Africa Great Lakes Democracy Watch



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Africa Great Lakes Democracy Watch Blog. Our objective is to promote the institutions of democracy,social justice,Human Rights,Peace, Freedom of Expression, and Respect to humanity in Rwanda,Uganda,DR Congo, Burundi,Sudan, Tanzania, Kenya,Ethiopia, and Somalia. We strongly believe that Africa will develop if only our presidents stop being rulers of men and become leaders of citizens. We support Breaking the Silence Campaign for DR Congo since we believe the democracy in Rwanda means peace in DRC. Follow this link to learn more about the origin of the war in both Rwanda and DR Congo:http://www.rwandadocumentsproject.net/gsdl/cgi-bin/library


Showing posts with label Rwanda Spain. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Rwanda Spain. Show all posts

Saturday, September 25, 2010

You will shortly see the light a UN report detailing a decade of continued violence in Central Africa

SOURCE:Veritas Rwanda Forum
You will shortly see the light a UN report detailing a decade of continued violence in Central Africa
De los genocidios de Rwanda y Congo a un tribunal español Of the genocide in Rwanda and Congo to a Spanish court
¿Tiene relación los genocidios de Rwanda y Congo con España y sus tribunales; con la ONU, EEUU y Gran Bretaña? Do you have regarding the genocide in Rwanda and Congo with Spain and its courts, with the UN, the U.S. and Britain? Más de la que parece. More than meets the eye. ¿Y qué nos importa? What do we care? Nos toca más de cerca de lo que podemos pensar. We get closer than we think. Hace pocos días la prensa internacional se hacía eco de la filtración de un informe del Alto Comisionado para los Derechos Humanos de la ONU (UNHCHR) sobre 10 años de violencia continuada en la República Democrática del Congo (1993-2003). A few days ago the international press echoed a leaked report of the High Commissioner for UN Human Rights (UNHCHR) on 10 years of continued violence in the Democratic Republic of Congo (1993-2003). Este informe de casi 600 páginas debe ver la luz en los próximos días y veremos en qué términos después del revuelo internacional y las enormes amenazas –veladas ya plena luz- que se están produciendo por numerosos actores internacionales- incluidos gobiernos- en múltiples direcciones. The report of nearly 600 pages to see the light in the coming days and see what terms after the huge international outcry and veiled threats and full-light-being brought about by many international actors, including governments, in multiple directions.
La ONU dice que Rwanda podría ser culpable de genocidio en la RD Congo The UN said that Rwanda could be guilty of genocide in the DR Congo
Dicho informe filtrado de la ONU pone de manifiesto con contundencia, después del estudio de miles de documentos y de más de mil testimonios recogidos por los expertos, la crudeza de las matanzas producidas de forma sistemática contra población de la etnia hutu, tanto refugiados rwandeses como población civil congoleña, principalmente durante las dos guerras (de septiembre de 1996 a julio de 1998 y agosto de 1998 en adelante). This leaked report from the UN shows forcefully, after studying thousands of documents and over a thousand testimonies gathered by the experts, the rawness of a systematic massacres against Hutu population, both Rwandan refugees as Congolese civilians, mostly during the two wars (September 1996 to July 1998 and August 1998 onwards).

Según dicho informe, se procedió a la masacre deliberada de personas, incluyendo en especial ancianos, niños y mujeres, hutus rwandeses y congoleños sin excepción y sin poder ser en ningún caso consideradas muertes accidentales o colaterales de la guerra. According to the report, proceeded to deliberate slaughter of people, including especially the elderly, children and women, Rwandan and Congolese Hutus without exception and without in any case to be considered accidental deaths or side of the war. Según las pruebas recogidas, dichas masacres estuvieron “bien planeadas y altamente organizadas”, haciéndose referencia a más de 600 actos criminales sistemáticos con cientos de miles de víctimas como resultado. According to evidence gathered, such killings were "well planned and highly organized" and referred to more than 600 criminal acts systematically with hundreds of thousands of casualties as a result.

En la misma línea que las resoluciones judiciales españolas, la ONU pone de manifiesto ahora que, además de la muerte directa por armas ligeras o pesadas, las muertes se tuvieron lugar también por otras formas de producir genocidio como privación de alimentación y desplazamientos forzosos de población (refugiados hutus y población civil congoleña, cuyas víctimas fueron también mayoritariamente hutus), agresiones sexuales o sometiéndoles a condiciones de inanición y enfermedades que provocarían con toda probabilidad su muerte. In the same line as the Spanish judicial decisions, the UN now shows that in addition to direct killing by light and heavy weapons, deaths also occurred for other ways to produce genocide as deprivation of food and forced population displacement (Hutu refugees and Congolese civilians, the victims were also mainly Hutus), sexual assault or subjecting them to conditions of starvation and disease that most likely would cause his death. Sólo hay que detenerse un instante para ir más allá de las cifras (millones, en plural, más allá de las 800.000 víctimas del genocidio oficial en Rwanda) y tomar consciencia del sufrimiento –individual, familiar y colectivo- que hay tras cada víctima para acercarse a la magnitud de la tragedia (que desgraciadamente continúa). Just pause a moment to go beyond the numbers (millions, plural, beyond the 800,000 victims of genocide in Rwanda official) and become aware of suffering-individual, family and community, which is behind every victim to come the magnitude of the tragedy (which unfortunately continues).

Aunque en dicho informe no se establecen responsabilidades individuales por dichos crímenes, sí se atribuye la responsabilidad principal al ejército de Rwanda -y sus aliados locales- y también se concretan los crímenes que podrían haberse producido en esa década estudiada, pudiendo los hechos constituir crímenes contra la humanidad, crímenes de guerra e incluso susceptibles de ser calificados como genocidio. Although the report does not establish individual responsibility for these crimes, it is attributed primary responsibility for the army of Rwanda, and its local allies, and make concrete the crimes that may have occurred in the decade studied, the facts may constitute crimes against humanity, war crimes and even that could be classified as genocide.

Curiosamente lo que ha levantado revuelo en el Gobierno de Rwanda es este último crimen, el de genocidio, no los dos primeros, no discutidos por Rwanda y ya de por sí crímenes internacionales gravísimos. Interestingly it has raised a stir in the Government of Rwanda is the latter crime, genocide, not the first two, not challenged by Rwanda and already very serious international crimes. Y no es por casualidad: la prensa internacional, sin dejar de recordar la enorme tragedia producida en el genocidio de Rwanda de 1994 con mayoría de víctimas tutsis, no ha dejado de replantearse el papel de Paul Kagame y sus acólitos en dicho genocidio, cuestionando severamente la versión de éste y su cúpula que reclama que él fue quien detuvo dicho genocidio. It is no coincidence: the international press, still remember the great tragedy produced in the 1994 Rwandan genocide with a majority of Tutsi victims, has continued to redefine the role of Paul Kagame and his acolytes in the genocide, severely questioning version of this and its dome claims he was the one who stopped the genocide. Esta versión se va desmontando como un castillo de naipes y este informe de la ONU no hace más que acelerar la caída. This version of the whole structure like a house of cards and the UN report does nothing but accelerate the decline.

Muchos afirman que habrá que reinvestigar lo que sucedió realmente durante en genocidio del año 1994 en Rwanda, incluido el informe secreto de 1994 del representante norteamericano del ACNUR en Rwanda Robert Gersony, embargado por la propia ONU, recogido en la investigación de los tribunales españoles a través del testimonio del ex ministro de exteriores ruandés –entre otros- y que documentó más de 30.000 asesinatos en sólo tres meses después que Kagame tomara el poder por la fuerza después de cuatro años de guerra tras su invasión de Rwanda desde Uganda y “parara oficialmente el genocidio”. Many say they will have to reinvestigate what really happened during the 1994 genocide in Rwanda, including the secret report in 1994 the U.S. representative of UNHCR in Rwanda Robert Gersony, embargoed by the UN, included in the investigation of the Spanish courts Through the testimony of former Rwandan Foreign Minister, among others, and documented more than 30,000 murders in just three months after Kagame took power by force after four years of war after its invasion of Rwanda from Uganda and "officially stop genocide. " Sólo de esta manera los responsables de crímenes internacionales – sin distinción étnica ni política de ningún tipo, como prevé el Estatuto del Tribunal Penal Internacional para Rwanda- podrían rendir cuentas ante la justicia sin distinción partidista. Only in this way those responsible for international crimes - no ethnic or political distinction of any kind, as envisaged in the Statute of the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda, could be accountable to the law without distinction partisan.

