The First Anniversary of the Rwandan Genocide: “Forgetting Does Not Exist”

More than 10 thousand people gathered on a hill overlooking Kigali in early April 1995 to take part in solemn ceremonies in memory of the victims of the genocide and political massacres that took place the year before in Rwanda. I was there and had this report.

It was a somber and emotional ceremony that lasted most of the day, and even through a drenching thunderstorm.

But thousands of Rwandans, many of them survivors of last year's bloodshed, flocked to Rebero hill, overlooking Kigali, to take part. They came in trucks and buses, in cars and on motorbikes. Many made the more than five kilometer long climb on foot.

They came to pay their respects to the dead, the half million or more who were slaughtered systematically on ethnic and political grounds following the shooting down of a plane carrying the Presidents of Rwanda and Burundi one year ago.

Some of the victims were reburied on Rebero hill, laid to rest in concrete vaults that will be a permanent memorial to the dead. There were dignitaries killed in the massacres, including Rwanda's late Prime Minister Agathe Uwilingiyimana and several other prominent political leaders. There were also some six thousand ordinary Rwandans, their remains mingled in simple coffins, draped in purple cloth and Rwandan flags.

The entire Rwandan leadership was on hand as well as several foreign officials, ranging from Uganda's vice-president to Burundi's prime minister to the UN’s Special Envoy in Rwanda. They joined the massive crowd of onlookers, their heads bowed, for a moment of silence as the dead were lowered into their new graves.

But it was not only a ceremony to bury the dead. It was also a ceremony for voicing complaints, complaints about the inability of UN peacekeepers in Rwanda to stem the violence a year ago, or the slowness of the international community in providing aid to help Rwanda rebuild now, or the lack of success thus far in bringing the masterminds of the genocide to justice.

That was a job left to the speakers -- speakers like the one-time rebel general who led the Rwandese Patriotic Front to victory and power after the slaughter began. Paul Kagame is now Rwanda's Vice-President and Defense Minister. He complained about the foreign aid being given to exiled former government troops and extremist militia blamed for the killing.

“I think there are (legitimate) refugees who deserve to be assisted, but I have never known of armed people clearly harboring intentions to destabilize their mother country benefiting from the assistance of the international community…under the name of refugees.”

General Kagame complained Rwanda's new government and army, on the other hand, are still under an international arms embargo. But he had a stern warning for anyone contemplating an attack.

“I can assure you we still have teeth to bite. (applause) We can bite very deep and very hard.”

But on this day, the soldiers on hand to provide security shouldered their weapons and lent a hand, lifting coffins from trucks to ground cloths, from ground cloths into cement vaults. They joined onlookers like the 26-year-old driver who lost his mother and father, eight brothers and sisters and his fiancee in vowing never to forget. Forgetting, said the driver, does not exist.

The First Accused Killers Stand Trial in Rwanda

On April sixth, 1994, the killing started in Rwanda. On April 6th, 1995, the first accused killers went on trial. I was in the courtroom in the Rwandan capital, Kigali, as the legal process started.

The shabby, shell-shattered stone and stucco courtroom in Kigali's battle-scarred Nyamirambo district was packed with reporters, photographers and dozens of curious Rwandans, as the first accused killer was called before the three-judge panel.

He was a 17-year-old named Ngomayubu, the only minor and the only defendant who was accompanied by attorneys -- lawyers provided by UNICEF, the UN child welfare organization. They asked for an adjournment in order to study the case. It was granted without objection.

Then five more accused killers, all adults, but like the youth dressed in pink prison clothing, stood before the judges. The court president also ordered their cases continued to a later date to allow additional preparations.

The whole process did not last more than an hour, but it was symbolically important. For it was one year ago that a mysterious plane crash claimed the life of Rwanda's then-President, Juvenal Habyarimana. Within hours, a bloodbath began that left a half million or more Rwandans dead, most of them members of the ethnic Tutsi minority.

None of the accused killers in the courtroom would be considered masterminds of the genocide. Those officials of the former Hutu-led government and extremist Hutu militia are expected to be tried by an international tribunal beginning sometime several months from now in Arusha, Tanzania.

That process is expected to last years, and the mainly Tutsi spectators on hand for the first locally-staged trial said it was important to them as survivors of the killing that justice move more quickly. They made it clear there was no doubt in their minds as to the guilt of the accused, including the 17-year-old.

The spectators also made clear they wanted them to face the same fate as their victims: death.

What To Do About Burundi? To Intervene Or Not To Intervene

In April 1995, it was the first anniversary of the start of the genocide in Rwanda -- genocide that left one half million or more people dead. An international peacekeeping force was in the country as the slaughter began but failed to halt or even stem the level of violence. In April 1995, world attention was focused on neighboring Burundi, where a new bout of ethnic killing was under way. People were again asking what should the international community do?

UN Special Envoy to Rwanda Shaharyar Khan says diplomats, relief workers and the news media may be over-reacting to the recent violence in Burundi. But he says they have good reason, given what happened in Rwanda last year.

“Because last time around everyone was caught napping, as it were, and not really focusing on the terrible things that were happening here, not reacting to it.”

Mr. Khan recalls that after the ethnic and political killings started in Rwanda on the night of April 6th, 1994, the United Nations reacted by drawing down the size of the peacekeeping force that had been deployed there.

For many UN officials, it was a moment of shame. Lives were saved by the small international troop contingent that stayed behind, but even the former UN Commander in Rwanda, Canadian Major General Romeo Dallaire, has acknowledged so much more could have been done to stem the horrible violence.

In an interview (4/5/95), Mr. Khan says that bitter memory may explain why there has been an almost hysterical reaction to what he says is a troubling but far less bloody and less dramatic situation in Burundi.

“There is a feeling that with Rwanda there was great failure of focusing on the degree of horror that went through here. Maybe the international community is reacting now in a more upfront aggressive manner.”

The UN Special Envoy says people, in his words, may be pulling the trigger sooner than necessary. But he believes the situation in Burundi is bad enough to warrant international military intervention.

“I think the situation is bad enough for preemptive action to be taken and what that preemptive action should be is to have a sufficient force on the ground (international) just to make sure the people stay calm. It might not do the trick, but I think it needs to be done.”

Mr. Khan says he has heard nothing to suggest such an intervention is imminent -- and he feels it is unlikely to happen.

“The problem is the countries involved are not prepared to spend the money nor are they prepared to send the people so we are really talking about something that probably cannot materialize.”

The UN Special Representative in Burundi, Ahmedou Ould Abdallah, said in an interview last week that he could not discuss his views on the question of intervention. Diplomats in Bujumbura, like Mr. Khan, say they too feel the prospects are remote.

An Ominous Rise in Tensions in Rwanda on the First Anniversary of the Start of the Genocide

From Burundi, I went to Rwanda for the first anniversary observances of the 1994 genocide. I found events in Rwanda had taken an ominous turn: a dramatic rise in tensions as the top UN envoy there disclosed a surge in armed incursions by extremists loyal to the country's ousted Hutu-led government.

UN Special Envoy Shaharyar Khan says that what he calls a vicious circle is again at work in Rwanda, ratcheting up the tension level.

In an interview, Mr. Khan says the most compelling element in this vicious circle is a recent rise in infiltration raids by insurgent forces loyal to Rwanda's former government and the Hutu extremist militia blamed for last year's massive blood-letting.

“There are more armed incursions from across the border in Zaire. Previously there used to be banditry, people stealing cows and coming in for, oh, various attacks, many for banditry. But now it seems it is a more organized armed infiltration and this naturally leads to tension.”

Although officials of Rwanda's Tutsi-dominated military play down the seriousness of the threat posed by the insurgents, they say they have reports these forces are training and regrouping and rearming.

Diplomatic sources confirm former Rwandan government troops and Hutu militia in Zaire have received new weapons. Their source is unknown but the new arms are deadly. Just last weekend, a relief worker was killed and several others injured when their vehicle drove over a powerful anti-tank mine in southwestern Rwanda, where much of the infiltration has taken place.

UN envoy Khan says this is particularly troubling.

“They've been caught with mines and grenades and when you catch a group with mines and grenades and you interrogate them and they tell you that we are being trained to come in, make contact with our friends here, to have arms caches, and it does lead to a certain tension and unease.”

Diplomatic sources say there are indications the exiled extremists may be planning to seize a small part of southwestern Rwanda bordering Zaire and Burundi in order to create a so-called liberated area and to give their insurgency a certain legitimacy.

These sources, along with Rwandan military officials, say it is possible such an invasion could be timed to coincide with the genocide anniversary now just days away (April 7 is date for scheduled ceremony).

They say there are reports young men, aged 13 to 19, have recently disappeared en masse from refugee camps in Goma. Rwandan military sources also say the militia forces may be responsible for the latest killings in Burundi in the belief their destabilizing efforts there may have a spillover effect in Rwanda itself.

