RWANDA:Is Rwanda preparing for Gen. Kayumba’s war?

From INYENYERI NEWS

KAYUMBA AND KAGAME

With continued reports of Gen. Kayumba Nyamwasa raising forces to wage war with support from certain countries, Rwanda has taken serious measures in preparation.
Great Lakes Voice’s highly placed security sources that are familiar with Rwanda Defence Forces [RDF] nature and modalities say that Rwanda intelligence believes Gen. Kayumba who is exiled in South Africa is busy recruiting in Uganda targeting all categories of people and has forces in Walikale area of Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC)
“Rwanda Defence forces (RDF) at the beginning of this year mobilized new recruits and is now organizing former RDF soldiers who were demobilized to form a new structure under the reserve force,” the source says.

According to this source, every demobilized combatant is not allowed to pass through the airport or cross the boarders with only passports unless he/she gets a traveling permit from the army head quarters.

“Formally, the decision to ban the demobilized soldier’s movement was applied to the officers who were crossing to Uganda but now the principle has applied to all countries of the region and to all ranks,” the sources say.
Apparently the decision was taken to avoid Kayumba’s recruitment of some former Rwandan Patriotic Army [RPA] officers who feel marginalized. And the second reason was to bring them back to the military structure and get prepared for the possible war.

Rwanda Defence and military spokesman, Lt Col. Jill Rutaremara has not responded to our questions for a week after promising us to respond in details.

However, an official in the Rwanda’s Ministry of Defence speaking on condition of anonymity since he is not authorized to speak on army issues defended the travel ban for ex-combatants to Uganda as a “protection measures” given the officers who are mistreated by Uganda security suspected of being Rwanda spies.

“When these demobilized guys go to Uganda, they are arrested without informing Rwanda government and rot in custody and tortured, we wanted their travel to be protected,” the official said without explaining why those measures applied to other neighboring states.

The story envisages a scenario that the conflict between the two countries would be fought through proxies in Congo with Ugandan elements supporting Gen. Kayumba’s rebels.

Ugandan forces would enter Congo stating aim to curb Lord’s Resistance Army forces (LRA) of Joseph Kony who is wanted by International Criminal court [ICC] for charges of war crimes and crimes against humanity.
Observers have appointed out Uganda’s acquiring of hi-tech Sukhoi fighter jets as a major factor in regional security thinking.

Local Defence units dissolved

Meanwhile the reserve forces which every retired RDF is a member by default according to this Ministry of Defence official are to be equipped, armed to replace the Local Defence units, a local government militia.
“These Ex-RDF (read reserve forces) will be paid, put in a military structure in every district and sector and be used any time there is a threat,” the official added.

Did Col. Karegyeya expose Col. Muzoora?

Unconfirmed reports allege that former Uganda People’s Defence Forces (UPDF) officer and fugitive Colonel Edison Muzoora was in Kigali for a meeting before travelling to Johannesburg a few weeks before he was killed and his body dumped at his home in Bushenyi, western Uganda.

With some Rwandan intelligence believing that some officers in Ugandan security are supporting Kayumba and Patrick Karegyeya, Col. Muzoora’s group together with Col. Mande and Kyakabale was supposed to act as a counter measure.

One source suggests that, Col. Muzoora’s plot was exposed by Col. Patrick Karegyeya’s network that tracked his movements and passage through South Africa to Uganda to carry on the secret mission and thus informed Ugandan security.

MNL

RWANDA:Umuvugizi back in Rwanda against all odds

  By Herman from the AFRICAN DICTAOR

Umuvugizi editor Bosco Gasasira

Fantastic news for Rwandans! Umuvugizi online can now be read in Rwanda  in Kinyarwanda and in English.
The paper went live in Rwanda on 22 June 2011. It has been a bruising fight for the paper to get to this stage. Here is the sequence of Umuvugizi struggle and remarkable achievements:

• Rwandan dictator Kagame suspends Umuvugizi on 13 March 2010 along with Umuseso.
• Umuvugizi editor Bosco Gasasira goes into exile in Uganda and starts the online version in April 2010.
• The Rwandan dictator shuts down the online version of Umuvugizi in May 2010.
• Umuvugizi deputy editor Jean Leonard Rugambage is shot outside his Kigali home on 14 June 2010.
• Editor Gasasira moves far away from Rwanda for safety, leaving Uganda for Sweden in July 2010.
• Gasasira revives Umugugizi online but is consistently harassed by hacking, and intimidation of his journalists.
• Editor Gasasira is sentenced in absentia by Rwandan supreme court to two and half year prison term on 3 May 2011.
• The re-entry of Umuvugizi online into Rwanda on 22 June 2011, one year after the death of its deputy editor Rugambage is testimony to the courage and determination of its editors, staff and supporters.