Hay que decir que la planificación precisa y el alto grado de organización del ejército de Rwanda en la ejecución de crímenes ya fueron puestas de manifiesto en otros dos Informes de la ONU de los años 2001 y 2002 ( http://www.veritasrwandaforum.org/informes.htm ), en ese caso en relación al pillaje sistemático de recursos naturales como oro, diamantes, coltan, estaño, y casiterita, entre otros, junto a multinacionales norteamericanas, europeas, africanas y orientales (minerales preciosos incorporados en nuestros móviles, ordenadores, consolas además de armamento inteligente y estratégico). It must be said that the precise planning and the high degree of organization of the Rwandan army in the execution of crimes and were highlighted in two UN reports in 2001 and 2002 ( http://www.veritasrwandaforum.org / informes.htm ), in this case in relation to the systematic plundering of natural resources like gold, diamonds, coltan, tin, and cassiterite, among others, with U.S. multinationals, European, African and Eastern (precious minerals embedded in our mobile computers, consoles in addition to smart weapons and strategic).

¿Qué tribunal puede investigar estos crímenes internacionales en la RD Congo? What court can investigate these international crimes in DR Congo?
El informe acaba preguntándose qué tribunal podrá hacerse cargo de la investigación y enjuiciamiento de estos crímenes. The report just wondering what the court may take over the investigation and prosecution of these crimes. Es una pregunta esencial para que la impunidad de los mismos, ya de hace años, no continúe retroalimentando el conflicto violento como lo hace hasta nuestros días. Is an essential question for the impunity of those, and years ago, do not continue feeding back the violent conflict as it does today. Aunque la idea de investigar estos crímenes en la RD Congo es anterior, los expertos de la ONU empezaron a trabajar en ello en julio de 2008, pocos meses después de que el 6 de febrero de 2008 los tribunales españoles hicieran público un Auto de Procesamiento de 40 altos mandos político-militares de Rwanda por crímenes de genocidio, crímenes contra la humanidad y crímenes de guerra, entre otros, presuntamente ejecutados en Rwanda y el Zaire/RD Congo en el período que media entre el año 1990 y el 2002. Although the idea of investigating these crimes in DR Congo is earlier, the UN experts began to work on it in July 2008, just months after the February 6, 2008 the Spanish courts made public an indictment of 40 senior political and military control of Rwanda for genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes, among others, allegedly carried out in Rwanda and Zaire / DR Congo in the period between 1990 and 2002.

Dicho Auto ( http://www.veritasrwandaforum.org/dosier/resol_auto_esp_06022008.pdf ) concretaba tres años de investigación iniciada mediante una querella presentada en 2005 por las familias de 9 españoles asesinados en 1994, 1996, 1997 y 2000 en estos dos países y por sobrevivientes rwandeses y congoleños, por el premio Nobel de la Paz Adolfo Perez Esquivel, la ex congresista norteamericana Cynthia McKinney, los ayuntamientos de Sevilla, Manresa, Figueres, Navata y Tremp, y ONG nacionales e internacionales englobadas bajo el Forum Internacional señalado más abajo. This Auto ( http://www.veritasrwandaforum.org/dosier/resol_auto_esp_06022008.pdf ) identifies three years of research initiated by a complaint filed in 2005 by families of 9 Spanish killed in 1994, 1996, 1997 and 2000 in these two countries and Rwandan and Congolese survivors, for the Nobel Peace Prize Adolfo Perez Esquivel, the former U.S. Congresswoman Cynthia McKinney, the municipalities of Sevilla, Manresa, Figueres, Navata and Tremp, and national and international NGOs included under the International Forum noted more below. Numerosos sobrevivientes de dichas masacres en la RD Congo, que huyeron casi dos mil kilómetros a pie, e imágenes obtenidas sobre el terreno como las de Hubert Sauper han relatado lo que ahora expone públicamente la ONU: ataques sistemáticos de campos de refugiados, bombardeos con armamento pesado y persecuciones sistemáticas en caminos, selvas, pueblos y ciudades –muy especialmente Kisangani, en diversas ocasiones- e incluso repatriaciones forzadas por parte del ACNUR de refugiados que posteriormente serían asesinados o encarcelados, según expuso el propio Auto judicial español. Many survivors of these massacres in the DR Congo, who fled nearly two thousand miles on foot, and images from the field as those of Hubert Sauper have reported what is now publicly exposed the UN's systematic attacks on refugee camps, weapons bombing systematic persecution heavy roads, forests, villages and cities-especially Kisangani, on several occasions, and even forced repatriation by the UNHCR refugee who would later be killed or imprisoned, according exposed himself Writ Spanish.

Ya en 2008 la amenaza de Paul Kagame y Rwanda ante la investigación judicial y la efectividad de la orden de arresto internacional (que los propios ayuntamientos personados pidieron directamente al Secretario General de la ONU) era la misma que ahora ante este informe: si uno de los 40 buscados, el general rwandés Karake Karenzi no era confirmado en su puesto como segundo comandante en la fuerza híbrida de paz de la ONU en Sudán a pesar de la orden de arresto internacional española, Rwanda retiraría todas las fuerzas de paz de Sudán. Already in 2008 the threat of Paul Kagame and Rwanda to the judicial investigation and the effectiveness of the international arrest warrant (which people asked for the councils themselves directly to the Secretary General of the UN) was the same as now to this report: if one of the 40 searches, the Rwandan general Karenzi Karake was not confirmed in his post as deputy commander in the hybrid force of UN peacekeepers in Sudan despite the Spanish international arrest warrant, Rwanda withdraw all forces of peace in Sudan. Karake Karenzi, después de que las Rwandan Defense Forces recibieran el 3 de septiembre de 2008 del Departamento de Estado de EEUU la cantidad de 20 millones de dólares, fue confirmado en su puesto por la ONU. Karenzi Karake, after the Rwandan Defense Forces received the September 3, 2008 the U.S. State Department the amount of $ 20 million, was confirmed in office by the UN. Hace escasos días se ha repetido la amenaza de Rwanda: si el ejército comandado por Paul Kagame es acusado de genocidio, Rwanda retirará sus fuerzas de las operaciones de mantenimiento de la paz. A few days ago has repeated the threat to Rwanda, if the army commanded by Paul Kagame is accused of genocide, Rwanda will withdraw its forces from the maintenance of peace.

