| The US and the Genocide in Rwanda 1994 Evidence of Inaction William Ferroggiaro, Editor August 20, 2001 |
On April 6, 1994, Rwandan President Juvenal Habyarimana's personal plane, a gift from French president Francois Mitterand, was shot down as it returned to Rwanda, killing Habyarimana, Burundian president Cyprien Ntarymira, and members of their entourages. The two presidents were returning from Tanzania, where they'd met with regional leaders concerning events in Burundi. Habyarimana himself was pressed to implement the power-sharing Arusha Accord his government had concluded with the rebel Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF) in August 1993, which capped three years of war, cease-fires and negotiations. To do so, however, would mean the effective end of his 20-year, one-party rule over Rwandan politics and society. Extremists in the military and government bitterly opposed the accord; they are the likely culprits in his assassination. Within an hour of the plane crash, the Presidential Guard, elements of the Rwandan armed forces (FAR) and extremist militia (Interahamwe and Impuzamugambi) set up roadblocks and barricades and began the organized slaughter, starting in the capital Kigali, of nearly one million Rwandans in 100 days time. Their first targets were those most likely to resist the plan of genocide: the opposition Prime Minister, the president of the constitutional court, priests, leaders of the Liberal Party and Social Democratic Party, the Information Minister, and tellingly, the negotiator of the Arusha Accord. Those who hesitated to join the campaign, such as the governor of a southern province, were quickly removed from positions of influence or killed. As a US intelligence analyst noted in late April,
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