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The "Rwandan Genocide" refers to the 1994 mass slaughter in Rwanda of the ethnic Tutsi and politically moderate Hutu peoples. The killings began in early April of 1994, and continued for approximately 100 days until the "Hutu Power" movement's defeat in mid-July. The genocide was carried out primarily by Hutu supremacist militia groups, co-perpetrated by the state government of Rwanda, the Rwandan Army, and Rwandan civilians in compliance with the "Hutu Power" movement. By its conclusion, at least 500,000 ethnic Tutsis were murdered, along with thousands of Tutsi sympathizers, moderate Hutus, and other victims of atrocity. Some estimates claim anywhere between 800,000-1,000,000 were killed, with another 2 million refugees (mostly Hutus fearing the retribution of the newly-empowered Tutsi rebel government) packed in disease-ridden refugee camps of neighboring Burundi, Tanzania, Uganda, and former Zaire.

Rwanda is a very small country (about the size of Maryland), located near the center of Africa, a few degrees south of the Equator. It is separated from the Democratic Republic of Congo (former Zaire) by Lake Kivu and the Ruzizi River valley to the west; it is bounded on the north by Uganda, to the east by Tanzania, and to the south by Burundi. The capital, Kigali, is located in the center of the country. According to the 1991 national census, the total population of Rwanda was 7.7 million, with 90 percent of the population in the Hutu ethnic group, 9 percent Tutsi, and 1 percent Twa. The Rwandan Genocide itself began with mass killings in Kigali, but over the course of its 100-day duration, killing spread to all corners of the country.

The Rwandan genocide took place over a time span of only 100 days, between April and July 1994.

Hutu nationalist group Parmehutu led a social revolution which overthrew the Tutsi ruling class, resulting in the death of around 20,000 Tutsis and the exile of another 200,000 to neighboring countries. Rwandan independence from Belgium would follow in 1961, marking the establishment of a Hutu-led Rwandan government. The Tutsis remaining in Rwanda, mostly due to intermarriage or other family ties, would be discriminated against as racially "lesser" citizens by the new Hutu government. The RPF (Rwandan Patriotic Front) was formed in 1985 as a political group of Tutsi nationalist exiles who demanded the right to return to their homeland as citizens and an end to social discrimination against the Tutsi in Rwanda. The RPF rebels invaded Rwanda from neighboring Uganda in October of 1990, re-igniting Tutsi hatred throughout Rwanda. It was this act of Tutsi aggression, coupled with decades of discrimination and fear for a loss of power, that paved the way to genocide. Killed alongside the Tutsi people were those native Rwandan Hutu, who sympathized with their Tutsi neighbors and resisted by defending, hiding, or providing aid to their Tutsi neighbors. Moderate Hutus, many of whom refused to take action against their Tutsi neighbors, were also victimized in the genocide.

Most of the killing was carried out by two Hutu radical militant groups: the Interahamwe and the Impuzamugambi. Armed, backed, and led by the government of Rwanda (MRND), the Interahamwe are remembered today as the driving force of the genocide, comprised mostly of young Hutu men, brainwashed by the "Hutu Power" ideology. Springing from a separate political entity, the CDR, the Impuzamugambi was made up of members of the CDR's youth wing. These forces were fewer in number than those of the Interahamwe. The "more-extreme" anti-Tutsi agenda of the CDR reflected on the Impuzamugambi; their killings were often regarded as less organized, and more vicious. The genocide was obviously supported by the Hutu-led government (MRND) and members of the Rwandan army: they armed and directed militias, dispatched killing orders, and even participated in the rounding up of victims themselves. The most unsettling co-perpetrators of the genocide, however, were those Rwandan civilians who collaborated with and supported the genocide. Many Tutsis and moderate Hutus were handed over and/or killed by their own neighbors, also bent on anti-Tutsi sentiment.

Unlike other genocides of the 20th century, the Rwandan genocide unfolded before the eyes of the national media. Journalists, radio broadcasters, and TV news reporters covered the events live from Rwanda, until the violence escalated to fanatical levels and all foreigners were encouraged to evacuate. In short, the world knew of the genocide from its first day up until its conclusion. Mark Doyle, a reporter for the BBC in Kigali, tried to explain the situation to the world in late April 1994 as follows,

"...you have to understand that there are two wars going on here. There's a shooting war and a genocide war. The two are connected, but also distinct. In the shooting war, there are two conventional armies at each other, and in the genocide war, one of those armies, the government side with help from civilians, is involved in mass killings."

UNAMIR, the UN peacekeeping force in Rwanda, was present on the ground throughout the course of the genocide. With disregard to the violence portrayed in the national media, France, Belgium, and the United States declined to send additional support, despite UNAMIR's specific warnings to the U.N. Security Council in early 1994, describing the Hutu militia's plan for extermination. The Security Council denied UNAMIR's request to intervene, and in early April, the Belgian contingency of UNAMIR's force were pulled out, due to the murder of ten Belgian soldiers. Almost overnight, 4,500 UNAMIR peacekeepers on the ground were reduced to a mere 260. Not until mid-May (approx. 500,000 Rwandans had already been killed) did the UN recognize that "acts of genocide may have been committed," at which point the UN pledged to send in 5,500 troops and 50 armored personal carriers. This force, however, was further delayed due to continuing arguments between the UN and the U.S. army over the cost of the Armored Personnel Carriers. The genocide would be ended by the RPF overthrow of the Hutu Regime in July; the UN intervention never occurred. The state support for the genocide in Rwanda was no doubt one of its primary engines. The Hutu-led government provided arms, planning, and leadership for the militias. It also funded the RTLM "Hutu Power" radio broadcast, the primary source of "brainwashing" for the Rwandan civilians who also took part in the genocide.

