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The Legacy Of The Rwandan Genocide, A Quarter-Century Later

Adam Jones, Ph.D.
/
Wikimedia
Genocide Memorial Church in western Rwanda.

It has been 25 years since the genocide in Rwanda, in which the ruling Hutu majority government slaughtered as many as one million Tutsi people. By most measures, life in Rwanda is vastly different today, as a full generation has been born since the end of the civil war hostilities there.

However, human rights observers say despite the general changes for the better in Rwanda, there are reasons to be wary of the possibility of another genocide like the one from the 1990s. Carine Kaneza Nantulya is the Africa Advocacy Director for Human Rights Watch. She says that while Rwanda has turned around for the better, other nations are falling into the very same patterns that led to that genocide. 

Nantulya explains, "We saw the signs. Now the question we need to ask ourselves - if we were to see the same signs today... would we react earlier? Unfortunately, that answer has not been what we would expect."

 

Bonnie North
Bonnie joined WUWM in March 2006 as the Arts Producer of the locally produced weekday magazine program Lake Effect.