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SECRETARY-GENERAL TO COMMISSION ON HUMAN RIGHTS: THE RISK OF GENOCIDE IS FRIGHTENINGLY REAL
07 April 2004
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Commission on Human Rights
MIDDAY
7 April 2004
As Commission Marks International Day of Reflection on 1994 Genocide in Rwanda, Secretary-General Launches Action Plan to Prevent Genocide
United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan today addressed a special meeting of the Commission on Human Rights to mark the International Day of Reflection on the 1994 Genocide in Rwanda which started with the observance of two minutes of silence in memory of the 800,000 victims of the genocide.
Mr. Annan said all should acknowledge their responsibility for not having done more to prevent or stop the genocide. Neither the United Nations Secretariat, nor the Security Council, nor Member States in general, nor the international media, had paid enough attention to the gathering signs of disaster. Still less did they take timely action. Too often, even when there was abundant warning, the political will to act was lacking.
Therefore, as the only fitting memorial the United Nations could offer to those whom its inaction in 1994 condemned to die, the Secretary-General said he was launching an Action Plan to Prevent Genocide involving the whole United Nations system. The plan was summarized under five headings: first, preventing armed conflict; second, protection of civilians in armed conflict; third, ending impunity; fourth, early and clear warning, and fifth, the need for swift and decisive action when, despite all efforts, it was learned that genocide was happening, or was about to happen.
In this connection, the Secretary-General shared the grave concern expressed last week at the scale of reported human rights abuses and at the humanitarian crisis unfolding in Darfur, Sudan. Whatever terms it used to describe the situation, the international community could not stand idle. No one should wait until the worst had happened, or was already happening. At the invitation of the Sudanese Government, Mr. Annan proposed to send a high-level team to Darfur to gain a fuller understanding of the extent and nature of this crisis, and to seek improved access to those in need of assistance and protection.
Addressing the Commission at the outset of the meeting, the Chairperson of the Commission, Ambassador Mike Smith of Australia, said that those present gathered today to mark the darkest moment in recent history – the collective failure of humanitarian protection in Rwanda in 1994. All should reflect on how to ensure that such an occurrence never happened again.
Laurent Nkusi, Minister of Information of Rwanda, said the refusal to intervene to stop the Rwandan Genocide was a result of lack of political will from the international community, dominated by divergent interests. The response of the international community to a similar situation should not be allowed to be as inadequate as it was in Rwanda in 1994. Since the genocide, Rwanda had made significant progress socially, economically, and politically, and the promotion of unity and reconciliation was the cornerstone of all national efforts.
Claudien Uwanyirigira, a member of the National Human Rights Commission of Rwanda and survivor of the Rwandan genocide, said ten years after the genocide, its survivors continued to feel an inextinguishable anguish, and the haunting memories of it constituted an overwhelming burden in daily life. It remained a source of trauma for the survivors, but the progress made by the Government in trying to redress the past, in spite of obstacles, should be hailed.
Also addressing the meeting were the coordinators of the regional groups: Congo for the African Group; Pakistan for the Asian Group; Armenia for the Eastern European Group; Argentina for the Group of Latin American and Caribbean States; and Germany for the Western Group.
The Commission will reconvene at 3 p.m. to resume its general debate on the rights of the child. If it concludes its list of speakers on children’s rights this afternoon, it will start its consideration of its agenda item on specific groups and individuals including migrant workers, minorities, mass exoduses and displaced persons, and other vulnerable groups and individuals.
Statements
MIKE SMITH (Australia), Chairperson of the Commission on Human Rights, said that those present were gathered today to mark the darkest moment in recent history – the collective failure of humanitarian protection in Rwanda in 1994. In commemorating this day and the victims of the tragedy, one must first try to imagine the depth of horror and incomprehension that each of the 800,000 murdered must have felt as they realized their fate. Then, one must think of what might have been done as individuals, as nations and as the United Nations to avert that disaster. Finally, one must reflect on how to ensure that such an occurrence never happened again.