AfricanDictator will support Umuvugizi like we do with all newspapers in imprisoned nations like Rwanda. Keep up the fight Umuvugizi.

Rwanda opposition challenges Kagame in Chicago

From AFP in Chicago
  click here to watch the video of PROTESTORS IN CHICAGO

AFP/File – Rwandan opposition leaders called President Paul Kagame, pictured in March 2011, a corrupt dictator and …

by Mira Oberman Mira Oberman – 1 hr 16 mins ago

CHICAGO (AFP) – Rwandan opposition leaders called President Paul Kagame a corrupt dictator and war criminal Saturday at a protest outside the Chicago hotel where Kagame was set to address the Rwandan diaspora.
"Kagame is the worst dictator you can even think about because the entire political space has been closed," said Theogene Rudasingwa, Kagame's former cabinet chief and a leader of the opposition in exile.
"If you tried to write this story in Rwanda you'd be dead," he told AFP.
"Opposition leaders have been killed. Journalists have been killed."
The human rights violations resulting from Kagame's stranglehold on Rwanda and proxy war in the Democratic Republic of Congo have been well documented, Rudasingwa said.
"We are here to say can the world help us to bring accountability for these crimes and also for these crimes to stop because they are still going on," he said.
"On a positive note, the message of hope we are telling Rwandans and the international community is we Hutus and Tustis and Twa want truth, reconciliation, and healing."
Rudasingwa said he has been inspired by the democratic movements sweeping the Middle East and is hopeful that Rwanda can find a peaceful path to democracy, even though he does not believe Kagame will "easily relinquish power."
"We want freedom and of course the basics of democracy, that is something we aspire for," he said. "It's possible. We only need to work towards it."
Paul Rusesabagina, the man who inspired the film Hotel Rwanda by saving 1,268 people during the 1994 genocide, helped organize the protest.
"What happened in Rwanda in 1994 is not yet over," he said in an interview.
"It has been going on in the Congo led by these men who have been looting blood minerals and killing Congolese."
Rusesabagina cited human rights reports which show that approximately 4,500 people are killed every month in the Congo, where rape is used as a weapon of war.
Kagame's war crimes and dictatorship must end, he said, so that Rwanda can achieve reconciliation through open political dialogue and true democracy.
"What happened in Arab countries in North Africa might also be the next step in sub-Saharan Africa and if it is, it will start in Rwanda," Rusesabagina said.
"Dialogue -- not guns -- will solve our conflicts. Guns have failed. Let us silence guns and give hope."
Nathan Ndajeh was among the dozens of protesters who chanted "Kagame! War criminal!" outside the Rwanda Day conference.
"If you say something against the government you are signing your death," he said as he clutched a photograph of two jailed female journalists.
Ndajeh was out of the country when the genocide ravaged Rwanda and has been too afraid to go back.
"I know they have been killed, but I don't know how they've been killed," he said of his father and other relatives.
"It will trouble me for the rest of my life, and this is the guy who did it," he said of Kagame.
But Kagame got and extremely warm welcome inside the hotel, where thousands of Rwandan emigrants cheered his arrival and applauded his work in transforming their homeland.

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Samantha Power, Libya, and Selective Memory of Genocide

