After the attempts to destroy the Armenians and Jews of Europe, the genocide of the Tutsi in 1994 is the last of the genocides of the 20th century. Orchestrated by the party in power in Rwanda, the genocide has claimed a million victims in the space of 3 months.
Like previous genocides, that of the Tutsi began with a phase of stigmatization of the population, continued with persecution that would lead to the killing.
For all that, this mass murder characterized in particular as it is the first "proximity genocide". Executioners and victims were in effect neighbors, as are now the Tutsi survivors and the Hutu convicted of crimes by the local courts set up by the new regime.
By its scale as well as the mechanisms implemented, the genocide of the Tutsi raises crucial and still relevant questions for States, international organizations and citizens.
The genocide of the Tutsi is rooted in colonial politics and ideology of the 19th century. The Belgian colonizer initially chose to rely on the Tutsi by creating the myth of their superiority over the other community, the Hutu.
The antagonism born of this hierarchization was exacerbated during the independence of Rwanda in the 1960s, marked by a reversal of power that then fell to the Hutus with the support of Belgium. The young Rwandan state reduces all forms of political opposition to a racial struggle between so-called ethnic groups, in fact communities historically related to clans.
In this context, while the multiparty system authorized in 1991 allowed the opposition to manifest itself, the Hutu authorities developed hate propaganda that psychologically prepared the population for genocide. The conditioning role of media, like the weight of words, is decisive. Tutsi are likened to harmful insects that must be disposed of.
The process of animalization will lead in April, when the genocide begins, to a hunt for "game" followed by a killing of victims, slaughtered with cruelty and like cattle.
The speed and scale of the murders partly explain the lack of reaction in the country where the actions that are then carried out relate more to rescue, including by Hutu hostile to genocide, than to armed resistance.
In this respect, the defection of the international community has been catastrophic. Disqualified by its support for the regime of Hutu president Juvenal Habyarimana, France withdrew its forces in 1993.
Unlike the genocide of the Jews, the killing of the Tutsis is not concentrated in specific sites such as extermination camps. The planned assassination takes place in the space of daily life. From 7 April 1994, barriers were erected at all strategic crossroads, in the capital Kigali, and then throughout the country.
Holders of an identity card marked "Tutsi" are shot on the spot. The involvement of the civilian population in the massacres is one of the defining features of the genocide.
Grouped in small groups, called ibitero, the murderers include young men as well as women and even children.
On July 4, 1994, the military victory of the Rwandan Patriotic Front, created by the Tutsi in 1987, marks the end of the massacres and the beginning of a civil and moral reconstruction that goes through the trial of those responsible for the genocide, and not only the executors.
The Shoah Memorial dedicated an exhibition to the genocide of the Tutsi in Rwanda from 11 April to 5 October 2014.
The
The association was founded in Belgium on 16 August 1994. On 28 May 1995, an association with the same name was created in Switzerland with the same objective as its Belgian counterpart. On 14 November 1995, the association Ibuka was created in Rwanda. In France, the association