KOFI ANNAN, Secretary-General of the United Nations, said no one should ever forget the collective failure to protect at least eight hundred thousand defenceless men, women and children who perished in Rwanda ten years ago. First, all should acknowledge their responsibility for not having done more to prevent or stop the genocide. Neither the United Nations Secretariat, nor the Security Council, nor Member States in general, nor the international media, paid enough attention to the gathering signs of disaster. Still less did they take timely action. When recalling such events and asking "why did no one intervene?", the question should be addressed not only to the United Nations, or even to its Member States. No one could claim ignorance. All who were playing any part in world affairs at that time should ask themselves the question.
If there was one legacy he would most wish to leave to his successors, Mr. Annan said, it was an Organization both better equipped to prevent genocide, and able to act decisively to stop it when prevention failed. Many of his actions as Secretary-General had been undertaken with this in mind, but he knew that his efforts were insufficient: the risk of genocide remained frighteningly real.
Therefore, as the only fitting memorial the United Nations could offer to those whom its inaction in 1994 condemned to die, and as recommended in 1999 by the Independent Inquiry into the actions of the United Nations during the genocide in Rwanda, the Secretary-General wished to launch today an Action Plan to Prevent Genocide involving the whole United Nations system. The plan could be summarized under five headings: first, preventing armed conflict; second, protection of civilians in armed conflict; third, ending impunity; fourth, early and clear warning, and fifth, the need for swift and decisive action when, despite all efforts, it was learned that genocide was happening, or was about to happen. Too often, even when there was abundant warning, the political will to act was lacking.
Anyone who embarked on genocide committed a crime against humanity, and humanity should respond by taking action in its own defence. Humanity’s instrument for that purpose should be the United Nations, and specifically the Security Council.
In this connection, the Secretary-General shared the grave concern expressed last week by eight independent experts appointed by the Commission at the scale of reported human rights abuses and at the humanitarian crisis unfolding in Darfur, Sudan. Whatever terms it used to describe the situation, the international community could not stand idle. There was an urgent need for clear guidelines on how to identify such extreme cases and how to react to them; such guidelines would ensure that there would be no excuse to ignore a real danger of genocide when it does arise, and would also provide greater clarity, and thus help to reduce the suspicion that allegations of genocide might be used as a pretext for aggression. At the invitation of the Sudanese Government, he proposed to send a high-level team to Darfur to gain a fuller understanding of the extent and nature of this crisis, and to seek improved access to those in need of assistance and protection.
But no-one should wait until the worst had happened, or was already happening, until the only alternatives to military action were futile hand-wringing or callous indifference. All should be serious about preventing genocide. Only so could the victims remembered today be honoured, and only so could those who might be victims tomorrow be saved.
LAURENT NKUSI, Minister of Information of Rwanda, said the people and Government of Rwanda were grateful that today the sixtieth session of the Commission on Human Rights and people from different walks of life around the world were joining the people of Rwanda as they commemorated the most tragic and painful chapter in their nation’s long history. As the atrocious murder of over one million people was remembered, all should ask themselves whether appropriate measures were in place to ensure that genocide never happened again anywhere in the world. In Rwanda, a two-pronged approach had been adopted against this evil. One approach included Constitutional measures that prescribed punitive action against those who promoted hate, intolerance, and division within communities. The other included implementing a pro-active programme aimed at promoting national unity and reconciliation, and encouraging open and frank discussions about the mistakes of the past to ensure that they were not repeated. The international community for its part should ask whether appropriate mechanisms had now been put in place to ensure that there was no repeat of the Genocide that occurred in Rwanda anywhere in the world.
However, it had been realized that the United Nations system had had, in 1994 and even before, the capacity and resources to know exactly what was happening in Rwanda through many sources, and it was thought that the system of information worked to give sufficient and credible warnings for what had been qualified as a “preventable genocide”. The refusal to intervene to stop the genocide was a result of the lack of political will from the international community, dominated by divergent interests. The response of the international community to a similar situation should not be allowed to be as inadequate as it was in Rwanda in 1994.
