tagged w/ Rwanda
-
Rwandan forces fired tank shells and other heavy artillery across the border at Congolese troops during fighting last week, the United Nations said Tuesday.
Congo's government had accused Rwanda of actively supporting Congolese rebel leader Laurent Nkunda, but the accusation marks the first time the U.N. has publicly said Rwanda was overtly involved in the latest fighting. Rwanda has repeatedly denied its military is involved in the conflict.
U.N. spokeswoman Sylvie van den Wildenberg told The Associated Press in Goma that Uruguayan peacekeepers saw Rwandan tanks and other heavy artillery fire into Congo on Wednesday as Nkunda's forces advanced toward the regional capital, Goma.
Kibumba is located on a main road about 17 miles north of Goma. The Rwandan border is visible to the east, amid several volcanoes that straddle the frontier.
Rwanda invaded Congo twice in the late 1990s but initially denied its troops were there both times. Rwanda finally pulled its forces out after a 2002 peace deal ended a war in Congo that drew in half a dozen African nations.
Despite fears of a regional conflict, the fighting in Congo has subsided in recent days.
Rwandan forces fired tank shells and other heavy artillery across the border at... more
-
-
While neighbouring countries struggle to get pregnant women to visit antenatal centres, women in Rwanda seem to be flocking to them. Rwanda manages to reach 72 percent of pregnant women with HIV testing and counselling and other prevention of mother-to-child services (PMTCT), but fewer than 20 percent of Burundi's health centres offer PMTCT services, while Kenya is reaching half its pregnant women.
While neighbouring countries struggle to get pregnant women to visit antenatal... more
-
-
KILIMANYOKA, Congo (AP) — The Congolese army said troops from Rwanda have crossed the nearby border and attacked its soldiers Wednesday in support of a minority Tutsi rebellion, as thousands of refugees cowered from the shelling just a few miles down the road.
The military spokesman for Rwanda's Tutsi-led government immediately denied the Congolese allegations.
A helicopter gunship from the United Nations mission flew high in the sky toward the battlefield and Uruguayan peacekeepers deployed on a hilltop ridge.
The 17,000-strong peacekeeping force in Congo is stretched to the limit with the upsurge of fighting and needs more troops quickly from wherever it can get them, the U.N.'s top envoy to Congo, Alan Doss said.
The force is the U.N.'s biggest mission but its failure to halt the rebellion has enraged Congolese who attacked U.N. compounds in Goma with rocks this week. People regularly stone peacekeepers' vehicles.
Bomb blasts, rocket fire and screaming mortars could be heard Wednesday from three miles (5 kilometers) outside the city.
The bombardment frightened tens of thousands of refugees and stirred dangerously growing anti-Tutsi sentiment in a region where decades of conflict with the majority Hutu reached a cataclysm in the 1994 Rwandan genocide. More than a half million Tutsis were slaughtered in 100 days.KILIMANYOKA, Congo (AP) — The Congolese army said troops from Rwanda have... more
-
-
After the attacks of 9/11 Terry Tempest Williams was asked by a friend and artist who specialized in mosaics if she would accompany her on a trip to Rwanda and act as her scribe. She had no desire to go but realized in the end that her own humanity depended on it. That experience makes up part of her new book, Finding Beauty in a Broken World.
If we are honest, says Williams, we will acknowledge that our world is broken. Our environment. Our economy. Our identity. The question then is how we rebuild the world around us. That is why the word mosaic has become a kind of guidepost for Williams, a way of making sense of the current moment. In other words we have to pick up the pieces and create something new. After the attacks of 9/11 Terry Tempest Williams was asked by a friend and artist who... more
-
-
GRITtv
-
added this
-
3 years ago
- |
-
Said*, a long-distance trucker from the Democratic Republic of Congo, is married with six children. His work keeps him on the road for weeks at a time, and on those long, lonely nights he turns to his girlfriend, who lives in town of Malaba on the Kenya-Uganda border.
Said*, a long-distance trucker from the Democratic Republic of Congo, is married with... more
-
-
A former top Rwandan official facing charges of genocide was transferred today from Frankfurt, Germany, to Arusha, Tanzania, to the United Nations war crimes tribunal set up to deal with the 1994 mass killings in the small Great Lakes nation.
Augustin Ngirabatware, former Minister of Planning, was arrested in Germany last September and faces nine counts including genocide and crimes against humanity for murder, extermination and rape.
An estimated 800,000 Tutsis and moderate Hutus were killed - often by machete or club - during a 100-day period starting in early April 1994.
The International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) expressed its gratitude to the German Government for its arrest, detention and smooth transfer of the accused to Arusha.