Immediately following the RPF takeover, around 2 million Hutus (perpetrators, bystanders, and resistors to the genocide) fled into the neighboring countries to avoid potential Tutsi retribution. Thousands died of epidemics, which spread like wildfire through to overcrowded refugee camps. The refugee presence in Zaire, among other factors, led to the first Congo War in 1996 and the formation of the Democratic Republic of Congo. Due to worsening conditions in the DRC and Tanzania, more than a million Rwandan refugees would return home by 1997. Back in Rwanda, the fully regenerated "UNAMIR 2" assumed control until March 8th, 1996. They faced the enormous task of cleaning up a war-torn country side, and dealing with the bodies of more than 1 million victims of genocide and war. The "machete" would become a symbol, synonymous to the Rwandan genocide for its widespread use by untrained civilians, to hack their neighbors to death.

With the return of the refugees, the long-awaited genocide trials could proceed. The International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda, located in Arusha, Tanzania, began proceedings in 1996. The Tribunal indicted 93 individuals, and convicted 62 persons guilty of war crimes, acts of genocide, rape, and the creation of "hate media." The Tribunal closed in 2015. It was the first international court to convict someone of the crime of genocide and was the first to recognize rape as a means of perpetrating genocide.

* Luke Walker of the Center for Holocaust and Genocide Studies researched and wrote this description. CHGS is a partner of World Without Genocide. Updated 2/21/2017.

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Rwandan Genocide " World Without Genocide -

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The "Rwandan Genocide" refers to the 1994 mass slaughter in Rwanda of the ethnic Tutsi and politically moderate Hutu peoples. The killings began in early April of 1994, and continued for approximately 100 days until the "Hutu Power" movement's defeat in mid-July.

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Newsela | Why the U.S. Didn't Intervene in the Rwandan Genocide

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In 1994, the U.S. waited and watched in horror as the Hutu majority in Rwanda led a genocide against the Tutsi tribe.

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The Rwandan genocide is one of the heaviest moments in human history. An airplane crash in 1994 carrying the presidents of Rwanda and Burundi provided a spark for an organized campaign of violence against the Tutsi and moderate Hutu civilians across the country.

Approximately 800,000 Tutsis and Hutu moderates were slaughtered in a carefully organized program of genocide over 100 days, making history as the quickest killing spree the world has ever seen.

Genocide Begins

Civil war broke out in Rwanda in 1990, exacerbating existing tensions between the Tutsi minority and Hutu majority. The civil war began when Rwandan exiles formed a group called the Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF) and launched an offensive against Rwanda from their home base in Uganda.

The RPF, which was comprised of mostly Tutsis, placed blame on the government for failing to address the Tutsi refugees. All Tutsis in the country were characterized as accomplices of the RPF and all Hutu members of the opposition parties were deemed traitors. Despite the opposition forces reaching a peace agreement in 1992, political negotiations continued in attempts to achieve harmony between the Tutsis and Hutus.

On April 6th 1994, as Rwandan President Juvenal Habyarimana returned from a round of talks in neighboring Tanzania, he was killed when his plane was shot down outside of the country's capital, Kigali.

Following the crash, the U.S. Deputy Assistance Secretary of State warned of "the strong likelihood that widespread violence could break out."

The president's death provided a spark for an organized campaign of violence against Tutsi and moderate Hutu civilians across the country. In just a matter of hours, Hutu rebels surrounded the capital and took over the streets of Kigali. Within a day, the Hutus had successfully eliminated Rwanda's moderate leadership. As the weeks progressed, Tutsis and anyone suspected of having any ties to a Tutsi, were killed.

The political vacuum enabled Hutu extremists to take control of the country. Detailed lists of Tutsi targets were prepared in advance and government radio stations called upon Rwandans to murder their neighbors. These specific lists included names, addresses and sometimes license plates. Through radio hate speech, people were encouraged to take the streets and exterminate those who matched the list.

The Power of the Radio

The radio was utilized to not only list the location of specific Tutsis to be targeted, but to also justify the genocide. Radio hosts discussed discrimination the Hutus suffered under the power of the Tutsis. Strong connotations describing Hutus as slaves during colonization painted the Rwandan genocide as a type of slave rebellion. Radio stories were used to anger the Hutus and channel that anger into action. Radio was also used to dehumanize Tutsis by calling them "cockroaches," making acts of violence against them seem less inhumane.

The extremist Hutus strategy turned into an extermination campaign as they began to encounter resistance from the Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF), a Tutsi rebel group. The RPF fought back as the violence grew more severe, creating a toxic mix of both civil war and genocide. In response, the Hutus changed their strategy, believing if the opposition was completely exterminated, their majority power and status would be reassured and preserved. Thus, they set out to get rid of the Tutsis completely.