Mr. Khan also blames the exiled extremist groups for deliberately planting rumors in Rwanda that the country's Tutsi-led army intends to carry out revenge killings of ethnic Hutu in connection with this week's genocide anniversary ceremonies. The government in Kigali has rejected the allegations categorically.

But UN officials do report a massive increase in arrests in recent weeks, adding to an already burgeoning prison population estimated at some 30 thousand. They also say efforts to get displaced Hutu in southwestern Rwanda to return to their homes have ground to a halt, reflecting Hutu fears they face possible reprisals. The overall atmosphere is such that one senior UN official warns the country could be on the verge of massive killings once again.

A Burundian Cabinet Minister Says The Situation Is Precarious: “Like a Volcano”

In April 1995, officials in Rwanda were preparing to hold solemn ceremonies to mark the first anniversary of the start of a genocide that shocked the world. Even as the observances drew near, there were fears a similar bloodbath could erupt at any time in neighboring Burundi. I was in in the tiny central African country and had this report from Bujumbura, the capital.

The senior Burundian government official is embarrassed. In his formal capacity as a cabinet minister he says he can tell a small group of reporters nothing about the precarious situation. But speaking on condition of anonymity, he makes clear the anguish about the future of his country. We are facing a civil war, he says bluntly.

Increasingly, extremist elements, both Hutu and Tutsi, are guiding the course of events in Burundi -- giving the coalition government no rest as they seek ways to destabilize it. In the meantime, the country is itself becoming more and more polarized along ethnic lines -- with the minority Tutsi community, backed by the Tutsi-dominated security forces, holding the centers of towns like Bujumbura and the Hutu majority relegated to the countryside.

Can Burundi survive this system of segregation? The senior official says "no." The question now, he says, seems to be when the country will explode. The official likens the situation to a volcano that has emerged after a series of earthquakes. The volcano can explode tomorrow, or in a week or in a month, he says.

The official says moderate, centrist elements in the government and the political parties need to be strengthened if a catastrophe is to be avoided. But he complains they are getting no support from the international community. He says there is so much foreign countries could do, but he believes it is now too late. As examples, the official says there has been talk about deploying human rights monitors throughout the country to bolster confidence, or to send in foreign legal experts to work side-by-side with Burundian magistrates to ensure justice is even-handed. But neither proposal has come to fruition.

The cabinet minister says he has been wracking his brains to try and come up with fresh ideas to prevent a worsening of the situation. But he tells reporters it is difficult. He says members of the government are not able to think and react in serenity because of the deteriorating conditions in the country. He says that same psychological pressure is also affecting the population at large -- Hutu and Tutsi.

The official floats one new idea, though. He says Burundian President Sylvestre Ntibantunganya has talked about creating two new special military units -- one to undertake anti-guerrilla actions against armed extremist groups, the second to launch a disarmament campaign. The official seems to feel it may be a last chance option. He believes the units could be put together quickly and carry out their jobs effectively. But he acknowledged that can only be the case if the members equally represent the Hutu and Tutsi communities and accept their responsibilities as professionals, as soldiers who are loyal to Burundi and not to either ethnic group.

The official says the plan has already been discussed at the highest levels of the government and the military. He even indicates approaches have been made to some other African governments to help train and equip the units. He does not say what the reaction of the military in Burundi has been.

But other sources with links to the army, including former President and army Major Pierre Buyoya, suggest the reaction has already been unfavorable. Mr. Buyoya tells reporters the best weapon to fight extremist militias is politics. He says Burundi's political leaders have to lead the way in bringing about peace and security, otherwise all the military force in the country cannot succeed in ending the crisis.

Perhaps because the various opposing sides -- Hutu and Tutsi, military and political -- cannot seem to come together and agree on concrete plans for defusing the situation, it may explain why members of the government, the opposition, and the army are said to have begun sending their families abroad -- much like members of the foreign diplomatic and business community have done.

Even the anonymous minister acknowledges having a plan for getting his wife and children to safety abroad. But when he finally leaves reporters and gets into his car, he is headed to another political meeting. The search for solutions, peaceful solutions, appears to go on.

Burundi: Ready to Explode Like Rwanda

Like Rwanda in April 1994, Burundi in April 1995 appeared to be on the verge of an all-out ethnic war. The country's Hutu and Tutsi power-sharing government seemed increasingly marginalized as extremist groups appeared to be guiding the deteriorating course of events. I went to Burundi, meeting with senior government officials, UN authorities, foreign diplomats, and others, and had this report.

In late 1993, Melchior Ndadaye, Burundi's first freely-elected Hutu president was assassinated by renegade elements of the country's Tutsi-controlled army. His death triggered an ethnic bloodbath that left 50-thousand to 100-thousand people dead.

Then one year later -- on April 6th, 1994 -- Mr. Ndadaye's successor was killed in the same plane crash as Rwandan President Juvenal Habyarimana. Hundreds of thousands, perhaps as many as one-million people, mainly Tutsi, were killed in Rwanda.

But there was no new slaughter in Burundi -- perhaps because of the earlier violence, perhaps because of the horror of what occurred in Rwanda, but also because all parties in Burundi, Hutu and Tutsi alike, adhered to calls for restraint.

Now, though, violence is again on the increase. Hardly a day passes that three people or 12 people or 22 people or more are reported killed in what has become a gnawing, debilitating low-intensity conflict between Hutu and Tutsi extremist groups -- extremist groups whose activities seem increasingly to dictate the course of events in Burundi. No one is ever caught or brought to justice, reinforcing the sense of ethnic hatred and suspicion. Many top officials in the Burundian government as well as in the foreign diplomatic community say openly the country is on the verge of an all-out civil war. And they indicate there seems to be little hope that an explosion can be avoided.

The government, split between Hutu and Tutsi, seems paralyzed, not able to act to halt the violence without the support of the military. The military, fearing any power-sharing measures that might compromise Tutsi control over security in the country, seems unwilling to work with civilian politicians. But at the same time, top officers blame the government for failing to come up with a strategy for tackling the crisis.

For its part, the international community, strapped by a host of crises around the globe, seems unsure about what to do other than to warn repeatedly against a new, Rwanda-like slaughter.

Meanwhile, the situation remains dangerously volatile -- with people living in an almost constant state of fear. That fear has already led to fresh rounds of what diplomats liken to ethnic cleansing. The minority Tutsi, fearing attacks from majority Hutu, appear to be forcing them out of urban centers like Bujumbura and into the countryside. The result is what one foreign official describes as a form of apartheid more complete than the former white minority regime in South Africa was ever able to devise.

In recent days, foreign residents, responding to the latest violence, have begun to flee abroad. Rwandan Hutu refugees who took shelter in northern Burundi last year have also tried to flee, fearing they may get caught up in the ongoing ethnic conflict. Even senior Burundian officials are said to have begun sending their families out of the country.

It is a bleak picture and the sense of foreboding is great. Some political leaders are calling on Burundians to rise above ethnicity and to embrace reconciliation in the interests of peace and security.

But that may be easier said than done. This week, as he launched a planned month-long campaign aimed at easing tensions, Burundi's President Sylvestre Ntibantunganya, a Hutu, toured various parts of Bujumbura. He received a mixed reception.

In some neighborhoods he faced open hostility. In others he was welcomed with cheers. Not surprisingly, the reactions were divided largely along ethnic lines.

Perhaps even more disturbing, though, in some areas, his visit went ignored or unnoticed.

Panic In The Rwandan Refugee Camps in Burundi: Some Try to Flee to Tanzania

In northern Burundi in early 1995, UN officials and aid workers were busy setting up a temporary camp for some 30-thousand Rwandan refugees who fled toward the Tanzanian border in fear of getting caught up in renewed ethic violence. I traveled to the area and had this report.

UN officials are calling the new camp near Gashoho a re-groupment center. Although they are busy digging latrines and trucking in drinking water, they say it will only be a temporary home for some 30-thousand Rwandans until other arrangements can be made.

For the moment, UN spokesman Fernando del Mundo says Burundian authorities, citing security reasons, will not allow the refugees to return to their original camp, at Magara, in Ngozi province. Mr. del Mundo says negotiations on a return are continuing, but if Burundian officials refuse to budge, then a new location will have to be found.

Already some 10 to 15-thousand refugees are setting up shelters and cooking fires at the temporary sites, some 50 kilometers west of the Tanzanian border. The camp is nestled among eucalyptus and pine trees not far from the main road to the frontier, where the Rwandans stopped after being told Tanzanian authorities would not allow them in.

Some 50-thousand Rwandans in all fled camps in northern Burundi last week after a mysterious attack by unidentified gunmen in which 12 of the refugees were killed and 22 others wounded. But the refugees, all of them members of the Hutu ethnic community, say there was more behind their frightened decision to flee than just that one attack. They claim to have heard rumors they will all be massacred in raids from Rwanda linked to the impending first anniversary of the start of the genocide there.