Initially, Mr. Ngirabatware was charged jointly with Jean de Dieu Kamuhanda, former Minister of Higher Education and Scientific Research, who was convicted and sentenced to life in prison.
Last month, the Tribunal handed down a life sentence to a former prosecutor found guilty of genocide, extermination and murder during the 1994 killing spree.
The ICTR's trial chamber found that Simeon Nchamihigo, former deputy prosecutor in Cyangugu Prefecture, instructed the Hutu-dominated rebel group known as the Interahamwe to seek out and kill Tutsis and moderate Hutus with the intent to destroy the Tutsi ethnic group and accomplices of the Tutsi-dominated Rwandan Patriotic Front.
The chamber also found that Mr. Nchamihigo took part in attacks on refugee places, with some of the massacres planned during meetings of the prefecture Security Council which he attended.A former top Rwandan official facing charges of genocide was transferred today from... more
-
-
How does a country recover from a genocide? In Rwanda, the government has implemented a traditional system of justice and reconciliation known as the Gacaca courts. The courts are expected to deal with the hundreds of thousands of people accused of participating in the 1994 genocide and promote reconciliation between genocide perpetrators and survivors. Jonathan Jones and Anna Sussman were granted rare access to videotape the proceedings. They also traveled to other parts of the country to investigate underlying ethnic tensions.How does a country recover from a genocide? In Rwanda, the government has implemented... more
-
-
Elections held on Tuesday saw Rwandan women taking 56.25 percent of the contested parliamentary seats something that has never happened in Africa or the world. These polls have set Rwanda on the world record having 44 parliamentary seats taken up by women.
RPF took 17 seats, PSD- 2 and PL- 1.
"Rwanda Patriotic Front (RPF) won 42 of the 53 seats contested on Monday's direct voting, while the Social Democratic party (PSD) took seven, and the Liberal Party (PL) won four," said Chrisolugue Karangwa, the electoral commission Chief.
In the heat of the elections, the people of Rwanda Tuesday voted diligently for the women representatives who were to occupy their reserved 24 seats and the Youth with 2 seats, while yesterday Wednesday, people cast votes for the Disabled who occupy only one seat. The uprising of Rwandan women is something that has been anticipated for over the past years.
In the wake of 2003, the people of Rwanda nominated and finally elected 39 women parliamentarians who became part of the 80- member chamber of deputies. This alone hit the world record of Rwanda having the highest women parliamentarians in Africa and better still across the globe.
This was after the UN in 2003 set a target for nations to implement a 30 percent female representation in parliament. Subsequent to this, the constitution of the Republic of Rwanda quickly adapted to the call and saw that women were well catered for.
That year an additional 15 seats were won on top of the usual 24 reserved seats. After Tuesdays polls, the whooping 56.25 percent women representation dictates that the Rwandan woman is well represented in the lower house of parliament. This figure emphasizes the fact that the country's future is being shaped by women.
With the empowerment and emancipation of women through educational and business skills, the women of Rwanda are at the forefront of the government's ‘VISION 2020'- an effort by the government to transform the country's economy to a Knowledge based one. As a result of this, female literacy has risen from 10 percent to over 50 percent over the past fourteen years.
The country's new era of equal opportunity has also coincided with extraordinary economic development where in 2007 the economy grew by 6 percent.
Not only are women the backbone of the country's economy, they also are speedily taking up leadership roles in high places.
This can be attributable to the fact that a few women are ready and willing to represent the less sought after women- those in rural Rwanda.
"It is not only in the numbers. It is also the quality of those women we are electing to take those positions and also for the common women, women at the village level this gave them a certain message, a message that women can do," Oda Gasinzigwa, of the National Women's Council, said.
Gasinzigwa also said that the women leaders are in parliament to also represent the rural women and that their yardstick is the livelihood and the status of the Rwandan woman.
However women alone would not have achieved this success if it were not for the many motivating forces behind their backs.
The government's initiative to improve the status of the Rwandan woman has been a major anvil-and- axle to the success story.
Quoting colonel Rose Kabuye, a patriot in the RPF- the now ruling party who believes that without the backing of the government, women could not have possibly done it alone.
"Whenever women struggle on their own it hasn't been successful... so it has to all go to what the leaders of the country want."