In addition to the brutal mass killings, systematic rape was also widely used as a weapon of war during the Rwandan genocide. The exact number is unknown, but it is estimated that between 250,000 and 500,000 women were raped. It was considered another way to destroy the Tutsi ethnic group, through both the emotional pain (so the woman could "die of sadness"), and through the health problems that would be a result. Often times, women did not even have to succumb to the aftermath of rape as they were often immediately killed right after.

Over the course of the 100 days, the RPF began to make gains on both the battlefield and in the negotiations led by Tanzania. By early July, the RPF had control of the majority of the country. Fearing reprisal killings, hundreds of thousands of Hutus fled the country.

Who Are the Hutus and Tutsis?

Rwanda is composed of three main ethnic groups: Hutu, Tutsi and Twa. Nearly 85% of the population identified as Hutu, making it the majority group in Rwanda. Tutsi comprised 14% of the population and Twa made up 1%.

The colonial power, Belgium, believed that the Tutsi were superior to the Hutu and the Twa and put the Tutsis in charge of Rwanda. At the end of colonial rule, however, Belgium began giving more power to the Hutus. As the Hutus gained more leverage, they began to drive the Tutsis out of Rwanda and significantly lowered the population of Tutsis in the country.

Precursors to Genocide

Ethnic tensions existed in Rwanda for centuries, growing even more extreme after Rwanda gained independence from Belgium in 1962. In the 1990's, the Hutu political elite blamed the Tutsi population for increasing political, social, and economic problems in the country. They also associated Tutsi civilians with the Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF) rebel group.

Many Hutus resented the Tutsi, as they were typically considered the elite and had ruled the country for decades. As a result, they also feared the Tutsi and were determined to hold on to their own power. When President Habyarimana's (a Hutu) plane crashed, Hutu extremists assumed it was the Tutsis who shot it down. Immediately, Hutus set out to destroy the entire Tutsi population and seek revenge on the power that had always been deemed the elite.

The Response

From the beginning, despite claiming to be caught unaware by the killings, the United States and international community knew of the danger and disorder in Rwanda. But no actions were taken to stop the killings. Months before the killing began, General Romeo Dallaire, the commander of the UN Peacekeepers in Rwanda, sent a now infamous " genocide fax ", warning of an "anti-Tutsi extermination" plot.

The media covered eyewitness accounts and direct stories from missionaries who were unable to save their Rwandan friends from inevitable death. Stories hit the front pages of the Washington Post and the New York Times, even with descriptions of six foot high piles of corpses. There were Defense Intelligence Agency reports that stated the killings were directly administrated by the government and intelligence memos that reported the ringleaders of the genocide.

The United States

Despite these reports, President Clinton specifically avoided calling the massacre genocide to avoid U.S. involvement. The Clinton administration held on to the idea that there were no U.S. interests in Rwanda, so it was not their place to intervene. They also believed that U.S. credibility would be diminished if they deemed Rwanda acts of genocide and then did not step it to intervene.

A senior U.S. official described the decision to not intervene in Rwanda as "a foregone conclusion." Military intervention was not on the table for discussion; it was automatically concluded that the United States would not take part in stopping the Rwandan genocide.

The International Community

International leaders also refused to use their authority to challenge the legitimacy of the genocidal government. When disapproval was finally voiced, the perpetrators in Rwanda did not stop the killing. The whole world saw what was happening, yet refused to step in.

A UN peacekeeping operation (UNAMIR) was sent to Rwanda in April. The mission, however, failed to be sufficient and was extremely ill equipped. There was a lack of functioning vehicles and the ones that were available were hand-me-downs. Medical quickly supplies ran out with no money to restock and other supplies could rarely be replaced.

The United States was the main proponent in backing the UNAMIR's exit of Rwanda. U.S. officials felt that a small peacekeeping mission would result in a large and costly war for Americans. Belgium joined the United States in calling for a full UN exit in April of 1994. The Security Council later voted in mid-May to send 5,000 troops back to Rwanda after reports that the genocide spread. However, by the time the force returned, the genocide had long been over.

Those in power at the time claim that the information available was overlooked in the confusion of the civil war and the rapidity with which the genocide unfolded. But newly released archived materials of discussions within the U.S. government and the UN Security Council suggest more could and should have been done to prevent and respond to the Rwanda genocide.

The Aftermath

When the killing stopped, the RPF established a coalition government with Pasteur Bizimungu (a Hutu) as president and Paul Kagame (a Tutsi) as vice president and defense minister.

The UN also reinstated and revamped the UNAMIR operation in Rwanda, which remained there until March 1996. UNAMIR provided humanitarian relief in the aftermath of the genocide.

The outflow of former genocidaire's across the border into the Democratic Republic of the Congo has had lasting effects that continue to reverberate in the region today.

The effect that the genocide posed on the people of Rwanda is immeasurable. The people were tortured and terrorized as they saw those they love die and feared the loss of their own life. It is estimated that nearly 100,000 children were orphaned, abducted or abandoned. Twenty-six percent of the Rwandan population still suffers from post-traumatic stress disorder today.