By Edward Herman from ACCURACY
It might seem a bit surprising to see Samantha Power on the National Security Council and working with Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, who Power famously called a “monster” during the 2008 presidential campaign. But this was a heat-of-battle bit of name-calling, not a designation based on any difference in outlook. Both women are hardliners, along with their colleague Susan Rice, and the three together have constituted a regrettable women’s caucus in favor of a military solution to the conflict in Libya.
In her 2002 book A Problem From Hell: America and the Age of Genocide, Power called for greater U.S. intervention to prevent major human rights violations and genocide. She never suggests that this might require LESS intervention (e.g., Vietnam; the “sanctions of mass destruction” in Iraq) or reduced support for killers (e.g., Guatemala, El Salvador, Chile, Israel). She also finds that we inappropriately “just stood by” and failed to intervene in cases where we actually gave positive support to the mass murderers (e.g., Indonesia in East Timor; Kagame and Musaveni in Rwanda and the Congo)
But while ignoring U.S. and client state bloodbaths Power did focus with great passion on genocides or alleged genocides carried out by U.S. targets. This huge bias carried her to the Carr Center for Human Rights and a professorship at Harvard, a Pulitzer Prize, generous media access, and now to a high level position in the administration of the Nobel Peace Prize president. It all fits!
For more information see the following piece, an excerpt of an article which originally appeared  ZNET
The cruise missile left also adheres closely to the party line on genocide, which is why its members thrive in the New York Times and other establishment vehicles. This is true of Paul Berman, Michael Ignatieff and David Rieff, but I will focus here on Power, who is currently the expert of choice on the subject in the mainstream media (and even in The Nation and on the Bill Moyers show).
Power never departs from the selectivity dictated by the establishment party line. That requires, first and foremost, simply ignoring cases of direct U.S. or U.S.-sponsored (or otherwise approved) genocide. Thus the Vietnam War, in which millions were directly killed by U.S. forces, does not show up in Power’s index or text. Guatemala, where there was a mass killing of as many as 100,000 Mayan Indians between 1978 and 1985, in what Amnesty International called “A Government Program of Political Murder,” but by a government installed and supported by the United States, also does not show up in Power’s index. Cambodia is of course included, but only for the second phase of the genocide—the first phase, from 1969-1975, in which the United States dropped some 500,000 tons of bombs on the Cambodian countryside and killed vast numbers, she fails to mention. On the Khmer Rouge genocide, Power says they killed 2 million, a figure widely cited after Jean Lacouture gave that number; his subsequent admission that this number was invented had no effect on its use, and it suits Power’s purpose.
A major U.S.-encouraged and supported genocide occurred in Indonesia in 1965-66 in which over 700,000 people were murdered. This genocide is not mentioned by Power and the names Indonesia and Suharto do not appear in her index. She also fails to mention West Papua, where Indonesia’s 40 years of murderous occupation would constitute genocide under her criteria, if carried out under different auspices. Power does refer to East Timor, with extreme brevity, saying that, “In 1975, when its ally, the oil-producing, anti-Communist Indonesia, invaded East Timor, killing between 100,000 and 200,000 civilians, the United States looked away” (146-7). That exhausts her treatment of the subject, although the killings in East Timor involved a larger fraction of the population than in Cambodia, and the numbers killed were probably larger than the grand total for Bosnia and Kosovo, to which she devotes a large fraction of her book. She also misrepresents the U.S. role—it did not “look away,” it gave its approval, protected the aggression from any effective UN response (in his autobiography, then U.S. Ambassador to the UN Daniel Patrick Moynihan bragged about his effectiveness in protecting Indonesia from any UN action), and greatly increased its arms aid to Indonesia, thereby facilitating the genocide.
Power engages in a similar suppression and failure to recognize the U.S. role in her treatment of genocide in Iraq. She attends carefully and at length to Saddam Hussein’s use of chemical warfare and killing of Kurds at Halabja and elsewhere, and she does discuss the U.S. failure to oppose and take any action against Saddam Hussein at this juncture. But she does not mention the diplomatic rapprochement with Saddam in the midst of his war with Iran in 1983, the active U.S. logistical support of Saddam during that war, and the U.S. approval of sales and transfers of chemical and biological weapons during the period in which he was using chemical weapons against the Kurds. She also doesn’t mention the active efforts by the United States and Britain to block UN actions that might have obstructed Saddam’s killings.
The killing of over a million Iraqis via the “sanctions of mass destruction,” more than were killed by all the weapons of mass destruction in history, according to John and Karl Mueller (“Sanctions of Mass Destruction,” Foreign Affairs, May/June 1999), was one of major genocides of the post-World War 2 era. It is unmentioned by Power. Again, the correlation between exclusion, U.S. responsibility, and the view that such killings were, in Madeleine Albright’s words, “worth it” from the standpoint of U.S. interests, is clear. There is a similar political basis for Power’s failure to include Israel’s low-intensity genocide of the Palestinians and South Africa’s “destructive engagement” with the frontline states in the 1980s, the latter with a death toll greatly exceeding all the deaths in the Balkan wars of the 1990s. Neither Israel nor South Africa, both “constructively engaged” by the United States, show up in Power’s index.
Power’s conclusion is that the U.S. policy toward genocide has been very imperfect and needs reorientation, less opportunism, and greater vigor. For Power, the United States is the solution, not the problem. These conclusions and policy recommendations rest heavily on her spectacular bias in case selection: She simply bypasses those that are ideologically inconvenient, where the United States has arguably committed genocide (Vietnam, Cambodia 1969-75, Iraq 1991-2003), or has given genocidal processes positive support (Indonesia, West Papua, East Timor, Guatemala, Israel, and South Africa). Incorporating them into an analysis would lead to sharply different conclusions and policy agendas, such as calling upon the United States to simply stop doing it, or urging stronger global opposition to U.S. aggression and support of genocide, and proposing a much needed revolutionary change within the United States to remove the roots of its imperialistic and genocidal thrust. But the actual huge bias, nicely leavened by admissions of imperfections and need for improvement in U.S. policy, readily explains why Power is loved by the New York Times and won a Pulitzer prize for her masterpiece of evasion and apologetics for “our” genocides and call for a more aggressive pursuit of “theirs.”
Edward Herman is professor emeritus of finance at the Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania. He’s written on economics, political economy, foreign policy, and media analysis in such books as The Myth of the Liberal Media: An Edward Herman Reader and Manufacturing Consent (with Noam Chomsky).