Besides the refugees now grouping near Gashoho, some 10-thousand others have agreed to be trucked back to the camps they left. Several thousand more have settled at yet another camp near the Tanzanian border, while several hundred actually managed to slip across the frontier.

UN spokesman del Mundo says Burundian authorities have agreed to bolster security in all the refugee locations. But while some of the Rwandans interviewed said they saw no alternative but to return to the camps, they made clear the promise of a stepped-up Burundian military and police presence would not calm their fears.

One refugee, a 31-year-old man who gave his name as Nyandwi, said he would prefer having foreign troops guarding the camps. And another Rwandan, 22-year-old Jean-Marie Mporwiki, told reporters he still intends to flee into Tanzania if the border re-opens.

Rwandan Refugees Held Hostage by Hutu Militants: How Long Can It Go On?

As UN officials, African diplomats and other envoys opened that conference in Burundi in mid-February 1995 to discuss the problems of the millions of refugees, returnees and displaced in and around Rwanda, I tried to provide some additional perspective in this report after visiting the camps in Bukavu and Goma.

Six trucks carrying about 400 Rwandan refugees are heading out of the sprawling Kibumba camp outside Goma. They are heading for the nearby Rwandan border. Within a day, the refugees should be back in their homes.

One of those in the convoy is Lazar Tirikwendira, a 74-year-old farmer wearing a tattered suit and standing on crutches. He shrugs off a reporter's question about whether he feels safe in returning to Rwanda and says he believes God will help him.

But speaking through an interpreter, he later admits his decision to return is based on more than just his hopes for God's protection.

"Some people come from there and they tell him everything is okay there."

UN refugee agency officials say more and more refugees are asking for repatriation these days. From the Kibumba camp they say there is enough demand to send one thousand back to Rwanda daily. But the officials say they can't handle that many. Even if they could, it would still take years to repatriate all of the more than two million Rwandans now living in camps like Kibumba in eastern Zaire.

And UN officials suggest they do not have the time or the money to wait that long. Patrick de Sousa is the head of the UN refugee operation in the Zairean border town of Bukavu, south of Goma on the shores of Lake Kivu.

“It cannot continue. It's not a question of years. It's a question of months within which this problem must be resolved. The days when we had camps in Thailand for 10 years and camps for Afghans in Pakistan for 12 years, those days are over and certainly it is not going to be the case here.”

One of the main deterrents to any mass repatriation is the high level of intimidation which relief workers say still goes on in the camps. Convoys like the one taking Mr. Tirikwendira and his family out of Goma are heavily guarded by Zairean army troops. Because of threats, people who want to return home and make their wishes known to UN officials are also routinely removed from the camps where they live and taken into a kind of protective custody pending their departure.

Some of the refugees, nearly all of whom are ethnic Hutu, are reluctant to return because of genuine concerns about their safety following allegations of killings and detentions by the predominantly Tutsi troops of the former Rwandese Patriotic Front, who now control Rwanda's army.

But aid workers indicate much of the fear is mere propaganda, spread by officials of the ousted Hutu-led Rwandan government and enforced by former soldiers and extremist Hutu militia, the same groups blamed for the massacres carried out in Rwanda last year and who now largely control the camps. For them, it remains politically important to hold on to as many innocent civilians as possible as a bargaining chip. These camp leaders believe that will give them the power they need to force the new government in Kigali to negotiate with them on such issues as power-sharing. But the government has said repeatedly it will not negotiate with those who planned the genocide.

A Visit to the Bukavu Camps: “We’re Just Normal Refugees, Not Genocidists”

From Goma, I went to Bukavu with the UN High Commissioner for Refugees, Sadako Ogata, who was in the region not only to visit the camps but also to attend a refugee conference in Bujumbura, Burundi. The refugees in Bukavu put on a well-organized performance for Mrs. Ogata as you will see as you read this February 1995 report.

Traditional dancers and musicians among the Rwandan refugees at the huge Inera camp outside Bukavu put on a good show when UN High Commissioner for Refugees Sadako Ogata stopped by for a brief visit on the way to the refugee conference in Burundi.

Officials in her entourage agreed the camp leaders put on a good show, too, organizing a display of placards -- in English and French -- with a variety of messages aimed both at Mrs. Ogata and the international community at large.

One insisted, "the author of the genocide does not live here, we are normal refugees." Another proclaimed support for the international tribunal that is to try those accused of last year's massacres.

Yet relief workers at Inera and other camps in the area say it is no secret that former officials of the ousted Hutu-led government as well as soldiers and extremist militia blamed for the slaughter are in the camps. Not only are they in the camps, they control them -- and aid officials say they are using the ordinary refugees as political pawns in an attempt to pressure the new government in Kigali.

One way that is done is by raising the general level of uncertainty among refugees about the fate that awaits them if they go home. Another way is by trying to convince visitors like Mrs. Ogata that the new authorities in Kigali are evil. Both messages were clear in some placards on display.

I dictated to tape some of the inscriptions: “We want to go back to our country but the RPF, the Rwandese Patriotic Front which now controls the government in Kigali, it's alleged on this placard, goes on killing. There's no security, no democracy, no power-sharing. Another one is accusing the RPF of implementing an alleged starvation plan of Hutu refugees by blocking lorries [trucks] transporting their food.”

For her part, Mrs. Ogata told the crowd the United Nations wants them to go home as soon as the security situation allows. She did not say whether she thought that was now the case.

But in a later exchange with reporters, she said it was her impression that the security situation in Rwanda has improved considerably -- and she made clear her belief that the security problem is in the camps themselves, camps which she stressed could only be a temporary solution.

“Repatriation is the only viable solution for a refugee outflow of more than two million people. The neighboring countries cannot really sustain them for a long time. So we are trying to do everything to remove any kind of problems that hinder their return. In this sense, the question of security in the camps has been an important one because there have been many cases of harassment, intimidation for those who want to go back. We would like to remove at least that factor. And in this sense the United Nations has been trying very hard to bring in some forces to maintain law and order.”

Those forces, 15 hundred Zairean soldiers, are to begin patrolling the camps on an around-the-clock basis this month. Camp leaders have already expressed concern about their mission. Mrs. Ogata said they will not try to separate extremists from innocent refugees, but other officials said the soldiers will take a tough line with anyone who gets out of line, suggesting some separation could take place.

Beyond that, UN officials indicate they may have to fall back on another ploy later this year to promote mass repatriation. That ploy would be an announcement that camps adjacent to the Rwandan border will be closed -- and that anyone staying behind will be shifted much further inland into Zaire where they will have to grow their own food. Few refugees seem to relish the prospect of a move in that direction.

Oops! We Only Expected 50,000 Rwandans (And We Got Over A Million); Holiday Zaire Indeed!

New revelations emerged while I was in Goma in early 1995 about the major miscalculations that were made in planning for the mass exodus of Rwandan refugees fleeing genocide in that country. At the time, relief workers told me they hoped lessons could be learned so that the same mistakes would not be repeated the next time there was an African refugee crisis. I leave it to you to judge whether lessons were learned.

In late April 1994, as fighting and killing raged in Rwanda, the UN High Commissioner for Refugees dispatched several emergency teams to neighboring countries in the region. The missions were considered so sensitive that one of the team members called them "James Bond" assignments after the fictional British secret agent.

Their specific job was to discretely prepare for a likely outpouring of refugees, a job that included the selection of sites for potential camps and the stockpiling of relief supplies.

One of the teams was dispatched to Goma, Zaire -- on a cargo plane so packed with aid items that a UN official recalls the members had to sit in the seats of vehicles that had also been loaded on board. The team even included a cameraman sent out from the Geneva headquarters of the UNHCR to record the movement of refugees into the Goma area.

But the team saw no great movement -- and one week before the bulk of the more than one million Rwandans who eventually gathered in Goma fled across the border in July, the emergency unit of 15 international officials was scaled down to just three persons.

The team itself had made preparations for receiving just 50 thousand Rwandans.

It proved to be a major miscalculation, UN refugee officials now admit. Why did it happen? One of those who took part in the Goma mission says "that's a good question."

This official says there had been warnings that a mass exodus was likely as forces of the then rebel Rwandese Patriotic Front pressed Rwandan government soldiers and extremist Hutu militia west towards the Zairean border.

One of those warnings even came from a top official of another UN agency, the World Food Program. In mid-June, Bronek Szynalski, the WFP’s emergency division director, told reporters in Nairobi that in excess of a million people would probably be forced into Zaire by the continued fighting in Rwanda.

Yet UN refugee authorities believed until the end that most of the movement from the violence-torn central African country would be southwards into Burundi -- not Zaire.

What is the lesson to be drawn from last year's disaster? Panos Moumtzis is a spokesman for the UN High Commissioner for Refugees. He believes money from big donors like the United States, Japan and the European Community could be better spent trying to avert trouble ahead of time through political efforts before much larger amounts need to be spent on humanitarian assistance. He acknowledges there is a dilemma, though.