Para responder a la pregunta hay a quien le interesa complicar las cosas más de la cuenta para que al final no se haga nada. To answer the question is who cares more complicated than the account so that the end nothing is done. Para los crímenes de 1993 a 2003 hay dos tribunales a nivel internacional que ya están investigando y tienen procesos abiertos: para los crímenes de 1993 al 1 de julio de 2002 el único tribunal del mundo que está ya investigando estos crímenes es el tribunal español, de acuerdo con el principio de justicia universal (baste señalar, a título de ejemplo, que de las 40 órdenes de arresto internacional emitidas por el tribunal español en 2008 una de ellas se ha traducido en solicitud de extradición por crímenes producidos tanto en Rwanda como la RD Congo en el mismo período que el informe respecto al general Kayumba Nyamwasa, ex brazo derecho del Presidente Paul Kagame y actualmente huido en Sudáfrica); For crimes from 1993 to 2003 there are two courts at the international level and are investigating and have open processes: for crimes of 1993 to July 1, 2002 the only court in the world which is already investigating these crimes is the Spanish court of According to the principle of universal justice (suffice it to say, by way of example, that of the 40 international arrest warrants issued by the Spanish court in 2008, one of them has resulted in the extradition request produced crimes in both Rwanda and the DR Congo during the same period that the report regarding the general Kayumba Nyamwasa, former right hand man of President Paul Kagame and currently fled South Africa);

Para los crímenes a partir del 1 de julio de 2002 hasta 2003 la Corte Penal Internacional (CPI) tiene dos procesos abiertos y en curso. For crimes from July 1, 2002 until 2003 the International Criminal Court (ICC) has two open and ongoing processes. Ambos tribunales son competentes aunque gozan de escasísimos recursos para realizar su cometido. Both courts have jurisdiction even though they enjoy very little resources to perform their duties. La Audiencia Nacional recibe el silencio como respuesta cuando pide a la ONU con todas las formalidades las pruebas de estos crímenes contra las personas de los años 1996 y 1997 o las pruebas del pillaje de recursos minerales valiosos de esos mismos años y posteriores. The High Court receives the silence for an answer when asked the UN with all the formalities the evidence of these crimes against the people of the years 1996 and 1997 or evidence of looting of valuable mineral resources of those years and thereafter. Los medios internacionales que han tenido acceso al informe han puesto de manifiesto que la Alta Comisionada de la ONU responsable del texto guarda una base de datos confidencial –separada del Informe- con pruebas que implican de forma individual a cargos militares rwandeses y ugandeses de los crímenes antes relatados. The international media have had access to the report have highlighted the UN High Commissioner responsible for the text maintains a confidential database, separate from the report, with evidence implicating individually to Rwandan and Ugandan military officers for crimes reported before. La Alta Comisionada –casualmente sudafricana- Navanethem Pillay, buena conocedora de las implicaciones y de la dimensión de la tragedia en el África Central al haber sido jueza del Tribunal para Rwanda (TPIR) y de la Corte Penal Internacional, debería poner a disposición de la CPI y de la Audiencia Nacional las pruebas que implican a personas determinadas de dichos crímenes internacionales en aplicación del derecho internacional. The South African High Commissioner-chance-Navanethem Pillay, well aware of the implications and the extent of the tragedy in Central Africa, having been a judge of the Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) and the International Criminal Court, should make available to the ICC and National Hearing tests involving such persons certain international crimes under international law.

Importantes implicaciones internacionales en los crímenes ejecutados en África Important international executed for crimes in Africa
Esto no es sólo una cuestión entre hutus y tutsis rwandeses y congoleños o una cuestión de África Central, siendo que es el conflicto violento que se ha llevado más vidas humanas desde la Segunda Guerra Mundial, según palabras del Fiscal de la CPI, Moreno Ocampo. This is not just a matter between Hutu and Tutsi Rwandans and Congolese or a matter of Central Africa, where it is the violent conflict that has claimed more lives since World War II, in the words of the ICC Prosecutor, Moreno Ocampo. Aparece una historia de violencia, guerra y neoesclavitud por el control geoeconómico, geopolítico y geoestratégico de África Central después de la caída del muro de Berlín, cuyos capítulos van saliendo a la luz poco a poco. Shows a history of violence, war and geo-economic control by the neo-slavery, geopolitical and geostrategic Central Africa after the fall of the Berlin Wall, whose chapters are coming to light gradually. Antaño los europeos y norteamericanos utilizaron a una minoría africana para que se beneficiara y explotara a sus hermanos de sangre. Europeans and Americans once used a minority to benefit African and exploit their siblings. Las dinámicas de explotación y esclavitud de los siglos XV a XIX (de las entonces potencias europeas como España, Francia, Portugal, Gran Bretaña, Bélgica, Holanda y más tarde Estados Unidos) se reproducen con nuevos modelos a finales del siglo XX y principios del XXI, sólo que ahora –sin necesidad de desplazar a los esclavos del territorio- son gobiernos, multinacionales y grupos de poder que utilizan y manipulan a “elites” africanas para que masacren y exploten a sus hermanos africanos a cambio de un pequeño porcentaje de poder y dinero del pillaje sistemático de guerra, que deja unas migas en África pero que sus grandes beneficios se esfuman a Norteamérica, Europa y aliados bajo complejas formas de transacciones de grupos empresariales, como ha señalado en dichos informes de 2001 y 2002 la propia ONU. The dynamics of exploitation and enslavement of the XV to XIX (of the then European powers like Spain, France, Portugal, Britain, Belgium, Holland and later the U.S.) will play with new models in the late twentieth and early XXI, only now, no need to move to the slaves of the territory, are governments, multinationals and power groups who use and manipulate the "elites" to massacre and Africa to exploit their fellow Africans in exchange for a small percentage of power and systematic looting money from the war, leaving a few crumbs in Africa but its major benefits are disappearing in North America, Europe and allies in complex forms of transactions of business groups, as noted in these reports for 2001 and 2002 the UN itself.

La ONU, que debería ser la esperanza y apoyo a los pueblos ya la humanidad, se ha convertido en el juguete de los gobiernos y de las multinacionales y grandes poderes que les guían según sus propios intereses. The UN, which should be the hope and support to people and humanity, has become the plaything of governments and multinational corporations and large powers that guide them in their own interests. En este caso los capítulos ocultos que vamos conociendo gracias a investigadores tenaces e independientes nos permiten conocer cómo agencias gubernamentales norteamericanas, canadienses y británicas, junto con multinacionales y grupos empresariales se unen para conseguir el control de los territorios, los riquísimos recursos naturales de los mismos y los gobiernos locales: sólo como ejemplo, la ex congresista norteamericana McKinney -descendiente de esclavos, como la actual Primera Dama norteamericana y enviada especial en 1996 por el presidente Clinton a África Central- reveló más tarde que descubrió que el avión en el que viajó -fletado por directivos de la multinacional American Mineral Fields- transportaba también traficantes de armas y que había un plan previsto para financiar la guerra para deponer a Mobutu en el entonces Zaire y controlar las zonas mineras con el fin de pillar primero y explotar después las minas, hechos que fueron corroborados posteriormente por los propios informes de la ONU de 2001 y 2002. In this case the hidden chapters we meet, thanks to tenacious and independent researchers allow us to know how U.S. government agencies, Canadian and British, along with multinational companies and business groups join forces to gain control of territories, the very rich natural resources of the same and local governments, just as an example, former U.S. Congresswoman McKinney, a descendant of slaves, as the current First Lady and U.S. Special Envoy in 1996 by President Clinton to Central Africa, revealed later that he discovered that the plane that flew -chartered by executives of multinational American Mineral Fields, also carrying arms dealers and had a plan in place to fund the war to oust Mobutu in the then Zaire and control mining areas in order to catch first and then exploit mines facts which were corroborated later by the UN's own reports of 2001 and 2002.

A ello se puede unir el hecho, también corroborado, que Paul Kagame fue llamado en octubre de 1990 desde Estados Unidos (donde se estaba formando militarmente en la Comandancia del Ejército de Estados Unidos de América –conectado con la tristemente conocida Escuela de las Américas-, concretamente en la base de Fort Leavenworth, Kansas) a Uganda para liderar la rebelión que debía deponer al entonces presidente de Rwanda Habyarimana. To this can be added the fact, also confirmed that Paul Kagame was called in October 1990 from the U.S. (where it was forming militarily in the Army Command United States-connected with the notorious School of the Americas specifically in the Fort Leavenworth, Kansas) to Uganda to lead the rebellion that had deposed the then Rwandan President Habyarimana.