Carla Del Ponte settles accounts with the international community Former Attorney General of the ICTY gave last night in Geneva a conference full of chili. And humor

Carla Del Ponte

Andres German It glows, Carla Del Ponte. She brags, indeed, making people laugh last night 400 people came to listen to Uni Bastions, at a conference organized by the Association of university graduates. Is that the former Attorney General of the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia (ICTY) knows that Ratko Mladic has been transferred to The Hague. The man chased the Ticino during his eight years in office will finally be judged. His efforts were finally rewarded.Exactly. Where did she find the strength to track down serious criminals throughout his life, asks the journalist Jean Roman, responsible for channeling the public's questions. Where does this vocation? Carla Del Ponte laughs. "I chose law instead of medicine because it was only four years. And I chose the University of Geneva, it seemed less daunting. If I became a criminal lawyer, because it was not too technical, there was human contact. That's where I got my motivation by meeting with victims seeking justice. "Yet it took years to catch Ratko Mladic. Which was an obstacle? "From the start, Radovan Karadzic, Ratko Mladic and Slobodan Milosevic were the main suspects wanted. But the third was president of Serbia, so untouchable. For cons, the Bosnian Serb president and his military chief lived in Bosnia controlled by NATO. The trouble is that the international community was afraid to create disorder. The Atlantic Alliance had not been mandated to cooperate with the ICTY. And when she started, Karadzic and Mladic had already taken refuge in Serbia. ""Even after the political defeat of Milosevic in 2000 and his arrest in 2001, his successor, Vojislav Kostunica refused to help me track them, said Carla Del Ponte. He summoned me to give me hell. So as we could to nothing, we tried to convince countries of the European Union to block the accession of Serbia. It was hard, it was necessary to canvass every capital. And Kofi Annan wrote to me begging me not to mix justice and politics. I reminded him of the independence of the Attorney General. "And why do we judge the criminals and not Serbian Kosovo? "An attorney working with the material he may have. Serb crimes, we had the evidence and testimony. But the KLA (note: the Kosovo Liberation Army), we have opened three investigations that were unsuccessful because the witnesses withdrew. I understand it: Kosovo is the only place I have seen witnesses killed after participating in trials. "What does she say to Bernard Kouchner, former administrator of Kosovo, when he asserts that allegations of organ trafficking in the KLA, it's anything? "He said anything! He has not seen the report. I could not believe it but I opened the investigation, it was my job. And I discovered that there was indeed concrete evidence. But we neverhad permission to travel to Albania to see the mass graves. The international community would not help us. "His great regret is Rwanda. "I wanted to investigate the genocide but also the charges against President Kagame's men, I was summoned to Washington and they told me that the Rwandan justice system would take care of. London then proposed that the International Criminal Tribunal on Rwanda is now an attorney general than the one on the former Yugoslavia. I was rejected. And these investigations have never occurred. "

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Unwelcome the Rwanda Dictator to Chicago June 2011

From the AFRICAN DICTATOR

North American-based Rwandan Diaspora is ready unwelcome the dictator Kagame to Chicago.
Join and support this effort wherever you are.

• Deny the Rwandan Dictator global space.
• Do it for falsely imprisoned opposition leaders, Victoire Ingabire, Deo Mushayidi and Bernard Ntaganda.
• Do it the murdered opposition leader Andrew Kagwa Rwisereka and journalist Leonard Rugambage.
• Do it for all the Rwandans the serial killer Kagame has murdered in the last 17 years.

