio advised people to stay in their homes. The Hutu Power station RTLM broadcast violent propaganda against the Tutsi and Hutu moderates. The militia put up hundreds of roadblocks around the country, using them to block off areas and attack the citizens. Lieutenant-General Dallaire and UNAMIR were in Kigali escorting Tutsis and were unable to stop the Hutus from escalating their attacks elsewhere.
Through the RTLM, the Hutu also attacked Lieutenant-General Dallaire and UNAMIR personnel. On April 8, Dallaire sent a cable to New York City indicating ethnicity was the driving force of killings. The cable detailed the killings of politicians and peacekeepers (Chairman of Liberal party, Minister of Labor, Minister of Agriculture, and dozens more). Dallaire informed the UN that the campaign of violence was well-organized and deliberately conducted, primarily by the Presidential Guard.
On April 9, UN observers witnessed the massacre of children at a Polish church in Gikondo. The same day, 1,000 heavily armed and trained European troops arrived to escort European civilian personnel out of the country. The troops did not stay to assist UNAMIR. Media coverage picked up on the 9th, as the Washington Post reported the execution of Rwandan employees of relief agencies in front of their expatriate colleagues. On April 9–10, US Ambassador Rawson and 250 Americans were evacuated.
Killings quickly took place throughout most of the country. The mayor (burgomaster) of the northwestern town of Gisenyi was the first local official to organize killings on a genocidal scale: on April 6, he called a meeting to distribute arms and sent militias to kill Tutsis. Gisenyi was a center of anti-Tutsi sentiment. It was the homeland of the minority Akazu and a refuge for thousands of people displaced by the rebel RPF occupation of large areas in the south. While killing occurred in other towns immediately after Habyarimana's assassination, it took several days for officials to organize them on the scale of the murders in Gisenyi.
Butare Province was an exception to the local violence. Jean-Baptiste Habyarimana was the only Tutsi prefect, and the province was the only one dominated by an opposition party.Opposing the genocide, Habyarimana was able to keep relative calm in the province, until he was deposed by the extremist Sylvain Ndikumana. Finding the population of Butare resistant to murdering their fellow citizens, the government flew in militia from Kigali by helicopter, and they readily killed the Tutsi.
Murambi Technical School, where many victims were killed, is now a genocide museum.
Most of the victims were killed in their own villages or in towns, often by their neighbors and fellow villagers. The militia typically murdered victims by machetes, although some army units used rifles. The Hutu gangs searched out victims hiding in churches and school buildings, and massacred them. Local officials and government-sponsored radio incited ordinary citizens to kill their neighbors, and those who refused to kill were often murdered on the spot. "Either you took part in the massacres or you were massacred yourself."
One such massacre occurred at Nyarubuye. On April 12, more than 1,500 Tutsis sought refuge in a Catholic church in Nyange, then in Kivumu commune. Local Interahamwe, acting in concert with the authorities, used bulldozers to knock down the church building.[53] The militia used machetes and rifles to kill every person who tried to escape. Local priest Athanase Seromba was later found guilty and sentenced to life in prison by the ICTR for his role in the demolition of his church; he was convicted of the crime of genocide and crimes against humanity. In another case, thousands sought refuge in the École Technique Officielle (Technical School) in Kigali where Belgian UNAMIR soldiers were stationed. On April 11, the Belgian soldiers withdrew, and Rwandan armed forces and militia killed all the Tutsi.
5,000 people seeking refuge in this church were killed by grenade, machete, rifle, or burnt alive
Because of the chaotic situation, there is no consensus on the number of people killed between April 6 and mid-July. Unlike the genocides carried out by Nazi Germany and the Khmer Rouge in Cambodia, authorities made no attempts to record deaths. The succeeding RPF government has stated that 1,071,000 were killed, 10% of whom were Hutu. The journalist Philip Gourevitch agrees with an estimate of one million, while the UN estimates the toll as 800,000. Alex de Waal and Rakiya Omar of African Rights estimate the number as "around 750,000," while Alison Des Forges of Human Rights Watch states that it was "at least 500,000." James Smith of Aegis Trust notes, "What's important to remember is that there was a genocide. There was an attempt to eliminate Tutsis – men, women, and children – and to erase any memory of their existence."
Out of a population of 7.3 million people–84% of whom were Hutu, 15% Tutsi and 1% Twa–the official figures published by the Rwandan government estimated the number of victims of the genocide to be 1,174,000 in 100 days (10,000 murdered every day, 400 every hour, 7 every minute). It is estimated that about 300,000 Tutsi survived the genocide. Thousands of widows, many of whom were subjected to rape, are now HIV-positive. There were about 400,000 orphans and nearly 85,000 of them were forced to become heads of families.
Several individuals were active in attempting to halt the Rwandan genocide, or to shelter vulnerable Tutsi, as it was taking place. Among them there are Romeo Dallaire (Lieutenant-General of UNAMIR), Pierantonio Costa (Italian diplomat who rescued many lives), Antonia Locatelli (Italian volunteer who tried to save 300 or 400 Tutsis by calling officials in the international community and was later murdered by the Interahamwe), Jacqueline Mukansonera (Hutu woman who saved a Tutsi during the genocide), Paul Rusesabagina (Academy Award nominated film Hotel Rwanda is based on his story), Carl Wilkens (only American who chose to remain in Rwanda during the genocide), André Sibomana (Hutu priest and journalist who saved many lives) and Captain Mbaye Diagne (Senegalese army officer of UNAMIR who saved many lives before he was killed).
Aftermath
An anticipation of a Tutsi retaliation, approximately 2 million Hutus, participants in the genocide, and the bystanders, fled from Rwanda to Zaire (now called Congo), Burundi, Tanzania and Uganda. Thousands of them died in disease epidemics common to the squalor of refugee camps, such as cholera and dysentery. The United States staged the Operation Support Hope airlift from July to September 1994 to stabilize the situation in the camps.
After the victory of the RPF, the size of UNAMIR (henceforth called UNAMIR 2) was increased to its full strength, remaining in Rwanda until March 8, 1996.
The presence of 2 million refugees in eastern Zaire helped destabilize the already weak country, whose corrupt president, Mobutu Sese Seko, allowed Hutu extremists among the refugee population to operate with impunity. In October 1996, Mobutu's continued support of the Hutu militants led to an uprising by the ethnic Tutsi Banyamulenge people in eastern Zaire (supported politically and militarily by Rwanda), which marked the beginning of the First Congo War, and led to a return of more than 600,000 Hutu refugees to Rwanda during the last two weeks of November. This massive repatriation was followed at the end of December by the return of 500,000 more from Tanzania after they were ejected by the Tanzanian government. Various successor organizations to the Hutu militants operated in eastern DR Congo until May 22, 2009.
Mobutu was overthrown in May 1997, and Zaire's new leader, Laurent Kabila, renamed the country the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Kabila's relationship with his Rwandan allies quickly turned sour, and in August 1998 Tutsi rebel forces, supported by Rwanda and Uganda, launched another rebellion. This led to the Second Congo War, killing 5 million people from 1998 to 2004.
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