- the only point I'd quibble with is the question of Uganda's role in the Congo, I think Uganda's Museveni, as well as Mugabe of Zimbabwe, Nujoma of Namibia and Dos Santos of Angola were, along with various mining concerns, all stumbling over each other to pillage the Congo, but the invasion of the Congo by Kagame had Uganda's - the Americans' support. It is only when Kabila kicked out Kagame's Ugandan/Tutsi mafia and decided he wanted all the loot for himself that things began to turn sour between Kagame and Museveni. A French judge recently issued a ruling vindicating Cameroonian journalist Charles Onana's charge (laid out in the book "Les Secrets Du Génocide Rwandais, Enquête Sur les Mystères D’un Président - The Secrets of the Rwandan Genocide, Investigations on the Mysteries of a President) that Kagame was responsible for shooting down the plane triggered the mass killings.
>From: <heartfield at blueyonder.co.uk>
>Reply-To: lbo-talk at lbo-talk.org
>To: <lbo-talk at lbo-talk.org>
>Subject: [lbo-talk] Rwanda and racism
>Date: Mon, 23 Feb 2004 22:13:58 -0000
>
>The categories of race and genocide really don't help to increase our
>understanding the conflict in Rwanda in the early 90s. I am not of course
>suggesting that the slaughter was not conducted on racial (or ethnic)
>lines. But assimilating the Rwanda conflict to the psychological theory of
>race (which teaches that every group needs an 'other' for its own self
>definition) only suceeds in dispelling the specific character of what
>happened.
>
>The Belgian colonists imposed a social differentiation between Hutus and
>Tutsis that saw the former as mere labourers, and the latter as noble
>farmers. Subsequently predominantly Hutu governments expelled many Tutsis.
>Exiled in Uganda, these organised an army, the RPF under the tutelage of
>Yusevini and (after some infighting) the leadership of Paul Kagame, with
>the backing of the US and the UK. The RPF prepared for their invasion by
>assassinating Habyarimana, and sent Rwandan society into panic.
>
>Already premissed upon racial exclusion, Rwanda's Hutu-dominated society
>attacked the Tutsi minority, on the grounds that they were loyal to the
>invading rebels. The slaughter was justified in racial terms.
>
>The west did intervene. They systematically undermined the Habyarimana
>government, forcing them to take RPF representatives into government at the
>Arusha accord - concessions that did not satisfy Kagame.
>
>Subsequently, the RPF in turn conducted pogroms against Hutu refugees from
>the RPF invasion, slaughtering thousands in the camps near Zaire. Kagame
>tested the patience of his Ugandan allies by his intervention in the (newly
>re-named) Congo.
>
>In Rwanda, Kagame used the charge of genocide to systematically
>de-legitimate any Hutu representatives, with the consequence that the
>current government is overwhelmingly Tutsi, while former Hutu allies have
>all been jettisoned whenever they pressed their case. Kagame's 90+ per cent
>of hte vote in recent elections is an indication of the extent of the
>criminalisation of opposition in the country, less than it is of his own
>popularity.
>
>Kagame's regime needs to keep public attention on the genocide to justify
>its minority rule.
>
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