By Matthew Russell Lee
UNITED NATIONS, April 7 -- On the day the UN held its 21st Commemoration of the Rwanda Genocide, the French government of Francois Hollande announced it would be declassifying some documents from during and before the genocide, back to 1990.
At the UN ceremony, this decision was the buzz among attendees. From the podium, survivor Regine King told how when in 1994 she approached a French truck in Butare, “they just left us there.”
UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon spoke and did use the phrase shame along with UN; he did not mention, for example, UN staffer UN staffer Callixte Mbarushimana,click here for Inner City Press on that.
Many Permanent Representative were among the attendees, including for example those of Italy, Belgium, the Netherlands, Cameroon, Luxembourg, Afghanistan and many others. The UK and French deputies were in the front rows; US Ambassador Samantha Power was on the podium (speech online here.)
Apparently not in attendance was the head of UN Peacekeeping Herve Ladsous, who represented France in the UN Security Council in 1994 (sample memo published here by Inner City Press.)
More recently, Ladsous refused for the UN to participate in action against the Hutu FDLR militia, not granting a waiver the UN explicitly gave to fight the Lord's Resistance Army and under Ladsous opaquely gave for months after DR Congo Army rapes in Minova (video compilation of Ladsous non-answers here.)
And on April 2, Ladsous essentially scapegoated Rwandan peacekeepers for his Department's deadly bungling in Mali, in Tabankort and Gao, which followed a similar shooting at civilians in Haiti for which Ladsous had also refused to answer. Video here, Vine here. We'll have more on this.
