genocide in rwanda

"The meaning of today will not be clear until tomorrow." Mason Cooley

Before the colonial era, Rwanda’s population comprised three ethnic groups: Twa, Hutu and Tutsi. The Twa, a pygmy people who numbered less than 1% percent of Rwandans, lived as hunters and gatherers in Rwanda’s forests. Hutu clans—about 85% of the population—predominantly practiced small-scale agriculture, while the minority Tutsi lived as cattle herders. Common use of lands, shared regional customs and intermarriage rendered ethnic identity fluid; but through ownership of agricultural resources there emerged an economically and socially privileged elite. Governmental structure eventually coalesced around a Tutsi king, or mwami, whose power was enforced at the local level. With all land considered the property of the mwami, farmers lived by a sharecropping system, renting land and cattle from the regional elite.

1884	German explorer Carl Peters enters the Rwandan kingdom and obtains treaty rights over portions of the territory.
			Germany declares a protectorate over present-day Rwanda, Burundi and Tanzania under the administration of the German East Africa Company.	1885
1890	Rwanda accepts German colonial rule without resistance. The Germans subsequently exercise little direct influence in the country—a German territorial administrator is not appointed until 1907—and launch no economic development initiatives.
			WWI Belgian Allied forces capture German East Africa.	1916
1924	A League of Nations mandate divides former German colonial holdings. Great Britain assumes control over Tanzania, while Belgium is granted trusteeship over Rwanda and Burundi.
			Raphael Lemkin, advisor to the US War Department and attache to the US Chief of Counsel for Prosecution of Criminality at Nuremberg, coins the term "genocide".	1945
1946	Julius Streicher, Nazi publisher of two virulently anti-Semitic newspapers and self-appointed "Jew-Baiter Number One", is sentenced to death at the Nuremberg tribunal. Despite direct participation in the administration of the Holocaust, it is the propaganda through which he incited others to violence that secured his conviction for "crimes against humanity". Read more about Julius Streicher?
			The UN General Assembly ratifies the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide. In signing, the contracting nations "undertake to prevent and to punish" genocidal campaigns at a supranational level, subjecting to prosecution not only acts of violence but also conspiracy in and incitement to commit genocide. Read more about the Genocide Convention?	1948
1952	The Belgian administration implements a Ten-Year Development Plan to achieve social stability through native participation in government. Under Belgian rule, the class distinctions in Rwandan society have been conflated with the ethnic division, granting the Tutsi minority privileged political, economic and social status. The mechanics of the new plan codify ethnic profiling into a system of identity cards. The Kinyarwanda language has no word for "ethnicity"; ubwoko, or "clan", is used instead.
			Rwandan Hutus issue a manifesto demanding government representation commensurate with their demographic majority, and form ethnically based political parties.	1957
1959	Mwami Mutara III dies; Kigeri V assumes power. Hutus, contending impropriety in the succession process, instigate warfare against the Tutsis. After a Hutu victory some 100,000 Tutsis, including Kigeri V, seek refuge in neighboring countries. Belgian administrators declare a state of emergency and summon troops from the Congo to restore order.
			Local elections are staged in hopes of equalizing political representation. Hutu parties claim power, declaring Ruanda-Urundi an independent republic under Grégoire Kayibanda as prime minister. Belgian authorities, though granting diplomatic recognition to avoid further unrest, are still accountable under their Trusteeship for actively ensuring a stable transition into autonomy.	1960
1962	When Ruanda-Urundi declares continued unity impossible, the UN terminates the Belgian Trusteeship agreement, granting independence on July 1. Rwanda is proclaimed a republic under Hutu leadership; Burundi retains a mwami as titular head of its Tutsi leadership.
			Tutsi refugees attempt to return to Rwanda; as they are forced back, Rwandan Hutus slaughter over 12,000 Tutsis, while thousands more flee the country.	1963
1973	Violence between Hutu and Tutsi groups resumes; hundreds flee to Uganda as Tutsis are purged from universities and restricted from civil service jobs. On July 5, a non-violent military coup ousts Kayibanda and installs Major General Juvénal Habyarimana, Hutu commander of the National Guard, as prime minister.
