UN on Rwanda Genocide Rings False, Between Callixte Mbarushimana and Ladsous

By Matthew Russell Lee

UNITED NATIONS, April 7 -- Remembrances of the 1994 Rwanda genocide at the UN have an air of falsity to them, like some other things at the UN.

  Take for example the case of UN employee Callixte Mbarushimana. In 1994 he is strongly alleged to have used his UN vehicle and radio and access to assist in the killing of at least three dozen Tutsi, including Florence Ngirumpatse, the director of personnel at UNDP's office in Kigali.

  What did the UN do about this? They gave Mbarushimana other UN jobs including in Angola (for which he was not language-qualified) and in Kosovo, as if on an ethnic cleansing road trip. Only when outed did they act; then they ended up paying Mbarushimana an additional $35,000. 

  The International Criminal Court, charging him in connection with other killings in Eastern Congo in 2009, also failed.

What does this say about the UN? At the UN's French-free genocide memorial on April 7, 2008, Inner City Press asked asked Rwanda's then-Ambassador Nsengimana about Mbarushimana's case. "The UN's awareness came very late," he said, diplomatically.

  But it's gotten worse. As we asked yesterday and before, what does it say about the UN that Herve Ladsous, who in 1994 as French deputy permanent representative argued for the evacuation of the genocidaires to refuge in Eastern Congo through Operation Turquoise, is now chief of UN Peacekeeping?

When Ladsous held his first press conference as head of DPKO on October 13, 2011, Inner City Press asked him about his past on Rwanda. Video here, from Minute 22:50.

  All Ladsous would say that day was that was history, that was the past. But is it only the past?

  Ladsous has refused to answer Inner City Press questions about his previous work; most recently last month Tim Witcher of Agence France Presse, on an management board of which Ladsous used to serve, complained to the UN that Inner City Press asked Ladsous a question, or how it asked the question.

Click here for questions, refused by Ladsous in 2012 on November 27, December 7 and December 18, all about rapes in Minova by the Congolese Army.

  Plus ca change, as they say. Never again? Hardly. Watch this site.

At UN's Rwanda Genocide Commemoration, Questions of Ex-Interhamwe FDLR, Darfur and UNDP's Callixte Mbarushimana

Byline: Matthew Russell Lee of Inner City Press at UN
www.innercitypress.com/un1rwanda040708.html

UNITED NATIONS, April 7 -- While the 14th anniversary of the start of the genocide in Rwanda was commemorated Monday at UN headquarters, the issues raised are not over. In Eastern Congo, the ex-Interhamwe FDLRs are being encouraged by the UN to disarm and return to Rwanda. At Monday's UN event, Inner City Press asked Rwanda's Ambassador to the UN Joseph Nsengimana what will happen with the FDLR fighters who return. They must come back without arms, he said. Then they will be treated like any Rwandan citizen. Does this mean that a form of amnesty is being granted, even to those who participated in the genocide?

Tanzania's Ambassador Augustine Mahiga spoke at the event, on behalf of the African Union, and said that in Liberia, too, he had seen "massacres go unpunished and uninvestigated." He spoke of seeing Rwandan genocidaires never separated out in the refugee camps in Bukavu in what he called, even Monday night, "eastern Zaire." By that stage, humanitarian and justice-seeking imperatives were deemed to be in conflict, needing to paralysis.

The UN's role in Rwanda in 1994 is not only one of inaction. UN Development Program staffer Callixte Mbarushimana "lent vehicles and satellite telephones of the UNDP to military officers, that he also used the UNDP vehicles to facilitate his own contribution to the killings," as stated in an article on the UN's own DR Congo website. Another UN documents recites his role in "the death of UNDP’s National Personnel Officer, Ms. Florence Ngirumpatse, and a number of refugees in the residence where they had taken refuge."

After the 100 days of killing, Mbarushimana was allowed to continue working for the UN for seven more years, for example (as recited in the course of the UN's process leading to an additional payment of $35,000 to Mbarushimana) "from December 1996 to December 1999, he was with UNDP-Luanda, Angola." As noted in a more detailed account, Mbarushimana wan't even language-qualified for this UNDP post. We hope to have more on this.

Inner City Press asked Rwandan Ambassador Nsengimana about Mbarushimana's case. "The UN's awareness came very late," he said. In fact, the UN has yet to answer when it knew what it came to know about Mbarushimana, and what actions if any it took on what it knew. Now after repeated extradition requests from Rwanda, Mbarushimana is under investigation in France.

There did not appear to be an French representation at Monday's Rwanda genocide memorial, held in the two-storied Delegates' Entrance lobby. Sudan's Ambassador was present, and took umbrage when the final speaker linked Rwanda's genocide with more recent events in Darfur. Afterwards, he told Inner City Press, Rwandan Ambassador Nsengimana apologized to him for the comments. Never again?

And see, www.innercitypress.com/un1rwanda040708.html