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GÉRARD KARANGWA SEMUSHI WA PDP YIHAKANYE DEO MUSHAYIDI

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Iyi nyandiko tuyivanye kuli website y'ijwi-ryihuriro-nyarwanda

semushi-kigali-300x225.jpgPar Radio Itahuka.

Ibi bintu biteye kwibaza byinshi cyane , ndabaza niba bwana Deo Pdp-imanzi Parti de Mushayidi na Gerald Karangwa Semushi bari bafite amashyaka 2 atandukanye? maze kunva BBC Gahuza aho Gerard Karangwa Semushi yagize ati: Ishyaka ryanjye ritandukanye ni rya Deo Mushayidi, ati ishyaka rya Mushayidi ni "Igihango giharanira kurengera abanyarwanda naho irya Karangwa Semushi ni Igihango cy' abaturage baharanira democratie" None sibwo Gerald Karangwa Semushi yihakanye Deo Mushayidi, kandi muri audio nyishi bwana Karangwa avuga inshuro nyishi cyane ko president wabo afungiye mu Rwanda. Kuki Gerald Karangwa yihakanye Deo Mushyayidi? Kuba baba bafite amashyaka 2 atandukanye ariko Karangwa agakomeza kuvuga ko Presient wabo afunzwe na Leta ya kagame hari icyo bivuze? ese koko baba bafite amashyaka atandukanye? abavuga ko Karangwa atavugisha ukuri baba bafite ishingiro? 

Kanda HANO wumve iyo nkuru.


LE LIEUTENANT JOËL MUTABAZI, ANCIEN GARDE DU CORPS DU PRÉSIDENT KAGAME NE PEUT PAS BÉNÉFICIER D'UN PROCÈS ÉQUITABLE AU RWANDA

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LT-MUTABAZI-JOEL.png

Photo Joël Mutabazi 


Le procès du Lt. Joel Mutabazi et ses amis n'aura pas lieu

Depuis leurs première comparution devant le Tribunal militaire de Nyamirambo le 13 novembre 2013, le Lieutenant Joel Mutabazi et ses 14 compagnons devaient revenir devant leurs juges le 25 novembre. Mais coup de théâtre, le tribunal a remis l'audience au 2 décembre pour des motifs inconnues, mais propres à une dictature féroce qui parvient encore à trouver des soutiens, même au sein du "Conseil de sécurité" dont le Rwanda est parvenu à se faire élire comme membre. 

Selon InyeneriNews qui parait en kinyarwanda, tous les 15 présumés sont victimes de la terreur blanche d'un pouvoir qu'ils ont longtemps servilement protégé.

Privés de défense, car il n'y a pas eu d'avocat commis d'office ni d'avocat volontaire qui aurait du courage à défendre cette cause perdue d'avance, le Lt. Mutabazi et ses compagnons ne peuvent pas bénéficier d'un procès juste et équitable d'une justice à genoux devant le pouvoir qui la manipule.

Le Lieutenant Joel Mutabazi Joel est un ancien garde du corps du Président Paul Kagame. Il a été kidnappé à Kampala où il avait trouvé asile et déporté au Rwanda avec la complicité des services de sécurité ougandaises que le Président Paul Kagame a dirigé alors qu'il était major de l'armée ougandaise entre 1986-1990. Les protestations des ONG comme Human Rights Watch n'ont pas pu faire plier Kigali de sa ligne dure de répression de toute voix dissidente.

Le Lt. Joel Mutabazi et ses 14 compagnons sont incapables de se payer les services des avocats. Les avocats rwandais sont eux aussi privés de leur indépendance de défendre ceux qui sont considérés comme ennemis du pouvoir en place.  

Le Lt. Joel Mutabazi lors de sa 1ère comparution le 14 novembre 2013 avec ses compagnons étaient accusés entre autre de "détention illégale d'armes(on ne dit pas lesquels); propagation de fausses nouvelles à l'extérieur du Rwandaincitation du peuple à la haine contre le pouvoir établi (de droit qui ne supporte pas de critique) ; nuisance au pouvoir en place ; terrorisme; formation d'une bande de malfaiteurs; désertion de l'armée etc ..."

Kabera Ignace

Source: InyenyeriNews

RDC : LA DÉMOBILISATION DU M23, CLÉ D’UNE PAIX DURABLE

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Au Nord Kivu, la déroute du M23, voici deux semaines, a engendré une sorte de « fonte des glaces » politique et militaire : l’iceberg majeur que représentait le mouvement rebelle pro rwandais, se posant en rival de l’autorité de l’Etat, ayant sauté sous les coups de boutoir de l’armée et des forces onusiennes, c’est toute la banquise des groupes armés qui part en morceaux. Chaque jour, des combattants
quittent les groupes armés et expriment leur souhait d’être soit intégrés au sein des forces gouvernementales soit, plus rarement, être rendus à la vie civile moyennant des mesures d’accompagnement.
Les chiffres sont impressionnants : alors qu’aux derniers jours de la guerre, le M23, miné par les pertes et les défections, ne comptait plus que quelques centaines d’hommes, quelque 1500 combattants ont soudain été présentés en Ouganda et ont exprimé leur désir d’être réinsérés. Sur le terrain, l’armée congolaise a accueilli quelque 400 hommes provenant de l’ancien mouvement rebelle, la Monusco en a accueilli 200 et au Rwanda, ils sont toujours quelque 600 combattants cantonnés dans des camps militaires et qui avaient accompagné le
général Bosco Ntaganda lorsqu’il avait pris la fuite au printemps dernier. Depuis lors celui que l’on appelait « Terminator » attend son procès dans une prison du Tribunal pénal international à Scheveningen et ses compagnons espèrent regagner un jour le Congo. Autrement dit, s’ils souhaitaient un jour se regrouper, les seuls hommes du M23 pourraient représenter une nouvelle petite armée.
Mais les anciens rebelles pro Rwanda n’étaient pas seuls sur la scène du Nord et du Sud Kivu : milices villageoises, groupes d’auto défense, supplétifs de l’armée congolaise, plusieurs dizaines de groupes armés d’obédience diverse écument depuis des années les campagnes et les carrés miniers de l’Est du Congo, sans oublier les combattants hutus rwandais des FDLR (Forces démocratiques pour la libération du Rwanda) dont le nombre est estimé à quelque 2000 combattants aguerris.
Depuis la défaite du M23, plusieurs des groupes « nationaux » congolais ont exprimé leur volonté de renoncer à la lutte armée et 1400 ex-rebelles se sont déjà rendus au Nord Kivu seulement. Nombre d’entre eux assurent avoir appuyé l’armée congolaise lors de son offensive sur Kiwanja et Rutshuru et ils espèrent, en contrepartie, être intégrés au sein des forces gouvernementales. Plus de mille
armes, restituées par ces soldats de fortune, ont été solennellement détruites à Goma. Mais l’avenir ce ces ex-rebelles demeure incertain.
Dans l’immédiat, ils sont hébergés et nourris par la Monusco mais rien ne dit qu’ils seront automatiquement réintégrés au sein de l’armée congolaise, qui souhaite se professionnaliser et s’assurer de la loyauté et des qualifications de toutes ses nouvelles recrues.
Soucieuses d’éviter le « réentrôlement » des ex-rebelles, les autorités souhaitent envoyer 1600 d’entre eux dans la province de l’Equateur, à 800 km de Goma, mais rien ne dit que les ex-combattants accepteront d’être ainsi coupés de leur famille et de leur milieu.
A Kinshasa, le gouvernement a présenté le 20 novembre un plan de désarmement, réintégration et réinsertion sociale des membres des groupes armés et un ultimatum a été lancé à l’intention de tous les miliciens afin qu’ils restituent leurs armes et rentrent dans le rang.
Par ailleurs, les organisations humanitaires se préparent à accueillir des centaines d’enfants qui avaient été enrôlés dans les groupes armés, parmi lesquels de nombreuses filles, qui étaient utilisées comme « esclaves sexuelles » par les commandants et qui craignent, plus encore que les garçons, le retour à la vie civile. En Ouganda seulement, 136 enfants qui étaient associés au M23 ont été recensés et seront rapatriés et démobilisés.
En tournée au Kivu, le ministre de l’Intérieur Richard Muyej a annoncé le déploiement d’unités de police locales et d’unités spéciales ainsi que l’installation d’un tribunal de paix à Rutshuru, afin d’éviter les règlements de comptes et 50 écoles primaires et secondaires vont être réhabilitées en priorité. La réinsertion à long terme des anciens rebelles, adultes ou enfants, représentera un défi plus lourd encore que le rétablissement de l’ordre public, car de sa réussite dépendra la réelle pacification de la région.

http://blog.lesoir.be/colette-braeckman/2013/11/26/la-demobilisation-cle-dune-paix-durable-au-kivu/

PDR-IHUMURE URGES CAUTION AND WISDOM IN DEALING WITH FDLR

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rusesabagina1.jpgPaul Rusesabagina

315 Pleasant Knoll

San Antonio, TX 78260

E-mail:paulrusesabagina@yahoo.fr; info@pdrihumure.org

 

-H.E. Mary Robinson

U.N. Special Envoy to the Great Lakes Region of Africa

United Nations, New York, NY USA

 

-H.E. Martin Kobler

U.N. Special Representative and Head of MONUSCO

United Nations, New York, NY USA

 

-Hon. Russ Feingold

U.S. Special Representative for the Great Lakes Region of Africa

Washington, DC USA

 

RE: PDR-IHUMURE URGES CAUTION AND WISDOM IN DEALING WITH FDLR.

PDF

 

Your Excellencies, 

1. I am coming before you as the President of the Party for Democracy in Rwanda (PDR-Ihumure), a political party that fights for truth, peace, justice and genuine reconciliation

among Rwandans, and aims to return Rwanda from more than 2 decades of a permanent state of war and an implacable reign of terror to a time of appeasement and the rule of law.

2. On behalf of our membership inside and outside of Rwanda and the Rwandan refugee community across the globe, the leadership of the PDR-Ihumure has taken note of the recent developments regarding the defeat of M23 in eastern DRC (Democratic Republic of Congo) by the FARDC (Armed Forces of the Democratic Republic of Congo) with the assistance of the MONUSCO Force Intervention Brigade, and urges you to seize the opportunity offered by the removal of M23 to exercise maximum caution and wisdom in dealing with the FDLR

(Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda) issue in your quest for comprehensive peace in the Great Lakes Region of Africa, and in Rwanda in particular.

3. The issues underlying the crisis in eastern DRC and the entire Great Lakes Region are much more complex than the often-used pretext of the FDLR presence in DRC, which alone cannot account for over 2 decades of war crimes, crimes against humanity and even genocide by the Rwandan government army, including rapes of women and young girls, forced recruitment of child soldiers, the massive plunder of RDC mineral resources, and the killing of thousands of Rwandans and more than 7 million innocent Congolese, as fully documented by the U.N. Mapping Report, the Gersony Report, the U.N. Report of Experts on M23, and other reports.

4. In addition to being an armed group, the FDLR is also a Rwandan political party in exile among many others, and it has publicly stated its preference for direct negotiations with the Rwandan government over armed confrontation. Many of its members are said to be young men and women who were toddlers in 1994 or were born and raised in DRC over the last two decades. Therefore, FDLR members are bona fide refugees like all of us who have scattered in many parts of Africa, Europe and America, and who have mothers, fathers, brothers, sisters, aunts, uncles, and cousins living in Rwanda or as exiled refugees across the globe.

Yet, over the last several years, the FDLR has been collectively demonized by the Rwandan government as a group of genocidaires, and whipped up repeatedly as the poster child for the entire Rwandan political opposition. Available estimates put the total number of Rwandan refugees in DRC alone at around 50,000, and labeling FDLR as genocidaires is tantamount to categorizing all these refugees as genocidaires. That’s wrong.

5. Either in our party bylaws, at our Party Assessment Convention on December 15, 2012 in

Brussels, or in our different publications and on many other occasions, we have unequivocally stated our opposition to any possible impunity for crimes of war, crimes against humanity, and the crime of genocide for anyone. If anyone within the FDRL is guilty of genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity, they must be prosecuted. Likewise, those guilty of the same crimes within the RPF government must equally be prosecuted. 

6. A careful examination of both FDLR and M23 clearly suggests that these are two different groups in terms of origin, history, cause, nature and composition, and consequently the two groups should not be equated or handled in similar fashion. On one hand, there is FDLR, a group of Rwandan refugees who include women, children and the elderly, and who, like all of us refugees, demand to be granted their full rights to return to their motherland without being threatened, and to enjoy their basic freedoms as citizens of their country, Rwanda. In many ways, today’s FDLR is an exact replica of the RPF (Rwandan Patriotic Front) rebel group that invaded Rwanda from Uganda in 1990, waged war with the Rwandan government over 4 years before taking power in July 1994. The only difference is that the RPF was a Tutsi rebel group, while the FDLR is a Hutu rebel group. On the other hand, there is M23, a mixed group of Congolese and Rwandan outlaws and criminals, run by warlords from within the upper echelons of the RDF (Rwanda Defense Forces) and fully funded logistically, militarily, and financially by Rwanda to occupy and exploit the resources of eastern DRC, as documented by the U.N. Group of Experts on DRC’s Interim Report (S/2012/348) (Addendum_

(26_June_2012)FINAL.pdf). A majority of these M23 outlaws and criminals have been granted a safe haven by Rwanda almost a month after their defeat by the FARDC. That is why recent public statements by multiple U.N. officials that FDLR will be attacked, disarmed and dismantled like M23 appear misguided, because the two groups are simply not the same.

A different approach would seem best indicated in dealing with the fundamental issues at the root of the FDLR rebellion, a primarily Hutu organization being targeted for elimination by a predominantly Tutsi minority military dictatorship in Rwanda. There is a real ethnic component to this issue that cannot be ignored or over-simplified.

7. As MONUSCO’s Force Intervention Brigade, in collaboration with all countries and partner organizations involved, prepares to disarm and dismantle the FDLR in the broader context of the peace process in eastern DRC, the Great Lakes Region of Africa and in Rwanda in particular, we think it would be wise to look carefully at the contours of the evolving political realities inside Rwanda today. Since recently, there appears to be a growing radicalization of the RPF regime in Kigali against Hutus in a possible desperate effort to rally all Tutsi faithful around the regime and ward off a potential internal cracking of the ruling Tutsi coalition. In a speech at a Youth Konnect event June 30, 2013, President Kagame openly asked Hutu youths nationwide to apologize for all killings committed “in their name” by Hutus against Tutsis during the 1994 genocide, despite the fact that criminal responsibility is personal rather than collective. Similarly, following a recent two-day cabinet retreat on the theme “I am Rwandan” (Ndi Umunyarwanda) that ended Saturday November 8, 2013 in Kigali under the leadership of President Kagame, members of government made the resolution that “The genocide against Tutsis was carried out in the name of Hutus, and so, for the sake of healing the Rwandan society, it’s necessary for those in whose name genocide took place to apologize to those against whom it was carried out”, according to a press release issued by ORINFOR (Rwanda Information Office). Unfortunately, these do not appear to be edicts that can speed up reconciliation and encourage the average Hutu refugee to go back to Rwanda, let alone FDLR members whom the Rwandan government regularly accuses of “harbouring the ideology of genocide” and of wanting to “finish the job of genocide”. Rather, the general fear is that there is a re-engineering of Rwandan society underway, with a very troubling

unconfessed goal of creating a generation of second-class subservient citizens bound down by the eternal shame and guilt of genocide. All this is in addition to a well-documented situation of gross human rights violations that include persecution of political opponents whether real or perceived, arbitrary arrests and imprisonments, torture, disappearances, the stifling of the press, the hunting down of opponents in their countries of exile using death squads, etc. Clearly, this is not the kind of positive political vision that can heal scarred hearts and lead to a new united Rwanda.

8. Our PDR-Ihumure leadership - and the Rwandan political opposition in general - is fully aware of the possibilities of peace, justice, and democratic change ahead of us because of the Intervention Brigade. The idea of “direct” Peace Talks between the government of

Rwanda and the Rwandan opposition (armed and non-armed), which was first proposed by

Senator Russ Feingold in the summer of 2009 in a letter to then-Secretary of State Hillary

Clinton, and then echoed forcefully by Tanzanian President Jakaya Kikwete in May this year, before being endorsed by Belgian Deputy PM and Foreign Minister Didier Reynders, remains the best option in averting unnecessary bloodshed while putting an end to the Rwandan refugee problem and settling the Rwandan political crisis. This idea of peace talks has been called for many times by the FDLR and by the many political organizations in the opposition.

It ought to be given utmost consideration. 

9. Your Excellencies, because of its overwhelming success, we cannot tell you the immense admiration that the Force Intervention Brigade currently enjoys within not only Rwandan refugee communities across the globe but also within different communities from countries of the Great Lakes region of Africa. You should be very proud of the job you are doing. We hope MONUSCO/FIB will not mar this success or reverse its gains by making ill-advised decisions based on an incorrect reading of the exact causes of the conflict and the proper way to address them. We want to take a moment here to salute the bravery, self-less sacrifice and outstanding service of the Tanzania, South Africa, and Malawi contingents of the Intervention Brigade. We are particularly beholden to the 3 Tanzanian officers who paid the ultimate price so that peace, justice and the rule of law may reign in our region.