			Habyarimana is elected president. He abolishes all other political parties and surrounds himself with an extended family network of Hutu supremacists. Policies of repression against Tutsis grow increasingly extreme as Habyarimana wins reelection in single-party contests in 1983 and 1988.	1978
1987	The newspaper Kanguka (Wake Up) begins publishing under a Tutsi owner and a Hutu editor. Its insistence on economic rather than racial analysis of Rwanda’s troubles brings popularity with readers, but also inspires harassment, intimidation and confiscation by cronies of Habyarimana.
			First Lady Agathe Habyarimana, center of influential Hutu extremist clique the Akazu, launches Kangura (Wake Them Up). Publishing anti-Tutsi propaganda with a similar name and identical format to that of Kanguka creates confusion and mistrust among readers of the popular anti-establishment paper. Read more about Kangura?	1990
october 1990	The Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF), a militia of Rwandan Tutsi exiles and Hutu dissidents based in Uganda, invades Rwanda. Thousands of Rwandan Tutsis are arrested as ‘accomplices’.
			RPF military victories pressure President Habyarimana into drafting a new multiparty constitution.	1991
1992	UN-led peace talks between the RPF, the Rwandan government and 12 opposition parties strive to define a power-sharing arrangement. A cease-fire is called for July 31, while partial agreements and protocols continue to evolve.
			Leon Mugesera, professor of political science and vice-president of the ruling MRNDD party in the northern province of Gisenyi, delivers a virulently anti-Tutsi speech at a party rally. "The fatal mistake we made in 1959 was to let them escape...they are foreigners from Ethiopia so we will send them home by the shortest route: throwing them into the Nyabarongo River. We must act. Wipe them all out." Waves of anti-Tutsi violence follow his call to arms, with Interahamwe death squads chanting phrases from his speech as they set to work.	november 1992
1992	Following the removal of Somalia’s dictator, the US deploys 25,000 troops charged with containing factional warfare to enable distribution of UN food supplies. Despite outgoing president Bush’s promise of a limited, two-month engagement, the US military remains in a leadership role under Clinton as humanitarian efforts devolve into guerilla warfare against tribal leaders. Violence escalates until October 1993, when a 90-minute mission becomes a bloody 2-day battle in Mogadishu leaving 18 Americans dead and 84 wounded before rescue vehicles can secure their retreat—a public relations crisis prompting final withdrawal of troops. The perception of tragic miscalculation and failure will shape a Clinton administration policy of extreme reluctance toward humanitarian missions, especially within Africa. Read more about ‘the Mogadishu effect’?
			The delegations to the UN summit agree on terms for peace, known as the Arusha Accords, to be enforced by a UN peacekeeping mission. In protest, militant Hutu factions instigate acts of violence in Kigali which, together with a resulting RPF counter-offensive, result in hundreds of deaths. Attacks on Tutsis continue, sporadically, throughout the country.	august 1993
1993	CDR, a Hutu Power party not participating in provisional multiparty government, establishes Radio/Television Libre des Mille Collines (RTLM) to circumvent the Arusha agreements’ explicit prohibition on government-sponsored hate speech. RTLM’s vicious anti-Tutsi messages broadcast from the same facilities and at the same frequency as the official state channel, Radio Rwanda, during the hours when official programming is off the air. Read more about RTLM?
			The United Nations Assistance Mission for Rwanda (UNAMIR) begins with the deployment of 21 troops under the command of Brigadier-General Romeo A. Dallaire of Canada. Additional troops continue to arrive until February 1994, when the mission is fully staffed with 2,5000 personnel. Many of the soldiers arrive without weapons, food or water; vehicles and radios are sent secondhand from other missions and rarely in working condition. Dallaire is forced to borrow petty cash from other agencies to obtain batteries, fuel, ammunition and other supplies.	october 1993
november 1993	Faustin Rucogoza, politically moderate Hutu Minister of Information, meets with RTLM officials to express concern over broadcasts inciting violence against Tutsis. When the climate of violence erupts into open butchery five months later, Rucogoza and his family will be among the first to die.
