Rutobwe Commune | |
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Coordinates: 1°59′03″S29°47′51″E / 1.984256°S 29.7973793°E | |
Time zone | UTC+02:00 (Africa/Kigali) |
Languages | Kinyarwanda, English, French, Swahili |
Rwanda, officially the Republic of Rwanda, is a landlocked country in the Great Rift Valley of Central Africa, where the African Great Lakes region and East Africa converge. Located a few degrees south of the Equator, Rwanda is bordered by Uganda, Tanzania, Burundi, and the Democratic Republic of the Congo. It is highly elevated, giving it the soubriquet "land of a thousand hills", with its geography dominated by mountains in the west and savanna to the east, with numerous lakes throughout the country. The climate is temperate to subtropical, with two rainy seasons and two dry seasons each year. Rwanda has a population of over 12.6 million living on 26,338 km2 (10,169 sq mi) of land, and is the most densely populated mainland African country; among countries larger than 10,000 km2, it is the fifth most densely populated country in the world. One million people live in the capital and largest city Kigali.
Human occupation of Rwanda is thought to have begun shortly after the last ice age. By the 11th century, the inhabitants had organized into a number of kingdoms. In the 19th century, Mwami (king) Rwabugiri of the Kingdom of Rwanda conducted a decades-long process of military conquest and administrative consolidation that resulted in the kingdom coming to control most of what is now Rwanda. The colonial powers, Germany and Belgium, allied with the Rwandan court.
Paul Kagame is a Rwandan politician and former military leader. He is the sixth and current president of Rwanda, having taken office in 2000. Kagame previously commanded the Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF), a Uganda-based rebel force which invaded Rwanda in 1990 and 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.
This is a list of public holidays in Rwanda. Rwanda observes fourteen regular public holidays.
The Rwandan genocide, also known as the genocide against the Tutsi, 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 militias. The most widely accepted scholarly estimates are around 500,000 to 662,000 Tutsi deaths.
.rw is the Internet country code top-level domain (ccTLD) for Rwanda.
The Rwanda Defence Force is the national army of Rwanda. The country's armed forces were originally known as the Rwandan Armed Forces (FAR), but following the Rwandan Civil War of 1990–1994 and the 1994 genocide against the Tutsi, the victorious Rwandan Patriotic Front (Inkotanyi) created a new organization and named it Rwandan Patriotic Army (RPA). Later, it was renamed to its current name.
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.
The Federation of Green Parties of Africa is an umbrella body of the various national Green parties and environmental parties in Africa. The formal coalition, the African Greens Federation (AGF) formed in 2010 at a conference in Kampala, Uganda. As part of the Global Greens, founded in 2001 in Canberra, Australia, the parties included in the Federation of Green Parties of Africa follow the Global Greens Charter. The organization's permanent administration is in Ouagadougou, the capital of Burkina Faso, where the predominant green organization is the Rassemblement Des Ecologistes du Burkina Faso. These parties tend to, but not always, be left-leaning and often do not have widespread support in their respective countries.
The Chamber of Deputies is the lower house of the bicameral national legislature of Rwanda. It was created under the new Constitution adopted by referendum in 2003.
Muhanga is a city in Rwanda, in the Muhanga District, in Southern Province. The city is 5,945 feet (1,812 m) above sea level.
Rwanda's legal system is largely based on German and Belgian civil law systems and customary law.
There are several planned railway lines in Rwanda, including a line to Tanzania. Historical railways are limited to three industrial railways.
Rwanda faces a generalized epidemic, with an HIV prevalence rate of 3.1 percent among adults ages 15 to 49. The prevalence rate has remained relatively stable, with an overall decline since the late 1990s, partly due to improved HIV surveillance methodology. In general, HIV prevalence is higher in urban areas than in rural areas, and women are at higher risk of HIV infection than men. Young women ages 15 to 24 are twice as likely to be infected with HIV as young men in the same age group. Populations at higher risk of HIV infection include people in prostitution and men attending clinics for sexually transmitted infections.
Rwanda competed at the 2012 Summer Paralympics in London, United Kingdom, from 29 August to 9 September 2012.
Édouard Ngirente is a Rwandan economist and politician. He serves as the Prime Minister of Rwanda, since 30 August 2017, having been appointed by the President of Rwanda, Paul Kagame.
Rwanda–Spain relations are the bilateral and diplomatic relations between these two countries. Rwanda does not have an embassy in Spain, however its embassy in Paris, France, is accredited to Spain and maintains an honorary consulate in Madrid. Spain does not have an embassy in Rwanda, however, its embassy in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, is accredited to Rwanda and maintains an honorary consulate in Kigali.
Events in the year 2020 in Rwanda.
France–Rwanda relations refers to the international relations between France and Rwanda.
Belgium-Rwanda relations refers to the international and diplomatic relations between Belgium and Rwanda. Belgian relations with Rwanda started under the League of Nations mandate, when the modern day countries of Rwanda and Burundi were governed as Ruanda-Urundi. As the colonial power, Rwanda's relationship with Belgium has been significant throughout the country's history, even after independence.