Posts Tagged ‘Bill Clinton’
15 Years ago today
Author’s Note: This diary is dedicated to the memory of Alison Des Forges, of Human Rights Watch, and author, or principle author, of “Leave None to Tell the Story,” Human Rights Watch’s narrative of the events of the Rwandan Genocide. It surpasses excellence. It’s not that I knew or ever met her, but I’m sure she felt personally compelled, as I have, to write about Rwanda, and certainly found it even more difficult. In her memory, in the memory of those both living and dead who have been touched by this, I have done my level best here. And like General Romeo Dallaire, head of the failed UN peacekeeping mission for Rwanda, I find I can take no consolation from that fact.
Virtually the entire world ignored this genocide, and why that happened is what I try to answer here.
We had a couple of friends over, and you know, I just–we just sat down to dinner, and all of a sudden, there was this huge explosion. And I–I–didn’t naturally, you know, come to me what that was because I wasn’t used to hearing those kinds of sounds.” –Laura Lane, U.S. Embassy, Kigali, Rwanda[1]
“And it went from “There’s been an explosion at the airport” to “We think it’s the ammunition dump at Kinumbi that’s blown up” to “It’s a plane that’s crashed” to “It’s the presidential plane that crashed.” –Brent Beardsley, Military Assistant to General Dallaire[2]
On the evening of 6 April 1994, the presidential airplane carrying Rwandan President Juvenal Habyarimana as well as Cyprien Ntaryamira, President of Burundi was shot down as it slowed and descended on approach to the airport in Kigali, Rwanda. Two shoulder mounted surface-to-air missiles struck the aircraft, the first hitting a wing, and the second impacting the tail. A pair of empty SA-16 missile tubes were later found, their serial numbers indicating that they had once been part of the Iraqi arsenal. Even today, it’s not known who was responsible, but what is known is that within hours, maybe within minutes, certain neighborhoods in Kigali were being patrolled by units of the elite Rwandan Presidential Guard and by the National Police. By daybreak the killing had begun.
The bloodshed continued and spread for eleven weeks, and by the time it was over, an estimated 657,000 men, women and children had perished.
The buzz about Hillary Clinton…
N.B.: This post was written here, but posted on The European Tribune and crossposted on DailyKos. Originally published on 18 November, 2008, I’m moving it out of draft status as a matter of housekeeping and consistency.
We’ve all heard it this week, the skillfully leaked report that Senator Hillary Clinton was being considered for Secretary of State in President-elect Obama’s administration. Then, details emerged about the Senator’s quiet trip to Chicago to confer with Obama, and neither Obama’s press office nor Clinton’s staff issuing a public correction of the basic premise that she’s been offered the post. So it is probable (provided she and Bill pass the vetting process) that she will be nominated, and if so, then she will likely be confirmed as the next Secretary of State.