Please talk to the media, call your representative and contact Hyatt Regency Hotel, 151 East Wacker Drive, Chicago, IL 60601, Tel: +1 312 565 1234; Fax: +1312 239 4414. The Dictator will be staying at the Hyatt Regency Hotel.
Rwandans and friends of Rwanda are prepared to come to Chicago on June 10-12, 2011 for a massive public protest against Paul Kagame dictatorship and criminal record.
For more information contact:
Immaculee Uwayezu
USA
443-980-4675
iuwayezu@yahoo.com
Watch this space for more information.

Rwandan exiles in London 'threatened by hitman'

President Paul Kagame Rwandan President Paul Kagame has been accused of harassing his critics
Continue reading the main story
Rwanda: Haunted Nation

From BBC

Two Rwandan exiles living in London were warned last week by UK police that they faced the threat of assassination. Click here to watch BBC video about the Rwandan hit squads in UK

It has emerged that the men were visited by officers who told them they were in danger of being killed by a hitman sent by the Rwandan government.

Shortly before the warning was issued, a Rwandan man suspected of involvement was prevented from entering the UK.

The Rwandan High Commission in London has denied involvement in any alleged plot to kill the two exiles.

"The government of Rwanda does not threaten the lives of its citizens wherever they live," High Commissioner Ernest Rwamucyo said.

The government later said that the Metropolitan police had not approached it with evidence of the allegations.

"We are ready as always to work with them to ensure that nobody, be they Rwandan or not, is the victim of violence on British soil", a statement said, quoted by the New Times website in Kigali.
'Scared'

The two men - Rene Mugenzi and Jonathan Musonera - have both been involved in political groups opposed to the ruling party of Rwanda's President Paul Kagame.

A week ago, UK police officers knocked on their doors and told them that they could not guarantee their safety. They advised them to increase the security around their homes or move away.

The police gave them written statements saying: "The Rwandan government poses an immediate threat to your life. The threat could come in any form."
Continue reading the main story
“Start Quote

We have cut off the home phone. The children now they stay at home, they can't go out”

End Quote Jonathan Musonera Rwandan exile

It is understood that shortly before visiting the two men, counter-terrorism officers had stopped a Rwandan man as he tried to enter the country at Folkestone.

They questioned the unidentified man and turned him away.

Mr Musonera said he and his family were very scared.

"I was not surprised, because this is not the first time they've tried to disturb the opposition," he told the BBC's Focus on Africa programme after learning about the death threat.

"I take this problem very seriously. I used to drive my car. Right now I stopped because the police told me to use limited movement or go out with friends.

"My wife, she is scared. We have cut off the home phone. The children now they stay at home, they can't go out. They can't go out with friends. I stopped visitors coming to our home."
Opposition meeting

BBC Africa analyst Martin Plaut says it is not the first time there have been reports of threats to Rwandan exiles living in the UK.
Lt Gen Faustin Kayumba Nyamwasa (file photo) Rwanda's ex-army chief Lt Gen Nyamwasa survived a assassination attempt last year in South Africa

The UK's Security Service (MI5) has apparently been attempting to prevent an assassination campaign for some time, he adds.

In April, it was reported that MI5 had warned Mr Rwamucyo to halt an alleged campaign of harassment against critics of his country's government.

The police's warning was issued just prior to a meeting in London of exiles last weekend that brought together Tutsi and Hutu opposition politicians.

The meeting heard from a former Rwandan chief of staff, Lt Gen Faustin Kayumba Nyamwasa, who addressed the gathering by videolink from South Africa, where he survived an assassination attempt in June 2010.

The Rwanda government has denied any links to the shooting of Gen Nyamwasa, who was a close ally of Mr Kagame before fleeing to South Africa last year.

The party representing the imprisoned Hutu politician, Victoire Ingabire, was also at the meeting.

The possibility that Hutu and Tutsi political parties could begin working together would be worrying for the Rwandan government, our correspondent says.

In January, four former top officials - including Gen Nyamwasa - who have fallen out with Mr Kagame and gone into exile were sentenced in absentia to long terms in prison for threatening state security and promoting ethnic divisions.

President Kagame's Rwandan Patriotic Front came to power in 1994, ending the genocide in which some 800,000 ethnic Tutsis and moderate Hutus were killed.

He was re-elected last year with 93% of the vote, amid opposition claims of harassment.