Over the last ten years, Rwanda had made significant progress socially, economically, and politically, and the promotion of unity and reconciliation was the cornerstone of all national efforts. Despite progress achieved, Rwanda had to continue to deal with the aftermath of the 1994 genocide: the extremists who planned and executed it were still lingering, and were still protected by some countries; also, there was a need to combat the ideology of revisionism which continued to deny the very occurrence of genocide. Another crucial problem was that survivors, many of them being physically disabled and psychologically wounded, still lacked adequate support. The Government of Rwanda had established a Fund, but this was extremely inadequate given the magnitude of the problems of the survivors. The people of Rwanda were especially grateful for the many expressions of regret for having been abandoned at their greatest hour of need - but such expressions would nevertheless remain empty rhetoric unless they were accompanied by concrete actions of support to survivors.
CLAUDIEN UWANYIRIGIRA, Member of the National Human Rights Commission of Rwanda, a survivor of the Rwandan genocide and a member of the Federation of Associations of Genocide Survivors, said that, out of nine children in his family, only three had survived the 1994 genocide. A million lives had been lost during those events while the international community looked on; men had been shot while peacekeeping troops looked on. Ten years after the genocide, its survivors continued to feel an inextinguishable anguish. The haunting memories of the genocide constituted an overwhelming burden in daily life – people had been hacked to death with machetes and their bodies eaten by dogs, women and girls had been raped and HIV/AIDS had served as an additional tool of genocide that continued to haunt the original survivors. Those still alive felt that they had been unable to bury their dead with dignity; bodies continued to be found today, which could not be identified.
If the large-scale involvement of soldiers and average men in the genocide had had so many consequences that people did not seek to know the truth, if there was a lack of will on the part of several development partners not to take account of the problem, if the international community could not understand why the genocide had happened, he said, the survivors themselves were left wondering what they had done to bring on such atrocity? What could have been done to avoid it? The genocide remained a source of trauma for the survivors, yet one must hail the progress that had been made by the Rwandan Government in trying to redress that past, in spite of obstacles to progress.
ROGER JULIEN MENGA (Congo), speaking on behalf of the African Group, said the occasion bringing the participants together today was the commemoration of one of the darkest moments of the history of the African continent and of humanity as a whole: the Rwandan genocide. Eleven years ago, at the session of the Commission, the Special Rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions gave an account of his mission to Rwanda, speaking of inter-ethnic violence. One year later, the campaign for the extermination of the Tutsis and the massacres of Hutus opposing the regime of the period had taken place on the entire territory of Rwanda. The result of this genocide was the massacre of more than one million people, and it was the extermination of these sons and daughters of Africa that was being commemorated today.
What was at issue today in the Commission was that the humanity of the victims of the genocide, of the Tutsis in Rwanda, was not only denied by those who perpetrated it, but also by the entire international community which was widely informed of what was happening. Ten years later, the African Group wished to invite the international community to reflect on the profound causes of this collective failure to protect humanity from this odious crime, and to learn from it. All should be vigilant to ensure that such situations were not repeated. The recent resurgence of ethnically-characterised violence in Kosovo showed that vigilance was essential in a society where ethnic hatred and division had been the rule for decades. It also showed that the process of reconciliation needed time. Justice, although very complex in the situation of Rwanda, was a priority to establish the different responsibilities, and to eradicate the long-lived culture of impunity that had fed for a long time the roots of this scourge.
SHAUKAT UMER (Pakistan), speaking on behalf of the Asian Group, said that the Group stood in full solidarity with the people of Rwanda on the tenth anniversary of the genocide that laid waste to so much human life. On that fateful day of 6 April 1994, a meticulously planned horror had been unleashed on the people of Rwanda. This was a moment of great sadness that engendered a sense of strong solidarity with the families of those who were intentionally and systematically killed and with a country that lost the flower of its manhood in an irrational frenzy of hate and revenge. This was also a moment of reflection. Preservation of human life should always be central to the actions and decisions of the international community.
