StateRepression.com
  • Home
  • Welcome
  • What is State Repression?
  • Repression Data
  • US repression - the movie?!
  • Featured data
  • Featured Reading
  • INcomplete Must-read list
  • Featured Repression Scholar
  • Repression Resources
  • (Car)Toons 'o Repression
  • Caveat Civis - Citizen Beware

Rwanda's Most Wanted (in 2014)

4/7/2014

1 Comment

 
Picture
At the 20th anniversary of the genocide and war in Rwanda during 1994, it is useful to reflect.  For example, of the people sought for crimes relevant to this conflict how many have been sought?  How many have been caught?  In short, who are Rwanda's "Most Wanted" and what happened to them?

Here is information on 177 of them: name, what they are accused of, probable whereabouts, interpol arrest warrant status, official extradition in host country, mention in the media, application for asylum and whether they were indicted in their host countries.  All source information was publicly available.  

Glancing at the list one thing immediately becomes intriguing: look at what crimes were sought for investigation and prosecution?  This reveals a somewhat more complex problem.  Of all the violence undertaken in 1994 (discriminatory behavior, interstate war, civil war, genocide, random violence and sexual violence) there have only been some activities that resulted in identification as well as investigation and thus only certain criminals that were pursued by diverse institutions.  When mandates of legal proceedings have been questioned or rarely still attempted to be changed (e.g., in the International Criminal Tribunal on Rwanda when they attempted to consider the behavior of the Rwandan Patriotic Front), the current Rwandan government employed diverse procedures for retracting the effort and the dismissal of those that attempted to change the mandate.  As a result, the focus has been exclusively on those that committed genocide and crimes against humanity. Now, this is clearly under the jurisdiction of international law and these people should be pursued.  At the same time, there are other criminals who have evaded identification, pursuit and persecution.  

For example, what about pursuing the individuals that engaged in discriminatory activity against ethnic Tutsi before 1990?  Isn't it illegal for people to harass, beat, restrict, hinder, terrorize and discourage specific parts of their population from engaging in political, economic or cultural life?  What about the members of the Ugandan and RPF forces that engaged in interstate war/invasion?  Isn't it illegal for a group of individuals to invade another country.  What about the members of the RPF that engaged in interstate invasion of the DRC after the genocide?  Isn't it illegal to invade a second country after invading the first?  These crimes have not been considered but they also fall under international law.  Don't they?

1 Comment
Larivière
4/7/2014 09:43:58 am

Mr. Davenport,

You are one of the few writers who go beyond the widely publicized and 1994 killing.
Rwanda has gone through different waves of systemic, ethnic-based killings. Millions of innocent Hutu civilians were systematically killed in DRC by the current Tutsi regime (find the UN Draft report). It was about to be called another genocide, this time done by Tutsi against Hutus, but due to protests from the perpetrators (Current Rwandan regime) and the UN's shame of having not done enough during the first genocide, the UN caved in and watered the language down.....
My point is Rwandans both Tutsis and Hutus died but the international community selectively chose to pursue the underdogs ignoring the misery that has been caused by the current regime.

So when I see writers like you, who are not Rwandan, writing on these issues in an objective manner it gives me hope that some people out there know the truth. I hope many people, especially mainstream media will start looking at the Rwandan case objectively like you. Kudos!

Reply

Your comment will be posted after it is approved.


Leave a Reply.

    Christian Davenport's Caveat Civis - Citizen Beware

    Given the elusive nature of state repression, it is crucial to be constantly aware of information as it becomes available.  This is not always easy to do and with the different tactics, perpetrators, locations and victims of domestic spying, torture, arrest, detention, disappearances and mass killing, it is necessary to keep one's eyes open, along with one's mind - Citizen's Beware.  The data is out there.  We just need to find it and figure out what it means.

    Archives

    February 2017
    January 2017
    May 2016
    November 2015
    April 2014
    March 2014
    February 2014
    January 2014

    Categories

    All
    Comparative Politics
    Conflict Studies
    Conflict Studies
    Covert Action
    Crowd Control
    Data
    Democratic Peace
    Domestic Spying
    Genocide
    Informants
    International Relations
    Language
    Mass Killing
    Misogynists
    Music
    Never Again
    Non-lethal Weaponry
    Northern Ireland
    Obama
    Peace Studies
    Pepper Spray
    Political Violence
    Pop Culture
    Protest Policing
    Research
    Rubber Bullets
    Social Media
    Social Science
    Social Science
    Targeted Assassination
    Technology
    Terror
    Torture
    Weapons

    RSS Feed

Powered by Create your own unique website with customizable templates.
Photos used under Creative Commons from dullhunk, rossbreadmore