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RASSEMBLEMENT POUR LE RETOUR DES | |
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119, RAHIER 4987 STOUMONT BELGIQUE Tél/Fax: 32-80786184 |
7, RESIDENCE MONTESQUIEU 49000 ANGERS FRANCE Tél/Fax: 33-41489987 |
July 1, 1995
PRESS RELEASE Nº11
Within two days, RPF will be celebrating its entry into KIGALI town after a four year war. It will be a year since RPF conquered the rwandan territory but still with an uphill task to win the hearts of the rwandan people.
Indeed each territorial gain of RPF coincided with an exodus of people, and was it not for the french military operation codenamed "OPERATION TURQUOISE", RPF would have inherited a ghost country.
According to conservative estimates, the number of refugees is more than 3 millions and the number is still rising. One should add the internally displaced people and those who sleep in bush to escape arbitrary arrests by RPF operatives. Many of those are found in the prefectures of BUTARE, GIKONGORO, CYANGUGU, GISENYI, KIBUYE, GITARAMA and RUHENGERI.
VIOLATION OF HUMAN RIGHTS
Up to the cold blood and horrible massacres of KIBEHO carried out by the RPF Army, the KIGALI Government has relatively succeeded in hoodwinking the international public opinion and convincing it that there was no violation of human rights in Rwanda. However, just to mention one example, more than 100.000 people are detained in overcrowded prisons, on a blanket charge of genocide, without any file. In this regard, Rwanda has the highest world record in the rates of detention. Indeed, it is a shame for RPF to take advantage of the unfortunate April 1994 massacres in order to get rid of any real or potential political opponent, thereby monopolising all the political, military and administrative power.
The continuing gross violations of human rights in Rwanda has been confirmed among others by Human Rights Watch, usually favourable to RPF, the International Federation for Human Rights (I.F.H.R) in its report dated April 1995, Amnesty International in its reports of April 1995 (AFR 47/05/1995) and June 1995 (AFR 02/12/95), by ARDHO (Rwandese Association of Human Rights), yet very pro-government, in its quarterly report of April 1995, by CLADHO, by the Chief Prosecutor of Kigali Chief magistrate court, NSANZUWERA François Xavier in his press release made in Brussels on the 11th May 1995, as well as by the district councils of GISENYI, and GITARAMA in the presence of the Minister of Internal Affairs.
RDR is very much concerned about the fate of people who escaped the KIBEHO massacres and are currently facing large scale harassment.
Nowadays, it is a crime in Rwanda to have survived the KIBEHO massacres, no matter the circumstances that led you in camp.
Despite the assurances given to them by western ambassadors accreditated to KIGALI that they would not be persecuted if they surrender and leave the camp, survivors of KIBEHO have dearly paid right from the moment they got out.
Some were killed on the way to BUTARE, where everybody had to transit, others were summarily killed on their arrival at home in the communes of HUYE, MUGUSA, RUSATIRA, NYABISINDU etc...Others were thrown in jail, while others simply disappeared.
Regarding imprisonments, the minister of internal affairs of KIGALI regime declared on May 26, 1995, in a council meeting of GITARAMA, that after the KIBEHO massacres, there had been so many arrests that all the available space in detention places had been exhausted.
Similarly the division commander of BUTARE, Major KATABARWA, declared in the presence of minister Pie Mugabo in RUSATIRA Commune, that the international community should not bother about the RPA killing Interahamwe. This took place after the discovery of 27 bodies in the communal jail of RUSATIRA.
As for disappearances, they are in thousands and the phenomenon is not yet over. According to some press reports, released on 22nd June 1995, there may be about 60.000 former KIBEHO camp residents who are yet to be accounted for.
RDR appeals to the international community which had hurriedly whitewashed the KIGALI Government after KIBEHO massacres in the famous report of the international commission of enquiry, (RDR has since expressed its disappointment over the same) to ask the same government to throw the light on the whereabout of those unaccounted for people.
Rather than looking for false pretexts, here are the real reason behind the non return of rwandese refugees.
RDR would like to make it abundantly clear for instance, that rwandese refugees did not flee for fear of reprisal for the April massacres.
Indeed, before those massacres, there was over 1 million displaced people fleeing RPF massacres, even after the signing of the Arusha Agreement.
Therefore, spreading that those refugees are hostages of militiamen amounts to ignoring that the displacement of people started with the very first attack of Rwanda by RPF in October 1990.
SITUATION IN REFUGEE CAMPS.
Rwandese refugees, on top of the psychological torture of being labelled indiscriminately criminals,, have to face multiples challenges, one after the other.