In 1994, the United Nations created the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR), dedicated to bringing those responsible for the genocide to justice. Although slow-moving, the ICTR began trying and indicting perpetrators in 1995.

The United Nations conducted more than 70 tribunal cases and Rwandan courts have tried up to 20,000 individuals. However, trying individuals in courts proved to be a challenging process as the location of many perpetrators was unknown.

To deal with the thousands of accused and to foster reconciliation, the traditional community court system known as " Gacaca" was used, leading to over 1.2 million cases being tried. The ICTR has also determined that the widespread rapes committed during the Rwandan genocide may also be considered an act of torture and genocide on their own. The ICTR closed at the end of 2014.

"Rwanda can be a paradise again, but it will take the love of the entire world...and that's as it should be, for what happened in Rwanda happened to us all - humanity was wounded by the genocide."
- Immacuée Ilibagiza, Rwandan author

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The Rwandan Genocide - United to End Genocide

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The Rwandan genocide is one of the heaviest moments in human history. An airplane crash in 1994 carrying the presidents of Rwanda and Burundi provided a spark for an organized campaign of violence against the Tutsi and moderate Hutu civilians across the country.

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This week marks 20 years since the start of the genocide in Rwanda, so the world has spent some time reflecting on one of the most horrifying - and most defining - events in post-Cold War history.

What may have gotten lost in all of this is what actually happened in Rwanda, a land-locked, Maryland-sized country in central Africa. Here's what you need to know about how 1 million people were systematically slaughtered, why it happened, how it changed the world, and where Rwanda stands today.

The Rwandan genocide was a systematic campaign by the Hutu ethnic majority a imed at wiping out each and every member of the minority Tutsi group. The Hutu-controlled government and allied militias slaughtered between 800,000 and one million Tutsis before a Tutsi rebel group overthrew them. Over 100,000 Hutus were also killed, including both moderate Hutus killed by Hutu extremists and those killed by Tutsis in so-called "revenge killings."

The genocide was set into motion by the death of Rwandan President Juvénal Habyarimana. On April 6th, 1994, Habyarimana's plane was shot down by a missile of unknown origin. Government-aligned forces used (Hutu) Habyarimana's death as an excuse to begin a campaign of slaughter they had been planning for some time, and the genocide began on April 7th. It went on for about 100 days.

The story behind the Rwandan genocide begins with colonialism

The split between Hutus and Tutsis arose not as a result of religious or cultural differences, but economic ones. "Hutus" were people who farmed crops, while "Tutsis" were people who tended livestock. Most Rwandans were Hutus. Gradually, these class divisions became seen as ethnic designations.

Because cattle were more valuable than crops, the minority Tutsis became the local elite. By the time Belgium took over the land in 1917 from Germany (who took it in 1884), an ethnic Tutsi elite had been the ruling monarchy for quite some time.
The Rwandan genocide was a directed, pre-meditated attempt to eliminate an entire people
German and Belgian rule made the dividing lines between the groups sharper. This "divide and conquer" strategy meant supporting the Tutsi monarchy and requiring that all local chiefs be Tutsis, turning the Tutsis into symbols of colonial rule for the Hutu majority.

Post-independence, the resentment created by colonial divide-and-conquer bred violence. Seeing as Hutus were a large majority, they handily won the country's first elections in 1961, and the regime that followed was staunchly Hutu nationalist. Intermittent violence between Hutus and Tutsis became a feature of post-independent Rwandan

The Rwandan genocide was a pre-planned extermination campaign

The Rwandan genocide was a different class of violence altogether from what came before it. It wasn't just wartime violence; it was a directed, pre-meditated attempt to eliminate an entire people.

The Hutu government had fought a war with Ugandan-based Tutsi rebels, the Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF), from 1990 to 1993. By early 1994 at the latest, many Hutus, including a number of important government officials, had come to the conclusion that the real problem was Rwanda's Tutsi minority. They began organizing armed paramilitary gangs and training them to prepare to wipe out Tutsi civilians.

President Habyarimana had agreed to a United Nations-enforced peace agreement with the RPF. The missile that shot down Habyarimana's plane shattered that agreement. We still don't know today whether Tutsi rebels or Hutu extremists opposed to the peace agreement fired the missile, but it quickly became irrelevant. T he Hutu ethnic supremacists saw a green light to begin their extermination campaign.

On April 7th, the killing began. Hutu militias, most infamously the government-backed Interahamwe, went city-to-city and village-to-village, slaughtering Tutsis with guns and machetes. The militias were horrifyingly efficient, using a radio station to coordinate the beginnings of the campaign around the country and to tell people where " the graves were not quite yet full." They were killing at a pace of about 8000 Tutsis per day.

There's a strong case the world could have stopped it

Unlike earlier mass killings, such as the Holocaust, the international community had advance evidence of the coming genocide. Once it launched, they had evidence of where it was going, and still did nothing.

Canadian General Romeo Dallaire, who commanded the small UN observer force tasked with implementing the peace agreement, heard the Hutus were planning genocide in January 1994. He informed the higher-ups at the UN, but wasn't permitted to act.