The international community had failed Rwanda once. It should resolve never to do so again. A tragedy of that scale should not be allowed to recur. Today, the international community should reaffirm its commitment to the principles and purposes of international human rights and humanitarian law; recognize and uphold the sanctity of life; reject all forms of discrimination; strive hard to eliminate violence, ensure peaceful co-existence of different social groups, and seek long-term reconciliation through political and juridical measures; address the inadequacies of prevailing legal systems and of juridical concepts in order to put an end to administrative massacres organized by State apparatuses; provide speedy justice to victims; and strengthen the early warning capacity of the United Nations for rapid and effective response.
ZOHRAB MNATSAKANIAN (Armenia), speaking on behalf of the Eastern European Group, said that today the international community gathered together to reflect on the hundreds of thousands of human lives lost as a result of the most horrendous of crimes that humankind had – to its shame – demonstrated its ability to commit. The Rwandan genocide had demonstrated the collective short-sightedness of the international community and had compelled it to admit that indifference had costs hundreds of thousands of innocent lives.
It was to be hoped that, at this commemoration ten years later, the international community would demonstrate its capacity to take action. The United Nations must demonstrate its ability to lead the world towards this objective. Careful note should be taken of the various initiatives aimed at transforming the United Nations’ culture from one of reaction to one of prevention for the Rwandan genocide had demonstrated that the destiny of entire peoples could rest in the hands of the Organization and its Member States. The lessons of Ituri province in the Democratic Republic of Congo and elsewhere – situations in which action had not been shunned – should serve as an encouragement to stand firm. Empowering the concept of the responsibility to protect, promoting legal accountability under international law and implementing effectively the Brahimi process for United Nations peacekeeping would serve as a conspicuous demonstration of the collective will and seriousness of purpose.
ALFREDO VICENTE CHIARADIA (Argentina), speaking on behalf of the Latin American and Caribbean Group, said he wished to express the Group’s profound compassion for the victims of the Rwandan genocide and its solidarity with the survivors. The genocide served to mark the international community’s and United Nations’ manifest failure to prevent or arrest the killings – its manifest failure to protect human rights. Regrettably, the international community was today obliged to retrace a path it had originally embarked upon in 1946 with the General Assembly’s condemnation of genocide as a violation of international law and the spirit of the United Nations and the entire civilized world. The international community found itself forced to reiterate its condemnation of genocide.
Internationally, the Group underscored the importance of the establishment of the International Tribunal for Rwanda, which had made an important contribution to bringing the facts of the genocide to light and to ending impunity. Systems incorporating the principles of democracy, transparency and the rule of law provided the best means of preventing future acts of premeditated violations of human rights and international humanitarian law. The international community must also act to ensure that political interference did not serve as an obstacle to effective preventive and reactive action. Finally, the work of Organization in the field, which had opposed the genocide and struggled to end the impunity of the perpetrators, must be praised.
MICHAEL STEINER (Germany), speaking on behalf of the Western Group, said that inconceivable violence and suffering had been unleashed in Rwanda ten years ago as the world had witnessed a crisis degenerate into a human rights catastrophe. The Rwandan genocide not only constituted a catastrophe for that country, but also for the international community as a whole and all must bear a share of the responsibility for the massacres. The international community had not moved quickly or firmly enough. And the international community had not called the crimes committed in Rwanda by their rightful name – genocide.
The shock of the Rwandan genocide made clear once more the necessity to prevent such a catastrophe from happening ever again, he continued. And indeed, important steps had been made to improve the international system, including in the fields of peacekeeping and the protection of civilians in armed conflicts. Yet, there must still be concerted progress in the field of prevention. The creation of a new Special Advisor on the prevention of genocide would serve as a tool to help protect the world from future genocide; it had the Western Group’s full support. The Commission on Human Rights must remain acutely aware of its particular responsibility to denounce gross violations of human rights and international humanitarian law, he added. Only if it was prepared to act swiftly in the face of systematic violations of human rights anywhere in the world could the international community ensure that a catastrophe of such magnitude never happened again.
