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As Rwanda prepares to commemorate the Kwibuka20 by taking around the country a flame of hope, the UN Security Council has officially confirmed it as the “1994 Genocide against the Tutsis
The UN Security Council on Thursday adopted a new global reference to the 1994 mass slaughter in Rwanda as “genocide against the Tutsi”, after years of confrontational campaigning by the Rwanda government and survivors’ groups, say diplomats.
The Council has been in long negotiations for the past weeks as the mandate for the sanctions regime on the Democratic Republic of Congo ended.
To renew the regime and since the text makes reference to Rwanda and the genocide, disagreements arose among diplomats at the Security Council over the exact wording for the 1994 Genocide.
DRC interference
During the debate on January 28th, the representative of the DRC raised the issue about Rwanda and the M23 rebels.
In response, Rwanda’s Deputy Permanent Representative Olivier Nduhungirehe replied with a series of questions whether it was Rwanda who killed Lumumba or responsible for Mobutu who hosted and failed to separate the genocidaires from Rwanda in 1994.
In the course of adopting a resolution on the sanctions against Democratic Republic of the Congo the Un Sec
urity Council instead shifted its focus on how to refer to the 1994 genocide in Rwanda, having earlier been put ‘in blue’ in final form, during the Security Council’s debate on January 28.
Rwanda’s Deputy Permanent Representative to UN posted on his Twitter account earlier before the resolution was adopted that: “It’s worth noting that this Resolution is the very first since 1994 to recognize “genocide against the Tutsi”, away from the “Rwandan genocide.”
“We fought hard for the last days but I am proud tonight. You may be surprised but our strongest ally in this fight was…”
As the Security Council debate ended yesterday, a compromise was reached, in PP 13: a reference to the 1994 genocide against the Tutsi in Rwanda, during which Hutu and others were killed.
A Rwandan diplomat told Inner City Press that during the Genocide, Hutus killed were not because of their ethnicity but because they opposed the genocide against the Tutsi, adding: “This is a precedent,”
Ibuka issues a statement
Meanwhile, Ibuka, an umbrella association of Genocide survivors issued a statement on Thursday, calling on the World to revise what they called “A growing conspiracy by some in the international community’ to turn the Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda (FDRL), perpetrators of the Genocide against Tutsi, into a powerful political and military force.
“IBUKA is speaking out today to awaken the world community to a growing conspiracy by some in the international community to turn the Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda (FDLR), perpetrators of genocide against the Tutsi, into a powerful political and military force.
The FDLR, the vast majority of whom killed our families during the Genocide against Tutsi in 1994, have operated for years in the East of the Democratic Republic of the Congo.
Since they fled to Zaire (DRC today) they have remained the same people, retained the same ideology of Genocide and are more armed than ever before,” the communiqué reads in part.
President Kikwete implicated in sympathizing FDRL and Twagiramungu
FDLR have now been joined by Faustin Twagiramungu, president of RDI- Rwanda Nziza. He declared on 12th January 2014, that he had joined FDLR, a known terrorist organization.
His recent visit to the United Republic of Tanzania at the invitation of President Jakaya Kikwete raises serious concerns. It shows that President Kikwete who made a choice to be a voice of FDLR according to his statement on 26th May 2013 is now fully supportive of the organization.
He is using tax payers’ money to support a terrorist organisation and facilitate their plan to come back to Rwanda and finish their job.
We are not ready to be victims twice.
In the communiqué, Ibuka reminded that: “The United Nations turned its back on Rwanda and a million Tutsi were killed before their eyes. The International community claimed to not be fully aware that Genocide was happening.
The same international community has decided not to appreciate FDLR as a terrorist group. Consequently, there is no clear plan to neutralise these terrorists.
Survivors are better positioned to predict clearly the danger of giving a platform to the terrorist group such as FDLR and the impact of political conspiracy by international community to support their plans.
The world has not learned from the past. We want to remind the citizens of the world that in 1959, when 30,000 Tutsi were killed and more than 80,000 forced into exile, evidence shows that those events were fueled by foreign political interests. This was done in the name of so-called democracy “1959 Hutu revolution”. It gave power and legitimacy to the former president Habyarimana and Mobutu to slaughter innocent Tutsi in 1994.”
“The same pretext of democracy and freedom of speech is being used by President Kikwete and President Kabila to support and give political cover to a known terrorist group (FDLR).
We shall never wait again to be brutally slaughtered. We have to speak out now.
Survivors of the Tutsi Genocide have been part of the long journey of reconciliation and rebuilding the social fabric that genocidaires destroyed in 1994.
But it is as if our willingness to accept and live with those who killed us have been exploited particulary by those who created, supported and supervised the implementation of Genocide against Tusti. The fact is that we shall never allow to die again.
We will remain grateful to the former Rwanda Patriotic Army for their heroic courage we owe our current survival.
We want also to take this opportunity to dismiss the idea by some people who wrongly made some people, such as Paul Rusesabagina, our saviour and heroes. Survivors know better than anybody else who saved their lives.
These are self seekers who sold chicken, food and hotel rooms and those who had no means were killed by genocidaires at Mille Collines’s gate.
IBUKA calls upon the international community, world leaders , peace lovers and survivors wherever they are in the world to raise their voice against this growing political conspiracy to support negative forces (FDLR) to come back and kill us again as they did in 1994.”