Even after the genocide began, and the evidence of slaughter became undeniable, the international community did nothing. The United States actively discouraged the UN Security Council from authorizing a more robust deployment.

In hindsight, there's a good chance the UN could have done something. General Dallaire believes that, with an extra 5,000 troops and a stronger UN mandate, he could have saved " hundreds of thousands." The failure to intervene, which Bill Clinton calls one of the greatest regrets of his presidency, catalyzed the modern movement in favor of humanitarian military intervention to prevent genocide. Two major Obama administration officials - Susan Rice and Samantha Power - became converted to the cause of humanitarian intervention in part due to America's inaction in Rwanda.

It ended only after Tutsi rebels defeated the government

The day after the genocide began, the Tutsi rebel group RPF, led by Paul Kagame, launched an offensive aimed at toppling the Rwandan government. In about one hundred days, the RPF defeated the government forces. Kagame, a Tutsi, became the country's leader in all but name: a Hutu was technically made president while Kagame was vice president, but Kagame controlled the army.
Sadly, there's no reason to stop worrying about Rwanda even 20 years after the genocide
Though the RPF stopped the genocide from reaching its completion, their victory was hardly clean. A Human Rights Watch assessment of the campaign concluded that "systematic" RPF killings claimed tens of thousands of Hutu lives. These "revenge killings" by oppressed are sadly common after episodes of mass killing, and one reason why the lack of international peacekeeping forces can be so devastating.

Moreover, the aftershocks of the Rwandan genocide contributed to the conflict in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC). That war, the deadliest since World War 2, was sparked in part by 2 million Hutus fleeing Rwanda attacking Tutsis. Some of the 2 million were militiamen, who attacked Tutsis in the DRC. The Kagame government supported local Tutsi forces, and the conflict escalated.

Rwanda today is a much better place, but still suffers from authoritarianism and violence

Today, Kagame still runs Rwanda - he's officially been president since 2000. His record has been extraordinarily mixed; he's done an incredible job helping rebuild life in Rwanda since the genocide, but he's also sponsored violence around the region, killed political dissidents, and consolidated authoritarian power.

Start with the good. Rwanda's life expectancy has doubled in the past decade, and child mortality and HIV rates have plummeted. The Rwandan economy has grown at a staggeringly high 8 percent rate since 2008, making it, by one assessment, the most desirable African country to invest in.

However, Kagame's government is described by his critics as an ethnic autocracy. Tutsis (who make up 10 percent of the government) staff most official positions, especially in the military. Kagame has supported murderous foreign militias, like the M23 in the DRC, and may have been complicit in revenge killings.

Perhaps most ominously, a statistical assessment of the risk of state-led mass killing puts Rwanda in the top 15 percent of countries most likely to see mass killing. Sadly, there's no reason to stop worrying about Rwanda even 20 years after the genocide.

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What you need to know about the Rwandan genocide

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This week marks 20 years since the start of the genocide in Rwanda, so the world has spent some time reflecting on one of the most horrifying - and most defining - events in post-Cold War history. What may have gotten lost in all of this is what actually happened in Rwanda, a land-locked, Maryland-sized country in central Africa.

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Last month, the photographer Pieter Hugo went to southern Rwanda, two decades after nearly a million people were killed during the country's genocide, and captured a series of unlikely, almost unthinkable tableaus. In one, a woman rests her hand on the shoulder of the man who killed her father and brothers. In another, a woman poses with a casually reclining man who looted her property and whose father helped murder her husband and children. In many of these photos, there is little evident warmth between the pairs, and yet there they are, together. In each, the perpetrator is a Hutu who was granted pardon by the Tutsi survivor of his crime.

The people who agreed to be photographed are part of a continuing national effort toward reconciliation and worked closely with AMI (Association Modeste et Innocent), a nonprofit organization. In AMI's program, small groups of Hutus and Tutsis are counseled over many months, culminating in the perpetrator's formal request for forgiveness. If forgiveness is granted by the survivor, the perpetrator and his family and friends typically bring a basket of offerings, usually food and sorghum or banana beer. The accord is sealed with song and dance.

The photographs on the following pages are a small selection of a larger body on display - outdoors, in large format - starting this month in The Hague. The series was commissioned by Creative Court, an arts organization based there, as part of "Rwanda 20 Years," a program exploring the theme of forgiveness. The images will eventually be shown at memorials and churches in Rwanda.

At the photo shoots, Hugo said, the relationships between the victims and the perpetrators varied widely. Some pairs showed up and sat easily together, chatting about village gossip. Others arrived willing to be photographed but unable to go much further. "There's clearly different degrees of forgiveness," Hugo said. "In the photographs, the distance or closeness you see is pretty accurate."

In interviews conducted by AMI and Creative Court for the project, the subjects spoke of the pardoning process as an important step toward improving their lives. "These people can't go anywhere else - they have to make peace," Hugo explained. "Forgiveness is not born out of some airy-fairy sense of benevolence. It's more out of a survival instinct." Yet the practical necessity of reconciliation does not detract from the emotional strength required of these Rwandans to forge it - or to be photographed, for that matter, side by side.