ONU, Kagame, Zapatero y política internacional UN Kagame, Zapatero and international politics
Este informe de la ONU, contundente con Rwanda, se ha filtrado con delicadeza diplomática, casualmente justo tres semanas después –no antes- de haberse celebrado elecciones presidenciales en Rwanda, donde Paul Kagame (acusado de crímenes internacionales por el Tribunal español en relación a dichos crímenes en la RD Congo y que goza del asesoramiento personal gratuito del ex premier británico Tony Blair, entre otros) ha sido reelegido presidente por un 93% de los votos, donde los candidatos de la oposición o han sido encarcelados o asesinados. The UN report, blunt with Rwanda, has leaked diplomatic gently, coincidentally just three weeks later, not before the presidential elections have been held in Rwanda, Paul Kagame (accused of international crimes by the Spanish court in relation to such crimes in the DR Congo and enjoying the free personal advice of former British premier Tony Blair, among others) has been reelected president by 93% of the vote, where opposition candidates or have been imprisoned or killed. Elecciones validadas a pesar de las grandes reservas internacionales de diplomacias y ONG's internacionales. Elections validated despite the large reserves of diplomacy and international NGOs. Sin duda el secretario general de la ONU debía conocer el contenido de dicho informe cuando en julio se desplazó a Madrid para asistir a la cumbre de la ONU convocada por él mismo preparatoria de los Objetivos del Milenio, junto a los dos co-presidentes que él mismo –aparentemente- escogió: el presidente Zapatero, presidente de un país donde sus tribunales investigan justamente esos crímenes, y Paul Kagame – presidente investigado y acusado por un tribunal español de ser el máximo responsable de esos crímenes, incluidos de los 9 españoles asesinados en Rwanda y RD Congo. No doubt the UN secretary general should know the contents of that report in July when he moved to Madrid to attend the UN summit convened by him in preparation for the Millennium Development Goals, with the two co-presidents that he same, apparently chosen: President Zapatero, president of a country where the courts are investigating just such crimes, and Paul Kagame - President investigated and charged by a Spanish court of being most responsible for these crimes, including the 9 killed in Spanish Rwanda and DR Congo.

Afortunadamente el Presidente Zapatero, después de la petición por parte de las nueve familias españolas, de una plataforma de ong's nacional (bastayadeimpunidadenruanda.org) e internacional, de peticiones en embajadas de todo el mundo y de la petición expresa de senadores y de siete grupos políticos del Congreso (entre los que no estaban ni el PSOE ni el PP), decidió en último momento no reunirse con Kagame y desplazar la reunión a un hotel privado. Fortunately, the President Zapatero, following the request from the nine Spanish families, a platform of national NGOs (bastayadeimpunidadenruanda.org) and international requests in embassies around the world and the request of Senators and seven groups Congressional politicians (which were neither the PSOE nor the PP), decided at the last minute not to meet with Kagame and move the meeting to a private hotel. Sin embargo, la reunión oficial que se celebrará en la sede de la ONU en Nueva York el próximo 20 de septiembre contará, si no hay cambio de última hora, con la co-presidencia de Zapatero y Kagame, junto al secretario general de la ONU que está por publicar este informe demoledor. However, the official meeting to be held at the UN headquarters in New York on September 20 will, if no last minute change, co-chaired by Zapatero and Kagame, along with UN Secretary General that is about to publish the damning report.

Para cumplir con los objetivos del milenio de erradicar el hambre y las enfermedades en el mundo y demás loables e imprescindibles objetivos convienen quizás otras medidas más eficaces que esta reunión, con un encuentro indecente e indigno entre bambalinas: como señala Carlos Castresana (Fiscal de las causas de justicia universal de Argentina y Chile), quizás será necesario al final aprobar un gran acuerdo estilo “Plan Marshal” para África, con la contribución determinante de EEUU, China, Gran Bretaña, Francia, Alemania, India, Cánada y Brasil u otros países, que permita a la par que abrir nuevos mercados y nuevos consumidores para estas ávidas potencias y sus multinacionales, beneficiar de forma definitiva a los actuales africanos –y de retoque a todos nosotros- y al menos a las siete generaciones que les seguirán. To meet the Millennium Development Goals of eradicating hunger and disease in the world and other laudable and necessary goals may agree to other measures more effective than this meeting, a meeting backstage indecent and unworthy, as pointed out by Carlos Castresana (Attorney of the cause of universal justice in Argentina and Chile), it may be necessary to pass a great deal final style "Marshal Plan" for Africa, with the decisive contribution of the United States, China, Britain, France, Germany, India, Canada and Brazil or other countries, allowing the couple to open new markets and new customers for these greedy powers and their multinational definitely benefit from the current African-retouching and all of us-and at least seven generations that will follow. Sí, la ley del boomerang es implacable y todo esto nos toca más de cerca de lo que podemos pensar. Yes, the law of the boomerang is relentless and all that touches us more closely than we think.

Jordi Palou-Loverdos es abogado acreditado ante la Corte Penal Internacional y mediador en conflictos internacionales. Jordi Palou-Loverdos a lawyer accredited to the International Criminal Court and mediator in international conflicts. Es representante legal de víctimas españolas, rwandeses y congoleñas y del Forum Internacional por la Verdad y la Justicia en el África de los Grandes Lagos ante los Tribunales españoles. Legal representative of Spanish victims, Rwandan and Congolese and the International Forum for Truth and Justice in the African Great Lakes before the Spanish Courts.

Sunday, September 19, 2010

The U.S./U.N. cover-up of Kagame’s genocide in Rwanda and Congo Conference in New York

President George W. Bush meets with President ...Image via Wikipedia


Posted By Mary 

A long-standing code of silence inside the U.N. is coming to an end regarding what is probably the largest genocide ever since the U.N. founding: The genocide committed by the Rwandan Patriotic Front since 1990

End impunity in Rwanda, a discussion with distinguished human rights champions Peter Erlinder, Juan Carrero Sarlegui and Spanish Sen. Pere Sampol, will be held Monday, Sept. 20, 6:30-9 p.m., at Global Information Network, 146 W. 29th St., Suite 7E, New York City – join them!
by Juan Carrero


 

