Rwanda Events

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French soldiers with Hutu militias, June 27, 1994

Pascal Guyot / AFP / Scanpix / LETA

A special commission of French scholars and historians concluded that France bears “heavy responsibility” for the events that led to the 1994 genocide of the Tutsi people by the Rwandan authorities. At the same time, as emphasized in the report of the commission, France cannot be called an accomplice of the genocide.

France has actively intervened in what is happening in Rwanda since the late 1980s as part of a policy aimed at increasing its influence in Africa. In 1990, when civil war broke out in Rwanda between the current government and the rebels from the Rwandan Patriotic Front, Paris sided with the government.

During the civil war, France sent weapons, equipment and financial aid to the government; French specialists trained the Rwandan military; several hundred troops were also deployed to the country. All this was done despite the fact that even then the Rwandan government was accused of ethnic cleansing of the Tutsi people.

In 1993, with the mediation of France, the government and the rebels negotiated a truce to create a coalition government of Tutsi and Hutu, but many radical Hutu were unhappy with this. In April 1994, after the assassination of President Juvenal Habyarimana, the military from his entourage seized power, after which they announced the need to exterminate all Tutsis, as well as moderate Hutus. The genocide lasted more than three months (until the rebels, who launched an offensive in response to the policy of mass murder, overthrew the government), its victims were, according to various estimates, from 200 thousand to a million people.

At the same time, France practically did not interfere in what was happening. In the first few days, expats were evacuated from the country (while the French refused at the same time to take Tutsis out of Rwanda - even those who worked for French companies), after which Paris did not take any active action for two months. Only in mid-June, France, having received a UN mandate, introduced a military contingent and created a humanitarian zone in the south-west of the country, where refugees could take refuge.

The construction of this humanitarian zone was later rep Rwanda Events eatedly criticized. First, it was created too late (the bulk of the killings occurred in the first two months of the genocide); secondly, there were no humanitarian corridors that would allow the Tutsis to reach her safely - because of this, many were killed at checkpoints on the way to her. Finally, many Hutus, directly involved in organizing the genocide, left through the French humanitarian zone under the guise of refugees from Rwanda.

The commission to investigate the role of France has been working for almost two years - it was created in May 2019 on behalf of President Emmanuel Macron. It included 15 historians under the leadership of Vincent Ducler - among them were specialists in the Holocaust, as well as the Armenian genocide in the Ottoman Empire. However, none of the commissioners specialized in Rwanda to ensure the impartiality of the investigation.

The commission concluded that France in the early 1990s supported a “racist, corrupt and brutal regime” and, despite numerous facts indicating that its most radical elements were preparing for a policy of mass murder, Paris “remained blind” to what was happening. This, among other things, paved the way for genocide. In addition, the commission's report emphasizes that the deployment of the peacekeeping contingent in Rwanda was belated.

“The French authorities pursued a policy that was completely divorced from reality, a policy that retained traces of the colonial approach. France was associated with the regime of President Habyarimana, which encouraged racist reprisals, did not see how the trouble was approaching, and thus contributed to the aggravation of the crisis, ”commented Vincent Dyukler on the report.

At the same time, the report emphasizes that it is impossible to talk about the direct involvement of France in the genocide - otherwise, the same responsibility can be assigned to the entire world community. In addition, the commission found no evidence that the French supplied arms to Rwanda after the start of the genocide, and denied accusations that t

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