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Rwanda Breaks Ties with France

Rwanda has decided to sever all ties with France after a French investigating judge issued arrest warrants for nine ranking Rwandans suspected of downing once president Juvenal Habyarimana's airplane on April 6, 1994. This downing sparked the country's genocide. These accused officials are close to the Rwandan president, Paul Kagame, and the accusations inflamed tensions. The Rwandan government is giving French ambassador, Dominique Decherf, until Saturday evening to leave the country. Other 29 French officials have until Monday evening to leave. Rwandans are accusing the French government of trying to destabilize their country.

The reason why the French judges were investigating this case was because the crew that piloted the downed plane was French. And in 1998, family members of the crew filed a suit in France. Some claim that the Kagame's largely Tutsi force downed the plane, and Kagame actually gave the order to down the plane in a meeting on March 31, 1994. In response, Kagame stated that relations between the two countries would suffer, which they did. The Rwandan president then accused France of doing little to stop the genocide.

After the plane of President Habyarimana crashed, the Hutu majority in the country set up road blocks across the capital of Kigali. Then, on April 7, they began to kill the accused Tutsi minorities. Nearly 500,000 people were killed in 100 days.

Rwanda Breaks Ties with France

posted by Anonymous @ 11/24/2006 06:14:00 PM