* *** *
MIDDAY
7 April 2004
As Commission Marks International Day of Reflection on 1994 Genocide in Rwanda, Secretary-General Launches Action Plan to Prevent Genocide
United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan today addressed a special meeting of the Commission on Human Rights to mark the International Day of Reflection on the 1994 Genocide in Rwanda which started with the observance of two minutes of silence in memory of the 800,000 victims of the genocide.
Mr. Annan said all should acknowledge their responsibility for not having done more to prevent or stop the genocide. Neither the United Nations Secretariat, nor the Security Council, nor Member States in general, nor the international media, had paid enough attention to the gathering signs of disaster. Still less did they take timely action. Too often, even when there was abundant warning, the political will to act was lacking.
Therefore, as the only fitting memorial the United Nations could offer to those whom its inaction in 1994 condemned to die, the Secretary-General said he was launching an Action Plan to Prevent Genocide involving the whole United Nations system. The plan was summarized under five headings: first, preventing armed conflict; second, protection of civilians in armed conflict; third, ending impunity; fourth, early and clear warning, and fifth, the need for swift and decisive action when, despite all efforts, it was learned that genocide was happening, or was about to happen.
In this connection, the Secretary-General shared the grave concern expressed last week at the scale of reported human rights abuses and at the humanitarian crisis unfolding in Darfur, Sudan. Whatever terms it used to describe the situation, the international community could not stand idle. No one should wait until the worst had happened, or was already happening. At the invitation of the Sudanese Government, Mr. Annan proposed to send a high-level team to Darfur to gain a fuller understanding of the extent and nature of this crisis, and to seek improved access to those in need of assistance and protection.
Addressing the Commission at the outset of the meeting, the Chairperson of the Commission, Ambassador Mike Smith of Australia, said that those present gathered today to mark the darkest moment in recent history – the collective failure of humanitarian protection in Rwanda in 1994. All should reflect on how to ensure that such an occurrence never happened again.
Laurent Nkusi, Minister of Information of Rwanda, said the refusal to intervene to stop the Rwandan Genocide was a result of lack of political will from the international community, dominated by divergent interests. The response of the international community to a similar situation should not be allowed to be as inadequate as it was in Rwanda in 1994. Since the genocide, Rwanda had made significant progress socially, economically, and politically, and the promotion of unity and reconciliation was the cornerstone of all national efforts.
Claudien Uwanyirigira, a member of the National Human Rights Commission of Rwanda and survivor of the Rwandan genocide, said ten years after the genocide, its survivors continued to feel an inextinguishable anguish, and the haunting memories of it constituted an overwhelming burden in daily life. It remained a source of trauma for the survivors, but the progress made by the Government in trying to redress the past, in spite of obstacles, should be hailed.
Also addressing the meeting were the coordinators of the regional groups: Congo for the African Group; Pakistan for the Asian Group; Armenia for the Eastern European Group; Argentina for the Group of Latin American and Caribbean States; and Germany for the Western Group.
The Commission will reconvene at 3 p.m. to resume its general debate on the rights of the child. If it concludes its list of speakers on children’s rights this afternoon, it will start its consideration of its agenda item on specific groups and individuals including migrant workers, minorities, mass exoduses and displaced persons, and other vulnerable groups and individuals.
Statements
MIKE SMITH (Australia), Chairperson of the Commission on Human Rights, said that those present were gathered today to mark the darkest moment in recent history – the collective failure of humanitarian protection in Rwanda in 1994. In commemorating this day and the victims of the tragedy, one must first try to imagine the depth of horror and incomprehension that each of the 800,000 murdered must have felt as they realized their fate. Then, one must think of what might have been done as individuals, as nations and as the United Nations to avert that disaster. Finally, one must reflect on how to ensure that such an occurrence never happened again.