“It's a very difficult dilemma, we're thinking, because on the one hand we cannot just rely one hundred percent on a political solution and say this is going to work and then be caught up unprepared and everyone would then accuse us and say "well you didn't do anything…”

Note: the photo above shows the hotel where I and other journalists stayed in Goma. I love the "Holiday Zaire" notion.

Zairean Troops, in Mustard-Colored Uniforms, Prepare to Police the Refugee Camps

I also went back to Goma in mid-January 1995, just before the first Zairean troops hired by the United Nations to bring law and order to Rwandan refugee camps were expected to begin patrolling the violence-plagued facilities. I in fact attended ceremonies marking the formal commissioning of the first contingent of the special security unit and filed this report:

One hundred fifty special Zairean camp police, sporting distinctive new mustard-colored uniforms, assembled for the first time at a hastily-built military compound adjacent to the Sprawling Kibumba refugee camp outside Goma.

On hand for the commissioning ceremonies were the UN High Commissioner for Refugees, Sadako Ogata, and Zaire's Minister of Defense, Mavua Mudima.

Mr. Mavua told the soldiers they would face a major challenge when they begin deploying into the camps. The minister said their mission would include the protection of relief workers and the prevention of extremist attacks on refugees considering repatriation to Rwanda. He urged the troops to be disciplined and to treat the refugees as brothers and sisters.

Last year, poorly paid Zairean soldiers were accused of adding to the chaos in the camps through attacks on refugees and the looting of relief supplies.

For her part, the UN High Commissioner for Refugees, Mrs. Ogata, called the mission an important one. She acknowledged there have been many cases of intimidation against refugees. But she stressed the Zairean units will not try to separate members of the former Rwandan army and extremist militia from ordinary refugees, a move that has been repeatedly urged by foreign diplomats, aid officials and even some senior UN authorities to halt the harassment of would-be returnees.

“It is not a force that is going to divide people, the perpetrators from the innocent. That is not the objective. It is strictly a law and order maintenance force. And this is as far as my office can go. But, at the same time, if it is effectively done, it should have implications that would contribute to solution of refugee problems.”

Although the troops paraded in front of Mrs. Ogata carried automatic weapons, Carol Faubert, the UN official who negotiated the arrangement, said it has not been decided whether they will carry guns when they begin their round-the-clock patrols in the camps.

“We have agreed that the rules of engagement would be decided jointly between the Zairean command and ourselves. We are now in the process of discussing those rules of engagement.”

Ultimately, 15 hundred Zairean troops will be deployed at refugee camps in both the Goma and Bukavu areas, where in all more than a million Rwandans are now concentrated. They will not, however, begin their patrol work until the first of an expected 40 foreign police advisors arrive to work with them. UN officials hope a dozen or so advisors will be in place by the end of the week.

The United Nations is providing the Zaireans with communications equipment, vehicles, tents, food and other supplies as well as a daily allowance of three US dollars per soldier.

It marks the first time the UN High Commission for Refugees has ever hired soldiers of a national army to undertake a humanitarian mission in their own country. The UN adopted the unusual plan after failing to enlist support for more ambitious schemes that would have required foreign troops.

Closing Rwandan Camps That Represent a Security Problem: A Visit to Cyanika

United Nations and Rwandan officials said in January 1995 that the closure of camps housing hundreds of thousands of displaced persons in the southwest of Rwanda was a critical step toward restoring stability in the country. But many of the displaced members of the Hutu ethnic community were still fearful of reprisals if they left and defied UN and Rwandan efforts to get them to go home. I visited one of the biggest camps in the southwest at Cyanika:

At one point last year, the Cyanika camp outside Gikongoro held an estimated 50-thousand displaced Hutus. They had fled their homes in fear of retribution after the Hutu-led massacres of more than half a million Rwandans, most of them members of the ethnic Tutsi minority.

Initially, the displaced found shelter in the southwest of the country, where French intervention forces established a so-called humanitarian safe zone. When the French troops pulled out last August, many of the Hutu refugees fled into neighboring countries.

Others stayed on and eventually decided to return to their original homes elsewhere in Rwanda.

But relief workers say some 15 thousand people still remain at Cyanika - - and these refugees are now engaged in what amounts to a showdown with the United Nations and authorities of Rwanda's new Tutsi-installed government.

Both the UN and the Rwandan government want the displaced of Cyanika - - and about 330 thousand other Hutus still living in the former French security zone - - to go home. Officials cite a variety of reasons, but the main one is that the camps represent a serious internal security problem.

A UN briefing paper says many of the authors of last year's genocide are still believed to be hiding in the camps. The document also describes the camps as safe havens and potential bases from which extremist elements loyal to the ousted Hutu-led government can initiate destabilizing raids.

Initial UN efforts to persuade the displaced to go home voluntarily met with mixed results and Rwandan authorities threatened to close the camps by force. But ultimately, a new strategy was adopted.

Under this plan, now under way at Cyanika, the refugees late last month were given one last food distribution consisting of three weeks worth of provisions. In a further effort to prompt them to leave, supplies of treated water were discontinued late last week.

UN vehicles now come six days a week to Cyanika to offer the displaced Hutus free transport home. Yet thousands still refuse to leave.

Aid workers in the camp say many cannot believe they will receive no further assistance - - especially if disease and malnutrition begin to show signs of a dramatic increase. Most of the displaced say their main reason for staying is fear of Tutsi retaliation if they return to their villages. In interviews, they repeatedly tell stories of refugees who went back to their villages and who were allegedly killed.

There have been cases of revenge killings and arbitrary detentions of returning Hutus. But overall, human rights monitors say there is no evidence of any systematic reprisal campaign being carried out by Rwanda's new authorities.

Instead, UN officials say that what they call a mischievous misinformation campaign is at work in the camps - - combined with a campaign of intimidation. They blame these campaigns on the same forces responsible for last year's slaughter who they say are working to block a normalization process in Rwanda.

It's not clear what will happen now at Cyanika. But some of the refugees insist they would rather leave Rwanda or risk starving to death rather than go home if the camp is closed.

Note: For some technical reason, yesterday's posting: A Kigali Wedding: Life Goes On failed to register on some displays. It is definitely there now and I trust those who may have missed it will visit the page. Thanks.

A Kigali Wedding: Life Goes On

In January 1995, I returned to Kigali to see how life was progressing less than a year after the genocide. I found that despite a host of continuing social, economic and political problems, the quality of life was slowly improving. One sign of the return to normalcy was a boom in weddings, most involving members of the minority tutsi ethnic community who survived the massacres.

30 year old Captain Jean Nkurikiye says he and 25 year old Sergeant Sandrine Uwamwezi agreed if they survived Rwanda's bloody genocide, they would get married.

Well, they did survive and, on a warm weekend in January, with dozens of friends and fellow soldiers looking on, they exchanged wedding vows at Kigali's Saint Michel Church.

These young veterans of the rebel Rwandese Patriotic Front were among a handful of couples married on this particular weekend -- usually in group ceremonies. Residents of Kigali say that since the fighting ended last year, after the Tutsi-dominated RPF ousted the former Hutu-led government, hundreds of weddings have been held, many involving Tutsi soldiers and civilian survivors of the massacres that tore Rwanda apart, killing a half million or more Rwandans, most of them members of the minority Tutsi community.

The wedding boom, and a corresponding rise in pregnancies, are clear signs that despite continuing serious political, social and economic challenges, life is slowly returning to normal in Rwanda.

Jojo Nzbamwita owns a shop in the capital called "Chez Jojo." She sells bridal accessories like veils and specializes in wrapping wedding gifts in colorful paper. She and her assistants are kept especially busy on Saturdays.

"Weddings are something we are not short of," she says.

But there are problems. Ms. Nzbamwita says most of the skilled tailors who fashioned the elaborate frilly white wedding gowns favored by brides were killed in the genocide. She says the successor generation of tailors in not yet good enough, so all the gowns used these days are brought in from Burundi or Uganda.

Following the church ceremonies, gala receptions are held at an assortment of restaurants and other locations. Since most of the new couples are short of money and often lost parents and other close relatives during the slaughter, friends now make donations to underwrite the costs.

Captain Nkurikiye and Sergeant Uwamwezi are lucky. As members of the new army, they are allowed to hold their reception at the Officers' Mess. As young soldiers with automatic weapons look on, the couple and their guests are entertained outdoors under canopied shelters by traditional dancers and drummers.

The bridegroom, wearing a burgundy double-breasted jacket and white gloves, looks a bit stiff as he sips a soft drink. His bride, dressed in white, seems equally ill at ease.

Yet as time goes on, smiles appear. Toasts are made. The crowd applauds. For the moment, the fighting and the guns, the massacres and the machetes are all forgotten. Life goes on.

A Flight Over Mt. Kenya: A Fathers' Day Special

In honor of Fathers’ Day, I decided to leap ahead in time to a report I filed in 1996 as we prepared to leave East Africa for Southern Africa. My own father was a pilot and one of the treasured possessions I have from him is the leather military flight jacket he wore during WW II. I took it and my eldest son Adam on a special trip over Mt. Kenya.