10. Should you need our expertise, please know that the PDR-Ihumure is more than ready to contribute our ideas and technical experts, and help define priorities in bringing to an end the long-running conflict of the Great Lakes Region of Africa in a way that guarantees the security of all ethnic groups while fostering peaceful coexistence and economic prosperity.

Sincerely,

 

Paul Rusesabagina (Signed)

President,

PDR-Ihumure


CC:

- H.E. Ban Ki-moon

Secretary General, United Nations

New York, New York

- H.E. Jacob Zuma

President of the Republic of South Africa President

Pretoria, South Africa

- H.E. Jakaya Kikwete

President of the Republic of Tanzania

Dar es Salaam, Tanzania

- H.E. Joyce Banda

President of the Republic of Malawi

Lilongwe, Malawi

- H.E. Joseph Kabila

President of the Democratic Republic of Congo

Kinshasa, DRC

- H.E. Dr. Nkosozana Dlamini Zuma

Chairperson, African Union Commission

Addis Ababa, Ethiopia

- H.E. Manuel Barroso

President, European Commission

Brussels, Belgium

- Hon. John Kerry

Secretary of State, USA

Washington, DC

- Hon. Didier Reynders

Deputy PM and Foreign Minister, Belgium

Brussels, Belgium

- Hon. William Hague

Foreign Secretary, UK

London, UK

- Dr. Stergomena Lawrence Tax

Executive Secretary, SADC

Gaborone, Botswana

- Prof. Ntumba Luaba

Executive Secretary, ICGLR

Bujumbura, Burundi

U RWANDA RWANZE KUYOBORA EAC UMWAKA UTAHA

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Umunyamabanga wa Leta muri Uganda ushinzwe ububanyi n’amahanga, Okello Oryem, yatangaje ko nyuma y’aho Leta y’u Rwanda imenyesheje ko itazafata umwanya wo kuyobora Umuryango wa Afurika y’Iburasirazuba (EAC) mu mwaka utaha kuko ari rwo rwari rutahiwe, umwanya wahise uhabwa Kenya.

Uyu muyobozi yatangarije Ibiro Ntaramakuru by’Abashinwa (Xinhua) ko u Rwanda rwamenyesheje Uganda yari ku buyobozi bwa EAC ko rufite imirimo myinshi mu mwaka utaha, ku buryo rutafata uwo mwanya.

Perezida w’u Rwanda yagombaga gufata ubuyobozi mu nama izahuza abakuru b’ibihugu bigize Umuryango wa Afurika y’Iburasirazuba (EAC) i Kampala muri Uganda ku itariki 30 Ugushyingo 2013.

Minisitiri w’ububanyi n’amahanga w’u Rwanda, Louise Mushikiwabo, yabwiye The Daily Monitor ko hari imbogamizi zibujije Leta y’u Rwanda gufata ubuyobozi bwa EAC.

Yagize ati “U Rwanda rufite ibintu byinshi bitumye duhuze, bimwe muri ibi birimo ko turimo kwitegura ukwibuka ku nshuro ya 20 Jenoside yakorewe Abatutsi mu Rwanda n’inshuro ya 20 u Rwanda ruzaba rwibohoye.”

Perezida Museveni niwe wari usanzwe ayobora uyu muryango wa EAC mu gihe cy’umwaka, umwanya yahawe mu nama yabereye muri Kenya mu mwaka ushize. U Rwanda nirwo rwagombaga guhabwa uyu mwanya kuwuyobora mu mwaka wa 2014, hagakurikiraho Tanzania, nyuma hakaza u Burundi.

Kenyatta-Uhuru2.jpgPerezida wa Kenya, Uhuru Kenyatta, azayobora EAC mu mwaka azatangira kwitaba Urukiko Mpuzamahanga Mpanabyaha rw’i La Haye ku byaha by’ubwicanyi byakurikiye amatora y’umukuru w’igihugu muri Kenya ya 2007.

Akanama gashinzwe amahoro ku isi gaherutse kwanga icyifuzo cy’Ubumwe bw’Afurika ko urubanza rwa Kenyatta rwigizwayo umwaka.

Umwanditsi wacu

http://www.rushyashya.net/amakuru/mu-mahanga/mu-rwanda/u-rwanda-rwanze-kuyobora-eac.html

LE RWANDA REFUSE LA PRÉSIDENCE DE L’EAC AU PROFIT DU KENYA

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Kigali : Le Rwanda a refusé d’assurer la présidence tournante annuelle de la Communauté est-africaine (EAC, sigle en anglais) au profit du Kenya.

Le Rwanda qui était censé relayer l’Ouganda à ce poste a déclaré son indisponibilité arguant qu’il sera occupé par les préparatifs de la vingtième commémoration du génocide des Tutsi de 1994.

C’est le Kenya qui va assurer la présidence du sommet des Chefs d’Etat de l’EAC de novembre 2013 à novembre 2014. Tandis que la Tanzanie va prendre la relève du Burundi en tant que rapporteur.

C’est ce qui ressort des conclusions d’une réunion des hauts cadres des pays de l’EAC qui se tient à Kampala, la capitale ougandaise, en prélude au conseil des ministres du 28 novembre.

L’EAC est un bloc régional qui réunit le Kenya, l’Ouganda, la Tanzanie, le Rwanda et le Burundi. Il a son siège à Arusha au nord de la Tanzanie.

Source

CPI/BEMBA - SUSPECTES DE SUBORNATION DE TEMOINS, BEMBA, SON AVOCAT ET UN DEPUTE ONT FAIT LEUR COMPARUTION INITIALE

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Arusha, 28 novembre 2013 (FH) – Suspectés de subornation de témoins, le sénateur congolais Jean-Pierre Bemba, son avocat et un député congolais ont fait leur comparution initiale mercredi après-midi devant la Cour pénale internationale (CPI).

 

 

Les actes de subornation dont ils sont soupçonnés auraient été commis, selon le procureur, dans le cadre du procès principal de Bemba, accusé devant la CPI, de crimes contre l’humanité et crimes de guerre commis en Centrafrique en 2002-2003 par des combattants de son ancienne rébellion du Mouvement de libération du Congo (MLC). Ce dernier est aujourd’hui l’une des principales forces de l’opposition politique au président Joseph Kabila.
« Je crois bien comprendre les charges qui me sont imputées mais je suis très surpris », a déclaré Jean-Pierre Bemba, également ancien vice-président de la RDC. Pour sa part, son avocat, Aimé Kilolo s’est étonné que le procureur ait choisi de le faire arrêter au lieu de le citer simplement à comparaître. « Je passe la majorité de mon temps à La Haye dans les bâtiments de la CPI où j'ai mes bureaux », a-t-il rappelé. Maître Kilolo a été arrêté le week-end, à Bruxelles, à son retour d’un voyage.
S’exprimant à son tour, le député MLC, Babala Wandu, a dénoncé les conditions de son arrestation, effectuée dimanche à 2H00 du matin par 30 policiers, sous le regard de ses enfants. Après son transfèrement à La Haye, son parti a suspendu sa participation aux travaux de l'Assemblée nationale. Babala Wandu a été directeur de cabinet de l'ex-chef rebelle Bemba lorsque ce dernier était vice-président de  RDC, de 2003 à 2006.
Après cette comparution initiale, une audience de confirmation des charges aura lieu pour  déterminer s’il y a des motifs substantiels de croire que les suspects ont commis ces crimes. Si la chambre préliminaire confirme les charges, elle renverra l’affaire devant une chambre de première instance, laquelle sera chargée de conduire la phase suivante de la procédure, à savoir le procès lui-même (pour subornation de témoins).
Deux autres suspects - Mangenda Kabongo, membre de l'équipe de défense de Bemba, et Narcisse Arido, un témoin de la défense - ont également été arrêtés pour subornation de témoins et seront transférés à la CPI à l'issue des procédures en vigueur aux Pays-Bas et en France, où ils ont été interpellés.
Ces arrestations pour subornation présumée de témoins constituent une première pour la CPI. La Cour a déjà émis un mandat d’arrêt à l’encontre d’un journaliste kényan soupçonné de subornation de témoins dans le cadre du procès du vice-président de son pays, William Ruto, mais le suspect est encore en fuite.
ER

 

© Agence Hirondelle

CPI : CERTAINS ACCUSES POURRONT COMPARAITRE PAR VIDEOCONFERENCE

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Arusha, 28 novembre 2013 (FH)  - Certains accusés de la Cour pénale internationale (CPI) pourront, sous réserve de l’autorisation des juges, comparaître par voie de vidéoconférence, selon nouvel amendement du Règlement de procédure et de preuve de la Cour.

 

 

Cette modification a été adoptée par la douzième session de l’Assemblée des Etats parties  (AEP) à la Cour, qui a clos ses travaux jeudi au siège de la CPI, à La Haye, aux Pays-Bas.

Selon cet amendement, vivent critiqué par les organisations de défense des droits de l’Homme, un accusé faisant l’objet d’une citation à comparaître peut soumettre une requête écrite à la chambre aux fins d’être autorisé à être présent par voie de la technologie vidéo pour une ou des parties de son procès.

Cet amendement reconnaît par ailleurs, quand il s’agit d’examiner des requêtes de ce genre, un statut particulier à un accusé « mandaté pour remplir des devoirs publics exceptionnels ».

Cette modification a été apportée à la demande de l’Union africaine (UA) qui a engagé un bras de fer avec la Cour suite aux procédures engagées contre le président et le vice-président du Kenya, respectivement William Ruto et Uhuru Kenyatta.

Les délégués africains ont soutenu que les dirigeants élus devaient être près de leurs administrés, surtout dans un pays comme le Kenya, aujourd’hui confronté à la menace islamiste.

« De telles décisions politiques compromettent l’indépendance de la Cour et mettent le pouvoir judiciaire dans une position délicate, pouvant l’obliger à ne pas appliquer une règle incompatible avec le Statut de Rome », a réagi Paulina Vega, vice-présidente de la Fédération internationale des ligues des droits de l’Homme (FIDH). « La FIDH et ses organisations membres resteront fortement mobilisées contre les tentatives des États de nuire à l’intégrité du Statut de Rome et des juges de la CPI », a renchéri Karim Lahidji, président de la Fédération.

Pour sa part, Amnesty International a affirmé que cet amendement met en danger « la notion d’égalité des hommes devant la justice ».

Pour de nombreux autres observateurs, les amendements adoptés pendant l’AEP érigent les exceptions en règle dans le but de répondre à une situation politique créée par l’élection, début mars 2013, de M. Kenyatta et M. Ruto.

La chambre saisie de l’affaire Kenyatta avait décidé, mardi, à la veille de l’adoption de ces amendements, que le président  ne pourrait être absent à son procès que dans des circonstances exceptionnelles, et que cette autorisation n’était pas une règle.

ER

 

© Agence Hirondelle


Mme ESPERANCE MUKASHEMA ARASABA PREZIDA KAGAME NA IBINGIRA GUSABA IMBABAZI MU IZINA RY'ABATUTSI

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BISHE-UMUMALAYIKA-copier.jpgNyakubahwa perezida,

Maze kubona gahunda watangije hamwe n'umufasha wawe mwise "Ndi Umunyarwanda", ndagusaba ibi bikulikira :

Nk'umukuru w'igihugu ni byiza ko watanga urugero rwiza. Urasaba ubwoko bw'abahutu gusaba imbabazi mu izina ry'abahutu kandi ubundi icyaha ni gatozi. 

 Ese waba witeguye gusaba imbabazi mu izina ry'abatutsi ko nawe wakoze ubwicanyi?

Urugero :

Nyakubahwa perezida,

Hali ubwicanyi bwakozwe i Gakurazo aho Abihayimana bishwe hamwe n'umwana wange Sheja w'igitambambuga. Ubwo bwicanyi bukaba bwarakozwe na jenerali Ibingira ku mabwiriza wamuhaye.

Ibingira ni umututsi, nawe nyakubahwa perezida uli umututsi nubwo mwabanje kuvuga ko mu Rwana nta moko abaho, aliko kuko ubu alimwe mubigaruye reka twongere tubivugeho.

Kubera ko nk'umukuru w'igihugu ali wowe ugomba gutanga urugero rwiza, nagusabaga kujya imbere y'abanyarwanda ugasaba imbabazi iliya miryango y'abihaye Imana, nange ukansaba imbabazi, izo mbabazi ukazazisaba mu izina ry'abatutsi bakoze ubwicanyi ukabikorana na Ibingira. Ndagukangulira gusaba izo mbabazi kuko nawe ukangulira abahutu gusaba imbabazi mubyo abahutu bagenzi babo bakoze.

Nyakubahwa perezida,

Nutanga urwo rugero uzabarwa mu ntwali. Kandi niteguye kukubabalira kuko ijya gutera uburezi irabwibanza.

Mugire amahoro Y'Imana.

 

Mukashema Esperance.

 

 

RWANDAN GENERALS ACCUSED OF WAR CRIMES IN UN EMPLOY

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By Judi Rever -Rwanda witness

Judi-Rever.jpgWhy did the United Nations choose men alleged to have supervised death squads to head peacekeeping forces in Darfur and Mali? The activities of Lieutenant General PatrickNyamvumba and Major General Jean Bosco Kazura in eastern Rwanda shed light on what their victorious army did during the 1994 genocide and for years to come. 

Nyamvumba’s battalion hunted down massive numbers of Hutu civilians, killing and burning them in Akagera Park, according to a dozen former RPA soldiers and other witnesses.

His deputy commander during the genocide, Jean Bosco Kazura, helped comb the countryside, eliminating thousands of men, women and children, soldiers allege.

A UN court had sufficient evidence to indict Nyamvumba but declined to do so, a UN official says

Highly secretive and organized killings were ordered by RPF leader Paul Kagame, a lengthy investigation has found

The UN says it is now taking the information seriously and assessing it.

BRUSSELS - Joseph Matata, a Rwandan farmer who became a human rights activist, was in Belgium in April 1994 when the genocide began.  But his children and ethnic Tutsi wife were at home in Murambi. a village on Rwanda’s eastern border. At dawn on April 12, a militia of Hutu extremists known as the Interahamwe arrived at their house looking for blood. The attackers quickly forced the family outdoors and sliced his wife’s back with a machete. They then went after Matata’s 12-year-old daughter, cutting her neck and face. The girl fell to the ground and lapsed into a coma. A Hutu neighbor named John intervened as the militia started beating three other children with clubs. When the attackers thought they’d killed two Tutsis, they decided to move on.

With the help of a local gendarme who knew the family, John managed to get Matata’s wife and daughter to the nearest hospital, while his remaining children found refuge with another neighbor who kept them safe by paying off marauding bands of killers.

A week later, the Rwandan Patriotic Army (RPA)– a Tutsi rebel army that routed Hutu extremists and seized power – swept into Murambi and brought Matata’s wife and daughter to a more equipped hospital in neighboring Gahini, a village in the commune of Rukara, on the shores of Lake Muhazi.

“For that, I have to thank the RPF,” Matata said dryly at a restaurant in central Brussels, referring to the Rwandan Patriotic Front, (RPF) the political wing of the RPA and current ruling party of Rwanda.

When the RPF formed an emergency coalition government in late July at the end of the genocide, flights resumed to the country and Matata was finally able to get home. He headed straight to Gahini to pick up his wife and daughter, who had temporarily moved into a house near the hospital that had nursed them back to health.

It was then that Matata heard a litany of other horrors that had occurred in Gahini and in villages throughout the prefectures of Kibungo and Byumba. Civilians began to tell him stories about systematic killings of Hutus perpetrated by the RPA, the victorious army that had supposedly halted the genocide.

“I was grateful to the RPF for helping my family but I couldn’t ignore what I was hearing,” Matata said, unable to finish the same glass of Leffe beer over our three-hour encounter.  “As someone who believed in human rights I felt obliged to investigate the allegations.”                                           

In the 1970s and early 1980s, Matata — a voluble yet linguistically precise man — worked at the National Bank of Rwanda in Kigali and became critical of the former Hutu regime and one-party rule of President Juvenal Habyarimana. He later moved to Murambi and opened an agricultural business. In November 1990 when the RPA first invaded northern Rwanda from Uganda, he was accused of aiding the RPF, a charge he denied, and was briefly thrown in jail. By 1991, he became a founding member of ARDHO, the Rwandan Association for the Defense of Human Rights and would later head CLIIR, the Brussels-based Centre to Fight Impunity and Injustice in Rwanda, where he’s become a tireless chronicler of the complex, unrepentantly violent history of Rwanda.

The 58-year-old Rwandan of mixed ethnicity stages weekly protests outside the Rwandan embassy in Brussels and issues missives condemning disappearances and arrests in his homeland, incidents largely ignored by organizations such as Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International. He has become, among Belgium’s curious sanctum of Rwandan exiles, a lawful Zorro-like figure and a one-man support network for Hutus and Tutsis behind bars or in flight.

