A People Betrayed audiobook cover - The Role of the West in Rwanda's Genocide

A People Betrayed

The Role of the West in Rwanda's Genocide

Linda Melvern

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A People Betrayed
Colonial Roots of Division+
Militarization & Civil War+
Preparation for Genocide+
The UN's Fatal Inaction+
The Genocide Unleashed+
French Complicity+
Aftermath & Accountability+

Quiz — Test Your Understanding

Question 1 of 10
How did European colonial powers, particularly the Belgians, fundamentally alter the social dynamics between the Hutu and Tutsi?
  • A. They introduced the cattle-herding economy that originally separated the two groups into distinct classes.
  • B. They conducted a census that classified ethnicity based on physical appearance and institutionalized Tutsi superiority in education and government.
  • C. They forced the Tutsi to work in diamond mines, which inadvertently created a cohesive Tutsi nationalist movement.
  • D. They abolished the Rwandan monarchy in 1894 and immediately installed a Hutu-majority democratic government.
Question 2 of 10
What was the origin of the Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF)?
  • A. It was a paramilitary unit formed by President Habyarimana's ruling party to combat political dissidents.
  • B. It was a French-backed guerrilla group aimed at destabilizing the heavily militarized Ugandan border.
  • C. It morphed from a Nairobi-based opposition group and recruited heavily from Rwandan Tutsi refugees serving in the Ugandan army.
  • D. It was a United Nations peacekeeping task force created to enforce the terms of the Arusha Accords.
Question 3 of 10
How did the Rwandan government utilize the period surrounding the 1993 Arusha Accords peace negotiations?
  • A. They genuinely attempted to integrate the RPF into the national army to prevent further conflict and stabilize the economy.
  • B. They used the ceasefire as a cover to stockpile weapons, funneling millions of dollars into agricultural tools like machetes.
  • C. They requested additional UN peacekeepers to help peacefully transition the country into a multi-party democracy.
  • D. They began dismantling the Interahamwe militia to appease international donors and human rights organizations.
Question 4 of 10
What role did the Radio-Télévision Libre des Mille Collines (RTLM) play in the Rwandan genocide?
  • A. It provided a platform for moderate Hutus to negotiate peace treaties with the advancing RPF forces.
  • B. It broadcast coded messages for the UN peacekeepers to locate and seize hidden weapons caches.
  • C. It incited violence by broadcasting racist propaganda, street slang, and reading the names and addresses of Tutsi targets on air.
  • D. It was primarily used by the French military to coordinate the logistics of Opération Turquoise.
Question 5 of 10
Why was the United Nations Security Council reluctant to fully support Roméo Dallaire's peacekeeping mission (UNAMIR)?
  • A. The recent deaths of American Special Forces in Somalia made the UN and US highly risk-averse regarding combat operations.
  • B. The UN believed the Rwandan army was fully capable of handling the RPF invasion without outside assistance.
  • C. France threatened to veto any UN intervention that would interfere with its lucrative military contracts in Africa.
  • D. The Arusha Accords explicitly forbade the presence of international peacekeepers on Rwandan soil.
Question 6 of 10
What specific event served as the immediate catalyst for the widespread slaughter of Tutsi and moderate Hutu in April 1994?
  • A. The signing of the Arusha Accords in Tanzania.
  • B. The assassination of President Habyarimana when his plane was shot down over Kigali.
  • C. The withdrawal of the Belgian peacekeeping forces from the capital.
  • D. The RPF's successful capture of the capital city, Kigali.
Question 7 of 10
Who remained in Kigali to run an emergency field hospital and rescue the wounded despite the UN's withdrawal and the escalating violence?
  • A. The French medical corps affiliated with Opération Turquoise.
  • B. The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), led by Philippe Gaillard.
  • C. A contingent of Belgian doctors who refused their government's orders to evacuate.
  • D. A group of American Special Forces medics deployed by President Bill Clinton.
Question 8 of 10
Why did the United States and the UK hesitate to use the word 'genocide' to describe the events in Rwanda during Security Council debates?
  • A. They lacked any credible evidence or reports from the ground indicating that mass killings were actually occurring.
  • B. Acknowledging it as a genocide would legally obligate the UN and its member states to intervene and respond.
  • C. They believed the killings were purely a consequence of a conventional civil war between two equal armies.
  • D. They were waiting for the French government to officially declare it a genocide first to share the political fallout.
Question 9 of 10
According to the text, what was the practical outcome of France's 'Opération Turquoise'?
  • A. It successfully disarmed the Interahamwe and brought the primary leaders of the genocide to justice.
  • B. It provided vital military support to the RPF, allowing them to capture Kigali more quickly and end the war.
  • C. It created a safe haven in the south of Rwanda that effectively protected the perpetrators of the genocide from arrest.
  • D. It reinforced the UNAMIR mission, providing General Dallaire with the 5,500 troops he had originally requested.
Question 10 of 10
What major crisis immediately followed the RPF's victory and the end of the genocide in July 1994?
  • A. The UN imposed severe economic sanctions on the new Rwandan government, causing widespread famine.
  • B. A massive exodus of one million refugees fled into Zaire, where camps became recruiting grounds for a resurgent Hutu Power movement.
  • C. France launched a full-scale military invasion to overthrow the RPF and reinstate the interim Hutu government.
  • D. The remaining Tutsi population initiated a retaliatory genocide against the Hutu, resulting in another million deaths.

A People Betrayed — Full Chapter Overview

A People Betrayed Summary & Overview

A People Betrayed (2000) is a masterful, in-depth look at the international community’s failure to intervene in one of the greatest humanitarian catastrophes since the Holocaust. Through selfish and racist policies, the UN and its Security Council dithered  and denied its way through three months of genocidal slaughter. As a direct result of their inaction, an estimated one million civilians were brutally murdered.

Who Should Listen to A People Betrayed?

  • Anyone interested in how policy translates from boardroom to battlefield
  • History buffs interested in the chilling after-effects of colonialism in Africa
  • People who suspect there’s a dark side to the new world order

About the Author: Linda Melvern

Linda Melvern is a British investigative journalist who has covered the Rwandan genocide for 25 years. Previously, she worked as a journalist on the Sunday Times’s award-winning investigative Insight Team. She also consulted for the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda, lending her personal archive as documentary evidence for the prosecution.

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