KOFI ANNAN, Secretary-General of the United Nations, said no one should ever forget the collective failure to protect at least eight hundred thousand defenceless men, women and children who perished in Rwanda ten years ago. First, all should acknowledge their responsibility for not having done more to prevent or stop the genocide. Neither the United Nations Secretariat, nor the Security Council, nor Member States in general, nor the international media, paid enough attention to the gathering signs of disaster. Still less did they take timely action. When recalling such events and asking "why did no one intervene?", the question should be addressed not only to the United Nations, or even to its Member States. No one could claim ignorance. All who were playing any part in world affairs at that time should ask themselves the question.
If there was one legacy he would most wish to leave to his successors, Mr. Annan said, it was an Organization both better equipped to prevent genocide, and able to act decisively to stop it when prevention failed. Many of his actions as Secretary-General had been undertaken with this in mind, but he knew that his efforts were insufficient: the risk of genocide remained frighteningly real.
Therefore, as the only fitting memorial the United Nations could offer to those whom its inaction in 1994 condemned to die, and as recommended in 1999 by the Independent Inquiry into the actions of the United Nations during the genocide in Rwanda, the Secretary-General wished to launch today an Action Plan to Prevent Genocide involving the whole United Nations system. The plan could be summarized under five headings: first, preventing armed conflict; second, protection of civilians in armed conflict; third, ending impunity; fourth, early and clear warning, and fifth, the need for swift and decisive action when, despite all efforts, it was learned that genocide was happening, or was about to happen. Too often, even when there was abundant warning, the political will to act was lacking.
Anyone who embarked on genocide committed a crime against humanity, and humanity should respond by taking action in its own defence. Humanity’s instrument for that purpose should be the United Nations, and specifically the Security Council.
In this connection, the Secretary-General shared the grave concern expressed last week by eight independent experts appointed by the Commission at the scale of reported human rights abuses and at the humanitarian crisis unfolding in Darfur, Sudan. Whatever terms it used to describe the situation, the international community could not stand idle. There was an urgent need for clear guidelines on how to identify such extreme cases and how to react to them; such guidelines would ensure that there would be no excuse to ignore a real danger of genocide when it does arise, and would also provide greater clarity, and thus help to reduce the suspicion that allegations of genocide might be used as a pretext for aggression. At the invitation of the Sudanese Government, he proposed to send a high-level team to Darfur to gain a fuller understanding of the extent and nature of this crisis, and to seek improved access to those in need of assistance and protection.
But no-one should wait until the worst had happened, or was already happening, until the only alternatives to military action were futile hand-wringing or callous indifference. All should be serious about preventing genocide. Only so could the victims remembered today be honoured, and only so could those who might be victims tomorrow be saved.
LAURENT NKUSI, Minister of Information of Rwanda, said the people and Government of Rwanda were grateful that today the sixtieth session of the Commission on Human Rights and people from different walks of life around the world were joining the people of Rwanda as they commemorated the most tragic and painful chapter in their nation’s long history. As the atrocious murder of over one million people was remembered, all should ask themselves whether appropriate measures were in place to ensure that genocide never happened again anywhere in the world. In Rwanda, a two-pronged approach had been adopted against this evil. One approach included Constitutional measures that prescribed punitive action against those who promoted hate, intolerance, and division within communities. The other included implementing a pro-active programme aimed at promoting national unity and reconciliation, and encouraging open and frank discussions about the mistakes of the past to ensure that they were not repeated. The international community for its part should ask whether appropriate mechanisms had now been put in place to ensure that there was no repeat of the Genocide that occurred in Rwanda anywhere in the world.
However, it had been realized that the United Nations system had had, in 1994 and even before, the capacity and resources to know exactly what was happening in Rwanda through many sources, and it was thought that the system of information worked to give sufficient and credible warnings for what had been qualified as a “preventable genocide”. The refusal to intervene to stop the genocide was a result of the lack of political will from the international community, dominated by divergent interests. The response of the international community to a similar situation should not be allowed to be as inadequate as it was in Rwanda in 1994.
