Progress Amid Pain: Rwanda reflects on 30 years since genocide
Kigali, RAWANDA (EFE) – Thousands gathered in Kigali on Sunday alongside a dozen heads of state and government to commemorate the 30th anniversary of the Rwanda genocide, which saw over 800,000 Tutsis and moderate Hutus killed in 1994.
“Today, our hearts are filled with grief and gratitude in equal measure,” President Paul Kagame said at a ceremony at an indoor stadium in the capital. “We remember our dead, and are also grateful for what Rwanda has become.”
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Striking an emotional chord, he said the nation was in debt to the survivors.
“We asked you to do the impossible by carrying the burden of reconciliation on your shoulders. And you continue to do the impossible for our nation, every single day, and we thank you.”
Kagame reflected both the progress and the wounds of the country.
A huge fluorescent tree-shaped structure was installed in the middle of the pavilion, and its changing lights played in synch with different musical and contemporary dance performances.
“Our journey has been long and tough. Rwanda was completely humbled by the magnitude of our loss, and the lessons we learned are engraved in blood,” Kagame asserted in a resolute intervention in which he also criticized the international community and the role played by the United Nations during the massacre.
In addition to the emotional account of a genocide survivor, who explained in a broken voice and the Kinyarwanda language her experience, the President of the African Union Commission (AU), Moussa Faki Mahamat, intervened on behalf of the various heads of state and government like Ethiopia, South Africa, Tanzania, and the Czech Republic.
“In a deeply conflictual African and international context, fueled by tribal, racial, religious, cultural, economic discriminations (…), Rwanda humbly offers a model whose positive resonance transcends Africa’s borders,” Mahamat noted.
Also present at the ceremony was the President of the European Council, Belgian Charles Michel, whose country, a former colonial power, divided the population by ethnic labels during its colonial rule, favoring the Tutsis over the 85 percent Hutu population, which resulted in decades of hatred culminating in the massacre.
“I am Belgian, I am European. We are here 30 years later, and I know what my continent, Europe, owes to your continent,” the European leader stated.
“I know the history with its roots, with its greatness, I also know the history with its shames (…) That is why the Belgian government apologized in 2000.”
After floral tributes by the invited leaders that took place on Sunday morning at the Kigali Genocide Memorial Center and the lighting of the so-called flame of remembrance, a vigil presided over by Kagame was scheduled for the afternoon at the BK Arena.
The genocide began on Apr. 7, 1994, after the assassination the previous day of the presidents of Rwanda, Juvénal Habyarimana, and Burundi, Cyprien Ntaryamira (both Hutus), when the plane they were traveling in was shot down over Kigali.
The Rwandan government accused the Tutsi rebels of the Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF) of the assassination, against whom they had been waging war since 1990.
The ensuing massacre resulted in the deaths of at least 800,000 Tutsis and moderate Hutus in just over three months.
Thus, in those 100 days, the government, the army, youth militias, known as Interahamwe, and ordinary Hutus systematically slaughtered, tortured, raped, and mutilated thousands of people.
The genocide was one of the worst ethnic massacres in recent human history. EFE