Matata did not last long in Rwanda under the Rwandan Patriotic Front, whose power was just beginning to flourish amid the ruins of war in July 1994. Within days of his return from Belgium to Rwanda, he interviewed dozens of villagers in Gahini and other sectors, many who would later disappear. He also visited 10 mass graves in the towns of Muhazi, Kayonza and Kabarondo. Some of the bodies of Hutus in those graves were later burned or brought to mass graves containing Tutsis killed by the Interahamwe before the RPA arrived.

A witness that assisted him with the probe was one of Matata’s former employees on a farm he owned in Murambi. This man, a Tutsi, had the ghastly job of transporting corpses for the RPA in afougonnette – a kind of African taxi minibus – to mass graves.

“This man worked for the RPA. He had to carry corpses in a vehicle the RPA had seized. The work was done quickly,” Matata said.

“He was traumatized. Sometimes the victims loaded into the taxi weren’t even dead. They would still be moaning and crying.”

The employee in question — whom Matata described as a sensitive person –eventually had problems with the RPF and was forced to flee the country.

In Matata’s initial investigation, witnesses described how the RPA combed the hillside. “The RPA hunted people down like they would rabbit or other prey. The soldiers did clean-up operations in the hills. They went from house to house, shooting people.” Sometimes they used grenades, he said.

Some people hid in banana groves or escaped to the adjacent forest, the Akagera National Park.

“Quite a few victims would see the soldiers coming and throw themselves into the lake and drown.”

The RPA also used another method — one of entrapment — to kill larger groups of people.

“They asked people to gather in certain areas, in schools and markets. Those who showed up at these meetings were given cooking equipment, clothes and food. These people were told to spread the word about other meetings. When larger groups of people showed up the RPA used grenades or guns to kill them.”

Matata contends the RPA called Hutus to meetings and slaughtered them in other areas of the country as well. “The massacres were intensive and massive.”

Matata was unable to complete a full investigation in Kibungo — with names and numbers of victims — because his life was threatened on several occasions. Within weeks he returned to Kigali and was forced in early 1995 to leave Rwanda for good. Nevertheless, his truncated work was eventually bolstered by the findings of a man named Robert Gersony.

Gersony, a consultant with extensive experience in African war zones, was hired by the United Nations to conduct a survey on the feasibility of Rwandan refugees returning to their homes after the genocide. Like many who descended on Rwanda in the aftermath of genocide, Gersony and his team were initially sympathetic to the RPF, and were granted access to 91 sites in more than 40 communes around the country. They conducted interviews with 200 individuals and held another 100 small group discussions.

But what they found was disturbing enough to throw the United Nations into complete disarray, findings that necessitated nothing sort of a paradigm shift in international agency thought.

 In September 1994, Gersony’s team discovered RPA soldiers appeared to have carried out genocide against Hutu civilians.

A US State Department cable dealing with Gersony’s findings was sent to then US Ambassador to the United Nations, Madeleine Albright, and US embassies in the region. The cable, dated September 1994, read: “(Hutu) refugees were called for meetings on peace and security. Once gathered, the RPA would move in and carry out the killing. In addition to group killings, house-to-house searches were conducted; individuals hiding out in the swamps were hunted; returnees as well as the sick, the elderly, the young and males between 18-40 (years old) were victims. So many civilians were killed that burial of bodies is a problem. In some villages, the team estimated that 10,000 or more a month have killed since April.”

Another cable sent by the UN peace monitoring mission, UNAMIR, quoted Gersony using stronger language to describe the crimes committed by the RPA against Hutus.

“Gersony put forward evidence of what he described as calculated, pre-planned, systematic atrocities and genocide against Hutus by the RPA whose methodology and scale, he concluded, (30,000 massacres) could only have been part of a plan implemented as a policy from the highest echelons of the government. In his view, these were not individual cases of revenge and summary trials but a pre-planned, systematic genocide against the Hutus. Gersony staked his 25-year reputation on his conclusions which he recognized were diametrically opposite to the assumptions made, so far, by the UN and the international community.”

The authenticity of the UNAMIR cable has been confirmed by two individuals: an ICTR lawyer and a person who took part in discussions of Gersony’s findings.

The cable, indexed and used as evidence at the UN International Criminal Court for Rwanda (ICTR), was written by UNAMIR official Shaharyar Khan and was sent to UN peacekeeping chief at the time, Kofi Annan. Khan went on to say that he did not believe the killings were part of a ‘pre-ordained, systematic massacre ordered from the top’ but admitted that the UN was now ‘engaged in a damage limitation exercise.”

The United Nations and the United States chose political subterfuge. Gersony’s field notes were ultimately buried in a concerted effort to protect the post genocide government led by Paul Kagame.  No further investigations were ever pursued, and those suspected of being behind the slaughter of innocents were never questioned.                                                       *

Before he left Rwanda, Matata tried to ascertain who was responsible for the slaughter, at least on a local level. In due course he discovered that authority emanated from a lieutenant colonel that would later go on to lead the world’s biggest UN peacekeeping operation.

“That commander was Patrick Nyamvumba,” Matata said ruefully. “The soldiers who massacred civilians were under his responsibility.”

Today, Lt General Nyamvumba is a highly respected figure on the international military stage, and currently Rwanda’s chief of defense staff.  In 2009, UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon appointed him commander of the UN/African Union hybrid Mission in Darfur (UNAMID), a post he held until June this year, when Ban praised the general for his “dedication and invaluable service” provided over four years.

Rwanda has four battalions deployed in UNAMID, the world’s largest and arguably most important peacekeeping mission at an estimated 22,000 international troops. The country’s crucial contribution to peacekeeping in an unstable but politically important region such as Sudan has provided Kigali with prestige in the hallowed halls of the United Nations, according to analysts. Indeed, in October 2012, Rwanda secured a rotating seat on the UN Security Council  – and is generally accustomed to receiving cover against allegations of serious breaches in humanitarian law at home and in neighboring Democratic Republic of Congo.

So how did Lt General Nyamvumba rise to the highest echelons of Rwanda’s prodigious military? And more importantly how was he chosen as a chief peacekeeper by the United Nations, a global body whose enshrining principles are based on international law and security? And how did Nyamvumba’s comrade-in-arms, General Jean Bosco Kazura, come to secure his role in June as force commander of the UN’s newly created peacekeeping force in Mali, MINUSMA? Just who is Kazura, and how did this Tutsi officer originally from Burundi rise to prominence within the RPA?

Over the last several months, a dozen former RPA soldiers and officers in Africa, Europe and North America have quietly agreed to share their knowledge of what these men did two decades ago along a swathe of Rwandan territory that stretched from the border of Uganda to that of Tanzania. And another young man — a Tutsi genocide survivor who was a teenager at the time – has related chilling memories of Nyamvumba and some of his men operating in an area on the western rim of the Lake Victoria basin, a seemingly primeval paradise of red rutted paths, papyrus reeds and bourbon coffee trees that belies its history as a killing ground.

Kamanzi, the witness in question, has a luminous face and a reluctantly determined demeanor. In late April 1994, because he knew some of the young Tutsi soldiers based in Gahini, he was entrusted with collecting livestock on abandoned properties seized by the RPA. He remembers Nyamvumba as a pleasant man who walked with a limp. “He presented well. He was calm and often smiling. He was the ground commander. But soldiers were definitely comfortable around him.” 

Nyamvumba, whom Kamanzi called the colonel, often stayed in the most beautiful house in Gahini overlooking Lake Muhazi — the first dwelling on the left on a road leading to the top of the hill. The witness went to Nyamvumba’s residence several times when he was there.  It was customary for young women to be milling around; one well-known girl became Nyamvumba’s girlfriend.

Kamanzi regularly accompanied soldiers when they ransacked buildings, grabbing merchandise, food and money. “It was wartime. We were trying to get by,” he explained.

But it was during operations, going house-to-house and into the fields — the teenager saw first hand what the soldiers’ actual objectives were. Over a period of two months, from late April onward, Kamanzi accompanied soldiers on their missions at least two or three times a week. The soldiers referred to the work as screening or cleaning out the enemy.

“I saw soldiers kill people. Sometimes I stayed back in the vehicle because I really did not want to see what was happening,” he said. “I was frightened to see someone killed in front of me.”

The soldiers, many of them barely out of their teens, called the unarmed Hutus Interahamwe.

“But what is sad is that these were villagers,” he explained. “They weren’t Interahamwe. Many of them were working in the fields. Sometimes the parents had fled and children were left at home alone. Unfortunately the soldiers killed the children.”

Kamanzi remembers one traumatic incident early on, in a village near the Akagera park.

“We went into a house. No one was there except a little girl about five years old. The soldiers asked her where her parents were. She told them they had gone into the fields. A few of us headed back to our vehicle but one soldier stayed behind. After a few seconds I heard a gunshot.”

 “The soldier shot her dead. He later told me she was the daughter of an Interahamwe. He didn’t even think that she was just a little girl.”

              “At that point I wondered: did these people come to save us?”

Colonel Nyamvumba rarely accompanied soldiers during operations. But there was one incident, Kamanzi recalled, where they’d received word that Hutus in a particular village might be armed. On that day, the ground commander, his escorts and a team of soldiers went in separate vehicles to the location, eventually surrounding a property there. Kamanzi went along too. Nyamvumba gave orders in Swahili, a language the teenager did not understand, and he and Nyamvumba stayed behind a few metres while soldiers fired shots for an extended period of time. Like in every mission he was privy to, there was no combat; soldiers just proceeded to kill.

Former soldiers and officers explained that before April 1994, Nyamvumba had been a middle ranking officer with very little if any command experience; he was above all the chief instructor of the RPA’s training wing, which shifted from the Gatunda township near the Ugandan border to Gabiro at the edge of the Akagera Park after the genocide was unleashed. The battalion that was created under his direction to euphemistically screen, mop up, or comb the hillsides of Hutu civilians was considered highly clandestine. Oscar operated in areas already cleared of insurgents, in the rear of the RPA’s 157th mobile force led by the notorious Fred Ibingira, now a Lt. General, and the 7th brigade under William Bagire.

Sources interviewed for this story said Nyamvumba supervised this battalion, which consisted of several companies of young soldiers drawn principally from RPA’s High Command – consisting of Kagame’s escorts — and soldiers from the training wing.  Nyamvumba received direct instructions from Kagame, according to senior officers familiar with the operations.

The operations were conceived, planned and coordinated by Kagame and the Directorate of Military Intelligence (DMI), along with intelligence staff from High Command and the training wing, officers alleged.

The intelligence officer that worked directly for Kagame was Silas Udahemuka, who helped coordinate operations. Udahehumka was assisted by three other Kagame escorts: Innocent Gasana, Jackson Mugisha, and Charles Matungo.

At the time, DMI was headed by Kayumba Nyamwasa, long considered second to Kagame in Rwanda’s military hierarchy. General Nyamwasa fell out with his boss in 2010, fled to South Africa and survived an assassination attempt by suspected Rwandan agents. He declined to be interviewed for this article.

Another central figure from DMI that helped execute was Jackson Rwahama. He advised, inspected and attended secret meetings, officers explained. “Rwahama was a senior killer from the Ugandan army, had worked in intelligence for Idi Amin,” one officer said, referring to Uganda’s ruthless dictator during the 1970s whose regime was marked by egregious human rights abuses and political repression. 

“Rwahama helped coordinate the killings. Remember Nyamvumba was young at the time and had little experience. They asked themselves ‘how are we going to kill a lot of people in a short period of time before anyone knows about it?’ Rwahama was the best person to plan this,” the officer confided.

Officers and soldiers confirmed that in addition to working alongside DMI in a scheme to clear Hutus from these prefectures, Nyamvumba had at least three deputy commanders overseeing death squads. They were John Birasa, Emmanuel Butera and Jean Bosco Kazura.

By all accounts, Kazura was an intellectual with a passion for soccer and little battle experience apart from briefly serving in a battalion known as Delta Mobile. Originally from Burundi, he spoke fluent French, English and Kinyarwanda, was commissioned in 1992 and joined RPA High Command where he became a translator for Kagame, regularly listening to Radio France Internationale and greeting important visitors that came to see Kagame and RPF chairman Alex Kanyarengwe at Arusha House at the RPF’s military base, Mulindi, before the genocide.

But as soon as former Hutu President Juvenal Habyarimana’s plane was shot down by a surface-to-air missile on April 6th 1994, Kazura was catapulted into new, deadlier terrain.

Immediately after the assassination – which would ignite the genocide and spark a killing frenzy predominantly against Tutsi civilians — Nyamvumba left the Karama training wing near the Ugandan border, along with intelligence staff and several nominees of the main rank and file there. The intelligence staff that went with Nyamvumba were Dan Munyuza, Rwakabi Kakira and Kalemara alias Kiboko. Leaving his official job as chief instructor, Nyamvumba and his men ‘started to sweep’ from Gatunda and on to Ngarama, where they would make a temporary base.

According to testimony, some of the first operations began along the eastern border of the demilitarized zone, where the RPA had an upper hand in the pre-genocide war of invasion. The RPF had lured Hutu peasants in this area, with promises of salt, sugar, medicine and other basic necessities. These were some of the first people to be caught and killed in the RPA’s snare.

By the end of April, the training wing – ostensibly run by Nyamvumba — was relocated to Gabiro, at the edge of Akagera, a park originally spanning 2,500 square kilometres comprised of swamp, savannah and mountains.

His Oscar battalion – as it eventually would be called — grew in small numbers to an estimated 800 soldiers as the genocide wore on, with new waves of Tutsi passouts from within Rwanda and surrounding countries. The force would eventually be sent across the prefectures of Byumba and Kibungo; localities targeted included Muvumba, Ngarama, Gituza, Bwisige, Muhura, Murambi then on to Kibungo.

Kazura, at the time in High Command and known to be close to Kagame, became deputy commander of these operations, initially in Byumba. Then, sources say, Kazura’s and Nyaumvumba’s men advanced toward Kibungo town, to Kanyonza, Kabarondo and Rukira.

“The soldiers did this job deliberately,” said David, a former RPA officer.

David is a loquacious, middle-aged Rwandan Tutsi living in exile. When he’s not talking about Rwanda, his manner shifts easily between jovial and ironic. Surprisingly, like so many Rwandans who’ve endured the horror of genocide, his face betrays little of the emotional scars that lie underneath. But his expressions change quickly. When he speaks of the crimes that unfolded around him in eastern Rwanda, his mouth contorts and his brow twists in trenches.

“The soldiers were digging mass graves. They had the manpower to dig, to burn,” David said. “There were some serial killers, people who were trained just to kill, to exterminate. Others were there to see and get rid of the dead.”

The RPA would kill small groups of Hutus on the spot, he explained. But with larger groups, attempts to separate them were made. Many were brought by trucks to killing grounds in Akagera and were later shot or stabbed. Some were starved for days then killed with hammers and hoes.

One of the main killing centres was Nasho next to a lake of the same name, on the park’s southern flank. The commanders moved around, depending on the magnitude of operations.

“Kazura was at times in Nasho overseeing those killings. Sometimes John Birasa was there with Nyamvumba, who was working under Kagame’s orders,” David pointed out. “This was something they were trying to do in secret, not to alert other troops in the main fighting battalions.”

One of the first killing spots was at Gabiro at the House of Habyarimana – a guest lodge of more than 200 rooms that had once been the home of Rwanda’s king — used by the RPF for screening, identifying and eliminating Hutus, as soon as the genocide started.

Other known killing grounds were located between five and 10 kilometres from Gabiro deeper in the park, and at Rwata, some 30 kilometres from Gabiro toward the Akagera River.

 “From Gabiro, Hutus could not escape; they were surrounded by soldiers. They were thrown into mass graves dug with bulldozers. Then soldiers started shooting at them,” an intelligence officer that received daily reports of the operations said.

“Lt Colonel Nyamvumba was from Gabiro and was the commander of that operation,” he confirmed.

This officer estimates that thousands of people died in this manner. He said anywhere between 100 to 200 people were put onto lorries, and between 5 and 10 trucks went through Gabiro deeper into the park daily – at night — for months.

Gabiro had the logistics: bulldozers for digging, stocks of diesel and petrol to burn corpses, and acid to dissolve the victims’ remains. The ashes were then mixed with soil or placed into lakes in the park, according to sources.

By June, at the height of the genocide, Kazura was in Rwamagana in Kibungo, east of the capital. A soldier in High Command said Kazura was an operational commander of about 100 soldiers that hunted down civilians, killed them and dumped them in a pit in neighboring Rutonde.

“Kazura was personally involved in carrying out and commanding and overseeing those operations of hunting down and rounding up civilians, bringing them to a detention house and taking them to the killing site,” said the soldier, who was present during the murders.

In one incident, Hutu women and children that had taken refuge in a Catholic church in Rwamagana were taken to Rutonde, where they massacred and thrown into a pit with Tutsi victims that had been killed by Interahamwe earlier in the genocide, he noted.