"So the Rwandan leadership has accepted this and has put it in the constitution. This is not something that we should have done on our own and I do not think we could have managed it on our own," she said in an interview recently.**CONTINUES****Elections held on Tuesday saw Rwandan women taking 56.25 percent of the contested... more
-
-
FROM gaining the right to vote to holding office, women have achieved much in the battle for equal political rights. But on many counts, progress has been slow. In the 100 years since women were first elected to a national parliament, only 18.4% of seats worldwide are currently held by women. To address this, some 110 countries have introduced rules to help women get elected. Rwanda's has been the most successful—this week, thanks to a 30% seat guarantee, it became the first country in the world to elect a majority of women to parliament. Opponents of quotas say that women such as Tzipi Livni, the new leader of Israel's ruling party, do pretty well without them.FROM gaining the right to vote to holding office, women have achieved much in the... more
-
-
A woman who lost nearly all her family in the Rwandan genocide has herself been murdered, a local villager told AFP Monday, in what is the latest of several killings of survivors of the 1994 slaughter.
Jozefina Zaninka, 75, was beaten to death overnight Friday in the Muhanga district in the south of the country, Radio Rwanda, the official government broadcaster reported.
"Her body was found Saturday morning in her stable by a young man who had come, as usual, to milk the cows for her," Benoit Kaboyi, executive secretary of Ibuka, the main organisation for the genocide survivors, told AFP.
"We buried her yesterday (Sunday) after the autopsy and some suspects have already been arrested by the police," he added.
Zaninka had been claiming compensation before one of the semi-traditional courts, known as gacacas, for the pillaging of and damage to her possessions during the genocide.
Her murder might have been linked to the court action she initiated, Kaboyi added. Zaninka, who lived alone, had lost nearly all her family, in 1994.
According to Ibuka, 167 survivors of the genocide have been murdered between 1995 and mid-May 2008.
Murders of survivors of the genocide are frequent in the region, Radio Rwanda reported: in May, a survivor in her 90s was burned alive by villagers.
The gacacas are grass-roots courts inspired by the old village assemblies.
They have tried most of those suspected of carrying out the 1994 genocide, in which Hutus targetted the country's Tutsi population, but also moderate Hutus. According to United Nations figures, nearly 800,000 were killed in the violence. A woman who lost nearly all her family in the Rwandan genocide has herself been... more
-
-
"France played an active role in the 1994 Rwanda genocide, a report unveiled Tuesday by the Rwandan government said, naming French political and military officials it says should be prosecuted.
The damning report accused a raft of top French politicians of involvement in the massacres, threatening to further mar relations between the two countries, which severed diplomatic ties in November 2006.
"French forces directly assassinated Tutsis and Hutus accused of hiding Tutsis... French forces committed several rapes on Tutsi survivors," said a justice ministry statement released after the report was presented in Kigali.
The 500-page report alleged that France was aware of preparations for the genocide, contributed to planning the massacres and actively took part in the killing.
It named former French prime minister Edouard Balladur, former foreign minister Alain Juppe and then-president Francois Mitterrand, who died in 1996, among 13 French politicians accused of playing a role in the massacres.
Dominique de Villepin, who was then Juppe's top aide and later became prime minister, was also among those listed in the Rwandan report.
The report names 20 military officials as being responsible.
France refused to comment directly on the report's findings, saying the inquiry had lacked legitimacy or impartiality.
A Defence Ministry spokesman instead referred reporters to the government's position as set out in a statement from February 2007.
That original statement declared that the Rwandan inquiry had no "independence or impartiality" because its stated remit was to "gather evidence of the involvement of the French state" in the Rwandan genocide.
The inquiry, it stated, had "no legitimacy nor competence" to conduct interviews on French soil because it had broken off diplomatic relations with France in November 2006.
France has acknowledged making "mistakes" in Rwanda but denies any responsibility for the killing spree.
The 1994 genocide in the central African nation left around 800,000 people -- mainly minority Tutsis and moderate Hutus -- dead, according to the United Nations.
"The overwhelming nature of France's support to the Rwandan policy of massacres... shows the complicity of French political and military officials in the preparation and execution of the genocide," the statement said.
Justice Minister Tharcisse Karugarama presented the report to the press in Kigali, more than two years after a special commission tasked with probing France's role in the genocide began its work.
The statement said the military and humanitarian Operation Turquoise carried out by the French in Rwanda between June and August 1994 abetted the killings perpetrated by the extremist Interahamwe Hutu militia.
The French military "did not challenge the infrastructure of genocide, notably the checkpoints manned by the Interahamwes.
"They clearly requested that the Interahamwes continue to man those checkpoints and kill Tutsis attempting to flee," the statement added.
"Considering the seriousness of the alleged crimes, the Rwandan government has urged the relevant authorities to bring the accused French politicians and military officials to justice," the statement said. "
Source: Yahoo News"France played an active role in the 1994 Rwanda genocide, a report unveiled... more
-
-
KIGALI, Rwanda (AP) -- Rwanda accused senior French officials Tuesday of involvement in the 1994 genocide that killed 800,000 people, naming late President Francois Mitterrand and former Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin among others.