Over the last ten years, Rwanda had made significant progress socially, economically, and politically, and the promotion of unity and reconciliation was the cornerstone of all national efforts. Despite progress achieved, Rwanda had to continue to deal with the aftermath of the 1994 genocide: the extremists who planned and executed it were still lingering, and were still protected by some countries; also, there was a need to combat the ideology of revisionism which continued to deny the very occurrence of genocide. Another crucial problem was that survivors, many of them being physically disabled and psychologically wounded, still lacked adequate support. The Government of Rwanda had established a Fund, but this was extremely inadequate given the magnitude of the problems of the survivors. The people of Rwanda were especially grateful for the many expressions of regret for having been abandoned at their greatest hour of need - but such expressions would nevertheless remain empty rhetoric unless they were accompanied by concrete actions of support to survivors.
CLAUDIEN UWANYIRIGIRA, Member of the National Human Rights Commission of Rwanda, a survivor of the Rwandan genocide and a member of the Federation of Associations of Genocide Survivors, said that, out of nine children in his family, only three had survived the 1994 genocide. A million lives had been lost during those events while the international community looked on; men had been shot while peacekeeping troops looked on. Ten years after the genocide, its survivors continued to feel an inextinguishable anguish. The haunting memories of the genocide constituted an overwhelming burden in daily life – people had been hacked to death with machetes and their bodies eaten by dogs, women and girls had been raped and HIV/AIDS had served as an additional tool of genocide that continued to haunt the original survivors. Those still alive felt that they had been unable to bury their dead with dignity; bodies continued to be found today, which could not be identified.
If the large-scale involvement of soldiers and average men in the genocide had had so many consequences that people did not seek to know the truth, if there was a lack of will on the part of several development partners not to take account of the problem, if the international community could not understand why the genocide had happened, he said, the survivors themselves were left wondering what they had done to bring on such atrocity? What could have been done to avoid it? The genocide remained a source of trauma for the survivors, yet one must hail the progress that had been made by the Rwandan Government in trying to redress that past, in spite of obstacles to progress.
ROGER JULIEN MENGA (Congo), speaking on behalf of the African Group, said the occasion bringing the participants together today was the commemoration of one of the darkest moments of the history of the African continent and of humanity as a whole: the Rwandan genocide. Eleven years ago, at the session of the Commission, the Special Rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions gave an account of his mission to Rwanda, speaking of inter-ethnic violence. One year later, the campaign for the extermination of the Tutsis and the massacres of Hutus opposing the regime of the period had taken place on the entire territory of Rwanda. The result of this genocide was the massacre of more than one million people, and it was the extermination of these sons and daughters of Africa that was being commemorated today.
What was at issue today in the Commission was that the humanity of the victims of the genocide, of the Tutsis in Rwanda, was not only denied by those who perpetrated it, but also by the entire international community which was widely informed of what was happening. Ten years later, the African Group wished to invite the international community to reflect on the profound causes of this collective failure to protect humanity from this odious crime, and to learn from it. All should be vigilant to ensure that such situations were not repeated. The recent resurgence of ethnically-characterised violence in Kosovo showed that vigilance was essential in a society where ethnic hatred and division had been the rule for decades. It also showed that the process of reconciliation needed time. Justice, although very complex in the situation of Rwanda, was a priority to establish the different responsibilities, and to eradicate the long-lived culture of impunity that had fed for a long time the roots of this scourge.
SHAUKAT UMER (Pakistan), speaking on behalf of the Asian Group, said that the Group stood in full solidarity with the people of Rwanda on the tenth anniversary of the genocide that laid waste to so much human life. On that fateful day of 6 April 1994, a meticulously planned horror had been unleashed on the people of Rwanda. This was a moment of great sadness that engendered a sense of strong solidarity with the families of those who were intentionally and systematically killed and with a country that lost the flower of its manhood in an irrational frenzy of hate and revenge. This was also a moment of reflection. Preservation of human life should always be central to the actions and decisions of the international community.