In Burundi, the about 250.000 refugees are paying heavily for the hutu rebellion against the Burundi tutsi army, on top of incursions by RPA in northern Burundi.
The existence of these massacres of rwandese refugees in Burundi has been confirmed by UNHCR, NGOs, as well as Amnesty International in its latest report of June 1995 (AFR. 02/12/95, pg 2).
In April 1995, they fled in thousands towards Tanzania only to be repulsed without mercy.
As if these incidents were not enough, these refugees are now a matter of political bargaining between the two minority regime in Rwanda and Burundi. The latest visit of Major General Kagame Paul in Burundi early June 1995 following another one by the Prime Minister, is to be seen in this framework.
In Zaire, beside the chronical shortage of food, (in average, a family of 6 gets 2 kg of beans, 4kg of maize flower, and 4 kg of maize per couple of weeks), rwandese refugees are now faced with a mounting hostility from the local people.
This animosity has increased with the vote in May 1995, by the Zairian parliament, of a resolution, calling for an unconditional departure of rwandese refugees, as well as the recent trouble in MASISI region between local BAHUNDE tribesmen and rwandese immigrants.
I would like to stress that those are rwandese immigrants who settled in Zaire very long ago, many of them before the independencies of the two countries, and not refugees of 1994 as erroneously reported by a section of the press; and that clashes between the two ethnic communities started very long before the arrival of rwandese refugees of 1994.
This confusion fuelled further the animosity against rwandese refugees.
The frequent threats of raids in camp by the RPA, (the last having been uttered by none other than Major General Kagame Paul, Vice-President and Minister of Defense, on May 14, 1995, in RWAMATAMU Kibuye) adds to their anxiety.
In Tanzania, once again, the vote by the national parliament of a resolution calling for an unconditional return of rwandese refugees, as well as the deportation back to Burundi, of rwandese refugees who had managed to sneak into Tanzania after the bloody attacks on their camps in norther Burundi, has sent them into panic.
The recent expulsion by tanzanian authorities, of thousands of Burundi hutu refugees, at the time of serious bloody confrontation in their country, is also a source of concern for rwandese refugees.
Given this painful situation, it is clear that rwandese refugees are eager to go home, because their life in camp is far from being a green pasture. What they are asking for is only security guarantees.
SPECULATION ABOUT AN INVASION OF RWANDA
The information about an invasion of Rwanda by rwandese refugees was released first by a British NGO. Later on, the information was relayed by a british shadow minister , by Human Rights Watch, and by Amnesty International.
RDR has twice refuted these reports, whose sole aim was to prepare the international community to accept the lifting of the arms embargo imposed on KIGALI by the UN in May 1994.
Without coming back to all these reports, RDR would like to point out some of the serious loopholes in the latest report, i.e the one of A.I:
1. The report seems to know so well the location of the arms caches (Pg 4, last paragraph), and even the UN seems also to share that information.
What is UN waiting for in order to seize those arms and get a red handed case against Zaire and former RGF ?
2. It is alleged that, 4 british pilots admitted having flown 36,5 tons, in November 1994 (pg 5) in GOMA having been tricked into believing that they were for former RGF.
How did they ascertain that they belonged to former RGF ? Were they ever charged in court for violating the UN embargo ? What about the owner of the carrier?
3. The report frequently talks about countries of origins of the cargo planes without mentioning the registration number. Was it difficult for the informer to put down that important detail?
4. If the shipments were so secret, why should the former prime minister, KAMBANDA Jean, make the long journey, from BUKAVU to GOMA, to receive the cargo? Couldn't he delegate somebody less noticeable?
Besides, the so called leader of Interahamwe, who accompanied the former PM to GOMA, has never led Interahamwe in his life, as the second in command of the FAR is well known and in any case different from the one mentioned by the report.
Beyond these inaccuracies, RDR would like to strongly deny the serious accusation about the involvement of refugees in political killing inside Rwanda.
1. The latest well known political killing in Rwanda was the one of the late RWANGABO P.Claver, prefect (district administrator) of BUTARE.
His escort, an RPA soldier surprisingly survived the ambush unscratched. UNAMIR investigators, as well as journalists, were prevented by RPF from interrogating him. Was it to cover hutu militia?
2. Concerning the killing of the bourgmestre of GISHOMA, the report quotes UNAMIR saying that "the trap (that killed him) could only have been placed by persons with specialist knowledge (pg 7)
Does it mean that hutu militiamen are the only ones with specialist knowledge about landemines? What about RPA?