Sinzikiramuka, Perpetrator (opening image, left): "I asked him for forgiveness because his brother was killed in my presence. He asked me why I pleaded guilty, and I replied that I did it as someone who witnessed this crime but who was unable to save anybody. It was the order from authorities. I let him know who the killers were, and the killers also asked him for pardon."

Karorero, Survivor: "Sometimes justice does not give someone a satisfactory answer - cases are subject to corruption. But when it comes to forgiveness willingly granted, one is satisfied once and for all. When someone is full of anger, he can lose his mind. But when I granted forgiveness, I felt my mind at rest."

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Portraits of Reconciliation (Published 2014)

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Last month, the photographer Pieter Hugo went to southern Rwanda, two decades after nearly a million people were killed during the country's genocide, and captured a series of unlikely, almost unthinkable tableaus. In one, a woman rests her hand on the shoulder of the man who killed her father and brothers.

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Rwandan Genocide - Facts, Response & Trials

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The Rwandan genocide, also known as the genocide against the Tutsi, occured in 1994 when members of the Hutu ethnic majority in the east-central African nation of Rwanda murdered as many as 800,000 people, mostly of the Tutsi minority. Started by Hutu nationalists in the capital of Kigali, the genoc…

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Feature History - Rwandan Genocide (1/2)

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Letter From Europe

President Paul Kagame of Rwanda and world dignitaries commemorated the 20th anniversary of the country's genocide at a ceremony in the capital city of Kigali.

PARIS - In this time of somber commemorations, from the 20th anniversary of Rwanda's genocide to the centennial of the start of World War I, a less obvious moment seems to have a particular resonance as European lands once more contemplate their role in African states they once ruled.

In 1884, 130 years ago, European powers gathered in Berlin for a conference under Chancellor Otto von Bismarck that historians depict as setting the rules for the scramble for Africa among outside powers that soon fractured it into a jigsaw of new nations.

Decades after the so-called winds of change blew away colonial rule, the impact of this colonial cartography lingers in profound sensitivities at the legacy of the outsiders' incursions into a continent that did not invite them to define its frontiers or impose their definitions of nationhood.

That much was evident when South Africa and Zimbabwe both stayed away from a major European-African summit meeting last week, citing European interference in determining how Africa should be represented.

Most dramatically, in the prism of mutual mistrust that separates Europe and many African countries, remarks just days ago by President Paul Kagame of Rwanda assailed Belgium, the former colonial power, and France, the leading outside force in most of francophone Africa, for what he termed their "direct role" in the "political preparation for the genocide" that killed 800,000 people in 1994.

"The people who planned and carried out the genocide were Rwandans," Mr. Kagame told a commemorative ceremony in Kigali, the Rwandan capital. "But the history and root causes go beyond this country."

"And no country is powerful enough, even when they think that they are, to change the facts," he added in what was taken as a particular swipe at France.

France is not the only former colonial power to shy from history. In Britain, decades went by before the authorities agreed last year to pay compensation to Kenyans tortured during the Mau Mau rebellion in the 1950s. That victory for a dwindling cohort of aging Kenyans inspired a group of Caribbean nations to seek similar redress for the depredations of the slave trade two centuries ago.

Europe's reticence about its past is not limited to sub-Saharan Africa. France waited until 1995 to apologize for crimes against Jews under the Vichy government during World War II. Only in 2012 did Paris acknowledge that its behavior in its former colony of Algeria was "brutal and unfair."

"From Vichy to the war in Algeria, it took decades for France to be able to confront disturbing truths and illuminate dark pages of its history," said an editorial this week in Le Monde.

The question more recently, though, is this: Have the lessons been learned to avert a repetition of Rwanda's bloodletting in other African countries, like South Sudan and the Central African Republic, where political and sectarian rivalries have plunged frail nations into bloodletting and chaos?

France has troops in Mali and the Central African Republic, where the European Union has also promised to deploy a force of 1,000 personnel.

But given the war-weariness of some European powers, most notably Britain, after the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, and considering their preoccupation with the much-closer-to-home crisis over Ukraine, the appetite for broader intervention in Africa seems limited.

At the ceremonies in Kigali, Ban Ki-moon, the United Nations secretary general, offered cautious hope that humanity was making progress toward the mechanisms of restraint.

"States can no longer claim that atrocity crimes are only a domestic matter," he said. "International criminal justice is expanding its reach. Leaders and warlords alike face the growing likelihood of prosecution for their crimes."

In coming weeks, the outside world will likely discover whether that is enough, or whether, as the columnist Simon Allison wrote on South Africa's Daily Maverick website, 20 years after the Rwandan genocide, "we still don't know how to curb humanity's very worst excesses."

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Colonialism, Bloodshed and Blame for Rwanda

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Letter From Europe PARIS - In this time of somber commemorations, from the 20th anniversary of Rwanda's genocide to the centennial of the start of World War I, a less obvious moment seems to have a particular resonance as European lands once more contemplate their role in African states they once ruled.

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Between April and June 1994, an estimated 800,000 Rwandans were killed in the space of 100 days.

Most of the dead were Tutsis - and most of those who perpetrated the violence were Hutus.

Even for a country with such a turbulent history as Rwanda, the scale and speed of the slaughter left its people reeling.