Other people, including men, were captured in neighboring areas and eventually detained at a petrol station, before being killed and buried in the pit.

 “Women’s arms were tied behind their backs with their pagnes (wraparound garments) and men were tied with their shirts. They were taken to a detention centre at the petrol station in Rwamagana. In the evening they were killed at the station or were taken to the pit and killed there,” the soldier described.

The soldier estimated that at least 600 people were killed in this manner in Rwamagana alone, and more than 2000 in total from outlying areas.

Another soldier said by early July, Kazura was moving around, coming to Rwamagana several times a week with his white Land Cruiser. He stayed at the Dereva Hotel, a kind of guesthouse where he had access to girlfriends and alcohol. It was known that Kazura had  “special forces” at his disposal.

The soldier, a quiet, self-assured man named Damas, confirmed that Rwamagana had become a microcosm of detention and killing throughout the genocide. Damas was on site in July when soldiers at the gendarmerie killed an estimated 200 Hutu men with guns and small hoes. Many of the Hutus had their arms and hands tied behind their backs. Some of them were already dead from being shot while they were rounded up in their home areas.

Damas has vivid memories of the slaughter, which took place under the cover of night in a tent sent up in the compound of the Rwamagana gendarmerie barracks.

 “No one could say no when it was happening or that it had to stop,” he said. “On a personal level, it was shocking, but we were in a killing situation.”

The victims were later loaded onto three Mercedes trucks and brought to the Akagera Park. “After it was over, one soldier said aloud: ‘Not all of these bastards are killers. We didn’t have to kill all of them! The soldier was then struck in the head with a hoe and brought to a hospital.”

Damas said Kazura was not present during the slaughter that night, and that forces carrying out the killings were part of the regular army under a major named Gahigana.

Sources said that as the genocide wound down, both Kazura and Nyamvumba were known to have overseen the transport of Hutu refugees back into Rwanda from camps in Tanzania where they had fled. In one instance, an officer witnessed Kazura directing operations in which an estimated 120 woman and children were promised food, supplies and a peaceful return home. They were put on trucks at Benako, a town on the Tanzania border, and brought to Rwanteru, Rwanda, where they were killed, according to the officer.

“I was there when they were collected in trucks. Most of them were ladies and children. The men were very few,” the officer explained. “These people were killed under the command of Kazura. They were killed with hoes in Rwanteru.”

Many refugees that escaped to Tanzania at the time later refused to go back home. Some survivors of those attacks gave testimony for this article. One refugee said RPA soldiers arrived in his village in the commune Gituza on April 9th. “It was early in the morning.  The entire population started to run as soon as they saw RPF troops. I saw wounded people trying to get away. I made the decision to flee with my family.”

The refugee, his wife and three sons ran south along the Kayonza-Kagitunda road to Mirambi then onto Rukara, finally settling at a place called the Karambi Trading Centre where many other displaced Hutus had sought refuge. But the location was quickly overtaken by RPA troops. At that point his life would change forever.

“On April 19th, we were surrounded. The RPF told us they’d bring us back home. The next day, two lines of soldiers arrived. They escorted us to a bean garden behind the trading centre and started to fire on us.”

The refugee said the shooting lasted between 5 and 10 minutes before the soldiers began reloading ammunition. As his three young sons and wife lay in a pool of blood, the refugee ran for his life to the park, wounded in the forehead, buttocks and stomach.

“In the end, I was not able to bury my family,” he lamented.

                                                          *

In conjunction with sweeping operations aimed at exterminating Hutus in the northern communes of Byumba, death squads run by DMI were pounding neighboring localities such as Giti and Rutare.

A confidential, 55-page document from the ICTR outlines a macabre and highly organized operation in these two areas, where a contingent of 100 DMI troops led by Jackson Rwahama rounded up countless Hutus before slaughtering them with grenades, guns or hoes, between April 17 and 25.

A witness who worked for DMI at the time said the operations conducted in Rutare and Giti were held on the heels of meetings with Kayumba Nyamwasa, then DMI chief.

The witness said soldiers initially undertook patrols throughout Rutare, where they arrested entire Hutu families, stole their belongings before “eliminating them with hoes, known as agafuni.”

The killings were directly supervised by Sgt Tharcisse Idahemuka, according to the witness, who was present at the time.

Hutu intellectuals were particularly targeted. “Eliminating the maximum number of Hutu intellectuals was a priority because these people posed an immediate and future threat of exposing the truth regarding RPF activities. And the death of these intellectuals would weaken the potential for political parties in the short or long term,” the witness said.

In another incident described by the witness, Colonel Rwahama and Jack Nziza, then a major, intercepted Hutu civilians on their way to a displacement camp. The two men oversaw patrols that led the Hutus to a series of houses on a nearby hill surrounded by a banana plantation and a forest.

With Kalashnikov wielding soldiers standing guard outside, DMI troops unleashed grenades inside the houses, killing between 300 and 400 people, according to the witness, who expressed remorse for his role in the violence.

“It was horrible to see.  Corpses were completely calcified. There were no survivors.”

The witness said the orders to carry out these grisly operations came from Nyamwasa. Individuals with roles in the operation were also named, and included Jean-Jacques Mupenzi, Habass Musonera and Joseph Zabamwita.

Within days the DMI contingent would move on to Giti, where soldiers proceeded to round up prisoners — mostly men — and slaughter them in the house of a former bourgmestre.  The witness remembered the victims’ skulls being smashed by hoes and ‘brain matter all over the floor.’

DMI would continue to kill waves of displaced Hutus streaming into Giti from other areas, separating them from Tutsi families who were given the grim task of digging graves and were nicknamed Tiger Force. A corporal named Emmnauel Nkuranga was in charge of eliminating Hutu prisoners, according to the witness.

He also stated the RPF held meetings in neighboring communes to persuade people hiding in the bush to go home, where they were eventually murdered, and that young Hutu men whose families had been opposed to the Habyarimana regime joined RPA ranks but were later killed. Truckloads of Hutus rounded up on military trucks also passed through Giti on their way to Gabiro, where they would ‘simply be eliminated.’

At the time, Gabiro was still nominally run by Nyamvumba, who would return to the barracks to check on waves of new recruits. The military barracks was 36-square-kilometres and like other areas in Akagera, was off-limits to UNAMIR and NGOs, ostensibly because Kagame’s army needed to remove anti-personnel mines in the area.

Several officers and soldiers contend that immediately after the genocide and in the years that followed, Nyamvumba and Kazura worked alongside DMI supervising the screening of Hutu men rounded up at night or recruited from all over Rwanda, in particular from Gitarama, Kibuye, Gikongoro, Cyangugu, Gisenyi and Ruhengeri, to be eliminated at Akagera and in Nyungwe forest in southwestern Rwanda.

“Nyamvumba was chief coordinator of those operations because after all he had already done it. He was critical,” said an officer.  

Another officer who worked in intelligence had a slightly nuanced view: “Right after the genocide, Nyamvumba wasn’t the one looking for those recruits,” he said, noting that brigades led by notoriously violent commanders such as Ibingira killed or rounded up Hutu civilians post genocide.

“But these people were eliminated from the training wing, which Nyamvumba was in charge of, so yes he shared responsibility for what was taking place,” the officer added.

A soldier at Camp Garde Presidentielle (GP) in Kigali witnessed Kazura’s participation in these operations in 1995, as well.

“Kazura was involved in taking people in lorries from Kigali to Gabiro. Those people were young Hutu men that were lured into military training from all over the country then taken to Kigali, to Camp GP,” he said, adding: “Kazura was personally involved in transporting the recruits.”

“And then those men were taken to Gabiro where they were killed and burned near the training wing, at a place called New Camp, near the house of the former king of Rwanda.”

Some of these young men died on their way to Gabiro, which by then had earned its reputation as a bona fide death factory, not unlike the Nazi extermination camp Auschwitz-Birkenau yet much smaller and without the labor.

“Many were taken in containers in trucks and died en route. They died of suffocation,” he explained.

In 1996, the Tutsi soldier in question was in Gabiro for training where Hutus were still being brought to the barracks, and witnessed Kazura, Nyamvumba and key members of DMI on site.

“Kazura, Nyamvumba, Jack Nziza and Nyamwasa were personally involved in killing and supervising the burning of bodies,” the soldier said grimly.

This testimony is strengthened, to some degree, by an ICTR official who requested anonymity but disclosed that Kagame’s and Nyamwasa’s hands have been “covered in blood” for decades.

In an interview, the official said the ICTR Office of the Prosecutor had enough evidence to indict Kagame, Nyamwasa, Nyamvumba and others ‘several times over” but was unwilling to do so because of political interference within the office itself, and by the United States, a staunch ally of the Rwandan president.

The ICTR official said witnesses brought forward evidence against Nyamvumba for his role in killings in the east, and against Kazura with respect to his role in transporting and eliminating Hutu recruits.

The ICTR, whose mandate has been to try genocide suspects for crimes committed in 1994, is winding down operations. Yet it has not prosecuted a single member of Kagame’s regime.

Despite ICTR evidence of alleged activities of Kazura and Nyamvumba, the United Nations Department of Peacekeeping Operations (DPKO) confirmed unequivocally that it had indeed screened Kazura before choosing him as UN force commander in Mali this year.

 The United Nations applied the human rights screening policy in the appointment of General Kazura to the position of Force Commander for the United Nations Integrated Mission in Mali,”  Kieran Dwyer, DPKO chief of public affairs, said in a statement.

Officials refused to discuss how DPKO specifically screened Kazura or Nyamvumba for their jobs as chief peacekeepers. Requests this month to interview Kazura — and Nyamvumba in 2012 — were not facilitated by the UN.

Yet Dwyer admitted this new information would be taken seriously.

The material provided contains new information. The United Nations takes this information seriously, and will thoroughly assess the information in accordance with the human rights screening policy,” the UN official went on to say.

In 2008, the United Nations was drawn into a human rights debacle after deciding to renew the mandate of another Rwandan General, Emmanuel Karake Karenzi, who was deputy commander of UNAMID, despite a Spanish indictment against him for war crimes committed against Hutus in the 1990s.

In February 2008, Spanish magistrate Fernando Andreu Merelles issued an indictment against 40 Rwandan officials, including Karake and Nyamwasa, for crimes committed against Hutus during and after the genocide.

 Nyamvumba himself was cited in the 2008 indictment as having played a role in massacres against Hutu civilians in Murambi, Kizimbo and Kigali Rural, although no indictment was actually issued against him, because more evidence was needed.

“A witness said Nyamvumba was heavily involved in the operations of massacres in these three areas,” confirmed Jordi Palou-Loverdos, a lawyer representing victims in Spain’s special court for serious crimes.

Another witness, also a top RPA lieutenant, provided evidence against Nyamvumba to the magistrate, he pointed out, adding that investigations were continuing in the case.

“The Spanish court is continuing to gather complementary evidence of international crimes committed in Rwanda and in the Democratic Republic of Congo. The research is ongoing,” Palou-Loverdos said.

Kagame himself — who is lauded for defeating Hutu extremists responsible for killing more than half a million Tutsis and moderate Hutus during the genocide — enjoys immunity from prosecution because the Spanish court does not have jurisdiction to indict a head of state.

But Spain has sufficient evidence implicating the Rwandan president in having a command role in large-scale massacres of Hutu civilians in the Rwandan towns of Byumba and Kibeho, in the murder of Rwandan bishops, Spanish missionaries and Spanish aid workers, and in the slaughter of Rwandan and Congolese Hutu refugees in the DRC in the 1990s, according to Palou-Loverdos.

“In most of these cases, we know very positively from key former RPF soldiers that there was a radio call directly from Mr Kagame to his subordinate commanders to do the work,” the lawyer said.

“The witnesses have testified that there were strict instructions that these decisions could only be taken by Mr. Kagame,” Palou-Loverdos added.

Despite Matata’s own investigation into RPA killings in Kibungo in 1994, he was not surprised that the UN caved into Kagame’s wishes to appoint Nyamvumba in 2009 as UNAMID chief.

“I barely reacted when the decision was announced,” Matata said. “But I admit that it is disheartening to see the RPF’s army in a peacekeeping force. How do killers ensure peace? These soldiers are implicated in crimes in Rwanda and the Congo, but the UN refuses to listen.”

 “We just can’t seem to get the message across.”

For Damas, the issue runs deeper. “We make the Rwandan government powerful because we don’t speak out.”

The Tutsi soldier — who lost most of his family to Hutu extremists during the genocide — said he’s ashamed to call himself Rwandan. And yet he is adamant about one thing: “I want people to know about these hidden crimes. The ball is in our court to tell the truth and say what we know.”

“We need a better future for our country; we have to tell our children what really happened.”

 

 

 

 

DR DENIS MUKWEGE, UN MÉDECIN CONTRE LE VIOL, ARME DE GUERRE À L’EST DE LA RD CONGO

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« Aujourd’hui, les Congolaises et les Congolais n’ont ni la paix ni la justice »

Denis Mukwege, médecin et directeur d’hôpital à l’est de la République démocratique du Congo

Jeudi 21 novembre, au musée du Quai Branly

Fils de pasteur, Denis Mukwege n’a jamais cessé de prendre soin du corps de ses semblables, et sans doute aussi, intimement, de leur âme. Médecin gynécologue, il a été conduit à se spécialiser dans la chirurgie réparatrice, du fait du très grand nombre de femmes victimes de viols dans la région où il opère, à l’est de la République démocratique du Congo (RD Congo). La guerre n’a en effet quasiment pas cessé depuis 17 ans dans les deux provinces du Kivu, voisines du Rwanda, du fait des tensions ethniques et du chaos entretenu par des hommes d’affaires et des dirigeants locaux et internationaux, qui veulent exploiter en toute impunité les richesses de la région.

Le viol est en effet devenu une arme de guerre

Installé à Bukavu, après des études à Angers, Denis Mukwege y a fondé en 1999 l’hôpital de Panzi, avec le soutien d’une ONG suédoise. Cet établissement est devenu au fil des ans le point de ralliement d’innombrables femmes victimes de la destruction volontaire et planifiée de leurs organes génitaux. Dans les deux provinces du Kivu, le viol est en effet devenu une arme de guerre utilisée par plusieurs groupes armés. Plus de 40 000 femmes ont été gratuitement prises en charge en 14 ans à  l’hôpital de Panzi, avec des soins chirurgicaux et une prise en charge psychologique. Un cycle de formation d’infirmiers et de médecins spécialisés a aussi été mis en place.

Attaqué dans sa maison

Depuis quelques années, Denis Mukwege a aussi décidé de prendre publiquement la parole pour attirer l’attention sur ce cycle atroce de violences et en dénoncer les responsables. S’exposant à des représailles, il a été attaqué le 25 octobre 2011 par des individus qui se sont introduit chez lui, tuant une personne qui s’interposait. Il vit depuis, avec sa famille, au sein de l’hôpital.

Un prix remis en présence de Jacques Chirac et François Hollande

Bénéficiant d’un soutien croissant sur la scène internationale, Denis Mukwege a reçu le 21 novembre 2013 au musée du Quai Branly le prix de la Fondation Chirac pour la prévention des conflits, en présence de l’ancien président Jacques Chirac et de l’actuel chef de l’État, François Hollande. Dans son discours de remerciement, il a appelé à refuser l’impunité des principaux chefs de guerre et de ceux qui les soutiennent.

« Des enfants nés du viol et qui, à leur tour, ont été violés« 

« L’hôpital de Panzi a été créé en 1999 pour venir en aide aux femmes enceintes, contribuer à améliorer la santé reproductrice en luttant contre la mortalité maternelle et infantile« , rappelle d’abord le médecin. « Malheureusement, nos premières patientes furent des femmes et des jeunes filles victimes de violences sexuelles commises avec une extrême violence dans le contexte de conflits armés.  Nous les avons soignés sur le plan physique et psychologique et nous les avons encouragées à réintégrer leur communauté pour devenir des actrices du changement social. Mais certaines sont revenues après avoir été à nouveau victimes. Nous avons donné la vie à des enfants nés du viol et qui, à leur tour, ont été violés« .

« Cette triste réalité qui fait honte à notre humanité commune« 

« Ces atrocités de masse, commises sur le corps de notre ressource la plus précieuse, la femme, ne pouvaient plus rester sous silence« , poursuit Denis Mukwege. « Le traitement au bloc opératoire ayant montré ses limites, nous n’avons pas eu d’autres choix que d’informer l’opinion publique internationale et les décideurs sur cette triste réalité qui fait honte à notre humanité commune. Depuis lors, nous dénonçons l’inacceptable pour briser l’indifférence, contribuer à traiter les causes de la violence et avancer sur le chemin de la paix« .