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STOP KILLING RWANDANS OR RESIGN: RWANDA NATIONAL CONGRESS (RNC) TELLS PRESIDENT KAGAME

CALLS UPON THE USA AND UK TO SUPPORT PEACEFUL AND DEMOCRATIC REFORMS IN RWANDA. Adapted from NGONews Africa
In a not so rare confession of intent to commit murder, the Rwanda Patriotic Front-owned and Rwanda Intelligence-run The New Times , May 3, 2011, in an opinion titled “ Osama bin Laden’s Lessons for Local Terrorists”, opens with ominously familiar warning to all pro-democracy voices and Rwandans in general: “ You can run. You can hide. But you won’t escape. Osama bin Laden learnt the lesson of this simple truth”. In short, Kagame is telling Rwandans, “ accept my rule and keep quiet, or else I will kill you, as I have killed many others..”
 Excerpts from The New Times article :
“In Rwanda we have our own criminals and terrorists sheltering in foreign countries. What has happened to Osama bin Laden should serve as notice to them that they cannot hide forever. Justice, in whatever form, will catch up with them.
 “Other politicians, like Victoire Ingabire and Deo Mushayidi, who have tried to use terrorism to get to power now know the perils of that route and, unless they are idiots, are unlikely to advise anyone to go the same way.”
“But there will always be idiots for whom history has no lessons. The group that is now known as the Gang of Four ( Kayumba Nyamwasa, Gerald Gahima, Patrick Karegeya and Theogene Rudasingwa) all of whom have committed crimes ranging from abuse of office to treason are trying to reinvent themselves as political saviours of Rwandans. The indication that they have learnt nothing is that they have chosen the terrorist route to political power”….The criminal quartet and other unsavoury characters to whom they are allied in a terrorist enterprise will soon find out that the jungles of foreign countries and villas in upmarket areas of foreign capitals are not very safe.”
“They can run and hide, but will run out of options and then their actions will catch up with them”
There is little or no surprise that President Kagame and his regime would, once again, turn to assassination, intimidation and insults in dealing with Rwandan citizens demanding peaceful and democratic change in their motherland. To Kagame, critics in academia, civil society, media and members of the political opposition are all genocidaires, revisionists, divisionists, terrorists, idiots, gangs, unsavoury characters and criminals who should be hunted and killed like Osama bin Laden. What is surprising is that Kigali regime’s previously secret policy of killing real or imagined opponents within and outside Rwanda has now become official open policy. The regime’s criminal nature, its decadence, arrogance and incredible impunity is alarmingly turning uglier, blatant and scandalous.
Osama bin Laden’s death should be a teachable moment to all humanity. Unfortunately, like all tyrannical regimes, Kagame’s regime is both unwilling and incapable of deriving the right lessons from an event like this, the foremost of which is that those who live by the sword die by the sword. On the African continent and the world at large, no other ruler’s profile comes close to resembling bin Laden’s as President Kagame’s. Kagame’s endless list of victims, itself a who is who in Rwanda and the Great Lakes region, probably is by far longer than bin Laden’s, and includes, over a decade and half, his comrades-in-arms, politicians, military officers, children, men, women, and other leaders in Rwanda and neighboring countries. The ghosts of these innocent victims ceaselessly haunt him and have turned him into a paranoid serial killer and sleepless character who must not rest till he finds another victim. If he was a good student of history, he would know that killing citizens has never saved dictators. On the contrary, such unparalleled onslaught on citizens’ fundamental rights and yearning for freedom makes Rwandans ever more courageous to resist Kagame’s regime. Rwandans firmly believe that Kagame and the RPF regime he has criminalized will one day be caught up with justice in the courts of law. Unlike him, however, RNC and other pro-democracy are not calling for his death. Killing people is not the RNC way. It is the Kagame  way.  RNC and the majority of Rwandans are trying to change, and change for good, this violent way that disregards the dignity and worth a Rwandan, by peaceful and democratic means.
The Rwanda National Congress calls upon President Kagame to resign immediately if he cannot stop killing, jailing and exiling innocent citizens. Rwandans need a leader who has moral integrity, who is honest, who can help them talk to each other truthfully as a genuine way to reconcile and heal. Rwandans need a leader who helps them overcome fear so as to build a shared future together. Out of the 11 million Rwandans in and outside our Rwanda, there are those who can surely lead us out of the present dangerous political impasse. Clearly, Kagame is not that leader. He has selfishly gambled away enough of Rwandans’ and international goodwill.
RNC further calls upon the United States and the U.K. Governments, and the rest of the international community, to use the leverage of their strong links with the government of Rwanda to support democratic change and respect for fundamental human rights by the state institutions. We recommend the following measures are necessary to convey an unequivocal message to the Government of Rwanda that it must carry out reforms to ensure respect of the legitimate demands of the citizens of Rwanda for freedom:
(a) Calling for the immediate and unconditional release of all political prisoners;
(b) Demanding an end to persecution (including arbitrary arrests and detentions, torture;
involuntary disappearances and extra-judicial killings) of government opponents and critics and their relatives;
(c) An end to the practice of channeling the development assistance directly into budget support, and conditioning the development assistance that the UK, USA and international community provide to the Rwanda government on political reforms, including opening up political space;
(d) Using regional and United Nations human rights mechanisms to ensure that President
Kagame and his security officials are held accountable for gross human rights violations
that are committed against innocent citizens;
(e) Encouraging the government of Rwanda to agree to a comprehensive and unconditional dialogue with the opposition on ways for resolving the political impasse, engulfing Rwanda;
f) Calling on the United Nations, the African Union, UNHCR, the international community and member states to prevent the impending application of the cessation clause (end of 2011) for the Rwandan refugees, and instead support creating an enabling environment within Rwanda for their voluntary and peaceful repatriation; and,
g) Supporting a political and peaceful process for ending the long standing DRC-based rebellion by Rwandan armed groups.
by Dr.  Theogene Rudasingwa
 Submitted by: Jennifer Fierberg, MSW