Anybody who has seen the film, Out Of Africa, will surely remember the flying scenes -- a biplane swooping low over a lake carpeted with pink flamingoes, dancing along the rim of a volcano, brushing through clouds billowing around Mount Kenya.

It was and remains an enchanted moment, one offering a portrait of an Africa untainted by conflict and poverty. It is a vision from this part of Africa that I choose to take with me.

As improbable as it sounds, a British-born, former US Air Force officer with a degree in dentistry who I first met three years ago while he was working for the United Nations in Somalia helped me achieve that goal. He is Andy Garratt.

“I've been involved in aviation since I was about 12, whether building model airplanes, working at airports, taking flying lessons. I got sidetracked into dentistry which I thought would probably be a more sensible career option but the lure of aviation has brought me back...I have to say it's really the culmination of a dream to be here and flying this aircraft."

"This aircraft" is the only Waco YMF-5 open cockpit biplane in Africa -- not an original like the ones first made 60 years ago but a modern-day replica, hand-built by a small company in the Midwestern US state of Michigan.

"Here" was a grass airstrip at the base of Mount Kenya, where Andy Garratt takes one or two passengers at a time, decks them out in leather flying jackets, silk scarves, helmet and goggles and gives them a taste of an older era in aviation. In so doing, he also gives them a glimpse of Africa that is unparalleled in its beauty.

On this day in May (1996), Andy's passengers are me and my 15-year-old son, Adam [who is now 26 and a computer specialist]. It is dawn. Mount Kenya, enshrouded in clouds the day before, has suddenly emerged uncovered in the sun's first light. Snow and ice cling to its jagged peaks, more than five thousand meters high.

Pilot Garratt does pre-flight checks of the gleaming red biplane in the chill of the early morning.

"The first thing in the morning you pull the engine through (engine noise) to make sure there's no oil that would be trapped (in the crankshaft)... it gives you a good opportunity to listen to the moving parts of the engine. Pulling wires to make sure they're intact and taught enough (wires twang). (Alex) Play it like a musical instrument? (Andy) Right. You then walk around to check the overall integrity of the airplane (to insure) nothing's become damaged inadvertently. When you operate in bush strips (bangs engine) (you need to) check the fly wires on the tail (another twang & banging). The controls are smooth, nothing is binding..."

He then climbs into the rear of the two open cockpits and starts the engine. My son and I scramble into the front cockpit and buckle in. I give a quick thought to my father, a former pilot who trained on a similar plane and who is with us in spirit this day. I am wearing his more than 50-year old Army Air Corps flight jacket, with his name and rank still visible. Then we start off.

I narrated the take off on tape: "I'm in the cockpit of a Waco bi-plane, taxing down a grass strip (runway) just at the base of Mt. Kenya. We're doing a kind of zig-zag because the nose points up so high you really can't see the runway in front of you. It's a beautiful dawn... the sun has just come up..”

With music from Out Of Africa piped into our earphones, we begin a long, slow, gently undulating climb. From rocky mountain faces to overgrown forests to cultivated fields to dry superheated plains, the terrain of East Africa opens up before us. It is a magic moment.

We fly for an hour, lazily circling Mount Kenya. We see tiny hidden mountain lakes, a herd of adventurous high-altitude grazing zebra, the smokey rustic cabins used by human climbers. My son Adam, who reached Point Lenana on the mountain with his classmates earlier this year, retraces the route he took.

I put aside my memories of a more violent and depressing Africa, and think to myself: this too is an enduring reality on this continent -- its spectacular, unspoiled natural beauty.

As we descend for our landing, Andy takes us through a series of steep winding turns. We pick up speed as the cold air rushes into the cockpit and the planes skirts through mountain valleys, brushing past rock faces. And then we land.

"We're coming in four our landing now, having just completed the circumnavigation of Mt. Kenya. (noises) Well, that didn't take much room did it? (Alex's son Adam) I guess not... (Alex) Well , you've just done a complete circumference of Mt. Kenya in a bi-plane. What do you think? How do you feel? (Adam) Wonderful."

Exhilarated, we later sit on the porch of the hangar and office building next to the grass airstrip. Andy Garratt has done this a thousand times over the past year. But he says he never tires of it.

"People ask me, don't you ever get bored doing the same thing going around the mountain? How can you stand listening to Out Of Africa one more time? I don't tire of any of it. It's so spectacular, so special, I finish a flight and I have to slap myself sometimes to make sure I'm here actually doing this."

His passengers -- who come from around the world -- tend to concur. One woman emerged from the plane at the end of her flight in tears because she was so moved. Most are just speechless, trying to hold on to the experience for just one more minute. That's how I feel -- not just about this one African moment, but about being in Africa at all.

MSF Pulls out of a Tanzanian Camp, Saying Aid is Being Misused to Help the Killers Behind the Rwandan Genocide

Goma was not the only refugee area with major problems. In December 1994, the French branch of the international medical relief group "Doctors Without Borders" (MSF) withdrew its health team from a large Rwandan refugee camp in northwestern Tanzania. The decision was a protest about what the group saw as a grave abuse of humanitarian aid efforts in the camps.

The French branch of MSF was among the first relief groups to react last May when tens of thousands of Rwandan refugees fled into northwestern Tanzania, establishing what was at the time the world's largest refugee concentration.

But now, Fiona Terry, the group's field coordinator, tells reporters in Nairobi the 15-member team has pulled out of the Lumasi camp, where a quarter of the 400 thousand Rwandan refugees still in the area are sheltered. She says the aid effort there is actually being misused to help the killers responsible for the massacres in Rwanda plot a return to power.

“The question really is, what is humanitarian aid supporting here. Can we really justify continuing a massive amount of humanitarian aid to support a structure which is capable of launching another genocide into Rwanda and talks openly of this. There are many leaders in the camps who have been openly accused of participating in the genocide and political speeches go on all the time, apparently with the same messages as were given in Rwanda prior to the genocide.”

Ms. Terry says that in addition to political speeches, military training is carried out openly in the camps. She says that because of political intimidation, ordinary refugees are still not free to choose whether to return to their homes in Rwanda.

What's more, the aid worker charges the level of aid in the camps is so high that the refugees are better off -- better fed and better clothed -- than the Tanzanians who live around them.

She says the international community must take urgent corrective action, including the deployment of a special police force to camps in Tanzania and Zaire.

“We think very strongly that the international community needs to take this much more seriously. And also consider that these camps in their present state could be used as a sanctuary from which to launch another genocide in Rwanda.”

Although the French branch of Doctors Without Borders has pulled out of the Lumasi camp in Tanzania, sections of the medical relief organization from other countries will continue basic health programs in neighboring camps.

As The Goma Refugees Get Aid, Rwandan Officials Back in Kigali Still Look for International Help

Unpaid and untrained for peacetime duties, Rwanda's new army, made up mainly of young, under-educated former rebels of the Tutsi-dominated Rwandese Patriotic Front, was showing signs of increasing restiveness in late 1994. The UN Special Envoy to Rwanda, Shaharyar Khan, said the blame lay in the continuing lack of international financial aid to revive a functioning government in the war-torn country. I was back in Kigali in December 1994 and interviewed Mr. Khan:

A Rwandan businessman is murdered and two soldiers confess they were paid by a rival trader to carry out the crime. UN vehicles are stolen and uniformed men are accused of the thefts. Residents of Kigali who survived weeks of fighting during the genocide, now say they are afraid to go out at night for fear of running afoul of military patrols.

Is discipline in the ranks of Rwanda's army breaking down completely? The UN Special Envoy to Rwanda, Shaharyar Khan, says "no."

But he and other top UN officials acknowledge there has been a rise in the number of security incidents involving troops of the Rwandese Patriotic Front. Mr. Khan says one key reason is a lack of pay.

“Anyone who's not paid for four or five months, any unit, the best of units, is going to get very frustrated, very tense. That goes without saying.”

Mr. Khan says another factor is that the former rebels are no longer doing what they were trained to do -- and that is to fight. Instead, he says they are being increasingly called upon to carry out government duties that would normally be carried out by civilians.

The UN Special Envoy says it is all part of a much broader problem involving frustration with the international community -- a community that, in his analogy, has spent hundreds of millions of dollars to rescue the passengers of a sinking ship but which hasn't done much at all to try and repair the ship itself.

“This country has been devastated and what you need to do is to repair the devastation so that the ship can float, the ship of state can float. Now I fear that the international community focuses very much on saving the passengers, it also focuses on new turbines and how to get going when the ship starts again but it's not focusing enough on getting it back into some kind of order.”

Mr. Khan, interviewed in his Kigali office, says this lack of money to revive a functioning civilian administration has left Rwanda with a mere empty shell of a government -- one in which the only real force is the military. He says he has pestered UN headquarters in New York repeatedly to make this point and says he has found understanding.