The genocide was sparked by the death of the Rwandan President Juvenal Habyarimana, a Hutu, when his plane was shot down above Kigali airport on 6 April 1994.

A French judge has blamed current Rwandan President, Paul Kagame - at the time the leader of a Tutsi rebel group - and some of his close associates for carrying out the rocket attack.

Mr Kagame vehemently denies this and says it was the work of Hutu extremists, in order to provide a pretext to carry out their well-laid plans to exterminate the Tutsi community.

Whoever was responsible, within hours a campaign of violence spread from the capital throughout the country, and did not subside until three months later.

But the death of the president was by no means the only cause of Africa's largest genocide in modern times.

History of violence

Ethnic tension in Rwanda is nothing new. There have always been disagreements between the majority Hutus and minority Tutsis, but the animosity between them has grown substantially since the colonial period.

The two ethnic groups are actually very similar - they speak the same language, inhabit the same areas and follow the same traditions.

However, Tutsis are often taller and thinner than Hutus, with some saying their origins lie in Ethiopia.

During the genocide, the bodies of Tutsis were thrown into rivers, with their killers saying they were being sent back to Ethiopia.

When the Belgian colonists arrived in 1916, they produced identity cards classifying people according to their ethnicity.

The Belgians considered the Tutsis to be superior to the Hutus. Not surprisingly, the Tutsis welcomed this idea, and for the next 20 years they enjoyed better jobs and educational opportunities than their neighbours.

Resentment among the Hutus gradually built up, culminating in a series of riots in 1959. More than 20,000 Tutsis were killed, and many more fled to the neighbouring countries of Burundi, Tanzania and Uganda.

When Belgium relinquished power and granted Rwanda independence in 1962, the Hutus took their place. Over subsequent decades, the Tutsis were portrayed as the scapegoats for every crisis.

Building up to genocide

This was still the case in the years before the genocide. The economic situation worsened and the incumbent president, Juvenal Habyarimana, began losing popularity.

At the same time, Tutsi refugees in Uganda - supported by some moderate Hutus - were forming the Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF), led by Mr Kagame. Their aim was to overthrow Habyarimana and secure their right to return to their homeland.

Habyarimana chose to exploit this threat as a way to bring dissident Hutus back to his side, and Tutsis inside Rwanda were accused of being RPF collaborators.

In August 1993, after several attacks and months of negotiation, a peace accord was signed between Habyarimana and the RPF, but it did little to stop the continued unrest.

When Habyarimana's plane was shot down at the beginning of April 1994, it was the final nail in the coffin.

Exactly who killed the president - and with him the president of Burundi and many chief members of staff - has not been established.

Whoever was behind the killing its effect was both instantaneous and catastrophic.

Mass murder

In Kigali, the presidential guard immediately initiated a campaign of retribution. Leaders of the political opposition were murdered, and almost immediately, the slaughter of Tutsis and moderate Hutus began.

Within hours, recruits were dispatched all over the country to carry out a wave of slaughter.

The early organisers included military officials, politicians and businessmen, but soon many others joined in the mayhem.

Organised gangs of government soldiers and militias hacked their way through the Tutsi population with machetes, or blew them up in churches where they had taken refuge.

The extremist ethnic Hutu regime in office in 1994 appeared genuinely to believe that the only way it could hang on to power was by wiping out the ethnic Tutsis completely.

Encouraged by the presidential guard and radio propaganda, an unofficial militia group called the Interahamwe (meaning those who attack together) was mobilised. At its peak, this group was 30,000-strong.

Soldiers and police officers encouraged ordinary citizens to take part. In some cases, Hutu civilians were forced to murder their Tutsi neighbours by military personnel.

Participants were often given incentives, such as money or food, and some were even told they could appropriate the land of the Tutsis they killed.

On the ground at least, the Rwandans were largely left alone by the international community. Most of the UN troops withdrew after the murder of 10 soldiers.

The day after Habyarimana's death, the RPF renewed their assault on government forces, and numerous attempts by the UN to negotiate a ceasefire came to nothing.

Aftermath

Finally, in July, the RPF captured Kigali. The government collapsed and the RPF declared a ceasefire.

As soon as it became apparent that the RPF was victorious, an estimated two million Hutus fled to Zaire (now the Democratic Republic of Congo).

These refugees include many who have since been implicated in the massacres.

At first, a multi-ethnic government was set up, with a Hutu, Pasteur Bizimungu as president and Mr Kagame as his deputy.

But the pair later fell out and Bizimungu was jailed on charges of inciting ethnic violence, while Mr Kagame became president.

Although the killing in Rwanda was over, the presence of Hutu militias in DR Congo has led to years of conflict there, causing up to five million deaths.

Rwanda's now Tutsi-led government has twice invaded its much larger neighbour, saying it wants to wipe out the Hutu forces.

And a Congolese Tutsi rebel group remains active, refusing to lay down arms, saying otherwise its community would be at risk of genocide.

The world's largest peacekeeping force has been unable to end the fighting.

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In just three months, an estimated 800,000 people were massacred in the Rwandan genocide of 1994. BBC News Online examines the causes.

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It started with one murder. It ended with some 800,000.

