Double genocide theory (Rwanda)

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The double genocide theory posits that, during the Rwandan genocide, the Tutsi-led Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF) engaged in a "counter-genocide" against the Hutus. [1] Most scholars of Rwanda, such as Scott Straus and Gerald Caplan, say that RPF violence against Hutus does not fully match the definition of "genocide", considering that it instead consisted of war crimes [2] or crimes against humanity. [3]

Contents

Examples

Black Furies, White Liars, a book by French investigative journalist Pierre Péan, accuses the RPF of genocide against Hutus. Jean-Pierre Chrétien, a French historian, criticized Péan's "amazing revisionist passion". [4] A 2003 study by Philip Verwimp, based on 8 months of field research in central and southern Rwanda over a period of 2 years, found that the absolute number of Tutsis killed was double that for Hutus, and that the patterns of killing for the two groups differed. [5] Verwimp acknowledged that his study was only a partial test of the double-genocide thesis as it excluded the prefectures where most RPF killings were purportedly committed, yet concluded by arguing that "for those prefectures in which we performed our fieldwork, the term genocide should be reserved for the killings committed by the Interahamwe and the FAR, and another word should be used for the killings committed by the RPF. That word could be massacre or terror or another word, depending on the event." [6]

A great deal of effort has been extended to make sure the focus stays exclusively on the Francophone Tutsi victims and their Hutu executioners. But of the estimated one million people killed, between 300,000 and 500,000 of them were Tutsi, according to best estimates. What about the other 500,000 to 700,000 people? Who is responsible for their deaths? [7] [8]

—Christian Davenport
Professor of Peace Studies at the University of Michigan

In 2009, scholars Christian Davenport of the University of Michigan and Allan C. Stam of Dartmouth College argued that the anti-Tutsi genocide constituted only part of the slaughter of spring and summer 1994; that the RPF was "clearly responsible" for another major portion of the killings; that the victims were "fairly evenly distributed between Tutsi and Hutu"; that the majority of the dead were Hutu, rather than Tutsi; and that, "among other things, it appears that there simply weren't enough Tutsi in Rwanda at the time to account for all the reported deaths". [9]

In October 2014, a BBC documentary, Rwanda: The Untold Story, was aired featuring interviews with Davenport and Stam. It suggested that Kagame's RPF was involved in the shooting down of Habyarimana's plane. It aroused considerable controversy. [10] Following this, the Rwandan government banned the BBC's Kinyarwanda-language radio broadcasts from the country [11] before conducting a three-week inquiry into the documentary. [12]

In 2018, the Canadian journalist Judi Rever released a book titled In Praise of Blood . Based on interviews with RPF defectors and top-secret documents that were leaked from the ICTR, Rever argued that ethnically targeted killings of Hutus by the RPF, beginning in 1990 in Rwanda and in 1996 in Zaire, should also be called "genocide." [13] Scholars had mixed reactions to Rever's description of these killings as "genocide." René Lemarchand called the book a "path-breaking inquest", "destined to become required reading for any one claiming competence on the Rwanda genocide". [14] Political scientist Scott Straus was critical, writing that in his opinion the evidence showed that the RPF killings of Hutu civilians constituted crimes against humanity, but not a double genocide. [3] Similarly, Gerald Caplan said that RPF had committed "war crimes" against Hutus but those crimes did not meet the definition of genocide. [2]

See also

Related Research Articles

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The Hutu, also known as the Abahutu, are a Bantu ethnic or social group which is native to the African Great Lakes region. They mainly live in Rwanda, Burundi and the eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo, where they form one of the principal ethnic groups alongside the Tutsi and the Great Lakes Twa.

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The International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda was an international court established in November 1994 by the United Nations Security Council in Resolution 955 in order to judge people responsible for the Rwandan genocide and other serious violations of international law in Rwanda, or by Rwandan citizens in nearby states, between 1 January and 31 December 1994. The court eventually convicted 61 individuals and acquitted 14.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Juvénal Habyarimana</span> President of Rwanda from 1973 to 1994

Juvénal Habyarimana was a politician and military officer who served as the second president of Rwanda, from 1973 until his assassination in 1994. He was nicknamed Kinani, a Kinyarwanda word meaning "invincible".