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Prof. Peter Erlinder Speaks on Rwanda Genocide

Published by AFROBEATRADIO
Professor Peter Erlinder is an international criminal defence attorney, human rights lawyer. and former prisoner in Rwanda, who is still wanted by the Rwandan government of President Paul Kagame, for disputing its official history of the Rwanda Genocide. In January, he began a speaking tour of the US, which coincided with DePaul University’s Journal of Social Justice’s publication of a selection of original UN documents and evidence supporting his analysis of what actually happened at the time of the epic massacres now widely known as the Rwanda Genocide. His presentation drew on his experience as a UN-ICTR defense lawyer and as a Rwandan prisoner.
When Professor Erlinder was in New York City to speak at several universities, and the Brecht Forum, I interviewed him about how the US manipulates the international criminal tribunals, including the International Criminal Court (ICC) and the International Criminal Tribunal on Rwanda (ICTR), and how this affects the people of East/Central Africa, in particular. Erlinder explained that the ICTR has become a victor’s tribunal serving U.S. geo-political interests and that it therefore impedes reconciliation between African peoples of the region, and how this may affect the long-term interests of the American people. We also talked about the UN documents which formed the basis of his new publication, and about his life altering experience as a prisoner in Rwanda.
Peter Erlinder was President of the National Lawyers Guild from 1993 to 1997, and he has served as President of the Association Des Avocats de la Defense (ADAD), the UN-ICTR defense lawyers associations in Arusha, TZ. He is a founding member of the National Coalition to Protect Civil Freedoms and the Minnesota Bill of Rights Defense Coalition, established to defend the civil liberties of Muslims. He pioneered defense of Vietnam Veterans with PTSD facing the death penalty, and has represented many Native American, civil rights, and political activists facing misuse of government power, including Palestinian activist Dr. Sami al Arian and the Cuban-5.
In May 2010, he was imprisoned in Rwanda while defending Rwandan presidential candidate, Victoire Ingabire, and charged with “genocide denial” for having won the acquittal of his ICTR client on “genocide conspiracy” charges. Many groups, including the National Lawyers Guild, the American Bar Association, and members of the U.S. Senate and House, and an international grassroots campaign called for his release, which was granted on June 17, 2010.
Erlinder then returned to his position as a tenured professor at William Mitchell College of Law, in St Paul, Minnesota. He has also held faculty positions or lectured at the law schools of the University of Chicago, IIT Chicago-Kent College of Law, Golden Gate University, Waseda University, Hitosubashi University, the University of Wisconsin, the University of Illinois, Columbia University, and American University.
He has organized and stored his evidence relating to conflict in Rwanda and the Democratic Republic of Congo in The Rwanda Documents Project an online archive for UN documents relating to conflict in Rwanda and the Democratic Republic of Congo.