The Rwandan genocide, which began 20 years ago this week, was one of the worst atrocities in living memory. It took just 100 days to massacre as much as 20 percent of the country's population, decimate its infrastructure and sow the seeds of regional conflicts still to come.

Here are 20 photos that tell the story of the events of April to July 1994. Because some things there are no words to describe.

April 6: The plane carrying Rwandan President Juvenal Habyarimana, shown here in 1982, is shot down over Kigali.

Habyarimana and Burundi President Cyprien Ntaryamira, both members of the Hutu ethnic group, are killed along with everyone else onboard.

(Pierre Guillaud/AFP/Getty Images)

April 7: The killings begin.

First political opponents are executed, then security forces and militia systematically murder members of the Tutsi minority, as well as moderate Hutus. This photo, taken on April 11, shows a looter ransacking a house as its occupants lie dead.

(PASCAL GUYOT/AFP/Getty Images)

April 13: Within days, France and Belgium deploy soldiers to evacuate their nationals.

They do not have orders to protect Rwandan civilians.

(PASCAL GUYOT/AFP/Getty Images)

April 19: Thousands of Rwandans flee the killing.

More than 30,000, including this man and his son, cross the border into Burundi in less than two weeks.

(PASCAL GUYOT/AFP/Getty Images)

April 30: More than 8,000 Tutsis take shelter at the Niashishi refugee camp in the south of Rwanda, where French soldiers guard them.

(PASCAL GUYOT/AFP/Getty Images)

May 12: Security forces, joined by members of the public, continue to massacre Tutsis at a rate of thousands per day.

Women are raped and sexually assaulted as part of the campaign to wipe out the ethnic group.

(GERARD JULIEN/AFP/Getty Images)

May 27: Armed rebel group the Rwandan Patriotic Front or RPF, made up chiefly of Tutsi exiles, battles government forces to stop the genocide.

Civilians flee the fighting, like this girl outside Kigali.

(ALEXANDER JOE/AFP/Getty Images)

May 27: Meanwhile UN Secretary General Boutros Boutros-Ghali meets US President Bill Clinton in Washington to discuss the crisis.

The international community resists acknowledging the genocide or any duty to intervene.

(PAMELA PRICE/AFP/Getty Images)

May 27: The massacre has made thousands of orphans, including these children seeking refuge at a church in Kabgayi.

In the weeks that follow, thousands of refugees will be killed here, allegedly with the help of clergy themselves.

(ALEXANDER JOE/AFP/Getty Images)

May 30: By now, militia groups have recruited children to assist the atrocities.

(ALEXANDER JOE/AFP/Getty Images)

June 8: RPF forces are advancing.

They capture and detain people they accuse of participating in the genocide as they go, including these men in Kabouga.

(ABDELHAK SENNA/AFP/Getty Images)

June 9: RPF fighters, including this boy, battle for control of the capital.

(ABDELHAK SENNA/AFP/Getty Images)

June 11: Under pressure from the RPF, government forces recruit young militiamen to help them fight the rebels.

(ALEXANDER JOE/AFP/Getty Images)

June 13: The UN, which removed most of its peacekeepers following the deaths of Belgian soldiers at the beginning of the conflict, sends troops to evacuate refugees from Kigali.

Some lucky families are reunited.

(ABDELHAK SENNA/AFP/Getty Images)

June 14: Rebels gain ground in Kigali.

When this picture was taken, two days later, the capital was strewn with bodies.

(ABDELHAK SENNA/AFP/Getty Images)

June 22: The UN Security Council approves a proposal by France to send troops to establish a "safe zone" for refugees in southwest Rwanda.

Soldiers from France and several African countries enter the country the next day. " Operation Turquoise," as it is known, proves controversial.

(PASCAL GUYOT/AFP/Getty Images)

July 17: As the RPF leads its final offensive, hundreds of thousands flee the fighting.

Many find themselves packed into makeshift camps in eastern Zaire (now the Democratic Republic of Congo).

(PASCAL GUYOT/AFP/Getty Images)

July 17: At least 100 people are trampled in the rush to escape across the border.

By now, President Clinton has described the genocide as the "worst humanitarian crisis in a generation."

(PASCAL GUYOT/AFP/Getty Images)

July 18: By mid-July, the RPF and its commander, Paul Kagame (pictured in Kigali on July 20), are claiming victory.

The government flees into Zaire.

(ALEXANDER JOE/AFP/Getty Images)

Afterward: The RPF forms a coalition government and bans all forms of ethnic discrimination.

But many people, including Hutus who fear retribution attacks, remain too scared to stay in Rwanda. The genocide leaves behind it hundreds of thousands of refugees, widows, orphans and people infected with HIV, as well as structural and economic devastation. Some sites where massacres took place, like this church in Nyamata, are turned into memorials to the estimated 800,000 people killed.

(GIANLUIGI GUERCIA/AFP/Getty Images)

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100 days of hell: Rwanda's 1994 genocide in photos

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It started with one murder. It ended with some 800,000. The Rwandan genocide, which began 20 years ago this week, was one of the worst atrocities in living memory. It took just 100 days to massacre as much as 20 percent of the country's population, decimate its infrastructure and sow the seeds of regional conflicts still to come.