France was not complicit in the 1994 genocide in Rwanda, but it was largely responsible. That is the conclusion of a commission of inquiry set up by President Macron two years ago to investigate the French role in the genocide. to investigate. France was “blind” to preparations for the large-scale massacres, the report said.
In the genocide in the East African country in 1994, at least 800,000 people were killed in a few months after a plane with President Habyarimana of the Hutu-led government was shot down. According to the researchers, France has failed to prevent the mass murder of the Tutsi minority and moderate Hutus by Hutu extremists.
In doing so, the experts also point to the central role of the then French President Mitterrand, who had close ties with the Hutu Habyarimana. The former French president is accused of having pursued a failed policy towards Rwanda in 1994. France had a “serious and overwhelming” responsibility in Rwanda, according to the researchers.
‘Involved in regime’
At the time of the genocide, there were French troops with a UN mandate in Rwanda. France has always maintained that, despite their mistakes, they have saved many thousands of people. The investigation now shows that the troops have indeed rescued many, but that the operation started far too slowly.
While Kigali and Paris have sought rapprochement in recent years, relations have been poor for decades. This is partly because Rwanda accuses France of supporting the Hutus and helping those responsible for the genocide escape. Historians have found no evidence of such complicity.
“Is France complicit in the genocide of the Tutsis? If that means there was a willingness to join the genocidal enterprise, then there is no evidence of this in the archives,” the commission states on the basis of official French documents on the crime. presence in Rwanda. “Nevertheless, France was involved in a regime that encouraged racist slaughter.”
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