But Mr. Khan says he fears direct financial aid to the Rwandan government is still no closer to becoming a reality. He says it's very sad.

Senior UN officials indicate some major donor nations, disappointed about the outcome of the civil war, are blocking the kind of assistance that would promote stability in Rwanda.

But Mr. Khan says it should not be viewed as a question of taking sides.

“Governance does not mean that you are helping one side against the other. You're simply making the wheels of state move. You're making the education system move, you're making the judicial and security systems function, you are de-mining, you're getting hospitals to work. This is what needs to be done today and this is where this country is not able to help itself because it can't pay the hospital worker, the doctor, the nurse, the policeman, the magistrate. It's very sad. The whole world starts talking about humanitarian aid but what do they mean by humanitarian aid? Vaccines, jerry cans, water, food, blankets, tents. This is not the issue today. The issue is to get people to feel that they have a social, economic, agricultural base to go back to so they can start leading normal lives.”

For the moment, Mr. Khan says senior commanders are maintaining discipline among the ranks of Rwanda's army and that those soldiers implicated in crimes are being punished. But with tensions between the military and the UN mission in Rwanda on the rise, he suggests time may be running short for corrective action -- otherwise he fears Rwanda could once again descend into a downward spiral of violence.

Although Aid Groups Called The Goma Camp Conditions Dangerous, They Dismissed A UN Warning About the Threat

In a bizarre and seemingly contradictory move, aid officials working with Rwandan refugees in Zaire (Congo) in late 1994 disputed a UN security council warning that armed extremist forces among the refugees might be planning to invade their former homeland. The move came shortly after aid groups warned they might be forced to withdraw from the refugee camps because of deteriorating security conditions. I was in Goma and had this report:

UN and relief agency officials operating in the main Hutu refugee camps around the eastern Zairean town of Goma suggest that a recent statement of alarm issued by the UN Security Council was exaggerated.

In that statement, Security Council members expressed concern over what were termed indications that forces loyal to Rwanda's ousted Hutu-led government may be preparing for an armed invasion of Rwanda.

These aid officials say that first of all, former Rwandan government soldiers and extremist militia do not, in their view, have enough military firepower to pose a serious threat.

Secondly, they note these forces have lately adopted a much lower profile, and no longer have as visible a presence in the camps as before.

The aid workers acknowledge this may be linked to growing Zairean resentment over the presence of the refugees. But they also tie this lower profile to what they believe is an effort by the Hutu government-in-exile to project a more moderate image.

They suggest it is part of an effort aimed at promoting negotiations with the new Tutsi-installed government in Kigali -- negotiations aimed at giving officials of the old government and army a chance to return to Rwanda and to share power in the future.

UN and relief agency officials favor such talks -- mainly because they feel some sort of compromise is necessary if the more than one million Hutu refugees now in Zaire and elsewhere are ever to return to their homes in Rwanda.

But authorities in Kigali remain adamantly opposed to making any deals with former officials whom they consider killers -- killers they blame for the massacres of hundreds of thousands of Tutsis in rwanda earlier this year.

Goma: A Dangerous and Much Misunderstood Mess

As the 1994 genocide unfolded in Rwanda, few reporters actually traveled in the country. When the major influx of Rwandan refugees into Zaire (Congo) occurred, many more reporters were sent in to cover that. This discrepancy in the amount of coverage and the attention paid by news media led many audiences outside of Africa to actually perceive of the refugees, mainly Hutu and largely controlled by the extremists responsible for the genocide, as the main victims of what had happened in Rwanda. This embittered most of us who reported mainly on the actual genocide. As the problems created in the refugee camps became more critical, I focused more attention on them and in October and November 1994 I went to Goma (where colleagues had covered the refugee story while I was in Rwanda). Among my stories was this one about some refugees I met along the road north of the city.

Weariness is etched into the eyes of 56-year-old Savelin Mukanyangezi as she and members of her family of 10 briefly interrupt their slow trek toward the Katale refugee camp north of Goma. She has been walking for hours, a few meagre possessions packed in a bundle balanced on her head. She says it is painful to be on the move once again.

Ms. Mukanyangezi, a member of the Hutu ethnic group, was first uprooted from her home in Rwanda early this year. That was when soldiers of the mainly Tutsi Rwandese Patriotic Front launched their all-out assault to take control of the country following the massacres of hundreds of thousands of Tutsi by extremist forces loyal to the then Hutu-led government.

Initially she stayed in Rwanda. But in July, when opposition to the RPF advance finally collapsed, she moved again -- this time across the border into Zaire (Congo). She and her family stayed away from the main refugee concentrations around Goma and settled in a village further north.

Now, though, armed Zairean troops have ordered them into the camps. Ms. Mukanyangezi and others in her group charge those soldiers gave them little time to move and looted most of their belongings, including items like plastic sheeting given to the Rwandans by relief agencies. She makes clear she does not relish going into the overcrowded camps. But she says she was afraid and had no choice.

The reason for her fear is plain along the road north of Goma. At one checkpoint, bellowing moans of pain can be heard from behind a parked truck. Between the big wheels a man can be seen curled on the ground, squirming. Zairean security forces are kicking him repeatedly. A smiling soldier explains the man, a Rwandan refugee, failed to stop at the roadblock.

Relief officials working in Goma say the Zaireans are fed up with the refugees, especially by acts of banditry the local authorities blame on the Rwandans. During the past week, in addition to evicting refugees like Ms. Mukanyangezi from their makeshift homes, Zairean security forces have been accused of shooting indiscriminately into crowds of refugees, killing and wounding more than 100 in one incident. They have detained other refugees on criminal charges stemming from the violence. They have even forcibly deported some Rwandan prisoners back to Rwanda, turning them over to forces of the new government in Kigali despite UN protests.

Still, the growing hostility of Zairean authorities hasn't pushed Ms. Mukanyangezi or a man walking with her, 33-year-old Dominique Uwimana, to think about returning to Rwanda. They say the regugees fear the Zaireans but insist most still fear the RPF as well (even though the new rulers in Kigali says refugees with no role in the genocide have nothing to fear and should return home). Mr. Uwimana says that for him to feel comfortable about going home, the new government in Kigali will first have to negotiate with the old, Hutu-led government -- and let former officials and soldiers return to their homes too.

While many refugees like the two in the previous piece were likely innocent of any wrongdoing during the genocide, there were clearly killers among them. They were terrorizing the camps in Goma and elsewhere, threatening and even killing refugees who wanted to return home. They were also hijacking aid shipments and controlling the distribution of relief supplies. Aid agencies were in a quandary but finally went public with the problems they faced, threatening a possible pullout of humanitarian workers from the camps.

Relief agencies working with Rwandan refugees are calling for swift international action to end what they say are "unacceptably dangerous" conditions for refugees and aid workers at camps in Goma, Zaire.

In a joint statement, the aid agencies warn they may be forced to withdraw from refugee camps unless there are immediate and tangible changes. They say current humanitarian operations are untenable because of what they characterize as deteriorating security conditions.

The relief groups -- including Care, Doctors Without Borders and Oxfam -- are demanding, among other things, that all weapons be removed from the camps along with those individuals who are inciting violence and interfering with the delivery of aid supplies.

They also say the protection of refugees must be guaranteed and refugees must be free to stay or return to their homes without intimidation or fear for their lives.

Most of the trouble in the Zairean camps has been blamed on armed militia loyal to Rwanda's ousted Hutu-led government. These are the same groups accused of carrying out the massacres that left more than half a million mainly Tutsi Rwandans dead.

Genocide Aftermath: De-Emphasizing Ethnicity (But Are Some Rwandan Officials More Equal Than Others?)

Rwanda's new leaders were trying in September 1994 to de-emphasize the ethnic and political differences that contributed to the violence that tore apart the country earlier that year, leaving more than half a million dead. But as I discovered, when it came to the trappings of power, it appeared leaders of the mainly-Tutsi Rwandese Patriotic Front were firmly in command. This report sparked anger among some of the senior RPF officials I had gotten to know – even though they were aware of my sympathetic feelings about what they had endured, what they had achieved and what problems they were coping with.

The charred and shattered wreckage is still in the backyard of the executive mansion near Kigali airport. But Pasteur Bizimungu, Rwanda's new president and the building's latest occupant, says he is not disturbed by that reminder of the plane crash that claimed the life of his predecessor, Juvenal Habyarimana, and triggered a bloodbath that left nearly one million other Rwandans dead.

"I'm comfortable not only to live in this building but to live in this country...my task as a Rwandan is also to work so that that tragedy may not happen again and as a president I'm not ashamed to stay in an official house if even there has been such an accident."

His choice of the adjective "Rwandan" to describe himself is no accident. It is part of a conscious strategy on the part of the country's new leadership to de-emphasize the kinds of ethnic and political differences that contributed to the bloodshed.