« La justice a été sacrifiée sur l’autel de la paix« 

« La prévention des conflits vise à empêcher le déclenchement d’une crise ou la récurrence d’un conflit« , explique le gynécologue. « Nous devons traiter les causes profondes de la violence, qu’elles soient d’ordre sociale, économique ou politique. Or en République démocratique du Congo, les accords de paix précédents portaient tous en eux les germes de nouveaux conflits en privilégiant des solutions politiques à court terme sur des perspectives durables. La justice a été sacrifiée sur l’autel de la paix. Des promotions ont été accordées à ceux qui doivent répondre de leurs actes devant la justice, nationale ou internationale. Aujourd’hui, les Congolaises et les Congolais n’ont ni la paix, ni la justice« .

« Une érosion de la moralité publique »

« La culture de l’impunité a sérieusement miné les efforts visant à  instaurer un État de droit et la confiance de la population dans ses institutions, entrainant une érosion de la moralité publique et des cycles de violence et de représailles qui ont conduit à des violations graves du droit international humanitaire et des droits humains« , martèle le docteur Mukwege. « Nous plaçons aujourd’hui tous nos espoirs dans la mise en œuvre effective de l »Accord cadre pour la paix, la sécurité et la coopération en République démocratique du Congo et dans la région‘, signé par onze États et quatre organisation intergouvernementales le 24 février 2013 à Addis-Abeba. Ce ‘cadre de l’espoir’ est la première initiative de paix visant à résoudre les causes de la violence et des conflits récurrents en RD Congo« .

« Nous saluons le mandat renforcé à la MONUSCO pour neutraliser les groupes armés »

« Nous profitons de cette occasion pour saluer les efforts du gouvernement et de la diplomatie française pour son rôle déterminant dans l’adoption de la résolution 2098 du conseil de sécurité des Nations Unies, qui donne un mandat renforcé à la MONUSCO pour neutraliser les groupes armés et protéger les civils« , ajoute le médecin. « La dernière victoire des forces armées de la République démocratique du Congo soutenues par la Mission des Nations Unies au Congo contre les rebelles du M23 est un premier fruit de cette résolution« .

« Fixer des lignes rouges »

« Cette nouvelle opportunité à saisir, cette « dernière chance» doit aujourd’hui se traduire dans le quotidien des Congolaises et des Congolais qui continuent de vivre dans la peur, à l’Est du pays« , insiste-t-il. « La société civile doit s’approprier le processus de paix et les associations de femmes doivent participer à tous les mécanismes de dialogue et réconciliation, de sortie de crise et de consolidation de la société et de la paix. Le monde diplomatique doit utiliser tous les leviers possibles pour que les États signataires respectent leurs engagements et fixer des lignes rouges : ceux qui recrutent des enfants soldats et utilisent le viol comme stratégie de guerre doivent être poursuivis et jugés« .

« Avant tout restaurer l’autorité de l’État »

« Pour instaurer la paix, il faut avant tout restaurer l’autorité de l’État et réformer l’armée, la police et la justice avec une réelle volonté politique et l’appui de la communauté internationale« , ajoute Denis Mukwege. « La lutte contre l’impunité des crimes les plus graves, y compris les crimes de violences sexuelles, est une priorité et doit être placée au cœur du processus de paix. L’absence de justice suscite un esprit de vengeance, cristallise les rancœurs et provoque malheureusement de nombreux cas de justice populaire. Il n’y aura pas de paix ni de développement durable sans justice, sans réparation pour les survivantes et les victimes, sans mécanisme d’établissement de la vérité« .

« L’exploitation du coltan et de la cassitérite est à l’origine du drame »

« La prévention des  conflits passe également par une gouvernance économique transparente« , signale le médecin, qui avait été élevé au rang d’Officier de la Légion d’honneur par le gouvernement français en juillet 2013. « Aujourd’hui, l’exploitation militarisée du coltan et de la cassitérite, utilisés dans la fabrication de nos gadgets électroniques du quotidien, est à l’origine du drame que connaît la femme congolaise. Les solutions existent. Le statu quo n’est pas une option. Il n’y a pas de fatalité. Il y a de l’espoir!. Les femmes survivantes des plus graves crimes retrouvent parfois le sourire après avoir reçu une prise en charge holistique« .

« La coopération française construit un centre de santé sur le modèle de Panzi »

« C’est dans ce cadre que nous remercions sincèrement la coopération française qui est en train de construire un nouveau centre de santé pour répliquer le modèle de Panzi à Minova, en zone rurale, dans la province du Sud Kivu. Merci du fond du cœur pour votre solidarité et votre appui« .

« Je dédie ce Prix aux femmes survivantes de violences sexuelles »

« Je dédie aujourd’hui ce Prix aux femmes survivantes de violences sexuelles. Leur dignité, leur courage et leur détermination sont notre principale source d’inspiration« , conclut Denis Mukwege. « Ensemble, nous pouvons mettre fin à la violence. Et agir pour la justice et la paix. »

Source

Pour aller plus loin:

Le discours intégral de Denis Mukwege, le 21 novembre, lors de la remise du prix par la Fondation Chirac pour la prévention des conflits;

Le discours de Claude Chirac, prononcé au nom de son père Jacques Chirac, le même jour; celui de François Hollande et celui d’une autre récipiendaire, Bineta Diop, président de l’ONG Femmes Africa solidarité.

- Les propos tenus par Denis Mukwege le 20 novembre 2013 en arrivant à Paris, tels que rapportés par le quotidien Le Monde, dans lequel il range le viol parmi les armes de destruction massive;

- le discours de Denis Mukwege aux Nations-Unies le 25 septembre 2012;

le site de l’hôpital de Panzi, cofondé par le Dr Mukwege, à Bukavu;

- le blog Paris Planète du 16 août 2013 avec Mgr François-Xavier Maroy, évêque de Bukavu : « En RD Congo, le pillage des terres engendre la violence »;

- le blog Paris Planète du 11 octobre 2012 avec l’écrivain belge David Van Reybrouck : « la démocratie devra patienter au Congo ».

PAUL KAGAME ACCUSÉ DE GÉNOCIDE CONTRE LES POPULATIONS CONGOLAISES

KAGAME GOVERNMENT DAYS ARE NUMBERED – GEN NYAMWASA

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Three years after an assassination attempt on him in South Africa, the former Rwandan army Chief of Staff, Gen Kayumba Nyamaswa, has finally broken his silence has spoken about his assassination ordeal, bush war memories, and how President Paul Kagame has betrayed the purpose for Rwanda’s liberation struggle.

He spoke to Robert Mukombozi in Johannesburg.

Gen Nyamwasa, the world was shocked by news of your shooting during the last world cup. What exactly happened on that day?

I was coming from a shopping mall and when we were entering the gate I saw somebody with a gun and the driver opened the window on his side and quickly the person cocked the pistol and shot me in the stomach and thereafter there was a scuffle between him and me and I was able to survive the assassination because during the scuffle the gun was dislocated.

Thereafter, I was taken to hospital and the rest is history. 

From the court proceedings, it would appear that some of the staff in your household were carefully involved. Had you suspected them?

Not at all. I really had full trust in all my staff members especially accused number four, who was my driver. On the day I fled Rwanda, he is the one who drove me across the border into Uganda and I trusted him. He stayed in Uganda while I proceeded to South Africa.

Eventually when he told me that his life was in danger in Kampala like many other Rwandan refugees who have been abducted from Uganda, indeed I facilitated him to come over (to South Africa).

Thereafter he stayed with us and I trusted him entirely. We treated him as part of our family but it turned out that he had been bought by the government of Rwanda.   In the government of Rwanda nobody could have picked money from his/her own pocket to finance an operation like that. These people did not know me and I did not know them either.

So, for them to have carried out that operation against someone they did not know then they must have acted on behalf of someone else and that must be the government from which I run away.

But most important now is that these people are using very expensive lawyers in this country. Who meets the bill? Before their involvement in this assassination attempt against my life, they cannot show that they had any business or had a job and yet they are able to meet very expensive legal fees. 

After the attempt on your life, do you feel safe here?

I am not the only one who is under threat from Rwanda all the time. If you read newspapers in Uganda, and if you can talk to my compatriots there, some of them have been abducted, others have been executed while others are hidden in safe houses. It is really a fight for most Rwandese in exile; so, mine is not an exception.    

Do you hope to fight back?

Well, we are already fighting back, only that we are not using the means that our adversary is using. For us, we are using peaceful means of change and we believe that Rwandans will come together and fight a dictatorship and it is not a peculiar or unique situation.

It has happened everywhere else in the world where people have come up to fight the regime that is dictatorial in nature and killing people. We also formed an organisation called the Rwanda National Congress and together with others we formed an alliance with the United Democratic Forces of Rwanda (FDU-Inkingi) and Amahoro and we believe together we will be able to galvanise efforts of Rwandese and remove the regime.

So, you are not looking at military plans...

No. But that will be a result of probably a situation that would degenerate into a kind of situation that has happened in other countries where peaceful means have been employed but the dictatorship pushes people in a different direction. We have not come to that. 

There is an increasing spate of kidnappings of Rwandan refugees especially students and former soldiers exiled especially in East Africa on accusations that they are working for you to destabilise Rwanda...

The accusations are not true. I would first of all begin with my own brother who has been in prison for the last three years. If I was working with anybody in Rwanda, the first person probably I would have worked with would have been my own brother but when I fled I did not take him along with me and I would have gone to his house and picked him even when I left, it took them about six months after which he was arrested and incarcerated.

So all these people, they can’t say that they are working for me. But there is no doubt that there could be some people in Rwanda who support the Rwanda National Congress, not necessarily [working for] Kayumba. 

According to sources in the Rwanda Defence Forces, President Kagame is paranoid about you controlling some factions of the army. Is this fear legitimate?

Well, I commanded the army, there is no doubt about that. I was a very influential member within the Rwanda Patriotic Front. I had very good friends and the plight that visited me is also a plight that also other people in Rwanda are meeting today.

Essentially it is not about me, it is about the cause for which I am fighting and I know essentially within the Rwanda Patriotic Front, and within the army, there are people who support what I do not because of me but because of what I stand for. What we want is liberation; if it comes from me, well and good but even if it comes from a different side, I am sure they will be able to embrace it. 

Talking about liberation, you had a cordial relationship with Kagame during the RPF bush war and subsequent years in his government. Kagame now says you were terrorising his country and lacked accountability. What exactly broke this rapport?

President Paul Kagame knows that we did a lot of things together and a lot of my colleagues but between me and him, yes there was a deep relationship. At one point in time I think I helped him when everybody else would not have wanted to and that is a fact. I wrote about it twice.

He is aware of the situation and that is probably why we had a strong relationship. I saved him out of a situation where people would have probably wanted him to perish. 

He [Kagame] is aware of the situation, that was the beginning of the closeness. But as far as I am concerned, the relationship kept deteriorating [and] it was about the ideological thinking of the RPF.

At one time it came to a point where the RPF ceased to market and publicise and promote itself as an organisation and had to be substituted by popularising and campaigning for an individual who is Paul Kagame and that was something I never believed in.

Secondly, there was the issue of Dr Joseph Sebarenzi (former Secretary General of RPF) who was persecuted using fabricated charges. I refused to support that trend and Paul Kagame was not happy about it. Then there were extrajudicial killings, which were being carried out around Rwanda using the Directorate of Military Intelligence and the Republican Guard and Kagame would be in the know and I was not aware about what was going on.

After committing those extrajudicial killings, they would come out and falsely implicate other people. Thirdly, there was the issue of Pasteur Bizimungu. Mr Bizimungu [when he was still president] was persecuted and lots of charges were fabricated against him.

The Directorate of Military Intelligence, which was under Jack Nziza and others that time, they thought they should have him imprisoned and I challenged them until I went to the United Kingdom for a course and eventually the man was taken to prison. Basically the relationship between me and Kagame started souring from 1997 and by 2003 it completely broke down. 

You say you saved Mr Kagame’s life several times during the bush war struggle; how?

At one point in time we were at one place called Nkana [northern Rwanda] in current Byumba district and I think it was in December 1990 and we had lost a battle. When we lost the battle, the forces withdrew, Kagame did not know that the forces had actually withdrawn to Uganda. I went there to collect casualties [and] I found Kagame hiding in a banana plantation.

I convinced some of our friends that we should go and rescue him and get him from there. But because of his nature and after the death of Maj Gen Fred Rwigema, people did not like and they were saying ‘just ignore [him]’. I thought that was not the right thing to do and I took it upon myself to go back.

I went back and collected him. He was there confused; he did not know where the forces were and he did not know where to go himself. Then the next day in another place called Nkanyantanga [also in northern Rwanda]. In the night the enemy was surrounding us. He was sleeping in the tent and he did not know what was going on.

I had information and intelligence and we were able to fight our way out and the next day we lost the battle. I came back and picked him from the tent and hid him in Uganda in someone’s home.

Some of the officers we had in Nkanyantanga subjected him to a lot of open ridicule; that they do not want him. And some of the officers who ridiculed him that time are still serving in the Rwandan army as senior officers today but I will not mention their names for their security but they know themselves.

Had it not been for me and late Col William Bagire, they would have beaten him thoroughly. 

Are you saying his subsequent leadership of the Rwandan Patriotic Army/Front was an accident?

Definitely it was an accident. The legitimate leader was late Maj Gen Fred Rwigema. We lost a person, we lost a leader, and we lost a charismatic person. Obviously if Kagame was so crucial in the planning and execution of the Rwandan liberation, Maj Gen Rwigema would not have allowed [him] to go for the course in the United States of America.

Are there officers you think would have been in a better position to steer Rwanda to real liberation?  And is there a possibility they could take the wheel of power in Rwanda and change the country’s course?

There are very many of them but they are completely marginalised. You can never find them now in the political establishment of Rwanda. It is a tragedy. 

But Kagame has maintained that the bitterness between both of you is based entirely on your undermining of his government and lack of accountability.

What else can he say? He has said that about everybody who has fled the country. He uses mainly charges against people who are opposed to his dictatorial leadership. Either you are a genocidaire, terrorist or corrupt. That is standard procedure and I happen to be part of that victimisation.

When you look at the sentencing that was meted to the four of us; sentencing me for 24 years in prison in absentia, it is not a charge of corruption. There is nothing because I was not corrupt and in any case if I had been corrupt, they would have charged me in a court of law when I was still in government. It is obviously a lie and Kagame has always lived by deceit but time is running out. 

Talking about time running out for the Kigali establishment. You have commanded Rwandan troops in DR Congo before. Do you think Rwanda is involved in DR Congo (M23 war)?

True, I was involved in the DR Congo war in 1997-2002 and yes the Rwandan troops were and are still heavily involved in the war there. Even today, Rwandan soldiers are still in DR Congo. And the other thing that is very important is that there is nothing like M23. M23 does not exist; it is the concoction of the government of Rwanda. 

Are you optimistic the stabilisation force in DR Congo now boosted by Tanzania and South Africa could eventually bring Rwanda to account for her atrocities committed there?

You can never lie to the world forever. Kagame’s lies have now come to the fore. He can no longer hide so the international community; Southern African Development Community (SADC) and everybody else have come to the realisation that Paul Kagame has always used genocide as pretext.

Instead of using it [genocide] as a tragedy that befell Rwandese, it has become a political and diplomatic weapon. He has used it to invade DR Congo and is also using it against his neighbours. The lie is now over and it is time to call a spade a spade and I applaud the international community to have come to the realisation. It may be late but as the adage says better late than never. 

Some of the assets of South Africa-based Rwandan multimillionaire, Tribert Rujugiro, such as the $20 million Union Trade Centre, are being frozen by the Rwandan government on allegations he could be supporting your cause.

Nyamwasa is being used as a pretext for eliminating all those people whom Paul Kagame does not want. In the 1990s it was Mr Sebarenzi; they would kill anybody who is associated with him. Later on it became Pasteur Bizimungu and then Tribert Rujugiro. Actually Rujugiro ran away from Rwanda before me and then later on it is me.

Anything else you would like to add?

Yes. I would like to inform Rwandans and friends of Rwanda across Africa and the international community that we will be driving real liberation to the country soon. Institutions of government in Rwanda have been hijacked.

The judiciary does not function; it has been compromised. The Parliament is owned and serves the interests of only one man and that is Paul Kagame. The government in Rwanda is an institution that is completely owned by one man and he does what he wants.

Now dictatorship has its own expiry date and I think the Rwandan people are now disgusted, they are disgruntled and they are disappointed.  I would like to assure Rwandans and friends of our cause that dictatorship is going to be removed in Rwanda soon. 

Robert Mukombozi is an international investigative journalist based in Australia. He can be reached on email:rmukombozi@gmail.com.  

Source


POUR L'ARRËT IMMÉDIAT DU PROGRAMME "NDI UMUNYARWANDA"".

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Chers amis, 

Je viens de créer ma propre pétition sur le Site de Pétitions Citoyennes d'Avaaz -- elle s'intitule "Communauté internationale, ONG, et démocrates rwandais: Demandons le Retrait immédiat du programme "Ndi umunyarwanda"".

Cette cause me tient vraiment à cœur et je pense qu'ensemble, nous pouvons agir pour la défendre. Mon objectif est de recueillir 100 signatures et j'ai besoin de votre aide pour y parvenir.