			Brigadier-General Dallaire transmits a fax to the UN summarizing the disclosures of a government informant. Among these revelations: administrators have compiled a registry of every Tutsi in Kigali; officers are stockpiling weapons and training civilian militias; the current level of preparedness would enable the murder of 1000 Tutsis every 20 minutes; a preparatory step in the extermination will be the murder of Belgian UN troops, thus guaranteeing the withdrawal of the most experienced and best-armed contingent of the UNAMIR force. Dallaire informs the UN of his intention to raid the secret arms caches, which are in clear violation of the peace agreement. A deputy to the Secretary-General explicitly forbids the seizure and instead requires Dallaire to report discovery of the government’s illicit acts to Habyarimana himself. UN contacts discount Dallaire as naïve and excitable; according to Shaharyar M. Khan, former Special Representative of the UN Secretary General to Rwanda, his concerns "were regarded as huge exaggerations. Human beings cannot behave in this manner... It so happens, wrongly, it was not an exaggeration." Read the fax?	january 11 1994
spring 1994	The climate of fear and anti-Tutsi hatred intensifies. Aid workers in Rwanda begin stockpiling emergency supplies and planning the logistics of supplying medical care in the event of mass casualties, while the Habyarimana regime is openly stockpiling weapons and distributing them to civilians. Radio and print sources feature threats that soon there will be no Tutsis left in Rwanda, and predictions of ‘something big’ in the near future.
			President Habyarimana and Cyprien Ntayamira, president of Burundi, are killed when their plane is shot down over the Kigali airport. That night a massive program of violence erupts. The army, coordinating efforts of militia groups throughout Rwanda, orchestrates nationwide slaughter of Tutsis and moderate Hutus opposed to their plan of extermination. House-to-house search parties murder entire Tutsi families in their homes or in public spaces where they congregate for safety; militia members establish roadblocks to kill those who flee.	april 6 1994
april 7 1994	10 Belgian soldiers are abducted, tortured and murdered. As predicted in the Dallaire fax, Belgium withdraws its remaining personnel from the mission.
			The Belgian delegation, together with the United States (which has zero troops in the UN force), persuades the UN Security Council to slash its forces in Rwanda from 2,500 to 270. The Rwandan representative of the genocidal regime remains on the council.	april 21 1994
may 1994	The RPF continues fighting, gaining territory and establishing "safe zones" behind its front lines where Tutsis seek refuge. RTLM broadcasts incite terror by claiming that the RPF is taking revenge through massacres of its own. This carefully orchestrated campaign of terror drives millions of Hutu into refugee camps, first in Tanzania and later in Zaire.
			The UN Security Council approves France’s proposal to establish a 'safe zone' in the southwest, enforced by 2,500 French troops.	june 1994
july 4 1994	Capturing Kigali, the RPF attains control of the entire country outside of the French 'safe zone', where killings of Tutsis continue.
			Pasteur Bizimungu, a Hutu RPF leader, is declared President of Rwanda. The following day the RPF announces that the war is over. Though the ousted regime continues to claim legitimacy and vows to keep fighting, other nations grant recognition to the Bizimungu administration. An estimated 800,000 civilians have been beaten, clubbed and hacked to death by their neighbors since the president’s death on April 6.	july 17 1994
july 1994	Millions of Hutu and displaced Tutsi crowd refugee camps beyond the Rwandan borders. Western reports of genocide in Rwanda are conflated in the public imagination with images of refugees suffering from cholera and from famine. As humanitarian aid pours in, many former leaders are able to recreate entire communal structures within the camps, preserving the organization of the genocidal regime to continue the killings.
			A UN-appointed tribunal, based in Tanzania, begins indicting leaders of the genocide for crimes against humanity under the Geneva Convention. Many of the most powerful figures have found sanctuary abroad and cannot be located for extradition.	1995
march 25 1998	In Kigali, President Clinton delivers a speech of apology to the victims of the genocide. "The international community," he conceded, "must bear its share of responsibility for this tragedy. We did not act quickly enough after the killing began. We did not immediately call these crimes by their rightful name: genocide."