The international community had failed Rwanda once. It should resolve never to do so again. A tragedy of that scale should not be allowed to recur. Today, the international community should reaffirm its commitment to the principles and purposes of international human rights and humanitarian law; recognize and uphold the sanctity of life; reject all forms of discrimination; strive hard to eliminate violence, ensure peaceful co-existence of different social groups, and seek long-term reconciliation through political and juridical measures; address the inadequacies of prevailing legal systems and of juridical concepts in order to put an end to administrative massacres organized by State apparatuses; provide speedy justice to victims; and strengthen the early warning capacity of the United Nations for rapid and effective response.
ZOHRAB MNATSAKANIAN (Armenia), speaking on behalf of the Eastern European Group, said that today the international community gathered together to reflect on the hundreds of thousands of human lives lost as a result of the most horrendous of crimes that humankind had – to its shame – demonstrated its ability to commit. The Rwandan genocide had demonstrated the collective short-sightedness of the international community and had compelled it to admit that indifference had costs hundreds of thousands of innocent lives.
It was to be hoped that, at this commemoration ten years later, the international community would demonstrate its capacity to take action. The United Nations must demonstrate its ability to lead the world towards this objective. Careful note should be taken of the various initiatives aimed at transforming the United Nations’ culture from one of reaction to one of prevention for the Rwandan genocide had demonstrated that the destiny of entire peoples could rest in the hands of the Organization and its Member States. The lessons of Ituri province in the Democratic Republic of Congo and elsewhere – situations in which action had not been shunned – should serve as an encouragement to stand firm. Empowering the concept of the responsibility to protect, promoting legal accountability under international law and implementing effectively the Brahimi process for United Nations peacekeeping would serve as a conspicuous demonstration of the collective will and seriousness of purpose.
ALFREDO VICENTE CHIARADIA (Argentina), speaking on behalf of the Latin American and Caribbean Group, said he wished to express the Group’s profound compassion for the victims of the Rwandan genocide and its solidarity with the survivors. The genocide served to mark the international community’s and United Nations’ manifest failure to prevent or arrest the killings – its manifest failure to protect human rights. Regrettably, the international community was today obliged to retrace a path it had originally embarked upon in 1946 with the General Assembly’s condemnation of genocide as a violation of international law and the spirit of the United Nations and the entire civilized world. The international community found itself forced to reiterate its condemnation of genocide.
Internationally, the Group underscored the importance of the establishment of the International Tribunal for Rwanda, which had made an important contribution to bringing the facts of the genocide to light and to ending impunity. Systems incorporating the principles of democracy, transparency and the rule of law provided the best means of preventing future acts of premeditated violations of human rights and international humanitarian law. The international community must also act to ensure that political interference did not serve as an obstacle to effective preventive and reactive action. Finally, the work of Organization in the field, which had opposed the genocide and struggled to end the impunity of the perpetrators, must be praised.
MICHAEL STEINER (Germany), speaking on behalf of the Western Group, said that inconceivable violence and suffering had been unleashed in Rwanda ten years ago as the world had witnessed a crisis degenerate into a human rights catastrophe. The Rwandan genocide not only constituted a catastrophe for that country, but also for the international community as a whole and all must bear a share of the responsibility for the massacres. The international community had not moved quickly or firmly enough. And the international community had not called the crimes committed in Rwanda by their rightful name – genocide.
The shock of the Rwandan genocide made clear once more the necessity to prevent such a catastrophe from happening ever again, he continued. And indeed, important steps had been made to improve the international system, including in the fields of peacekeeping and the protection of civilians in armed conflicts. Yet, there must still be concerted progress in the field of prevention. The creation of a new Special Advisor on the prevention of genocide would serve as a tool to help protect the world from future genocide; it had the Western Group’s full support. The Commission on Human Rights must remain acutely aware of its particular responsibility to denounce gross violations of human rights and international humanitarian law, he added. Only if it was prepared to act swiftly in the face of systematic violations of human rights anywhere in the world could the international community ensure that a catastrophe of such magnitude never happened again.
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