On Aug. 27, the French daily Le Monde leaked the news that a long report by U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights Navanethem Pillay [3] of South Africa calls the “systematic, methodical and pre-meditated crimes perpetrated against the Hutu” by the RPF (Rwandan Patriotic Front) in Zaire in 1996-1997 “crimes against humanity, war crimes, and even genocide crimes.” The report has not yet been officially released but is already circulating freely.
The victims were “mostly children, women, the elderly and the sick.” The investigation looks at the crimes perpetrated in Zaire/Congo throughout the decade 1993-2003. Rwanda is not the only country incriminated. But, according to Le Monde’s Jean-Philippe Rémy, the RPF’s systematic extermination of Rwandan Hutu refugees and other Congolese Hutu – either by violent force or by systematically blocking food supplies sent especially to them – could be considered “the crux of the report.” At any rate, it is clear this extensive report is “devastating, especially for Rwanda,” as Christophe Châtelot, in turn, points out in the excellent cover article [4].
Nevertheless, both articles end by reaching the same major erroneous conclusion stated by most of the press articles that have appeared since the report was leaked: the need, they say, to establish a tribunal with jurisdictional authority over these crimes. Not only does such a court already exist but, on Feb. 6, 2008, it already issued arrest warrants against 40 RPF top officials who are allegedly responsible for the crimes in Congo referred to in the new U.N. report.
This court is Spain’s Audiencia Nacional (National Court) which, pursuant to the principle of universal justice, possesses full jurisdiction to prosecute this kind of crime. It is by virtue of this principle, for example, that the arrest of Augusto Pinochet was possible in London and that today the Interpol and the SIRENE network are acting on the 40 arrest warrants cited above. Let us also remember that the four Spanish Marist clergymen who were accompanying the Hutu refugees and who had previously condemned internationally this huge slaughter were murdered by the RPF in the Nyamirangwe refugee camp in eastern Congo on Oct. 31, 1996.
In my opinion, there are various other errors in Jean-Philippe Rémy’s article. Rémy is much too quick to endorse some interpretations of the motives behind the crimes that hardly match the facts and are at this point almost untenable today. The most outrageous interpretation states that “the Rwandan intervention sought to prevent the refugees from coming together and, led by the ‘genocidaires,’ rising in revolt to attack Rwanda from their refugee camps at the other side of the border, in the former Zaire. The approach was to empty the entire region. Part of the refugees will return to Rwanda, another will be killed at the camps, others will flee across Zaire where they will be hunted down.”
Could a huge mass of human beings consisting mostly of malnourished women, elderly people and children come together and rise in revolt? Besides, shouldn’t there be a mention of the other goals the RPF pursued with that slaughter – those that many honest analysts actually rank as the main goals? That is,
• controlling the mineral fields in eastern Zaire, exactly where the “annoying” refugee camps were located; putting an end to the presence and diverting the attention of the international community related to those fields, which could derail the plans these criminals and their powerful allies had in Zaire;
• “correcting” as far as possible the demographic imbalance between Hutu and Tutsi which the RPF viewed as excessive, while at the same time averting a big international scandal under the guise of “hunting down the genocidaires”;
• having a submissive and controlled Hutu population, devoid of intellectuals or leaders, repopulate some of the regions in Rwanda that the RPF “operations” had left so deserted that they could potentially become a permanent black mark for the RPF that the international community would readily decry.
Unfortunately, the U.N.’s 14-year silence has had tragic consequences. Thousands of conniving silences have allowed those criminals basking in the bogus moral halo of having allegedly halted the genocide by Hutu extremists in the spring of 1994 to continue causing, with utter impunity, tremendous suffering in Rwanda and Congo!
But the report, whose recent leak has spurred widespread international coverage, could be the beginning of the end for Paul Kagame, who at the time was already head of the RPF and is now also president of Rwanda. True, up to now, it has only been a leak.
But the facts of the report are now in the public domain, above and beyond the sequel of pressures, blackmails and deals about to take place from now on, hushed and behind the scenes of the high political and economic circles of our times, primarily with the purpose of eliminating the word “genocide” from the text. Indeed, at long last more and more analyses are appearing about this situation which some of us had already been analyzing 14 years ago as the incidents themselves were occurring.
Already as early as October 1996 and more pointedly from February 1997 onwards, we condemned the massive massacres of Rwandan and Congolese Hutu being carried out in true genocidal manner, the cremation of tens of thousands of bodies, the extermination through starvation etc. Our documents were signed by some 20 Nobel laureates, as well as by heads of the political groups of the European Parliament.
How could our world leaders not possibly have known of crimes on such scale? How could Spain’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs not have known either?
We ourselves had those documents handed to Bill Clinton and others truly and ultimately responsible for this genocide. In addition to the diplomatic channels, Elie Wiesel, survivor of the Nazi extermination camps and Nobel Peace laureate, promised our colleague Adolfo Pérez Esquivel, a Nobel Peace laureate as well, to personally hand them to Bill Clinton in the meeting he was to have with the president shortly thereafter.
On the other hand, on Feb. 24, 1997, after my 42-day fast at the European Parliament in Brussels, I personally handed these documents to Abel Matutes1 [7], native of Ibiza, who was Spain’s minister of foreign affairs at the time. Inocencio Arias, spokesman for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, was with him at that meeting. I, in turn, was accompanied by Mercé Amer, Socialist regional/autonomic secretary of Mallorca.
Spanish state television TVE vetoed the news of this meeting, where documents of such serious nature and signed by such prominent people were being presented to the minister. The Brussels correspondent of TVE came over to me and told me how badly she personally felt: She had been following our fast and admired what we were doing together with Commissioner Emma Bonino, but she added that the news had unfortunately been vetoed and that, much to her regret, she wouldn’t be able to film.2 [8]
As it was, heightened tension reigned at the meeting due to the assassination of three Spanish volunteers of Médicos del Mundo merely a few days before. We now know that the RPF perpetrated this crime, even though the strong propaganda machine of the international godfathers of this criminal organization had managed within hours to get the world media to attribute this triple murder to extremist Hutu once again.
Indeed, it’s so true that the U.N. report doesn’t make any major revelations that even now, after its leak, I will hardly be making any changes in the second edition of my book, “África, la madre ultrajada” (“Africa, The Violated Mother”). The news is not the fact that the RPF perpetrated a genocide on such a large scale.3 [9]
In this genocide, the count of ethnic Hutu, both Rwandan and Congolese, violently eliminated by the RPF since 1990 should be estimated at hundreds of thousands at least. The scale of this genocide is even much larger if we consider the millions of victims, not only Hutu but also from other Bantu ethnic groups in Congo – or simply “not Hima-Tutsi,” as the racist RPF elite calls them.
They died not only through violent force but primarily due to starvation and other reasons related to the aggressions inflicted on Zaire/Congo by Rwanda, Uganda and Burundi in their genocidal attempt to establish in that region an empire controlled by Hima-Tutsi clans.
The High Commissioner for Human Rights has merely investigated the tip of the iceberg of this genocide, since it has looked at merely 600 violent incidents only in Congo and only from 1993 to 2003. It is a genocide in which already as early as 1997 – that is, one year before the second and deadliest invasion – the report of the U.N. team headed by the Chilean Roberto Garretón [10] documented the investigation of around 40 locations in Congo and put the death count at up to 100,000.
A hint of the scale of this genocide can be found in a report by the International Rescue Committee which estimates 5.4 million victims in Congo until 1997 – in excess of the normal mortality figures – due to causes related to the aggressions staged there.
That’s not the news. The real news is something else: namely, that in a move that breaks the code of silence that has reigned within the U.N. for too many years, the High Commissioner for Human Rights reveals that the U.N. Security Council and U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon and Kofi Annan before him – the same parties who less than a year ago accused some of us of financing the genocidaires – have actually spent more than a decade covering up the continuous genocide carried out by the RPF from Oct. 1, 1990, until today, which probably constitutes the largest one since the U.N. was founded!
Jean-Philippe Rémy’s article cited above is entitled, precisely, “A Long Set of Obstacles to Justice and Truth.” As Glen Ford well said in the analysis he wrote shortly after the leak of the report, “Rwandan Crisis Could Expose U.S. Role in Congo Genocide [11],”4 [12] we are facing “a political crisis that threatens to disrupt Washington’s plans to dominate the continent.
“At stake is not only the reputation of Rwandan President Paul Kagame, an alumnus of the U.S. Army Command and General Staff College in Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, but the larger American strategy for militarization of Africa and exploitation of her riches. …
“Carnage on such a scale could not have occurred were it not for the connivance of the United States, which has nurtured Kagame at every juncture. …
“The leaked U.N. report cannot be put back in the bottle. Kagame, who labels all critics ‘genocidaires’ or apologists for genocide, is exposed as ‘the greatest mass killer on the face of the earth, today,’ as described by Edward S. Herman, co-author of ‘The Politics of Genocide.’ Kagame’s mentors and funders in the U.S. government, who aided and abetted his genocide in Congo, must be held equally accountable – if not more so, since United States corporations derive the greatest benefit from Congo’s blood minerals, and the U.S. military gains the most advantage from Rwandan and Ugandan services as mercenaries at America’s beck and call in Africa.”
The Rwandan government has reacted by making virulent threats, and the High Commissioner has postponed the report’s release until Oct. 1. The following weeks will be marked by a fierce struggle to delete the word “genocide” from the report, since this classification would require the immediate intervention of the international community.