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Paul Kagame</span> President of Rwanda since 2000

Paul Kagame is a Rwandan politician and former military officer who is the fourth and current president of Rwanda since 2000. He previously served as a commander of the Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF), a rebel armed force which invaded Rwanda in 1990. The RPF was one of the parties of the conflict during the Rwandan Civil War and the armed force which ended the Rwandan genocide. He was considered Rwanda's de facto leader when he served as Vice President and Minister of Defence under President Pasteur Bizimungu from 1994 to 2000 after which the vice-presidential post was abolished.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Rwandan Patriotic Front</span> Political party in Rwanda

The Rwandan Patriotic Front is the ruling political party in Rwanda. Led by President Paul Kagame, the party has governed the country since its armed wing defeated government forces, winning the Rwandan Civil War in 1994.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Interahamwe</span> Paramilitary group involved in 1994 Rwandan Genocide

The Interahamwe is a Hutu paramilitary organization active in the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Uganda. The Interahamwe was formed around 1990 as the youth wing of the National Republican Movement for Democracy and Development, the then-ruling party of Rwanda, and enjoyed the backing of the Hutu Power government. The Interahamwe, led by Robert Kajuga, were the main perpetrators of the Rwandan genocide, during which an estimated 500,000 to 1,000,000 Tutsi, Twa, and moderate Hutus were killed from April to July 1994, and the term "Interahamwe" was widened to mean any civilian militias or bands killing Tutsi.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Rwandan genocide</span> 1994 genocide in Rwanda

The Rwandan genocide occurred between 7 April and 15 July 1994 during the Rwandan Civil War. During this period of around 100 days, members of the Tutsi minority ethnic group, as well as some moderate Hutu and Twa, were killed by armed Hutu militias. The most widely accepted scholarly estimates are around 500,000 to 800,000 Tutsi deaths.

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Opération Turquoise was a French-led military operation in Rwanda in 1994 under the mandate of the United Nations. The "multilateral" force consisted of 2,500 troops, 32 from Senegal and the rest French. The equipment included 100 APCs, 10 helicopters, a battery of 120 mm mortars, 4 Jaguar fighter bombers, 8 Mirage fighters, and reconnaissance aircraft. The helicopters laid a trail of food, water and medicine enabling refugees to escape into eastern Zaire. Opération Turquoise is controversial for at least two reasons: accusations that it was an attempt to prop up the genocidal Hutu regime, and that its mandate undermined the UNAMIR. By facilitating 2 million Rwandan refugees to travel to Kivu provinces in Zaire, Turquoise setup the causes of the First Congo War.

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Radio Télévision Libre des Mille Collines (RTLM) was a Rwandan radio station which broadcast from July 8, 1993, to July 31, 1994. It played a significant role in inciting the Rwandan genocide that took place from April to July 1994, and has been described by some scholars as having been a de facto arm of the Hutu government.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Rwandan Civil War</span> 1990–1994 conflict in Rwanda

The Rwandan Civil War was a large-scale civil war in Rwanda which was fought between the Rwandan Armed Forces, representing the country's government, and the rebel Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF) from 1 October 1990 to 18 July 1994. The war arose from the long-running dispute between the Hutu and Tutsi groups within the Rwandan population. A 1959–1962 revolution had replaced the Tutsi monarchy with a Hutu-led republic, forcing more than 336,000 Tutsi to seek refuge in neighbouring countries. A group of these refugees in Uganda founded the RPF which, under the leadership of Fred Rwigyema and Paul Kagame, became a battle-ready army by the late 1980s.

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">1993 ethnic violence in Burundi</span> 1993 killings of mostly Tutsis in Burundi

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">Assassination of Juvénal Habyarimana and Cyprien Ntaryamira</span> 1994 shootdown in Kigali, Rwanda

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Hutu Power is a racial and ethnosupremacist ideology that asserts the ethnic superiority of Hutu, often in the context of being superior to Tutsi and Twa, and that therefore they are entitled to dominate and murder these two groups and other minorities. Espoused by Hutu extremists, widespread support for the ideology led to the 1994 Rwandan genocide against Tutsi and their family members, the moderate Hutu who opposed the killings, and Twa who were deemed traitors. Hutu Power political parties and movements included the Akazu, the Coalition for the Defence of the Republic and its Impuzamugambi paramilitary militia, and the governing National Republican Movement for Democracy and Development and its Interahamwe paramilitary militia. The theory of Hutu people being superior is most common in Rwanda and Burundi, where they make up the majority of the population. Due to its sheer destructiveness, the ideology has been compared to historical Nazism in the Western world.

Rwandan genocide denial is the assertion that the Rwandan genocide did not occur, specifically rejection of the scholarly consensus that Rwandan Tutsis were the victims of genocide between 7 April and 15 July 1994. The perpetrators, a small minority of other Hutu, and a fringe of Western writers dispute that reality.

<i>In Praise of Blood</i> Non-fiction book by Judi Rever

In Praise of Blood: The Crimes of the Rwandan Patriotic Front is a 2018 non-fiction book by Canadian journalist Judi Rever and published by Random House of Canada; it has also been translated into Dutch and French. The book describes alleged war crimes by the Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF), Rwanda's ruling political party, during its ascent to power in the 1990s.