Pour en savoir plus et signer la pétition, cliquez ici: 
http://www.avaaz.org/fr/petition/Communaute_internationale_ONG_et_democrates_rwandais_Demandons_le_Retrait_immediat_du_programme_Ndi_umunyarwanda//?launch

Veuillez prendre un instant pour m'aider: faites passer le mot -- de telles campagnes démarrent toujours timidement, mais prennent de l'ampleur lorsque des gens comme vous s'impliquent!

Merci mille fois,

Amb. Jean-Marie Ndagijimana,

Porte-parole du Comité pour l'unité, la paix et la réconciliation nationale

MORT DE TABU LEY ROCHEREAU, GRAND MONUMENT DE LA MUSIQUE CONGOLAISE

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Le musicien Pascal Tabu Ley, dit Seigneur Rochereau, décédé le 30 novembre 2013 à Bruxelles (Belgique). Photo droits tiersLe musicien Pascal Tabu Ley, dit Seigneur Rochereau, décédé le 30 novembre 2013 à Bruxelles (Belgique). Photo droits tiers

Par Radio Okapi

Pascal Tabu Ley, dit «Seigneur Tabuley Rochereau», est décédé samedi 30 novembre à Bruxelles, en Belgique. Le célèbre chanteur congolais était dans le coma depuis plusieurs jours. Selon son fils Charles Tabu, joint par Radio Okapi, Tabu Ley est mort de suite de diabète après avoir été terrassé par un accident cardiovasculaire (AVC) il y a plus de deux ans.

 

 Né à Bandundu-ville, Pascal Tabu Ley commence par chanter à l’église puis dans plusieurs chorales scolaires.

Il rejoint ensuite le ministère de l’Education nationale comme fonctionnaire puis responsable administratif et financier à l’Athénée de la Gombe.

Pascal Tabu Ley entame une carrière musicale en commençant à composer dans les années 1950. En 1956, il chante avec Grand Kalle, un chanteur et chef de groupe, considéré comme le père de la musique congolaise moderne. C’est alors le début d’un succès fulgurant pour celui qui prend le nom de scène de Seigneur Tabuley Rochereau.

Comme son mentor, Rochereau va apporter avec son orchestre l’African fiesta National pas mal d’innovations dans la rumba congolaise. On lui attribue notamment l’adoption de la batterie. Une mode qui entraînera la création de plusieurs orchestres comme les Bella Bella des frères Soki.

Le Seigneur Tabuley Rochereau. Photo droits tiersLe Seigneur Tabuley Rochereau. Photo droits tiers

Très inspiré par la pop musique et le rhythm and blues des années 1960-1970, Rochereau n’hésite pas à se produire sur scène avec des pantalons«patte d’éléphant» et coiffure Afro. Il est le premier chanteur africain à se produire à l’Olympia.

Bien que très bon et grand chanteur solo, le Seigneur Tabuley a réussi quelques duos assez mémorables avec d’autres chanteurs qui l’accompagnaient avec des chansons comme «Permission» et «Rendez-vous chez là bas» avec Mujos, « Souza» et «Maguy» avec Sam Mangwana, «Ki makango mpe libala» et «Gipsy» avec NDombe Pepe.

Suite au recours de l’authenticité, lancé par le président Mobutu Sese Seko, Pascal Tabu devient «Tabu Ley».

Il s’est ensuite exilé aux États-Unis puis en Belgique, d’où il prend parti contre la dictature de Mobutu.

Après la chute du régime, il revient au Congo et se lance dans la vie politique tout en poursuivant ses activités artistiques. Il a été nommé député à l’Assemblée consultative et législative de transition et a exercé en 2005, les fonctions de vice-gouverneur de la ville de Kinshasa.

En 2012, lors de ses 72 ans d’âge, Tabou Ley a été décoré à Kinshasa, par le Chancelier des ordres nationaux, de deux médailles d’or dont une de mérite civique et l’autre des arts, sciences et lettres, en signe de récompense pour ses nombreuses œuvres artistiques qui ont valorisé la culture congolaise à travers le monde.

En 46 ans de carrière, Tabu Ley a composé plus de 3 000 chansons et vendu plusieurs milliers de disques. Quatre de ses fils, Pegguy Tabu, Abel Tabu, Philémon et Youssoupha, ont percé dans le milieu de la musique en tant que chanteur, compositeur.

Il a notamment chanté «Mokolo na kokufa» (Le jour où je mourrai), que nous vous proposons.

 

La Rédaction de Radio Okapi présente ses condoléances aux familles biologique et musicale ainsi qu’aux nombreux fans de l’illustre disparu.

Lire aussi sur radiookapi.net :

Des activités culturelles à Kinshasa pour fêter les 72 ans d’âge de Tabu Ley

Youssoupha : Les disques de mon père, le clip dévoilé – MELTY

 La musique congolaise vient de perdre sa plus grande étoile Tabu Ley ROCHEREAU, papa de l’artiste musicien Youssoupha rappeur français. Il est le premier artiste africain à s’être produit sur la scène mythique de l’Olympia dans les années 70.
Selon la source de « Congomikili », il serait mort cette nuit à Bruxelles.
Nous présentons nos condoléances à la famille.

 R.I.P.
 
Que son âme se repose en paix.
Paix à son âme !


GEN KAYUMBA NYAMWASA ATI "NAKIJIJE KAGAME ABANDI BAMUSIZE YIHISHE MU RUTOKI"

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30/11/2013 02:14

kayumba-kagame.jpgImyaka 3 nyuma y’ibikorwa byo gushaka kumwivugana muri Afrika y’Epfo, uwahoze ari umugaba mukuru w’ingabo z’u Rwanda, général Kayumba Nyamaswa, yemeye kugira icyo avuga ku byo yaciyemo igihe bashakaga kumwica, ubuzima bwo mu ishyamba ari mu ngabo za FPR, n’uburyo Perezida Kagame yateshutse ku ntego bari barihaye igihe bahagurukaga bagafata intwaro bagatera u Rwanda mu 1990.
Ibi Kayumba Nyamwasa yabitangaje mu kiganiro yagiranye n’umunyamakuru Robert Mukombozi i Johannesburg ho muri Afrika y’Epfo .

Gen Nyamwasa, abantu benshi baguye mu kantu bamaze kumva inkuru y’iraswa ryawe mu gihe habaga imikono y’igikombe cy’isi. Mu by’ukuri uwo munsi byagenze bite?

Nari mvuye mu nzu ikorerwamo ubucuruzi guhaha n’uko tugeze ku muryango winjira aho nari ntuye, nabonye umuntu ufite imbunda n’uko umushoferi wanjye afungura ikirahure cyo ku ruhande ako kanya wa muntu antunga imbunda ahita andasa mu nda, nyuma habaye kugundagurana hagati yanjye n’uwo washakaga kundasa ku bw’amahirwe nashoboye kurokoka kuko imbunda y’ushakaga kunyica yakwamye igihe twagundaguranaga. Nyuma najyamywe kwa muganga, ibyakurikiyeho benshi murabizi.

Mu gikorwa cyo gukurikirana abashatse ku kwica, bivugwa ko bamwe mu bakozi bagukoreraga baba baragize uruhare mu icurwa ry’umugambi wo kukwivugana. Ese wigeze ukeka ko bashobora gukora ibyo bintu?

Nta na gato rwose. Nari mfitiye icyizere gisesuye abankoreraga bose cyane cyane uregwa mu bashatse kunyica Numero ya 4 wari umushoferi wanjye. Umunsi nahunze u Rwanda, niwe wanyambukije umupaka hagati ya Uganda n’u Rwanda, naramwizeraga cyane. Yari yagumye muri Uganda mu gihe njye nakomezaga muri Afrika y’Epfo. Amaherezo amaze kumenya ko ubuzima bwe bugeramiwe i Kampala kimwe n’izindi mpunzi z’abanyarwanda, nakoze uko nshoboye muzana hano muri Afrika y’Epfo.

Nyuma yaho twaragumanye, nari mufitiye icyizere gisesuye, twamufataga nk’umwe mu bagize umuryango wacu, nyuma twaje kumenya ko yari yaraguzwe na Leta y’u Rwanda. Abashakaga kunyica ndetse n’abo bashakaga kunyica ntabwo bari banzi nanjye ubwanjye sinari mbazi.

Abo bantu bantu bakoze icyo gikorwa cyo gushaka kunyica batanzi bari bakoreshejwe n’undi muntu unzi ushobora kuba ari Leta y’u Rwanda nari narahunze. Ariko ubu ikigaragara cyane ni uko abo bashatse kunyica bafite ababunganira mu mategeko bahenze cyane muri kino gihugu. Ninde wishyura ayo mafaranga yose? Ko abo bantu bashatse kunyica mbere y’uko bagerageza icyo gikorwa ntacyo bakoraga kizwi cyashoboraga gutuma babona amafaranga yo kwiyishyurira abababuranira bahenze kuriya.

Nyuma y’igikorwa cyaburiyemo cyo kuguhitana, ubu wumva ufite umutekano?

Ntabwo ari njye njyenyine wugarijwe na Leta y’u Rwanda igihe cyose. Usomye ibinyamakuru byo mu gihugu cya Uganda ukanavugana n’impunzi z’abanyarwanda ziba Uganda, zimwe muri zo zarashimuswe, abandi baricwa mu gihe hari n’abihishe. Ni ukuri ubuzima bw’impunzi z’abanyarwanda ni nk’intambara ikomeye ntabwo ari njye gusa uri muri ubwo buzima.


Wizera ko nawe ushobora kwirwanaho?


Nibyo twatangiye kwirwanaho, ariko ntabwo uburyo dukoresha ari bumwe n’ubwo uwo duhanganye ari we Leta y’u Rwanda akoresha. Twe dukoresha inzira y’amahoro kugira ngo ibintu bihinduke, twizeye ko abanyarwanda bazishyira hamwe bakarwanya ubutegetsi bw’igitugu bubakandamiza, iki kibazo ntabwo ari ikibazo twihariye twenyine cyangwa ngo kibe ari cyo cyonyine dufite.

Byabayeho henshi kw’isi aho abaturage bageze aho bagahagurukira kurwanya ingoma y’igitugu mu miterere yayo ishyize imbere kwica abantu. Si ibyo gusa kuko twashinze umutwe wa politiki witwa IHURIRO NYARWANDA (RNC) dufatanije n’abandi twashyizeho ubufatanye na FDU-Inkingi n’ishyaka AMAHORO. Twizeye ko twese hamwe tuzashobora kongerera ingufu tukanatera akanyabugabo’abandi banyarwanda maze tugahirika ingoma y’igitugu.


Noneho nta gahunda y’intambara mufite.

 

Oya, ariko hari igihe bigera aho ibintu biba bibi cyane nk’uko byagenze mu bindi bihugu aho inzira z’amahoro zakoreshejwe ariko ubutegetsi bw’igitugu bugasunikira abaturage mu kimeze nk’amaburakindi bityo abaturage bagakoresha inzira y’intambara. Ariko twe ntabwo turagera aho.


Muri iyi minsi muri Afrika y’uburasirazuba ibikorwa byo gushimuta impunzi z’abanyarwanda byariyongereye, aho hibasiwe cyane cyane abanyeshuri n’abahoze ari abasirikare baregwa ngo gutegura ibikorwa byo guhungabanya umutekano w’u Rwanda…

 

Ibyo birego nta shingiro bifite. Nifuzaga mbere na mbere guhera kuri murumuna wanjye bwite (Lt Col RUGIGANA NGABO) umaze imyaka itatu mu buroko. Niba hari umuntu mu Rwanda twashoboraga gukorana, umuntu wa mbere twari gukorana ni murumuna wanjye ariko mu gihe nahungaga ntabwo najyanye nawe, nashoboraga guca iwe nkamufata tukagenda. Ariko byatwaye amezi 6 yose maze guhunga babona kumufunga. Ntabwo wavuga ko abantu bose banyitirirwa bakorana nanjye. Nta kabuza ko hari abantu mu Rwanda bashyigikiye RNC ariko ntabwo bishatse kuvuga ko bakorera Kayumba.


Hari amakuru aturuka mu gisirikare cy’u Rwanda, avuga ko Perezida Kagame ntawe agipfa kwizera bitewe n’uko ngo waba ushyigikiwe n’ibice bimwe by’igisirikare. Ayo makuru yaba afite ishingiro?

 

Nibyo nategetse ingabo, byo sinabihakana. Nari umwe mu bantu bakomeye muri FPR. Nagize inshuti nyinshi. Ntabwo ari umwihariko kuri  yewe kuko n’abandi barimu Rwandaniko bimeze ubu. Icya ngombwa sinjye ahubwo ni icyo ndwanira. Nzi neza ko benshi muri FPR no mu ngabo banshyigikiye ariko sinjye bashyigikiye nk’umuntu ahubwo bashyigikiye icyo mparanira. Icyo dushaka ni ukwibohoza, binturutseho ni byiza ariko binaturutse ahandi nzi neza ko nabyo babishyigikira.

 

Tuvuze ku byo kwibohoza, wagiranye ubucuti bukomeye na Perezida Kagame mu gihe FPR yari mw’ishyamba no mu myaka yakurikiyeho muri Leta. Ubu Kagame aravuga ko uteza umutekano muke mu gihugu ndetse uri umunyamafuti utubahirizaga inshingano zawe. Ni iki cyasenye ubucuti mwari mufitanye?

Perezida Kagame azi neza ko twakoranye byinshi na benshi muri bagenzi banjye ariko hagati yanjye nawe hari ubucuti bukomeye. Hari aho nsanga ko namufashije igihe abantu bose batifuzaga kumufasha, ibyo byabayeho kabiri kose.

Kagame nawe arabizi neza wenda ni nayo mpamvu twari dufitanye ubucuti bukomeye. Namukuye mu kaga aho abantu benshi bifuzaga ko yahasiga ubuzima.

Ibyo Kagame arabizi neza, ahanini icyo twapfuye ubucuti bwacu bugasubira inyuma ni ku binjyanye n’imitekerereze ku ngengabitekerezo ya FPR.

Hari aho byageze FPR isa nk’aho itakigikora ngo yiteze imbere ubwayonk’umuryango ahubwo bisimburwa n’ibikorwa byo kuzamura no guteza imbere umuntu umwe ari we Paul Kagame. Ni ikintu ntemeraga.

Icya kabiri, hari ikibazo cya Dr Joseph Sebarenzi wahoze ategeka inteko nshingamategeko, watotejwe kubera ibirego by’ibihimbano. Nanze gushyigikira ibyo bintu, Kagame ntabwo byamushimishije. Hari kandi n’ibikorwa by’ubwicanyi bitemewe n’amategeko byakorwaga mu Rwanda hifashishijwe DMI n’abasirikare barinda Kagame, byabaga Kagame abizi njyewe simbimenye. Nyuma y’ubwo bwicanyi bunyuranyije n’amategeko bwamenyekana bukagerekwa ku bandi bantu.

Icya gatatu hari ikibazo cya Pasteur Bizimungu. Bwana Bizimungu akiri Perezida yateshejwe agaciro anahimbirwa n’ibirego byinshi.

DMI, yategekwaga na Jack Nziza n’abandi icyo gihe bashatse gufunga Pasteur Bizimungu, nabyitambitsemo ndabirwanya kugeza igihe ngiye mu mahugurwa mu Bwongereza babona kumujugunya mu buroko. Ahanini ubucuti bwanjye na Kagame bwatangiye gucumbagira guhera muri 1997, byageze mu 2003 bwararangiye burundu.

 

Wigeze kuvuga ko wakijije ubuzima bwa Kagame kenshi mu gihe mwari mu ishyamba. Byagenze bite?

 

Icyo gihe twari ahitwa Nkana (mu cyahoze ari Komini Kiyombe, muri Byumba) ndakeka byari mu kwezi k’Ukuboza 1990, twari tumaze gutsindwa urugamba. Tumaze gutsindwa ku rugamba abasirikare bacu bari bahunze ariko Kagame we ntabwo yari azi ko abasirikare bose bahungiye muri Uganda. Narimo negeranya inkomere nsanga Kagame yihishe mu rutoki.

Numvishije bamwe muri bagenzi bacu ko tugomba kumutabara tukamukurayo ariko kubera uko Kagame ateye na nyuma y’urupfu rwa Fred Rwigema ntabwo abantu bamukundaga ndetse arambwiye ngo nimwihorere. Natekereje ko bitari byiza kumwihorera maze nsubira inyuma ubwanjye.

Nasubiyeyo ndamuzana, yari aho yazubaye atazi n’aho abasirikare bari, nawe ubwe ntiyari azi aho ajya. Nuko bukeye mu kandi gace kitwa Kanyantanga (muri Komini Kiyombe, Byumba) mu ijoro umwanzi yari yatugose. Kagame we yari asinziriye mu ihema rye atazi ibyabaye.

Nabonye amakuru y’uburyo dushobora kurwana dushaka inzira isohoka, ku munsi ukurikiyeho twatsinzwe urugamba, nasubiyeyo njya gukura Kagame mu ihema yarimo njya kumuhisha mu nzu y’umuntu muri Uganda.