As a result, officials in Kigali are taking increasing offense at recurring references in some international media to the ethnic and political make-up of the cabinet. They object to such descriptions as the Tutsi-dominated or Rwandese Patriotic Front-dominated government. They say this is not only oversimplified but inaccurate -- since more than half the more than 20 members of the cabinet are Hutu and not members of the RPF.

Prime Minister Faustin Twagiramungu, who like Mr. Bizimungu, is a Hutu, says the government is trying to avoid the mistakes of the past and wants to include members of all ethnic and political groups...with one exception.

“We are trying to include each and everybody who wants to come and participate in the building of this country. We are even calling people for MRND, the former party of the late president. Therefore I don't think we are trying to exclude people. We have to exclude criminals like happened in Germany. They did not want to include in the Adenauer government the Nazis. We are not going to include Rwandese Nazis, we are not going to include Rwandese fascists. It has to be quite clear. But anybody who was not involved in massacres and genocide in this country, even if he belongs to MRND, he is welcome."

Yet despite all the assertions about the inclusivity of the new government, many observers suspect real power remains with ethnic Tutsi leaders of the RPF, especially former rebel commander Paul Kagame. Now Rwanda's Vice President and Defense Minister, he dismisses the notion.

“People prefer to keep speculating about who is who or who has power or has no power... my responsibilities are not a secret, they are known: I am the Vice President as well as the Minister of Defense. I have no desires to go beyond those limits when there are other people with different responsibilities. I think what is important is that in our different responsibilities we together work toward a common goal of rebuilding this country."

Still, there are glaring differences in the treatment accorded the country's various leaders, and it seems linked to their ethnic and political backgrounds.

Prime Minister Twagiramungu, for example, was recently assigned an office in a building with no electricity, no running water and no equipment such as telephones or computers. His aides pester visitors who have automobiles for rides when they need to get around Kigali.

On the other hand, an RPF leader like the organization's Secretary-General, Theogene Rudasingwa, not only has a fully-equipped office, including fax and photocopy machines, he carries his own personal two-way radio -- and he doesn't have any formal government position.

As for General Kagame, he has more bodyguards than anyone else in Rwanda as well as the longest and most heavily-armed motorcade on the roads.

He is also being given the country's other presidential mansion --one that is right in the center of Kigali as opposed to the estate near the airport where President Bizimungu lives. Local residents say that of the two structures, the General's new home, now being renovated by workers, is the one that is more like the White House, the official residence of the US President.

Back to School in Rwanda, September 1994: Teaching Against Hate and Violence

For the first time since the end of Rwanda's civil war, Rwandan children began going back to school in mid-September 1994. I traveled to the northwestern town of Ruhengeri to watch the first classes get under way there.

In the shadow of the brooding peaks of Rwanda's Parc National Des Volcans, some 300 children went back to classes at the Nyamagumba primary school. They are the survivors -- happy not only to resume this little bit of normalcy, but happy to be alive.

Before the war, three times as many students attended the simple red brick facility, located in a lush forested area on the outskirts of Ruhengeri. But some were killed in the awful ethnic and political violence that tore Rwanda apart beginning last April.

Others fled with their families to neighboring Zaire (Congo), where they still languish in disease-and-violence wracked camps.

Death and displacement have also trimmed the ranks of the school's teachers. Of the 20 who used to lead classes, only a handful have returned. For the moment, several vacancies are being filled by secondary school students not that much older than their pupils.

The classes are large: 50 or more. Students are expected to wear the usual uniforms: blue for girls; khaki for boys. But it is a rule that is not being enforced strictly. Many of the children lost parents and possessions in the turmoil of the war.

They do not have much in the way of school supplies now, either. But at least the classrooms themselves appear to have sustained little war damage and have been declared safe. Soldiers of the new Rwandese army swept the area thoroughly to make sure no landmines or other explosives remain.

In the last days of the war, local officials say several children died in and around the school -- from grenades, mines and shelling.

Because of the special occasion, top Rwandan and UN relief agency officials traveled from Kigali to witness the opening of the first post-war classes. The students, restlessly fidgeting in the hot sun, assembled to sing the national anthem and then to listen to a succession of remarks by the visiting dignitaries. Armed young soldiers, including some who looked like they, too, should be in school, stood guard.

The remarks shared various themes: that the killings could not stop the schools from reopening, that there will be a new emphasis on teaching against hatred and violence, that this marks the real beginning of reconstruction and reconciliation in Rwanda.

Fewer than 10 schools actually reopened -- all of them primary schools in Ruhengeri Province. But throughout the coming week, authorities say more schools in other parts of the country will start up.

The UN International Children's Emergency Fund UNICEF and the UN Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization UNESCO are distributing special emergency packages of basic supplies throughout the country. These packages, dubbed "schools in a box," actually consist of a wooden locker and a bag filled with exercise books, pencils, math and letter charts, blackboards, chalk and more. Relief workers say they plan to put together some nine thousand such kits for Rwanda.

My Secret African Terror Detainee

Six leading human rights organizations have published the names and details of 39 people who are believed to have been held in secret US custody and whose current whereabouts remain unknown. A press release was posted June 7, 2007 on the website of Human Rights Watch, accompanied by a 21 page background report. (See it at: http://hrw.org/backgrounder/usa/ct0607/ )

In the report is a section which lists “Individuals about whom there is strong evidence, including witness testimony, of secret detention by the United States and whose fate and whereabouts remain unknown.” Among those listed is: Suleiman Abdalla Salim (Suleiman Abdalla, Suleiman Abdalla Salim Hemed, Suleiman Ahmed Hemed Salim, Issa Tanzania)

Abdalla is someone whose case I uncovered and reported about in 2003 as I, like other reporters, probed the secret and murky world of US terrorist detentions. This is what I found out then.

On May 28, 2003, I filed this report:

A Kenyan government spokesman says he is not sure how security authorities in his country obtained the information that enabled them to detain suspected al-Qaida operative Suleiman Abdalla.

“There is exchange of information between our agencies, the British and Americans, but I can not be forthright to tell you the information was given by America.”

But one thing spokesman Douglas Kaunda of Kenya's Ministry of Internal Security is sure of: he says that following Abdalla's seizure last March in Mogadishu, the suspect was turned over to American officials in Nairobi.

“He was handed over to the American authorities. Probably you can inquire from Washington exactly what they are doing with him at the moment.”

But therein lies the mystery. In Washington, no one seems to know what happened to the alleged al-Qaida fighter, or if they do, they are unwilling to discuss it.

A spokesman for the Federal Bureau of Investigation says he does not want to cast aspersions on the Kenyans. But, in the spokesman's words, "we just did not get info" on Abdalla, "nor was he seen by us, made available to us or turned over to us."

For their part, officials at the Justice Department are equally adamant, with a spokesman there saying the best information his department has is that Abdalla is still in Africa and not in the United States.

Other officials go further, saying Abdalla is in custody, but not US custody. They offer no elaboration.

Clearly, though, US authorities do know something about the suspect. First of all, they say he is Tanzanian, not Yemeni as originally reported from Kenya. They also say he is wanted in connection with the 1998 bombings of US embassies in East Africa. Because other terrorists linked to the attacks in Kenya and Tanzania were tried in the United States, Kenyan government spokesman Kaunda is insistent that Abdalla was heading to America.

“The other suspects of a similar nature were tried in the United States. It was found prudent for this one (Abdalla) also to be charged there.”

There are a number of theories on Abdalla's present whereabouts. For one, he could be in a secret foreign detention facility. But Abdalla could also be cooperating with US and other agents in East Africa, perhaps leading them to terrorist hideouts and weapons caches.

Curiously, after his capture, Kenyan officials are reported to have arrested four more people linked to al-Qaida. They also announced a manhunt for a leading al-Qaida suspect from the 1998 embassy bombings who they said was recently spotted in the region, perhaps plotting another bloody attack. Like Abdalla, this suspect, Fazul Abdullah Mohammed, originally from the Comoros, is believed to have been operating out of Somalia.

One thing is clear: East Africa remains a place where, as US officials put it, there is "high potential" for terrorist actions. The US military's Horn of Africa anti-terrorist task force operating out of Djibouti is working closely with regional governments, gathering and sharing intelligence. A military spokesman acknowledges the intelligence effort involves sea, land, and air assets and has become "more focused" in recent weeks. The spokesman will not comment specifically on al-Qaida suspect Fazul Abdullah Mohammed now being hunted in the region, but says it is significant that he was spotted.

I followed up the next day, May 29, 2003, with this report:

The US State Department's assessment of Somalia as a terrorist haven is clear. It says Somalia's lack of a functioning central government, its history of instability and violence and its long coastline, porous borders and proximity to the Arabian peninsula make it a potentially prime location for terrorists.

Other US officials have said Somalia is more than a mere "potential" base. They have called it a "hotbed" of terrorist activity.

This much is clear: earlier this year an alleged al-Qaida terrorist operative named Suleiman Abdalla was seized in Mogadishu and whisked away to Nairobi by Kenyan officials. Kenyan authorities now acknowledge they had help from unidentified, friendly Somalis.