France's Foreign Ministry said officials were still poring over the accusations, which were listed in a report, and they did not immediately have a comment.
Rwanda's government and genocide survivor organizations have often accused France of training and arming the militias and former government troops who led the genocide. But the latest accusations were the most detailed and point to top-level French officials.
During the genocide, which lasted from April to July 1994, Hutu militias slaughtered minority Tutsis and politically moderate Hutus.
"French soldiers themselves directly were involved in assassinations of Tutsis and Hutus accused of hiding Tutsis," according to the Rwandan report, which was compiled by a government-appointed team of investigators from the Justice Ministry. "French soldiers committed many rapes, specifically of Tutsi women."
Mitterrand and Villepin appear on a list of dozens of names at the end of the document, accused of giving French support of "a political, military, diplomatic and logistic nature."
French officials have repeatedly denied that France aided or directed the Hutu forces.
Rwandan Justice Minister Tharcisse Karugarama said his country had no immediate plans to issue indictments, but the report "could be the basis for potential charges against individuals or the state."
In 1998, a French parliamentary panel absolved France of responsibility in the slaughter.
But the lawmakers said that successive French governments had given diplomatic and military support to Rwanda's extremist government between 1990 and 1994.
KIGALI, Rwanda (AP) -- Rwanda accused senior French officials Tuesday of involvement... more
-
-
Rwanda has accused France of playing an active role in the genocide of 1994, in which about 800,000 people were killed.
An independent Rwandan commission said France was aware of preparations for the genocide and helped train the ethnic Hutu militias perpetrators.
The report also accused French troops of direct involvement in the killings.
It named 33 senior French military and political figures that it said should be prosecuted. France has previously denied any such responsibility.
Among those named in the report were former French Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin and late President Francois Mitterrand.
The French foreign ministry told the BBC it would only respond to the fresh allegations after reading the report, which was released on Tuesday afternoon.
Earlier this year France's Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner denied French responsibility in connection with the genocide, but said political errors had been made.
Some 800,000 minority Tutsis and moderate Hutus were slaughtered by Hutu militias in just 100 days in 1994.
Testimonies
The BBC's Geoffrey Mutagoma in the Rwandan capital, Kigali, says the commission spent nearly two years investigating France's alleged role in the genocide.
It heard testimonies from genocide survivors, researchers, writers and reporters.
The 500-page document was presented to the Rwanda's government last November, but was not made public until now.
Rwanda has repeatedly accused France of arming and training the Hutu militias that perpetrated the genocide, and of dragging its feet in co-operating with the investigations that followed.
France has maintained that its forces helped protect civilians during a UN-sanctioned mission in Rwanda at the time.
The two countries have had a frosty relationship since 2006 when a French judge implicated Rwandan President Paul Kagame in the downing in 1994 of then-President Juvenal Habyarimana's plane - an event widely seen as triggering the killings.
President Kagame has always denied the charge.
He says Mr Habyarimana, a Hutu, was killed by Hutu extremists who then blamed the incident on Tutsi rebels to provide the pretext for the genocide.
So, what do you think?Rwanda has accused France of playing an active role in the genocide of 1994, in which... more
-
-
Five peacekeepers from a UN-African Union force have reportedly been killed after their patrol was ambushed in Sudan's northern Darfur region.
The Suna news agency quoted an unidentified official from the joint force as saying the peacekeepers were attacked by a huge convoy of gunmen riding in 40 sport utility vehicles.
Another 17 peacekeepers remain missing, 18 others were wounded and 10 UN-AU vehicles were destroyed, the report said.
Among those killed, three were from Rwanda, one from Ghana and one from Uganda, Suna said. It did not give details about the gunmen.
The joint force took over peacekeeping duties in Darfur earlier this year with about 9,000 soldiers and police officers.
It is authorised to have 26,000 members, but has contended with chronic shortages of staff and equipment and less-than-adequate cooperation from the Sudanese government.
The peacekeeping force has been unable to persuade the US and other governments to supply attack and transport helicopters, surveillance aircraft, military engineers and logistical support it needs to safely navigate the remote western Darfur region.
Last month, four UN-AU staffers were assaulted and held at gunpoint in Darfur.
One of the staffers was stripped of his belongings, kidnapped briefly and then released by Arab militiamen on horseback, according to a statement from the joint force
The UN has warned of rising banditry and insecurity in Darfur. Attackers killed an Ugandan peacekeeper in May.Five peacekeepers from a UN-African Union force have reportedly been killed after... more
-
-
"U.N. envoys met Congo President Joseph Kabila on Saturday and backed his plans to disarm and expel Rwandan rebels behind years of strife, and to refocus the biggest U.N. peace force on rebuilding his shattered nation.
