Adama Dieng, AU Special Envoy on the Prevention of Genocide called on countries to act to stop possible Genocides building up in conflict-ridden countries.
Senior officials and experts say early prevention is key in averting new and future Genocides from happening, learning a lesson from Rwanda’s experience, where the world saw signs, planning and execution of the Genocide against the Tutsi, but failed to act, culminating into the death of more than one million people.
This is what was said during the International Conference on Genocide Prevention, which took place on December 9, organised by the Ministry of National Unity and Civic Engagement, in line with the 76th commemoration of the 1948 convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, with the aim of raising awareness and reaffirming the critical importance of the day and its purpose.
The convention defines genocide as acts committed with the intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnic, racial, religious group and more.
Officials and experts, including Adama Dieng, African Union Special Envoy on the Prevention of Genocide and Dr. Jean Damascene Bizimana, Minister National Unity and Civic Engagement, expressed concern that across the globe, in different countries and regions where conflict is ongoing, acts of hate speech and ethnic violence, teeter towards possible genocide, which must be stopped before many lives are lost, as it happened in Rwanda in 1994.
Both Adama Dieng, who was the guest of honour, and Minister Bizimana, reiterated how what happened in Rwanda in April 1994 was a climax of a genocide which was planned for three decades and later executed as the world watched, despite the many signs that showed that the Tutsi would be targeted in the massacres, but countries like France and Belgium, which were proactively present in Rwanda, and later the international community, failed to prevent it.
Minister Dr. Bizimana and Ibuka’s Dr. Philbert Gakwenzire, follow the proceedings.
Adama Dieng, who took up the AU Special Envoy role in April this year, expressed concern that the world has not learned much from Rwanda, with similar events that led up to the Genocide against the Tutsi, presenting themselves in conflict-affected countries like the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), Sudan, Central African Republic (CAR) and the Middle East, among other places, where humanity is threatened and on the blink of collapse.
Dieng commended the efforts of the Government of Rwanda to unite and reconcile Rwandans and to guide them onto a path that focuses on forgiveness and forging unity to build one country, putting behind the tragedy that left more than a million massacred and unimaginable devastation.
“From the outset, let me state, as a privileged witness, that the Rwandan Government has consistently made remarkable efforts in this regard. The people of Rwanda have shown the world that it is possible to heal, reconcile and forgive, even after enduring the darkest of tragedies and move towards reconciliation and forgiveness,” Mr. Dieng said.
He pointed out that Rwandans in general and political leaders, have set an example by advocating for a peace, tolerance and understanding, emphasizing that they deserve highest commendation for the achievements and progress over the past three decades.
The conference was attended by scholars and students in Genocide studies from France and beyond.
“Rwanda, its Heads of State, its government and its citizens have proven that human resilience can triumph over the darkest tragedies. Once again you are renewing your commitment to the principle of ‘Never Again’. On behalf of everyone gathered here today, I thank you for your steadfast dedication,” Dieng said.
Dieng however said that there is an urgent need to combat intolerance, racism, negative ethnicities, xenophobia’s, and all forms of intolerance that manifested themselves in Rwanda, starting with the discrimination and persecution of Tutsis in the 1950s and 60s, and the years that followed, culminating into a fully fledged Genocide in 1994.
“We should combat intolerance, treat fellow human beings with dignity and respect. We cannot just speak about defending genocide and then fail to take timely action to prevent it,” Dieng said, adding that he visited a transit centre where Congolese refugees are refused, the majority belonging to the Tutsi communities in the Eastern part of DRC, and felt the urgent need to call on African countries to act urgently.
“I was deeply moved by the accounts of the horrors they had lived through. Massacres, raids, torture sexual slavery, displacement, and the destruction of their communities, simply because of the beliefs that they hold behold and simply because of their identity,” he said, adding that he was equally shocked by the dire conditions the refugees and asylum seekers have to live in.
He said that in this day and age, Africans shouldn’t be enduring such or dying because of who they are, let alone being pushed out of their property and homes, as it has happened in Eastern DRC.
Dr. Bizimana said acts similar to Genocide are happening in countries not far from Rwanda, with little being done to prevent them.
Dieng said that the establishment of the African Center for Genocide Prevention in Rwanda, is a timely move and it couldn’t have come at a better time, when African countries and the world can learn from Rwanda and how it turned around a tragedy into an opportunity to unite, reconcile and rebuild.
The centre will focus on conducting research, facilitating education and training on the prevention of genocide, crimes against humanity, and war crimes, as well as engaging a wide range of stakeholders to ensure sustainable actions for genocide prevention.
For Rwanda, the convention on the prevention of Genocide holds profound significance and should serve as a reminder that prevention remains key if lives must be saved.
The United Nations Security Council passed Resolution 2150 on 16 April 2014, emphasizing the importance of learning from the genocide and condemning any denial of its occurrence. The resolution urged member states to establish educational programs that preserve the memory of this event to prevent future genocides.
The African Union Peace and Security Council has echoed similar recommendations, stressing the need to draw lessons from Rwanda’s experience to establish mechanisms for preventing international crimes.
Dr. Bizimana, in his keynote address, highlighted the circumstances that led to the 1994 Genocide against the Tutsi, pointing out that the world failed to act and stop it, despite the existence of the 1948 Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide and early warning signs that clearly pointed to a possible genocide.
“The Convention imposes an obligation to prevent genocide. Are we doing it? I question each and every one of us to think about it,” he said, adding that the Convention imposes an obligation to stop genocide before it starts.
“Unfortunately, 76 years after the adoption of the Genocide Convention, it is clear that there is still a long way to go in terms of prevention. To take only the most scandalous example close to home, in the Democratic Republic of Congo, genocidal crimes targeting the Congolese Tutsi population are being committed under the inactive gaze of the signatory States of the Genocide Convention,”
“More than 100,000 Congolese refugees have been on Rwandan territory since 1994, the first of them, driven from their lands by the same killers who committed the genocide against Rwandan Tutsis in 1994 in Rwanda, grouped today in a criminal movement, the FDLR (Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda), benefiting from the active support of Congolese officials,” Dr. Bizimana said.
Dr. Bizimana said that the very name of FDLR, a criminal organization is shameful because on one hand, a genocidal movement like the FDLR has nothing to do with democracy but rather into continues to propagate the old ethnic ideology that pitted Rwandans against each other for decades -something he said the current Rwandan Government would never allow.