The U.S. government must be held equally accountable if not more so, since United States corporations derive the greatest benefit from Congo’s blood minerals, and the U.S. military gains the most advantage from Rwandan and Ugandan services as mercenaries at America’s beck and call in Africa. – Glen Ford, Black Agenda Report

Nevertheless, something new is happening in this great conflict as a significant movement of pieces appears to be taking place on the board. Another fact also evidences this: The important Gersony report [14]5 [15], up until recently eerily unavailable, suddenly surfaced this past Sept. 7. It is another honest report, done as early as 1994, but in this case by the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees.
The report has remained suppressed since then and high-ranked U.N. officials even denied it had ever existed. It documents the systematic ethnic cleansing of Hutu, genocidal in nature, carried out by the RPF in the Rwandan interior6 [16] during 1994.
The investigative team led by Gersony examined the assassination of some 30,000 Hutu by the RPF, but only looked at crimes perpetrated during a two-month period and in merely three prefectures. However, similar to the recent report by the U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights, “[T]he massacres condemned in the Gersony report represented only the visible tip of a monumental iceberg consisting of hundreds of thousands of victims butchered by RPF troops since October 1, 1990 in the areas occupied by the military.”
Former Rwandan Foreign Minister Jean-Marie Vianney Ndagijimana makes this statement in his excellent book recently published, “Paul Kagame a sacrifié les tutsi”7 [18] (“Paul Kagame has sacrificed the Tutsi”). Upon receiving a photocopy of the Gersony report, I asked him to confirm its authenticity, which he did, although he added that an annex is missing.
Jean-Marie Vianney Ndagijimana, of mixed Hutu-Tutsi descent, had testified in the lawsuit we filed at the Spanish National Court and is now the person responsible in France for the Intra-Rwandan Dialogue we have been sponsoring since 2004. This extraordinary Rwandan witnessed first hand the wheeling and dealing behind the suppression of the compromising report.
The entire horse-trading took place in the U.S. Department of State in early October 1994 between Hutu Rwandan President Pasteur Bizimungu from the RPF – albeit always under the watchful eye of “consultant” Charles Muligande – and Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs George Moose. Pasteur Bizimungu had actually gone to argue that “a ‘post- genocide’ was going on, while at the same time, the RPF military was getting away with massacring entire groups of people without the international community expressing any disapproval.”
Seeing George Moose’s excessively understanding reaction to the Rwandan president’s case, Jean-Marie Vianney Ndagijimana inferred what was going to happen with the Gersony report, as it indeed turned out: That meeting “sealed the fate of the Gersony report once and for all.”
Vianney Ndagijimana resigned from his post as minister a few weeks later “in order not to be an accomplice of the ethnic cleansing practises” and went into exile “to bear witness of this silent genocide, as disgraceful and reprehensible as the Tutsi genocide, and to publicly condemn it worldwide.”
Others didn’t act with such ethics and integrity: Kofi Annan, U.N. Under-Secretary-General for Peacekeeping at the time; Shahryar Khan, U.N. Secretary-General’s Special Representative to Rwanda; Timothy Wirth, Undersecretary for Global Affairs, including matters of human rights; Brian Atwood, director for Africa of USAID, which had financed the investigation aimed at determining whether the interior of Rwanda was equipped for the return of Hutu refugees.
Prior to the meeting of the Rwandan president with the assistant secretary of state, all individuals cited above had met several times with Jean-Marie Vianney Ndagijimana, on one occasion with Robert Gersony present. The former minister described that some of them had spoken very harshly to the Rwandan president. But the fact is that the Gersony report was suppressed and none of the people mentioned above ever condemned the terrible ethnic cleansing that had taken place nor the cover-up of such an important piece of evidence.
Kofi Annan showed the report to Jean-Marie Vianney Ndagijimana and even let him read it but refused to give him a copy. Thus, already back then the future U.N. Secretary-General knew very well that the theory of a double genocide was not wrong. And it is certainly far from being a form of negationism and hence a crime, as Ramón Lobo has dared state in the Spanish daily El País.
Good heavens! – daring to label as criminals Judge Fernando Andreu, who accuses Kagame and 40 top officials from the RPF of committing crimes of genocide, and now High Commissioner Navi Pillay, who signs the recent U.N. report!
Yet this journalist is not alone. Many are the know-it-all analysts, who have no qualms writing about any matter of the moment, even about conflicts as serious and complex as this one – or who, rather, have only listened to the powerful rhetoric of the Manichean official doctrine that resolutely maintains that the story of the genocide is one of genocidaires on the one side and noble liberators on the other.
On the contrary, Kofi Annan and current Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon know that the accusations made by Judge Fernando Andreu Merelles are well-founded: “crimes of genocide, crimes against humanity, crimes against individuals and property protected in the event of armed conflict, membership in a terrorist organization, terrorist acts, pillage of natural resources and the assassination of nine Spanish nationals.”
As we suspected and made public at the time, Ban Ki-moon’s efforts to bill genocidaire Paul Kagame as the superhero of the struggle against hunger and other evils plaguing our world have possibly infuriated and mobilized the group of people with integrity still to be found at that big organization which is the U.N. Let’s just hope that Navi Pillay doesn’t end up sacked for the same reasons for which others were ousted in former times: U.N. Secretary-General Boutros Boutros Ghali, ICTR (International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda) prosecutor Carla del Ponte, among many others.
Jean-Marie Vianney Ndagijimana spent years wondering why the secretary-general had decided to embargo the Gersony report. In a meeting at the headquarters of the Tribunal of The Hague in November 2002, Carla del Ponte confirmed to him what he had been suspecting all along. The former minister writes in his book:
“[W]ithout avoiding [the subject], she acknowledged that this report was under the jurisdiction of the ICTR and that it should have ordinarily been included in the dossier of crimes perpetrated in Rwanda in 1994 by one of the warring parties. Unfortunately, she added, all efforts to obtain the Gersony report as well as various other U.N. reports providing evidence of the crimes committed by the RPF had proved to no avail up until then. She continued: ‘I sent an official request to the U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights, Ms Ogata,8 [20] asking her for that report, but I ran into a wall. …
“Carla del Ponte admitted that, in despair, she also requested that Robert Gersony be heard by the ICTR prosecutor – again to no avail. Once again the U.S. government expressed its opposition, ruling it inadmissible! As we can see, Paul Kagame enjoys the protection of one or more of the superpowers which have a veto right [in the U.N. Security Council] and are able to dictate its agenda at the heart of the U.N. organizations. You don’t need to be a wizard to know that the Clinton administration, surely embarrassed and ridden with guilt for having opposed the deployment of U.N. troops to stop the genocide, has preferred focusing on the bottom line of the massacres of hundreds of thousands of innocent Hutu civilians.”9 [21]
Let’s hope that the time has come; let us hope that those who pull the strings realize that sustaining this sham, this disgraceful impunity, is untenable at this point. We firmly believe that those of us outside the U.N. should help enable those upright individuals within the organization to keep it from serving the interests of the Trilateral Commission10 [23] and of other powerful and elitist groups instead of serving the interests of peoples. In this respect, we share the views expressed by Adolfo Pérez Esquivel and Mallorquinian Sen. Pere Sampol, who was vice-president of the government of the Balearic Islands and knows well the mazes of political intrigue.
At any rate, what I stated in the preface of my book might begin to prove true: “When this monumental tragedy gets the coverage it deserves in the big media, it will become one of the most embarrassing chapters in the annals of the United Nations, of the entire Western world, in general, and in particular, of José Luís Rodríguez Zapatero’s Socialist government.”
Spain’s prime minister, however, may still be able to change fate. He just needs to continue on the path he started by not meeting with Paul Kagame in Madrid; he just needs to refuse to co-chair together with this criminal the Advocacy Group of the Millenium Development Goals. He just needs to cooperate with Spain’s Audiencia Nacional on the legal proceedings against the 40 top officials of the RPF. He just needs to meet – at long last – with the families of the nine Spanish victims.
Juan Carrera of the International Forum for the Truth and Justice in the Great Lakes Region, a Nobel Prize nominee, has campaigned for years against impunity there. In 1996, he walked over 600 miles to Brussels and a year later went on a 42-day hunger strike in front of the European Union Council headquarters to persuade the EU to stop the atrocities in the DR Congo. With Spanish Sen. Sampol he successfully pushed for a lawsuit in Spain against members of the Rwandan government on behalf of Spanish victims who died in Rwanda after the genocide. The lawsuit resulted in the indictments of 40 of Rwanda’s current top and former military officials for genocide crimes and other human rights abuses. He can be reached by emailing info@stopimpunityinrwanda.org [24].