3. Lastly, RDR has never , since its inception, advocated for a blanket amnesty for all crimes committed in the ethnic conflict (pg 11). To the contrary, the rwandese refugee community in East Africa condemned publicly any manoeuvre to grant a unilateral amnesty before the verdict of the ITR in its memo dated February 10, 1995, pg 4, second paragraph.This could have shielded RPF elements as well against any legal action.
Therefore, while advocating for the arms embargo against FAR, human rights organizations should boldly tell us what to do about the KIGALI Government which is known for human rights violations (see A.I report of April 1995).
Is it buying arms for making peace of war?
POLICY OF ETHNIC EXCLUSION
RPF dominates all the State powers in Rwanda and is carrying out a policy of political and ethnic exclusion:
1. The entire army leadership, is dominated by RPF. The high command is exclusively made of former members of a foreign army.
2. RPF has got a permanent vote of 13 members (on top of the President), out of a cabinet of 19 members.
3. Out of 18 directors general (permanent secretaries), 16 are RPF tutsi.
4. RPF has got more than 40 votes out of 70 in the so called national assembly.
5. More than 3/4 of the rwandese foreign service are RPF members.
6. Out of 10 presidents and vice-presidents of parliamentary commissions, 8 are tutsi.
7. Out of 17 directors of cabinet (3 are yet to be appointed), 14 are tutsi.
8. Out of 5 head of department in the PM's office, 3 are tutsi.
9. All presidential advisers are tutsi.
10. Out of 60 interim directors of parastatals and semi-public companies, 58 are tutsi.
11. Out of 10 prefects (districts administrators), 6 are RPF tutsi members.
12. Reliable sources indicate that this trend goes down up to the lowest administrative level of commune, where virtually all bourgmestres are members of RPF.
Strange situation in a country where tutsi are only 9% of the population (1991 population census).
This RPF monolithic administration does not obviously inspire confidence among refugees, and this is the reason behind the persistence of the crisis.
RDR supported, right from the beginning, the creaction of the International Tribunal of Rwanda in order to try masterminders of the April 1994 massacres.
However, RDR is very much concerned about the multiplication of savage lists of suspects, circulating virtually in all countries of asylum of rwandese refugees.
RDR is particulary worried by persistent rumors about kidnaping of people listed as suspects, and their subsequent imprisonment until they are tried.
Yet, some of those lists do not have any substantial charge, apart from mentioning that somebody is a "criminal", or a member of MRND or CDR party.
POLITICAL DIALOGUE WITH KIGALI GOVERNMENT
With a view of breaking this deadlock, RDR is convinced that there is no alternative to dialogue. The deployment of some UN observers in GOMA or the separation between militia and ex-armymen on one hand and civilian on the other side, will not solve the refugee problem.
RDR would like to seize this opportunity to stress that instead of concentrating all efforts in monitoring rwandese refugees, the international community should address the real issues impeding the return of refugees, i.e the lack of a conducive atmosphere back home and not the intimidation by fellow refugees.
Whatever the case, refugees will never give up their inalienable right for return in their motherland.
In this connection, RDR wrote a letter on May 11, 1995 to the PM of the Kigali Government, seeking dialogue with representatives of refugees. RDR went on and suggested that negotiations start with July 1995.
On May 15, 1995, RDR released another appeal not only to the Kigali Government but also to the international community in order to make this dialogue a reality.
On 20th June 1995 on the eve of the departure of the rwandese delegation to the 31st summit of OAU in Addis-Abeba, the spoksman of the government and Minister of Information, declared that his government is "ready to negotiate with whoever wants it"
On the 21st June 1995, the Minister of Foreign Affairs responding to a question of journalists on the issue of negotiating with RDR, declared that RDR is a brain child of MRND Party, while his members are fascist, nazis and criminals".
On June 24, 1995, reacting to a question of a journalist of Radio Rwanda, the Minister of Information changed his mind, and pointed out that "there would be no negotiation in any way".
On the issue of the letter of RDR to the PM, seeking dialogue, he reacted angrily that the President of RDR is a well known MRND dignitary and that RDR recruits among criminals", before rectifying by saying that he is not sure wether all of them are criminals".
Instead of responding to the substantive issues, the Kigali Government hides itself behind its deep seated hatred against any opposition, in order to delay the advent of an era of peace, reconciliation and democracy in Rwanda.
In conclusion, RDR is appealing to all peace loving people, to impress upon Kigali Government, on putting in place the necessary confidence building measures, that could enable the return of refugees.
Short of this, the country heads for more chaos.
For RDR
NZABANDORA Chris
Director of Information