Rwanda Genocide

A time when children were ripped from their mothers arms and killed in front of them. Mothers, daughters, brothers, sisters, fathers, entire families all slaughtered. Entire generations lost. Women brutally raped and tortured in front of their families or thrown in ditches left to rot and die. The screams of victims had soared through the skies of Rwanda. A time where identification cards, if the correct one, would be the only thing that could save an individual's life. This is what the people of Rwanda had to endure for the one hundred day genocide that, according to the United Human Rights Council killed 80,000 men, women, and children, as well as thousands of Hutus slaughtered for opposing the genocide or aiding Tutsis. The big question

However, one could go back to colonial times where the Belgians divided the country only to renew the tensions between the Hutus and the Tutsis. Or the French who aided and equipped the extremist army. Lastly, the world around Rwanda has to hold some blame for the genocide. The surrounding world, especially the super power nations, did nothing and remained quiet throughout the whole thing. The Rwandan genocide was not one specific action because wars are rarely about one specific action, there was a plethora of conditions led to the Rwandan genocide, such as political propaganda, socioeconomic conditions, and religious differences leading to the genocide.

To understand how the genocide happened in Rwanda, one first needs to understand that there is a history of violence in their country. Ethnic tension between the Hutus and the Tutsis in Rwanda is nothing new. There have always been disagreements between the majority Hutus and minority Tutsi but the fighting between them has increased a lot since the colonial periods. The two ethnic groups are actually very

The people of Rwanda were very desperate for land in the 1900s which made them vulnerable to the Hutu propaganda and political manipulation by the government. During all the propaganda by the government and Hutu extremists they were encouraged to blame the Tutsis for their problems, so this would include the environmental issues and economic problems they were dealing with. Also, the desperate plight of the people made them more vulnerable to the propaganda and political corruption/manipulation that encouraged Hutus to rise against the Tutsis. As the President's power was rising with international support, France too supported the regime to gain local influence, the exploding population was rising and the elite had confiscated half of the country's