End impunity in Rwanda

Please join us for this late-breaking opportunity to greet three outstanding human rights activists:
• Peter Erlinder,
• Juan Carrero Sarlegui and
• Spanish Sen. Pere Sampol
and for an informal question and answer session on the most recent initiatives toward ending impunity in the Great Lakes Region of Africa.
The panel discussion will be held Monday, Sept. 20, 6:30 – 9 p.m., at the Global Information Network, 146 W. 29th St., Suite 7E, New York City. To RSVP, call (212) 244-3123 begin_of_the_skype_highlighting              (212) 244-3123      end_of_the_skype_highlighting.
Former National Lawyers Guild president Peter Erlinder, International Forum for the Truth and Justice in the Great Lakes Region promoter Juan Carrero Sarlegui and Spanish Sen. Pere Sampol will be looking to meet with U.S. counterparts to discuss the latest developments in the Rwanda-Congo region.
“With the strong conviction that the truth is history’s most powerful force and that its might is independent from the smallness of the messenger, we firmly resolve to investigate and analyze what really happened in Rwanda and in the Democratic Republic of Congo in the last 14 years.” – VeritasRwandaForum
Messrs. Carrero and Sampol successfully pushed for a lawsuit in Spain against members of the Rwandan government on behalf of Spanish victims who died in Rwanda after the genocide. The lawsuit resulted in the indictments of 40 of Rwanda’s current top and former military officials, including James Kabarebe and Kayumba Nyamwasa, for genocide crimes and other human rights abuses.
These activists will provide information on their campaign and will discuss the recently leaked draft U.N. report indicating that Rwanda may have committed genocide and crimes against humanity in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC).
Since May 2010 and the arrest of Minnesota-based law professor Peter Erlinder in Rwanda, there has been a surge of international attention to Rwanda’s “genocide ideology” and the limits placed on freedom of speech.
Juan Carrera of the International Forum for the Truth and Justice in the Great Lakes Region – called the soul of the campaign – has been working for years against impunity in the Great Lakes Region, trying to bring Rwandans together to rebuild the country. He was proposed as a candidate for the 2000 Nobel Peace Prize. He has written books, articles, and he went on a hunger strike in Brussels to attract the attention of the European Union and force them to get involved in the DR Congo to stop the atrocities.
Spanish Sen. Pere Sampol i Mas of PSM-Entesa Nacionalita fully supports this campaign and has been very active in demanding official answers from the Spanish government on this issue. He has traveled with Juan to the Democratic Republic of the Congo to see the situation and the people’s condition first hand. To learn more, visit http://www.bastadeimpunidadenruanda.org/ [25].
Please join us in welcoming these distinguished guests.
  1. He is currently one of the 12 Spanish members of the Trilateral Commission. [ [26]]
  2. The media, however, were allowed the photo-op de rigueur of that meeting. See Chapter 2 of www.pangea.org/olivar [27]. [ [28]]
  3. In the article mentioned above, Jean-Philippe Rémy comments on the statements made by one of the initiators of the report: “[T]here have been too many cases of massacres which have been concealed to the eyes of outside witnesses … These ‘concealed elements’ as well as those ‘things never said should have been brought to light a long time ago,’ the same source said. ‘It was well-known that this was a huge thing,’ the person added.” [ [29]]
  4. Black Agenda Report, translated for Rebelión by Mariola and Jesús María García Pedrajas. [ [30]]
  5. It can be found in “C:\Unearthed ‘Gersony Report’ the U.N. said it never existed [31]” at The Proxy Lake. – mht [ [32]]
  6. The RPF first carried out the ethnic cleansing in the areas they were seizing in the spring of 1994, the same spring when the Hutu extremists were carrying out their own genocide of the Tutsi in the areas under their control. Primarily, however, it was the cleansing carried out by the RPF after its full-fledged victory on July 18. [ [33]]
  7. Editorial La Pagaie, pages 134-141. [ [34]]
  8. As I pointed out in my book, Sadako Ogata is also a member of the Trilateral Commission. [ [35]]
  9. Pages 140-141. [ [36]]
  10. Almost everyone who has played a key political role in the Rwandan conflict has been or still is a member of the Trilateral Commission and/or has attended or attends the meetings of the Bilderberg Group: Bill Clinton, Tony Blair, Margaret Thatcher, Kofi Annan, Madeleine Albright, Bill Richardson, Sadako Ogata, Susan Rice, Raymond Chrétien, Jean Chrétien, Hillary Clinton or Bernard Kouchner. This list does not take into account the higher number of members of the Foreign Relations Council or of the Royal Institute of International Affairs. [ [37]
Wed February 6, 2008

Spanish judge indicts 40 Rwandan military officers for genocide


From CNN Madrid Bureau Chief Al Goodman
MADRID, Spain (CNN) -- A Spanish judge Wednesday indicted 40 current or former Rwandan military officers for several counts of genocide and human rights abuses during the 1990s when several million Rwandans died or disappeared.
General James Kabarebe, left, is one of the 40 indicted for several counts of genocide and human rights abuses.
The judge issued international arrest warrants against the 40, including Gen. James Kabarebe, whom the judge said is believed to be the chief of staff of Rwanda's military; Gen. Kayumba Nyamwasa, whom the judge said is believed to be Rwanda's ambassador to India; and Lt. Col. Rugumya Gacinya, whom the judge said is believed to be a military attaches at Rwanda's embassy in Washington, according to court documents viewed by CNN
Rwanda does not have an extradition treaty with Spain, a court spokeswoman told CNN.
The indictments against the 40 are for "crimes of genocide, human rights abuses and terrorism," during the 1990s in Rwanda, "when more than four million Rwandans were killed or disappeared under an extermination plan for ethnic and/or political reasons," the court documents said.
The judge, Fernando Andreu, named eight Spaniards who died or disappeared during those tumultuous years in Rwanda. Their plight prompted his investigation at Spain's National Court in Madrid, which previously has investigated human rights violations against Spaniards during past military regimes in Chile, Argentina and elsewhere.
Five of the Spanish victims were missionaries. The bodies of four of them were found in late 1996 after they were tortured, and shot or hacked to death with machetes, the documents said, while a fifth is still missing.
Three other Spaniards were shot to death in early 1997 while working for a non-profit medical group providing aid to Hutu refugees in Rwanda, the documents said.
The majority of the victims during the wave of terror, the documents said, were Hutu Rwandan refugees or Congolese civilians, mainly Hutus as well.
The judge did not indict Rwanda's president, Paul Kagame, because he has immunity as head of state, the documents said. But the judge also found evidence of criminal activity by Kagame, based on the testimony of an informant who told the judge he previously worked on Kagame's security detail, the documents said.
In preparing the indictments, the judge heard testimony from 22 people who said they witnessed the horrors in Rwanda in the 1990s. All of them live in exile, mainly in Europe, and all have changed their identity for security reasons, except Maria Beatrice Umutesi, who lives in Belgium and has written a book about the killings, the documents said.
The documents included a 182-page indictment and two accompanying summary documents.
French Experts Wind Up Plane Crash Probe in Kigali

in
KIGALI, Sept 17, 2010 (AFP) - French experts probing the 1994 downing of a plane carrying Rwanda's then president Juvenal Hbyarimana on Friday wound up their task of hearing witness testimonies and visiting key Kigali sites.