The Bugesera invasion, also known as the Bloody Christmas, was a military attack which was conducted against Rwanda by Inyenzi rebels who aimed to overthrow the government in December 1963. The Inyenzi were a collection of ethnically Tutsi exiles who were affiliated with the Rwandan political party Union Nationale Rwandaise (UNAR), which had supported Rwanda's deposed Tutsi monarchy. The Inyenzi opposed Rwanda's transformation upon independence from Belgium into a state run by the ethnic Hutu majority through the Parti du Mouvement de l'Emancipation Hutu (PARMEHUTU), an anti-Tutsi political party led by President Grégoire Kayibanda. In late 1963 Inyenzi leaders decided to launch an invasion of Rwanda from their bases in neighbouring countries to overthrow Kayibanda. While an attempted assault in November was stopped by the government of Burundi, early in the morning on 21 December 1963 several hundred Inyenzi crossed the Burundian border and captured the Rwandan military in camp in Gako, Bugesera. Bolstered with seized arms and recruited locals, the Iyenzi—numbering between 1,000 and 7,000—marched on the Rwandan capital, Kigali. They were stopped 12 miles south of the city at Kanzenze Bridge along the Nyabarongo River by multiple units of the Garde Nationale Rwandaise (GNR). The GNR routed the rebels with their superior firepower, and in subsequent days repelled further Inyenzi attacks launched from the Republic of the Congo and Uganda.

References

  1. ↑ Jean-Paul Gouteux. "Mémoire et révisionnisme du génocide rwandais en France: Racines politiques, impact médiatique". Online posting. Amnistia.net Archived 11 February 2006 at the Wayback Machine 12 February 2004.
  2. 1 2 Caplan 2018, p. 186.
  3. 1 2 Straus 2019, pp. 5, 13.
  4. ↑ "Point de Vue: Un pamphlet teinté d'africanisme colonial". Le Monde Archived 17 November 2007 at the Wayback Machine 9 December 2005. Qtd. by Thierry Perret in "Les dossiers de presse : Afrique-France: Rwanda/« l'affaire » Péan". Online posting. RFI Service Pro Archived 19 June 2006 at the Wayback Machine 22 December 2005. Chrétien's "Point de Vue" posted online in Observatoire de l'Afrique centrale 8 (December 2005) Archived 19 June 2006 at the Wayback Machine
  5. ↑ Verwimp 2003.
  6. ↑ Verwimp 2003, pp. 424, 441.
  7. ↑ David Peterson (17 June 2011). "Rwanda's 1991 Census". ZSpace. Archived from the original on 18 April 2014. Retrieved 9 August 2013.
  8. ↑ Fallon, Joan (24 March 2009). "Research sheds new light on Rwanda killings". news.nd.edu . Archived from the original on 20 December 2014. Retrieved 19 December 2014.
  9. ↑ Christian Davenport; Allan C. Stam (6 October 2009). "What Really Happened in Rwanda?". psmag.com. Archived from the original on 5 April 2018. Retrieved 10 August 2013.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
  10. ↑ For criticism of the documentary, see:
    Wallis, Andrew (6 October 2014). "'Rwanda: The Untold Story': questions for the BBC". openDemocracy . Archived from the original on 29 November 2014. Retrieved 26 November 2014.
    Musoni, Edwin (26 November 2014). "BBC had an agenda to twist Rwanda history – UK expert". newtimes.co.rw . Archived from the original on 29 November 2014. Retrieved 27 November 2014.
    Johnson, Richard (14 December 2014). "The BBC and the West need to clean up their act on Rwanda". csmonitor.com. Christian Science Monitor. Archived from the original on 19 December 2014. Retrieved 19 December 2014.
  11. ↑ Baird, Dugald (24 October 2014). "Rwanda bans BBC broadcasts over genocide documentary". theguardian.com. Archived from the original on 11 November 2014. Retrieved 26 November 2014.
  12. ↑ Musoni, Edwin (18 November 2014). "BBC probe team begins work tomorrow". newtimes.co.rw. New Times (Rwanda). Archived from the original on 21 November 2014. Retrieved 27 November 2014.
  13. ↑ Rever 2018, p. 223, 232.
  14. ↑ Lemarchand, René (25 June 2018). "Rwanda: the state of Research | Sciences Po Violence de masse et Résistance – Réseau de recherche". www.sciencespo.fr. ISSN   1961-9898. Archived from the original on 19 November 2018. Retrieved 13 December 2018.

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