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Tutsis In Rwanda Genocide

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Tutsis In Rwanda Genocide
In just 100 days in 1944 over 800,000 tutsis were killed in the Rwandan genocide. That is a horrible and shocking fact, but the worst fact is that no one stepped in to help them. From 1922 to 1962 Belgium came and took Rwanda over. There were two different kinds of people in Rwanda, the Hutus and the Tutsis. The Hutus made up about 85% of Rwanda while the Tutsi was a minority making up only about 14%. Despite being a minority Belgium favored the Tutsi people because of their longer noses and brighter skin, they thought they looked more European. Belgium gave the Tutsis power to control the Hutus, kind of like in the Holocaust how they had Kappos. They were called the Tutsi Elites. The Tutsis treated the Hutus like they were nothing and always …show more content…
Rwanda is located in central Africa and is not very big, you could compare it to the state of Massachusetts in the United States. It has little arable land and has no important natural resources that the United States could use. “The US arguably chose to ignore the Rwandan genocide of 1994. Rwanda was not an oil, gold or diamond rich country and from an economic perspective, the US did not have a lot to gain by intervening.” I found this quote in an article I was reading, it shows us how the United States decided to ignore the genocide due to to the fact that Rwanda had nothing of value to offer. They basically said that intervening would not benefit them in any way so they had no reason to help. President Bill Clinton's administration knew Rwanda was being engulfed by genocide in April 1994 but buried the information to justify its inaction, according to classified documents made available for the first time. The president did not think Rwanda was important enough to be thought about. Him not saying that he knew about the genocide gave him an excuse not to intervene and made it okay. He allowed the massacre to go on and acted as if he did not know, in fact senior officials privately used the word genocide within 16 days of the start of the killings, but chose not to do so publicly because the president had already decided not to step in and help. The United States let the genocide happen with no intention of helping all because Rwanda had nothing of value to give back. President Clinton was basically saying resources were worth more than human life. "Our conclusion is there is one overriding failure which explains why the UN could not stop or prevent the genocide, and that is a lack of resources and a lack of will - a lack of will to take on the commitment necessary to prevent the genocide.” The United Nations didn't want to help

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