Benshi mubo twari kumwe aho Kanyantanga baramwisekereye bari bamuhinduye urwamenyo, bavuga ko batamushaka. Bamwe mu basirikare bakuru bamwisekereye icyo gihe ubu baracyari mu gisirikare nk’abasirikare bo hejuru, ntabwo navuga amazina yabo kubera umutekano wabo ariko bariyizi. Iyo ntashyiraho akanjye, njye na Nyakwigendera Col William Bagire ibye biba byararangiye.

Ushatse kuvuga ko kugirwa umukuru w’ingabo za FPR kwa Kagame byari n’impanuka?

Nibyo byari nk’impanuka. Umuyobozi nyawe wari wemewe na bose yari Maj Gen Fred Rwigema. Twatakaje umuntu, twatakaje umuyobozi, twatakaje umuntu abantu bari bakunze kandi bibonagamo. Birumvikana ko iyo Kagame
aza kuba umuntu wa ngombwa mu gutegura no gushyira mu bikorwa imigambi yo gufata u Rwanda
, ntabwo Maj Gen Rwigema aba yararetse Kagame ajya mu mahugurwa muri Amerika.

Kuri wowe hari abandi basirikare bakuru bashoboraga kujyana u  Rwanda mu nzira yo kwibohora nyabyo? Byarashobokaga ko bashoboraga gufata ubutegetsi ibintu bikagenda ukundi, igihugu kikajya mu kindi cyerekezo?

Barahari benshi, ariko bateshejwe agaciro bahindurwa ubusa, ntabwo ushobora kubabona ubu mu bijyanye na politiki mu Rwanda. Ni akaga gakomeye!

Ariko Kagame we yemeje ko icyo mwapfuye ari uko washakaga guhungabanya Leta kandi utubahirizaga inshingano zawe.

Wowe se urumva Kagame yavuga ngo iki? Ibyo yabivuze ku bantu hafi ya bose bahunze igihugu. Akoresha akenshi ibyo birego ku bantu banze kwemera imitegekere ye irimo igitugu. Iyo utarezwe jenoside, uregwa guhungabanya umutekano cyangwa ubujura. Ni uburyo busanzwe iyo leta ukoresha nanjye ako karengane kangezeho.

Iyo urebye ingufu zashyizwe mu bihano badukatiye uko turi bane, kunkatira imyaka 24 y’igifungo ndahari, ntabwo ari icyaha cyo kunyereza umutungo.

Ntabwo nigeze niba, kandi iyo mba naribye bari kundega imbere y’urukiko nkiri mu buyobozi. Birumbikana ko ari ikinyoma kandi Kagame agendera ku binyoma, ariko igihe kirabaze.


Uravuga ko igihe kirimo kujyana Leta ya Kigali. Wayoboye ingabo z’u Rwanda muri Congo mu gihe cyashize. Utekereza ko u Rwanda rufite uruhare mu bibera muri Congo (intambara ya M23)?

Nibyo nagize uruhare mu ntambara yo muri Congo hagati ya 1997 na 2002. Nibyo ingabo z’u Rwanda zagize uruhare ziracyanafite uruhare mu ntambara ya Congo. N’uyu munsi, abasirikare b’u Rwanda baracyari muri Congo. Ikindi cy’ingenzi ni uko M23 itabaho ni ikintu cyaremwe na Leta y’u Rwanda.


Ese ubona bishoboka ko ingabo zishinzwe amahoro muri Congo zitewe akanyabugabo na Tanaziya n’Afrika y’Epfo zishobora gutuma Leta y’u Rwanda ibazwa uruhare rwayo mu bikorwa bibi bibera muri Congo?


Ntibishoboka kubeshya isi yose igihe cyose. Ibinyoma bya Kagame byafashe indi ntera. Ntabwo agishoboye kubeshya amahanga, umuryango w’ibihugu by’Afrika y’amajyepfo (SADC) n’abandi bose barangije kubona ko Paul Kagame akoresha Jenoside nk’urwitwazo.

Aho gukoresha Jenoside nk’ibyago byagwiririye abanyarwanda, yahinduwe intwaro ya politiki n’ububanyi n’amahanga. Yakoreshejwe mu gutera Congo inakoreshwa mu gutera ubwoba ibihugu by’abaturanyi. Ikinyoma cyararangiye igihe kirageze cyo kuvuga ukuri. Ndashimira umuryango mpuzamahanga ko wageze aho ukumva ukuri. Bishobora kuba byaratinze ariko burya gutinda siko guhera.

Imwe mu mitungo y’umuherwe w’umunyarwanda uba muri Afrika y’Epfo, Tribert Rujugiro. Navuga k’inzu y’ubucuruzi ifite agaciro ka Miliyoni 20 z’amadolari izwi ku izina rya Union Trade Centre yafatiriwe na Leta y’u Rwanda ngo kubera ko uwo muherwe yaba agushyigikiye.

Nyamwasa yabaye urwitwazo mu kwikiza abantu Kagame adashaka. Mu myaka ya za 1990 yari Sebarenzi bashoboraga kwica uwo ariwe wese ufite icyo ahuriyeho nawe. Nyuma hagerwaho Pasteur Bizimungu, ubu hagezwe Tribert Rujugiro. Ubundi Rujugiro yahunze mbere yanjye nyuma aba ari njye ugerwaho.


Hari ikindi wakongera ku byo umaze kuvuga?

 

Yego. Nifuzaga kubwira abanyarwanda n’inshuti z’u Rwanda haba muri Afrika cyangwa mu rwego mpuzamahanga ko tugiye gutangira igikorwa nyacyo cyo kubohoza igihugu vuba aha. Abayobozi bariho mu Rwanda bibye ubutegetsi abaturage.

Inzego z’ubutabera ntabwo zikora, inteko ishingamategeko ifitwe kandi ikorera inyungu z’umuntu umwe ari we Paul Kagame. Leta y’u Rwanda n’urwego rw’ubuyobozi ruri mu ntoki z’umuntu umwe, wikorera icyo ashatse cyose.

Ubu igitugu igihe cyacyo cyo kurangira cyarageze, abanyarwanda bamaze kugera aho badashobora kwihangana, bamaze kurakara, kandi ibyo bizeraga sibyo babonye.

Nakwizeza abanyarwanda n’inshuti zidushyigikiye ko igitugu kigiye kuvaho vuba mu Rwanda.

Inkuru ya Robert Mukombozi


Yashyizwe mu Kinyarwanda na Marc Matabaro wa The Rwandan

http://www.therwandan.com/ki/nakijije-kagame-abandi-bamusize-yihishe-mu-rutoki-lt-gen-kayumba-nyamwasa/


RDC : LE PRÉSIDENT KABILA EN TOURNÉE DANS L'EST APRÈS LA DÉFAITE DU M23

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DRC President Joseph Kabila at the African Union headquarters in Addis Ababa, 24 Feburary, 2013
DRC President Joseph Kabila at the African Union headquarters in Addis Ababa, 24 Feburary, 2013
Reuters/Tiksa Negeri

Par RFI

Le chef de l’Etat congolais a entamé depuis quatre jours une mini tournée dans l’est du pays. Après Kisangani mercredi en province orientale, Joseph Kabila a rejoint la ville de Bunia hier. Avant-dernière étape avant de venir à Goma, sans doute mardi. Le président a choisi de faire ce trajet de plus de 1000 km par la route, pour montrer le retour de l'autorité de l'Etat, dans une zone, occupée par la rébellion du M23, il y a encore trois semaines.

Ce trajet Joseph Kabila l’a déjà fait en 2009. A l’époque, il avait mis treize heures au volant de sa voiture pour aller de Kisangani à Beni un peu plus au sud de Bunia. Il avait alors inspecté les travaux de rénovation de la route fraîchement réalisés.

Hier, Joseph Kabila s’est arrêté un peu plus tôt au niveau de Bunia. Il lui reste plus de 600 km à parcourir jusqu’à la capitale du Nord-Kivu, Goma. Une route jonchée de nids de poules et globalement en très mauvais état.

A (RE)LIRE :RDC : l'armée congolaise impose un revers militaire au M23 dans le Nord-Kivu

Mais qu’importe ! Comme en 2009, ce trajet en voiture se veut aussi politique. Pour montrer, le retour de l’autorité de l’Etat, dans une zone, en tous cas sur les 100 derniers kilomètres jusqu’à Goma, en partie occupée par la rébellion du M23, il y a encore trois semaines.

A (RE)LIRE : RDC: le chef du M23 appelle ses troupes à l’arrêt des hostilités avec l’armée régulière

Une façon d’encourager aussi les milliers de déplacés dans le Nord-Kivu, à rentrer chez eux, et de montrer que le territoire est sécurisé. Et ce, même si de nombreux groupes rebelles sont encore actifs, comme les ADF Nalu, autour de Beni, à 400 km de Goma.

Du côté de la société civile, cette visite est attendue avec impatience. Les années de guerre ont multiplié les besoins en développement : route, eau, électricité… Tout reste à faire dans cette région pourtant très riche.

A (RE)LIRE : RDC, après les combats, les habitants de Goma subissent l’insécurité et la pauvreté

Et comme pour répondre à cette attente, le gouvernement a annoncé qu’il se déplacerait entièrement de Kinshasa à Goma, pour un Conseil des ministres extraordinaire, mardi ou mercredi.

POUR LE RETRAIT IMMÉDIAT DU PROGRAMME "NDI UMUNYARWANDA" DE STIGMATISATION ETHNIQUE

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COMITE POUR L'UNITE, LA PAIX ET LA RECONCILIATION 
INTEKO Y'UBUMWE AMAHORO N'UBWIYUNGE

Pétition pour le retrait immédiat du programme "Ndi umunyarwanda" de stigmatisation ethnique

Pourquoi c'est important

https://secure.avaaz.org/fr/petition/

Au cours de deux réunions tenues respectivement le 30 juin 2013 et le 9 novembre 2013, le président Paul Kagame a annoncé le lancement du programme dit "Ndi umunyarwanda" (je suis rwandais). 

Dans ce nouveau programme, le gouvernement de Paul Kagame affirme que le génocide des Tutsi aurait été commis au nom et pour le compte de tous les Hutu et que ces derniers seraient globalement génocidaires.Tous les Hutu, innocents et criminels confondus, sont appelés à demander pardon à leurs compatriotes Tutsi afin de "faciliter la réconciliation nationale". Pour lancer cette campagne de stigmatisation, les ministres hutu ont été enjoints de montrer l'exemple. Plusieurs d'entre eux ont, depuis, toutes affaires cessantes, organisé des réunions publiques au cours desquelles ils ont demandé pardon au nom des Hutu. 

Affirmer que le génocide tutsi à été commis au nom de tous les Hutu est un mensonge d'état contraire à la réalité historique; c'est chercher à opposer délibérément les populations hutu et tutsi, en masquant au passage que Paul Kagame qui a tout fait pour retarder l'envoi d'une mission militaire des Nations Unies chargée d'arrêter le génocide, porte une grande responsabilité dans ce génocide. Rappelons que plusieurs rapports des Nations Unies et d'organisations internationales des droits de l'homme ont établi que Paul Kagame a, entre 1990 et 2003, organisé le massacre de centaines de milliers de Hutu au Rwanda et en RDC.

Il est aussi important d'évoquer le rôle de Paul Kagame dans les différentes guerres de déstabilisation de la République Démocratique du Congo ayant entraîné des millions de morts dans ce pays frère. 

Cette politique de globalisation et de stigmatisation de l'une quelconque des composantes de la Nation rwandaise, est un coup de couteau porté dans le tissu déjà fragile de l'unité nationale. Cela doit être condamné par toute personne attachée à la paix au Rwanda et dans la région des grands lacs. 

Le Comité pour l'unité, la paix et la réconciliation :

- Demande au Peuple rwandais et à tous les démocrates soucieux de préserver la paix et l'unité nationale, de se mobiliser pour rejeter et faire barrage à cette politique criminelle qui sape les bases de l'unité nationale et met en danger la coexistence pacifique entre les différentes composantes du pays. 

- Attire l'attention de la communauté internationale et des gouvernements des pays démocratiques épris de paix et de justice, sur les risques de fractures et de tensions interethniques que ne manquera pas de provoquer le programme de "Ndi umunyarwanda" au sein de la population rwandaise.

A travers cette pétition, nous demandons aux gouvernements qui soutiennent le régime de Paul Kagame, de faire pression sur ce dernier afin qu'il mette fin immédiatement au programme de "Ndi umunyarwanda" qui porte une grave atteinte aux principes de la présomption d'innocence et de la responsabilité pénale individuelle, y compris en matière de génocide.

 Le Comité pour l'unité, la paix et la réconciliation nationale

Amb. Jean-Marie Ndagijimana, Porte-parole


 

GAHIMA GERALD “WE SACRIFICE MORE THAN PEOPLE REALIZE FOR THIS CAUSE”

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Published on Monday, 02 December 2013 18:53

Written by Super User

gahima_Gs.jpgA conversation with Dr. Gerald Gahima

By Jennifer Fierberg

Recently at a conference sponsored by the Royal African Society in London and organized by Dr. Phil Clark, Professor at London University, numerous academics presented research works on a variety of topics regarding the state of Rwanda under twenty years of post-conflict governance under the Rwandan Patriotic Front since the 1994 Genocide. Topics of the conference ranged from agricultural issues, youth in Rwanda, political opposition and peace building.

Due to the nature of the conference, being an academic conference, no direct quotations or information can be used in any publication.  Journalist received this requirement the night before the conference began.

One of the distinguished presenters, Dr. Gerald Gahima, spoke with this writer about his presentation at the conference and his research. Dr. Gahima’s paper, entitled “Peace building in the aftermath of mass atrocity: Evaluating the impact of the Peace Building Enterprise under the RPF,” presented a comprehensive and conclusive examination of the topic of which he is no doubt quite well experienced in. Two weeks after the conference, I interviewed Dr. Gerald Gahima on the issues which his presentation at the London conference addressed.

Dr. Gahimas answers are summarized below with his approval:

JF: What will it take to stop the cyclical violence of ethnic wars in Rwanda?

GG: I need to state at the outset that the views I express in this interview are strictly my personal views. The first key would be Security Sector reform. This step is required because security sector institutions are currently being used to advance the interests of one person or a small group of people. Additionally, the rule of law, as well as democratic institutions are required in order for the cycle of violence to end. Further the army, intelligence services and the police must be institutions in which all communities in Rwanda are represented. I do not propose that the existing army and other security sector institutions have to be disbanded or destroyed. I believe the RDF must be part of any future political settlement. It is, at the very least, an insurance against who might otherwise be tempted to complete the genocide of the Tutsi. However, the institution must be reformed and be made more inclusive to ensure equal protection for both the Hutu community as well as the Tutsi, for supporters of the government in power as those who oppose its policies. Reform of the intelligence services is particularly critical. The Rwanda Defense Forces Army not a homogeneous group of bigoted or blood thirsty men. The intelligence services are the more dangerous part of Rwanda’s security apparatus. I believe the majority of officers and men of the Rwanda military are patriots who want the best for the people of Rwanda. They are as much prisoners of the group that controls ultimate power as we civilians are. The intelligence services are, in my opinion, a different matter. They are responsible for the daily persecution, killings, and disappearances of real and imagined enemies of the government and general fear that the country suffers from. It is well known that the intelligence services have been directed to imprison any opposition members but when it comes to the Rwandan National Congress, any suspected members or supporters are to be killed without question or due process.  Therefore, the key to stopping the cyclical nature of ethnic based violence in Rwanda is building a fair, impartial and balanced judicial system and institutions of security and law enforcement in which all communities are represented at all levels and which serve the interests of all citizens rather than personal or sectarian interests of individuals or narrow groups.

 JF: You quoted Bizimungu in your paper that in 2007, he stated, “If things do not change… Hutu people they will rise up in 15-20 years and essentially revolt. What needs to change? Do you agree with his comment?

GG: Yes, I agree with this statement and I and my colleagues discussed this in our document The Rwanda Briefing. These sentiments are frequently in writings and audio and video publications, especially websites hosted by oppositions groups comprising of predominantly Hutu refugees. These publications argue that if the political climate does not change to give the Hutu community an equal balance of representativeness in the management of the Rwanda state, then they will be forced to impose these changes by any means possible. The risk of an uprising is very high and the cycle may repeat itself but it is not inevitable. Rwanda should look to the example of Burundi. They have many similarities to Rwanda such as ethnic make-up, same history of conflict, same history of genocide but they have been able to resolve their problems peacefully and to start building a society that where ethnic groups  do not feel that they can only secure their survival by total exclusion of the other from control of political and military power. Burundi was able to accomplish a peaceful outcome through external pressure. The Tutsi were forced to negotiate with Hutu resulting in Hutu being allowed political parties and have representation in politics and security services. There are elements of conflict that remain in Burundian society, but these are conflicts between political groups, that are not based on ethnicity. Burundi definitely has lessons for Rwanda. None of these measures are steps that President Kagame would want to take but I believe he is able to contemplate them.