Douglas Kaunda is a spokesman for Kenya's Ministry of Internal Security.

“He was captured through the efforts of friendly Somali leaders, who doesn't [don't] want to see Somalia being used as a terrorist haven, and Kenyan security agencies. It wascooperation between the two.”

US defense officials confirm there are some cooperative Somalis who have been helpful in the war against terrorism. They offer no details. But one defense official knowledgeable about the Horn of Africa region says Somalia is not a particularly friendly environment for terrorists, especiallyhigh-profile terrorists, because of its poor security.

This official, speaking on condition of anonymity, says a senior al-Qaida leader would for example need an alliance with a Somali warlord and heavily-armed bodyguards -- in part to protect himself against kidnapping by a rival Somali militia. Even so, this official suggests this might not guarantee a top terrorist's protection. As the official puts it, "The environment is so opportunistic...that any presence there isliable to being sold out."

One Somali source has said in the case of Suleiman Abdalla, the suspected terrorist was kidnapped by gangs and wounded in an exchange of gunfire before being flown out of Mogadishu.

Still, it is apparent by his presence that terrorists do at least transit through Somalia, even if they do not stay there. US defense officials also note that since Abdalla's detentionin March (2003), Kenyan authorities have announced they are on the look out for yet another al-Qaida suspect, Fazul Abdullah Mohammed. Like Suleiman Abdalla, he is alleged to have been involved in the 1998 U-S embassy bombings in Kenya and Tanzania. And like Abdalla, Mohammed is believed to have been operating out of Somalia and was perhaps plotting another bloody attack somewhere in the region. The US government does not have official relations with any entity in Somalia. The US military's special Horn of Africa anti-terrorism task force says it has no ties in the country. A military spokesman for the task force says its troops have not been, nor are they now, in Somalia. He also says the force does not have any direct line of communication established with indigenous personnel in Somalia. However the spokesman admits, quoting now, "information comes out of Somalia, and finds its way to us via the information-sharing network we have with US embassies and host nation governments (and) militaries."

And before I filed those reports, on May 14, 2003, I reported on the whole secret network of detention facilities:

A senior US military official is confirming for the first time that a number of terrorist suspects are being held at secret locations outside the United States in addition to theknown terrorist detention centers at Guantanamo Bay in Cuba and an air base in Afghanistan. The senior military official says these secret detention sites are where top al-Qaida operatives are being held for interrogation.

The official would not say where the detention facilities are located or who runs them. But Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld has previously indicated the most important terrorist suspects would receive special handling, separate from rank-and-file al-Qaida members being held in Afghanistan or sent to Guantanamo.

“In some cases, they're al-Qaida, senior al-Qaida, in which case they're treated in a totally different way, in a very careful way.”

Mr. Rumsfeld declined to elaborate, citing sensitive intelligence and security reasons.

"When one's gathering information and then piecing things together, it is helpful to be able to do that in an environment that not everyone in the world knows precisely what kind of information you may have.”

The senior military official who spoke on condition of anonymity has made clear the secretly held terrorist suspects --- and the secret sites where they are detained --- are notunder Pentagon control.

The notion of secret foreign detention was first raised last December in the Washington Post newspaper, which said some captives had been turned over to Egypt, Jordan and Morocco. The Post article expressed concerns the practice could lead to human rights violations or torture.

The Defense Department's chief legal officer confirmed in a letter last month that some terrorist suspects might be transferred "to other countries for continued detention on our behalf."

About 680 detainees are known to be held at the Guantanamo facility in Cuba and another 30 or so are at Bagram Air Base in Afghanistan. Thirty-six other detainees once held by the military have been released.

However, Director of Central Intelligence George Tenet told Congress earlier this year, that so far more than three-thousand al-Qaida detainees have been rounded up by the United States and its coalition partners in the war on terrorism. The Central Intelligence Agency declined comment when asked whether U-S officials had turned terrorist suspects over to other countries.

I learned of the secret detentions while inquiring about an alleged al-Qaida operative named Suleiman Abdalla seized by Kenyan authorities in March. Kenyan officials subsequently said the suspect had been turned over to US authorities and transported to the United States. But the FBI has denied knowledge of any transfer and a Justice Department spokesman says the suspect is still in Africa. Other government sources say the man is in custody, but not in U-S custody.

Paris Hilton Shocker: NeoConCubine to Wed Islamofascist

That's my limp headlining writing effort to see if I lure more readers. This is still mainly about Rwanda. Sorry for the deception.

World Bank To the Rescue in Rwanda?

Officials from the World Bank arrived in Rwanda in mid-September 1994 to see what they could do to activate the country's economy and give the new authorities a helping hand in their efforts to begin governing. They confirmed there was a catch.

Francisco Aguirre-Sacasa says the World Bank suspended large-scale cash disbursements to Rwanda in 1993 after discovering much of the money was being used by the old government to buy weapons. Now he says the bank wants to resume its assistance program and still has roughly 250 million dollars available to help Rwanda's new authorities.

But the official acknowledges those authorities must first make good on nearly four million dollars in arrears run up under the old regime -- a condition bemoaned this week by Prime Minister Faustin Twagiramungu.

Mr. Aguirre says he is hopeful Rwanda's traditional donors like the United States, Belgium and the European Community will step in on a bilateral basis to help resolve that problem. If they do, he believes the World Bank's aid can start flowing within a matter of months.

Mr. Aguirre says his initial discussions with Rwandan officials have made clear to him that quick and flexible assistance is critical. He says the new government generally lacks even the most basic means to carry out its work.

“We have to help this government get back on its feet again. And that's one of the things we're trying to do. We have a public sector management credit available to this country which was meant for completely different things. And one of the things we are looking at right now is to see how we can redefine that project, so that some of that money can become available right away for getting computers back in the offices of these people, helping them get desks – because I have a meeting today with a minister who does not have a desk, does not have any furniture; so we will lean against the wall or go out in the back yard and sit up against a tree. I am not an advocate of big government, but I do think you have to have some government. You do have to have some facilities.”

Mr. Aguirre says he would even be prepared to recommend funding for another project not normally within the World Bank's usual fare -- the issuance of new national identity cards that would eliminate references to the holder's ethnic background.

Note: In Rwanda at about this time I can attest the office of the Prime Minister had no glass in the windows, no power, no running water and chief aides had no vehicles. Virtually all US aid at this time was going to Rwandan refugee camps in Congo and Tanzania -- the same camps where Hutu extremist killers and many former government officials fled to. One Rwandan official told me the only direct US aid received by the new Tutsi-installed government at this point was a 60-thousand dollar fingerprinting kit.

It’s Official: What Happened in Rwanda was Genocide

In an effort to avoid the procedural snags that caused two years to pass before a special tribunal was established to prosecute war crimes in the former Yugoslavia, the international community is considering ways to speed the prosecution of Rwandan atrocities. Or so sources said in Rwanda in September 1994:

A special panel of UN appointed legal experts later this month will issue a preliminary finding that genocide did in fact take place in Rwanda.

The panel will recommend that an international tribunal be created to prosecute those suspected of involvement in the slaughter.

Diplomatic and legal sources in Kigali say a draft resolution is already circulating, which, if approved, would enable the UN Security Council to authorize establishment of that court as soon as the experts' report is released.

The draft, written by the United States, also includes specific language proposing a fast and efficient way to launch the tribunal. It calls for expanding the court already authorized under UN auspices to prosecute war crimes that have taken place in the former Yugoslavia. The same rules of procedure and many of the same key judicial personnel already selected for those prosecutions would be employed in the Rwandan trials.

One source familiar with the plan says its chief advantage is that it eliminates the prospect of another time-consuming wait to draft a separate set of legal guidelines for Rwanda. If approved, it also would enable accused Rwandan war criminals to be tried in the same courtrooms and held in the same detention facilities already set aside in The Hague for the Yugoslav trials.

This source says that having failed to prevent the crimes that occurred in Rwanda, the international community is now moving as fast as he has ever seen to tackle the sensitive issue of punishing criminals.

Rwandan authorities have been demanding that UN officials expedite the process of setting up a tribunal. They have been given a copy of the draft document but have not yet expressed any formal opinions.

However, Rwandan sources familiar with the government's thinking are already voicing concerns. While these sources describe the proposal as a step forward, and possibly the only way to speed the overall process, they point to what they view as a number of weaknesses. They say there should be specific provisions to enable representatives of the new government to be associated with the prosecutions, including the possible option of holding trials in Rwanda.

These sources also complain that the most severe punishment allowed under the provisions of the Yugoslav tribunal is life imprisonment.

In addition, they believe the mandate of the court may be too limited as written in the US proposal. That language would limit prosecutions to offenses committed after the first of April this year, either in Rwanda or by Rwandans on the territory of neighboring states. Although the bulk of nearly one million Rwandans killed in the slaughter died in massacres carried out after that date, the sources say some crucial crimes related to the genocide occurred beforehand.