By Wuyi Jacobs
Wuyi jacobs is founder of Afrobeat project: AfrobeatRadio.Net, AfrobeatJournal.Org. He executive producer and co-host of radio program AfrobeatRadio on WBAI 99.5 FM,  New York

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Rwanda: The allies of Rwanda’s leader are blind to the truth

From NGO News Africa

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A dictator is one how has a fierce stranglehold on the country, keeping its people in poverty and shrouded in ignorance.  Further, a dictator is one who holds complete autocratic control and rules absolutely and often oppressively. Despite his outward appearance, this is the clear definition of the Rwandan political leader, President Paul Kagame.
The Us, France and other foreign allies have strong diplomatic relationship with Rwanda. The US Government continues to stick their head in the sand to the horrifying situation within Rwanda, as they did during the 1994 genocide, and continues to support President Paul Kagame, known dictator of Rwanda. Why does the US ignore the desperate situation brewing inside of a country led by a tyrant while so many innocent people inside and outside of the Rwanda believe the country is on the verge of another genocide?  There are many governments in exile from Rwanda waiting to have an opportunity for  a free and fair election in order to return to Rwanda and create a safer place for the lives of all who live there.
There is very little freedom in this small but powerful country.  Young boys are being held as prisoners on Iwawa Island, dozens of people are being killed for voicing opposing political opinions, journalists are disappearing and whole news organizations are being shut down for speaking out against the Rwandan Government. During the August 2010 election no other political parties were allowed to register their platforms in order to be considered for the election.  Two opposing political leaders sit in prison today and a third was found beheaded back in August.  The ruling party of Rwanda has denied any connection to the ongoing question about their involvement in the murder as well as in the Kigali bombings but the evidence to support these claims is overwhelming yet the West and other supporters continues to turn a blind eye to the atrocities he continues to inflict upon his people.
The most disheartening point in all this support is the support that comes from the American “mega-churches.”  The people of Rwanda deserve the support of these religious organizations but in order to receive this help the churches have to express support for Paul Kagame.  A simple web search will turn up photo op’s of Paul Kagame with author and mega-church leader Rick Warren.  How can a Christian leader like Rick Warren support a man who, at his core, is murdering his own countrymen? I desperately urge Rick Warren to change his views of the leader of Rwanda and learn how to support the innocent Rwandan lives as opposed to their callous dictator.
A crack in the veneer of support began to seep through with President Obama’s reaction to the August 2010 election in Rwanda which ended with the re-election of Paul Kagame by an overwhelming 93% of the votes.  The Obama administration stated, after the election, that they have much concern over the legitimacy of the elections and urged the Rwandan government to develop a fair and democratic government.  They further acknowledged the violence leading up to the elections including the dismantling of two newspapers, the disappearance of journalists, the murder of an oppositional party who was not allowed to register for the election as well as the subsequent arrest and imprisonment of other political leaders who attempted to register their party.  Rwanda has a long history of imprisoning those they claim to be dissidents or genocide supporters yet never giving them a fair trial or any chance at a diplomatic process.  Just this week, the Rwandan courts have asked for 35 year sentences for two former military officials from Rwanda for committing crimes that there is no proof of.  These men are in exile now and many have come to their defense stating the charges are completely fabricated.
In September, the UN high commission for human rights issued a monumental document on the crimes committed in the DRC. The report claims to have “damning evidence” that, Kagame’s forces committed genocide against Hutu refugees in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC).
Tony Blair, like other supporters of this murderous regime did not say a word when this report was released. As a matter of fact, they were right to keep quiet considering that Britain, under Blair, was the largest donor to Rwanda when the countries forces were committing these massacres in the DRC. Given this past failure, it would make more sense for Mr. Blair to undergo some soul searching and possibly apologize to the Rwandan people and the great lakes community in general.
To claim that Mr. Blair supports a man that is responsible for the vast share of violence that has affected the lives of thousands, is both criminal and obtuse.
Recent events in Rwanda have shown that Kagame is losing control over the country. There is clear and growing dissent within the ranks of the Tutsi ruling elites. The military—the backbone of Kagame’s state—is deeply fragmented.
The UN, France and the other allies must take a closer look into what Kagame is really doing to his fellow countrymen.  How can they continue to support a vicious dictator who murders for sport and has damaged the people of Rwanda for generations to come? To what benefit is this diplomatic relationship? Please, supporters of President Kagame, take your head out of the sand and stop seeing only what you want to see. Stop supporting Kagame out of guilt for not acting during the 1994 genocide.
As Anwar Sadat said, “He who cannot change the very fabric of his thought will never be able to change reality, and will never, therefore, make any progress.”
By: Jennifer Fierberg, MSW

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