The five-member team including two anti-terrorism judges -- Marc Trevidic and Nathalie Poux -- surveyors, ballistics, explosives and fire experts sought to determine the origin of missiles that downed the plane.

Pre-genocide Hutu extremists and Tutsi rebels are both suspected of being behind the April 6, 1994 shooting of the Falcon 50 craft.

The French team, which arrived in Kigali on Saturday, suspects a commando unit of Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF) rebels of infiltrating the Rwandan Hutu army and firing two missiles from Masaka hill east of the runway where the plane was coming in to land.

However, the RPF government now in power in Kigali blames the attack on Hutu extremists within the FAR seeking to eliminate Habyarimana in order to launch a coup.

According to a Rwandan report, backed up by a ballistic survey conducted by British experts, the missiles were fired from the Kanombe military camp, a big army base adjoining the airport and the presidential residence.

Rwandan Justice Minister Tharcisse Karugarama handed text documents, pictures and audio recordings to the expert team on Friday and said they had been given a free hand during the probe.

"Rwanda has nothing to hide and ready to help whoever wants to reveal the truth. What we do not like are people who reach decisions without carrying out investigations and questioning those concerned," Karugarama told reporters.

Karugarama explained that the experts requested free access to all the documents, sites and to question people.

"They requested that we guarantee that they work in peace and without interference... that was done," he said.

Leon-Lef Forster, a defence lawyer for three Rwandan officials targeted in the probe, told AFP the team "could not reach any conclusions at this stage because they gathered a lot of information throughout the week which they will have to analyse."

The killing of Habyarimana, who was travelling with his Burundian counterpart Cyprien Ntaryamira, is believed to have triggered the 1994 genocide which claimed the lives of some 800,000 Tutsis and moderate Hutus.

The two were returning from a summit in neighbouring Tanzania to revamp a 1993 peace deal aimed at setting up a transitional government and integrate the RPF rebels.

The French team is expected to present its report to the two judges before March 2011.


[Description of Source: Paris AFP (World Service) in English -- world news service of the independent French news agency Agence France Presse]

Spain wants Rwanda general extradited for genocide

Fri Sep 17, 2010 3:16pm GMT
MADRID (Reuters) - Spain requested on Friday that South Africa extradite an exiled Rwandan general who it wants on charges including genocide and killing four Spaniards in Rwanda in the 1990s, the Justice Ministry said.

The Spanish High Court has charged Lieutenant-General Faustin Kayumba Nyamwasa with genocide and with the murder of a Spanish missionary in 1994 and three Spanish aid workers in 1997.
"He took part in systematic and planned attacks on the civilian population, in forced disappearances and crimes against international law, also, organising and executing terrorist attacks," a ministry statement said.
Nyamwasa fled to South Africa this year after falling out with Rwandan President Paul Kagame and later accused him of using an anti-corruption campaign to frame opponents.
The general fought alongside Kagame to end the 1994 genocide in the central African nation. During and after that war he held a number of key positions, including army chief of staff and head of the country's intelligence services.
Nyamwasa was shot in the stomach in June in what his wife called a Rwandan-backed assassination attempt. South African police arrested four people for the attack.

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Saturday, September 18, 2010

El presidente no tiene previsto anunciar nuevas aportaciones a las agencias de la ONU para alcanzar estas metas

 par Europa Press
  MADRID, 17 Sep. (EUROPA PRESS) -
  El presidente del Gobierno, José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero, no tiene previsto encontrarse con el presidente ruandés, Paul Kagame, durante su participación, la próxima semana, en la Reunión de Alto Nivel sobre los Objetivos de Desarrollo del Milenio (ODM), según ha señalado la vicepresidenta, María Teresa Fernández de la Vega.
   Kagame copreside, junto a Zapatero, el grupo de impulsores de los ODM creado por la ONU, pero el jefe del Gobierno español ha evitado hasta ahora reunirse con él ante la presión de la opinión pública y de varios partidos de oposición, ya que en 2008 el juez de la Audiencia Nacional Fernando Andreu vio "indicios" de la implicación de Kagame en la matanza de más de cuatro millones de ruandeses en la década de los 90, incluidos nueve misioneros y cooperantes españoles.
   De hecho, el pasado mes de julio se reunió en Madrid por primera vez el grupo impulso de los ODM. Inicialmente la reunión iba a tener lugar en el Palacio de la Moncloa con la participación de Zapatero, pero finalmente se trasladó al hotel Ritz y el Gobierno español estuvo representado por el ministro de Asuntos Exteriores, Miguel Ángel Moratinos.
   Zapatero recibió en Moncloa a todos los miembros del grupo que se desplazaron a Madrid en julio, salvo a Kagame. El secretario general de la ONU entendió que el presidente se mostrase sensible ante las preocupaciones de la opinión pública.
   A pesar de los indicios contra él, el juez Andreu no pudo procesarle porque como jefe de Estado tiene inmunidad de jurisdicción y de ejecución. Sí dictó en cambio órdenes de detención internacionales para 40 militares del Gobierno ruandés por delitos de genocidio, crímenes de lesa humanidad y terrorismo.
ENCUENTROS BILATERALES
  El presidente del Gobierno sí tiene previsto otros encuentros bilaterales aprovechando su estancia en Nueva York. Así, además de reunirse con el rey Mohamed VI, también se entrevistará con el presidente israelí, Simon Peres, con quien abordará las perspectivas de paz en la región ante las nuevas conversaciones directas iniciadas por palestinos e israelíes.
   Asimismo, se encontrará con el presidente de Filipinas, Benigno Aquino, en el que será el primer encuentro de ambos puesto que el mandatario asiático sucedió en el poder el pasado verano a Gloria Macapagal Arroyo, y no se descarta que pueda mantener otros contactos bilaterales aprovechando la presencia de numerosos dirigentes en Nueva York.
   El presidente será uno de los jefes de Estado y de Gobierno que asistirán a la Reunión de Alto Nivel sobre los ODM convocada por el secretario general de la ONU, Ban Ki Moon, con el fin de hacer balance sobre los avances en el cumplimiento de estas metas de cara a su fecha tope de 2015.
   En este sentido, Zapatero intervendrá ante el plenario y participará en una de las mesas redondas, bien en la dedicada a educación y salud, o bien a la centrada en pobreza, hambre e igualdad de género, cuestiones en las que, señalan fuentes gubernamentales, España tiene una amplia experiencia.
   La presencia del jefe del Ejecutivo en esta cita, subraya Moncloa, busca poner de relieve el compromiso del Gobierno en contribuir a los esfuerzos internacionales para alcanzar los ODM. Prueba de ello, añaden, es que la Ayuda Oficial al Desarrollo (AOD) ha aumentado un 139% desde que Zapatero llegó al poder, pasando de 1.985 millones de euros en 2004 a 4.728 en 2009. De esta ayuda, se estima que alrededor del 70% estaría financiando el cumplimiento de los ODM.
   Nuestro país, precisan las fuentes, se ha convertido en uno de los principales donantes de las agencias de la ONU, como lo demuestra el hecho de los más de 1.000 millones de dólares que se han aportado al Fondo para el Logro de los ODM que creó el Gobierno en 2006 y que gestiona el Fondo de la ONU para el Desarrollo (PNUD).
   Al contrario que en ocasiones anteriores, en las que Zapatero ha aprovechado su presencia en la ONU para anunciar nuevas aportaciones, en esta ocasión no está previsto que haga "ningún anuncio específico de aportaciones financieras adicionales", según las citadas fuentes, si bien se pronunciará sobre el debate abierto en torno a nuevos instrumentos de financiación de la AOD.
   España es uno de los países que ha estado discutiendo la posibilidad de crear una tasa que grave las transacciones financieras a nivel mundial y respalda esta iniciativa.