The ambassadors reassured Kabila the peacekeepers who have backed his army's efforts to control almost daily clashes with local militias and Rwandan Hutu rebels in eastern areas since a 1998-2003 war would not simply pack their bags and leave."It will not happen very soon," French U.N. Ambassador Jean-Maurice Ripert, who is leading the Security Council delegation on what has become an annual trip around Africa's trouble spots, said after the meeting.
"It should not happen abruptly. There should be of course a transition, in which to pass from security re-establishment to the development of the country and that the U.N. could do something else than only sending troops for security purposes."
He said Kabila wanted the peacekeeping mission, known by its French acronym MONUC, to shift its priorities from security to development as Congo tries to rebuild an economy ruined by decades of kleptocracy and violence.
An estimated 5.4 million people have been killed as a result of conflict since 1998, mostly through hunger and disease.
Fighting has been concentrated in the east of the vast country where Rwandan Hutu rebels known as the Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda (FDLR) fled after their country's 1994 genocide of some 800,000 Tutsis and Hutu moderates.
Their presence has triggered invasions in 1996, when Rwanda and Uganda helped Kabila's father Laurent march across the country to oust late dictator Mobutu Sese Seko, and again two years later, when those countries fell out with their protege.
Joseph Kabila became president after his father was assassinated in 2001 and five years later he won the country's first free elections in more than 40 years."
By Louis Charbonneau"U.N. envoys met Congo President Joseph Kabila on Saturday and backed his plans... more
-
-
yai
-
added this
-
3 years ago
- |
-
Rwanda's justice minister has denied the transfer of a man being accused of contributing to the genocides in the racial torn country. The genocide consisted of 800,000 Tutsis and moderate Hutus murdered in 1994. The ethnic cleanse has been one of the major atrocities in current events and continues to this day.Rwanda's justice minister has denied the transfer of a man being accused of... more
-
-
Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs Jendayi E. Frazer and Ambassador-at-Large for War Crimes Issues Clint Williamson this week announced the renewal of the "Rewards for Justice" (RFJ) War Crimes program to bring to justice those responsible for the 1994 genocide in Rwanda.
This campaign aims to secure the arrest of 13 individuals indicted by the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR), who remain at-large for perpetrating, financing and providing supporting for the 1994 genocide and crimes against humanity.Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs Jendayi E. Frazer and... more
-
-
Tethic
-
added this
-
4 years ago
- |
-
Thousands of people were massacred during the genocide of 1994 in Rwanda. Now, in the crucible of the ensuing war in neighbouring Congo, the fugitive killers are training their children to carry on the Hutu mission of extermination. Thousands of people were massacred during the genocide of 1994 in Rwanda. Now, in the... more
-
-
How does a country recover from a genocide? In Rwanda, the government has implemented a traditional system of justice and reconciliation known as the Gacaca courts. The courts are expected to deal with the hundreds of thousands of people accused of participating in the 1994 genocide and promote reconciliation between genocide perpetrators and survivors. Jonathan Jones and Anna Sussman were granted rare access to videotape the proceedings. They also traveled to other parts of the country to investigate underlying ethnic tensions. How does a country recover from a genocide? In Rwanda, the government has implemented... more
-
-
Bob Geldof has praised President Bush's humanitarian work in Africa and says the press has mostly ignored the positive reception that Mr. Bush has repeatedly received during his five-nation tour.
Geldof, a tireless campaigner for alleviating poverty in Africa, bagged an exclusive interview with the president for the latest issue of Time magazine, out Friday, in which he described Dubya as an unexpectedly witty and emotional man who has "quadrupled aid to the poorest people on the planet".
He also referred to a number of little-reported initiatives the president has set up in Africa. These have included funding HIV anti-retroviral drugs for 1.3 million people, a $350m project to stop the spread of tropical diseases and the awarding of $1.2bn in contracts in Tanzania and Ghana through the Millennium Challenge Account. Bush claims the US public doesn't know about many of these because the press "weren't much interested".
Geldof's piece is reported to humanise the man who recently scored his lowest ever approval ratings in the polls but the former Boomtown Rats man also writes: "Some of these thoughts, were they applied to Iraq, would have profound implications on the man's understanding of how the world functions: 'US solutions should not be imposed on African leaders'."
Bob Geldof has praised President Bush's humanitarian work in Africa and says the... more
-
-
richjm
-
added this
-
4 years ago
- |