 JF: What is your understanding of what life is like for present day in Rwanda and specifically for the Hutu population?

GG: First, I do not agree with all that some in the opposition have to say about the situation in Rwanda. I do, for example, agree with all that some opponents of the regime say about how the government is mismanaging the economy. I believe the government is generally doing as well as is possible in terms of economic management. Unfortunately, though, it is evident resources allocation and control of political power aligned. Poverty in Rwanda has an ethnic dimension. There is an imbalance of power toward Tutsi in Rwanda as well as economic inequalities. I do not agree that there is a deliberate policy to impoverish the Hutu people but there is no doubt that Hutu are discriminated against as well as marginalized in political representation.   Economic inequalities between rural and urban population are quite glaring. A disproportionate percentage of the urban population is typically Tutsi. Urban dwellers have better  access to state provided services and a better quality of life where as rural communities, who are predominantly Hutu, live in abject poverty. Relatives of people in power get differential treatment over the children of peasants in terms of access to employment and business opportunities. This is not unique to Rwanda. It happens in democracies as well. There is a historic precedent of ethnic division of economic factors. Oppression breeds grievances that fuel conflict. We discussed this in the Rwanda Briefing. Existing social and political inequalities are fueling conflict that could turn violent any time. Unless these inequalities are addressed, they could lead to new violence (possibly even another genocide) against the Tutsi community.

 JF: Why is the current ruling government in Rwanda exclusive of the Hutu people? Is it primarily due to the unbroken cyclical historic context or are there other reasons?

GG: The Rwanda government’s narrative about ethnicity is a living contradiction. Once there is a genocide, it is established beyond debate that there are specific and distinct ethnic groups. The narrative that “we are all Rwandans” is a contradiction especially since the genocide is now called “The Genocide of the Tutsi.” The Rwanda government denies the existence of ethnic groups but at the same time uses ethnicity to distinguish groups within Rwandan society in its policymaking. An initiative of President Kagame’s government requires that all Hutu apologize for the genocide to all Tutsi. This is a ridiculous and counterproductive request since the youth and many Hutu did not participate in the 1994 genocide. It is futile to deny that ethnic groups exist in Rwanda and the objective is not to oppress Hutu but to suppress all opposition Hutu or Tutsi. I do not believe that the Hutu are singled out for persecution by the regime. The regime persecutes anyone perceived as a threat to its survival, regardless of ethnicity. Because the Hutu are the majority and more of them are openly opposed to the regime, they endure the most of the discrimination and persecution. Far fewer people in the Tutsi community are willing to take the risks that regime change may entail. Many in the Tutsi community are apprehensive that political change may entail violence against them yet again.

 JF: Under Habyarimana, did the Tutsi face the same discrimination and oppression as the Hutu do today?

GG: There has never been a regime as oppressive as the current ruling regime in Rwanda. In the 1960’s there were terrible attacks on Tutsis in which more than 20,000 people died. Large numbers of the Tutsi community were internally displaced. Other Tutsi fled to exile. The population of the Tutsi in Rwanda was reduced by half as a result of these events. The other half were either killed or left into exile in order to survive. The human rights practices of Kayibanda and RPF regime bear similarities. The current regime can only be compared to that regime in the early 1960’s. However, considering what happened to the Hutu refugees in the DRC in the 1990’s, it may not be appropriate to compare the regimes. Under the late President Habyarimana, in the early years of his regime, the previous party to his experienced much violence after Habyarimanas party took power but none was experienced after that initial situation. During much of his time as president, President Habyarimana did not kill Tutsi, but they were marginalized in regards to access to schools, employment and service in government. They were excluded from playing a role in the society as equal citizens but they were not killed on a daily basis as is done today under Kagame’s regime. No other Rwandan president has ever been as intolerant or blood thirsty as the current president. President Kagame does not care about human life in Rwanda, Africa or the world as a whole. There is no comparison to him. It must pointed out however, that by far the worst of the human abuses that Rwanda has endured was the 1994 genocide. I personally do not believe that Habyarimana bears responsibility for the genocide itself. He was involved in the planning and carrying of violence that preceded the genocide. However, I personally believe that the decision to undertake an outright campaign to exterminate the Tutsi was taken by President Habyarimana’s inner circle after the President’s death. However, for the genocide against the Tutsi, even the violence that the Hutu community has suffered in both Rwanda and the DRC would not have happened.

 JF: What is the population consensus between the Hutu and the Tutsi?

GG: My best guess is that the population is 90% Hutu and 10% Tutsi. I confess I have no idea.

 JF: Restoring peace under RPF: There have obviously been some successes but the return of the refugees by force from DRC caused “Large scale loss of life.” Was this anticipated and/or planned? When word began to return from the battlefield that many were being murdered why wasn’t the mission stopped?

GG: I agree that there are successes under the RPF. Not everything they have done is bad by any means. Rwanda has successfully restored order and established some stability, if you compare to situations like such as Somalia, Iraq, Afghanistan and other states that have been through violent conflict. Order and relative public security should not be equated with democracy or peace. The process of imposing public order is not always in the best interest of the citizens. Rwanda has in my view also made progress in providing social services over the last 20 years. If violence does occur in modern day Rwanda, it is because the government intends for it. The government has the capacity to provide security that most post-conflict societies cannot. Although, this has not brought peace to Rwanda.

 In regards to the invasions of the DRC and the atrocities that are alleged to have been committed against Rwandan refugees in those operations, I was not party to decision to invade the DRC. We now know that many died in these wars but there were not briefings that I was a part of as to the situation on the ground. I learned of the atrocities later when I was doing my research at the United States Institute of Peace.

 JF: Who led this invasion on the ground?

GG: General James Kabarebe, I believe, led both the operations in DRC as well as other leaders I am not aware of in other theaters of war. President Kagame, of course, retained ultimate command of those operations.

 JF: You give two definitions of peace, negative and positive peace. Given those definitions of peace is seems like there is a cold war type of environment in Rwanda between the ethnic groups. Do you agree with this statement?

GG: When there are unresolved historical grievances between communities, one cannot say there has been reconciliation. When people are not yet free to discuss what problems they have as well as past grievances, there is no reconciliation. Until freedom of expression and political participation is open to all members of Rwandan society, one cannot speak of reconciliation. For example, Victorie Ingabire returned to Rwanda and spoke of the issues of Hutu victims of violence and she was imprisoned with others who have also spoken up on political issues. The grievances these political prisoners have spoken of are true and legitimate. One party to a conflict cannot unilaterally decree true reconciliation. There must be an opportunity for all stakeholders to come together with open minds, to express their differences and to acknowledge the grievances of the other. Reconciliation is only possible when parties in conflict have an opportunity to resolve issues between them through dialogue and then coming to terms and agreement to live together in peace on terms that are fair to all. This has not happened in Rwanda. One group will state, “We have brought you peace and you must accept it with no discussion.” There many unknown truths that must be opened to debate before reconciliation is realized. An example of these unknown truths include the responsibility for the plane crash that killed President Habyarimana as well as the planning of the genocide against the Tutsi. The ICTR failed to investigate the plane crash and to hold those responsible for it to account. Nevertheless, the killing of the President in no way justified the systematic attempt to exterminate the Tutsi community. The ICTR did a poor job prosecuting the genocide cases. It does not make sense to have such large-scale, state led violence without planning but the ICTR has not proved who bears responsibility for the planning and direction of the genocide. The kind of violence that happened in 1994 does not happen by accident. The truth about the organization of the genocide and who led it must be known before reconciliation can occur. Reconciliation is difficult when revisionists are at work, striving to make the world to believe that the genocide was merely an unavoidable consequence of the spontaneous anger of the people over the murder of the President. I do not agree with the narrative of the Rwandan government that the genocide was planned from 1991. I believe, however, that genocide was nevertheless planned and was not a spontaneous reaction due to the shooting down of the presidential plane; the killings that began immediately were too well organized. I came across proof of that organization in my work as a prosecutor.

 JF: In your paper, you wrote that, “Rather than promote reconciliation, Rwanda’s transitional justice processes have become a source of new grievances between Hutu and Tutsi communities.” Can you explain this statement?

GG: The government of Rwanda believes that the Gacaca court system was the climax of reconciliation. My opinion of Gacaca is well known. I was not in support of this process from the very beginning. I did not believe there could be fair and impartial judicial processes when accused people were to be judged by communities in which their friendships and family connections far outweighed the influence of the few survivors of the genocide. Further, the evidence was often unreliable. Gacaca trials relied on oral testimonies from witnesses, as there was no forensic evidence. Much research on Gacaca indicated that denial is still prevalent in Rwanda. Many Rwandans believe that the ICTR has been unjust to the people it has tried.  However, if all those who have been tried by the ICTR, Gacaca and ordinary Rwandan courts are victims of injustice, then who committed the genocide? To say all of these legal processes are unjust seems extreme. Many believe all these legal processes are another way the Hutu community has been victimized by the RPF. Gacaca has led to intensification of ethnic cleavages at the community level and this was foreseeable from my perspective. 

 JF: It seems to me the RPF replaced Habyarimana regime and is frankly similar. How are these regimes similar and how are they different from your perspective?

GG: There are differences between the two regimes. The Habyarimana was pushed into making major concessions during the 1990’s. This led to the establishment of a coalition of government in which opposition parties had real power. Opposition political parties were allowed to function during the last years of the Habyarimana regime, although they did experience some violence. Opposition parties were always allowed to exist, to exercise the right of assembly and to advocate for their policies. During the last years of the Habyarimana government, the media was free, so free to the point of inciting genocide. Human rights groups reported on human rights situations and advocated openly to the government as well as the world.  Under the RPF, these gains have been rolled back. These freedoms exist merely on paper. The RPF pushed back all of the progress towards opening of political space and exercise of fundamental liberties that briefly begun to flourish between 1991 - 1994. There is physically less violence now in Rwanda than there was in the last three years under Habyarimana but the people were more free than they are today.

 JF: Do you think in your lifetime Kagame will ever be charged for war crimes and crimes against humanity under the ICC? Why or why not?

GG: No, Rwandan courts will not hold President Kagame accountable unless he is overthrown. Outside forces, such as the major world powers of the US or UK decided a long time ago that in the interest of security and stability in the Great Lakes region, President Kagame should never be held accountable for any crimes for which he may be responsible. I do not see them going back on that decision. I believe President Obama is no fan of President Kagame but with the so-called “war on terror”; the US is focused elsewhere and has been for the time President Obama has been in in office. U.S. policies are driven by alliances that advance its strategic interests and not by human rights concerns. Global powers, including democracies like the UK and US have no problems working with dictators if it serves these interests. President Kagame does that in many ways for both super powers. Kagame has, for example, proven himself as a useful proxy in regards to peacekeeping missions in places such as Sudan. The decision to not hold Kagame accountable came long before Obama entered office; the decision was made back in the days of former President Bush, Jr. and former President Clinton who remain close to Kagame in many ways. The ICC is too dependent on what the major super powers want and, thus far, Kagame has been and will probably remain a beneficiary of those relationships.

JF: Your book, Transitional Justice in Rwanda, has had mixed reviews as to its tone. Some who have read it say it is pro-RPF, what do you say to those statements?

GG: I have not heard any reviews either positive or negative in regards to my book. Although, readers should not be surprised at the tone, I served the RPF for 14 years. Journalist and so-called academics always seem to want the dirty details on Kagame and I find this line of questioning insulting. When we took up arms against the Habyarimana regime, it was in support of a cause that we believed and still believe in. With the experience of the genocide, I now believe in change by only peaceful means. Nevertheless, I feel disgusted that people would think we sat around and planned to do harm when we took over the reins of power after the genocide. We felt what we were doing was right. Even today, I do not judge people serving in Kagames government. The vast majority of people who serve in the Rwandan government love their country, do their best, and believe what they are doing is right. Sadly, they are hostages. I do not agree with academics who say everyone who disagrees with Kagame should go into exile. It is our country and we are its people. I do not owe anyone any explanations for my time of service in that government. I have no apologies to make because I felt I was doing the right thing and my conscience does not disturb me about anything I did. I tried to build civil and justice services and did it in good faith. It is part of my heritage and I am proud of what I accomplished. I have no regrets. Clearly, there are things that have not gone right in Rwanda.  Still, it is an illusion to argue that the RPF has not achieved anything either. President Kagame is very corrupt and misuses his power but not to the degree of Uganda or Kenya. There are many people in Rwanda who are serving the country and working hard to improve the wellbeing of its people. Just because Rwanda is not a democracy it does not mean there are not people working in the best interest of the people of the country in that government.

 JF: Do you miss Rwanda? Do you see yourself returning to Rwanda while the RPF remains in power?

GG: Yes, I miss Rwanda. No, I do not realistically see myself returning to Rwanda soon. Because of reasons that I have given earlier in the interview, I do not advocate a change that would lead to the destruction of the RPA. Yet, I would never feel safe and secure living in Rwanda whereas some of the current leadership of the RPA remains power. The risks to my life and the lives of my family and colleagues would be very high.

 JF: Do you feel a sense of betrayal for being tried in absentia on charges that do not exist against you and then being sentenced to more than 20 years in jail?

GG: Taking on the RPF is not a decision one makes lightly. You lose all you have worked for and your livelihood. Going to exile and being a refugee again is very humiliating and not an easy decision to make. Nevertheless, I do not feel any sense of betrayal by that decision of the Rwanda’s kangaroo military courts. I make this stand boldly and with purpose and these are the consequences. I take my sentence not as a betrayal but as a badge of honor. We have stood up for what is right. We have suffered for it and I have the scars (figuratively) to prove it. We sacrifice more than people realize for this cause. Let the academics who judge my actions show me their own scars. We are speaking not because we seek to return to power, but because we aim to prevent the horrendous risks that Rwanda faces if things do not change peacefully.

 JF: Will you ever tell your personal story that so many have asked for?

GG: Yes, Theo, my brother, started that with his book. I believe I will tell mine but there is no hurry. I hope that those who presume they have the power of life and death over and other us will allow us to live  long enough to tell the story if necessary! However, first and foremost, the cause before us now is that people face daily risks and imminent catastrophe in Rwanda. We are privileged to be in a situation where we can speak out. We are working on their behalf. We and many others on the outside are their voices.

 

Source

CPI/COTE D’IVOIRE - LA CPI RAPPELLE A ABIDJAN SON OBLIGATION DE LUI REMETTRE CHARLES BLE GOUDE

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Ble-goude2.jpgArusha, 3 décembre 2013 (FH) –La Cour pénale internationale (CPI) rappelle à la Côte d’Ivoire son obligation de lui remettre Charles Blé Goudé, un proche de l’ancien président Laurent Gbagbo actuellement entre les mains de la Cour, apprend-on mardi.

 

 

D’abord placé sous scellés depuis son émission le 21 décembre 2011, le mandat d’arrêt de la CPI contre Blé Goudé a été rendu public le 1er octobre dernier.
Dans une décision rendue lundi, une chambre préliminaire de la CPI ordonne au greffier de la Cour de réitérer à la Côte d’Ivoire la demande de transfèrement du suspect et lui rappeler son obligation d’exécuter cette demande.
 

La chambre préliminaire demande par ailleurs aux autorités ivoiriennes de présenter, au plus tard le 13 janvier, leurs observations sur l’état d’exécution de la décision.
Ancien ministre de la Jeunesse de Laurent Gbagbo et chef des «Jeunes patriotes», milices pro-Gbagbo parfois extrêmement violentes, Charles Blé Goudé a été arrêté le 17 janvier au Ghana après plus d’un an et demi de cavale et extradé dès le lendemain vers la Côte d’Ivoire où il est détenu depuis lors.
Aujourd’hui âgé de 40 ans, il est soupçonné d’avoir engagé sa responsabilité pénale individuelle, en tant que coauteur indirect, pour quatre chefs de crimes contre  l’humanité  (meurtres,  viols et autres violences sexuelles, actes de persécution et autres actes inhumains).
 

Ces crimes auraient été perpétrés dans le contexte des violences post-électorales survenues sur le territoire ivoirien entre le 16 décembre 2010 et le 12 avril 2011.
Selon les conclusions préliminaires de la CPI, il y a des motifs raisonnables de croire qu’au lendemain des élections présidentielles en Côte d’Ivoire, les forces pro-Gbagbo avaient attaqué la population civile à Abidjan et dans l’Ouest du pays, à partir du 28 novembre 2010.

Toujours selon la Cour, le camp Gbagbo ciblait  des civils qu’il pensait être des partisans du candidat de l’opposition, l’actuel président Alassane Ouattara.
En tant que membre de l’entourage immédiat de M. Gbagbo, Charles Blé Goudé aurait exercé un contrôle sur les crimes et apporté une contribution coordonnée et essentielle à la réalisation du plan.  Sous son contrôle, des jeunes auraient été systématiquement recrutés, armés, entraînés et intégrés dans la chaîne de commandement des Forces de défense et de sécurité ivoiriennes, pour commettre des crimes.
ER

 

© Agence Hirondelle

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