1) Rwanda is overpopulated.
2) Soil NPK balance is negative.

There are still some 20-25 years till soil depletion in most areas but no-one knows what will happen next.

I just get sick when I read all these stories about how Internet has spurred Rwanda’s economic growth.

All for now.

Russians in Germany in 1945 also did “rape and displace and torture” on a HUGE scale. This was not without a reason. Americans didn’t do it, but there had been no SS Sturmtruppen burning villages in Iowa or Virginia. Just imagine how much one has to hate Germans to actually rape GERMAN WOMEN. They are (unless they have some Hungarian, Yugoslav or Polish blood) so UGLY that for myself, I might not have done it even if I was paid for it. D$?ks don’t take orders, you know..

Going back to the FDLR. The problem is not the FDLR, their offensive military capability is rudimentary. The problem is that a large part of FARDC, including some in the officer corps, are actually runaway Hutus. And what scares the hell out of Kagame and his pals is that at some point (maybe 10, 20 years from now) they might come back to Rwanda and fight it back for themselves, just like the RPF themselves did in 1990. Therefore the need to brand ‘genocidaires’ even those who were not born in 1994 .

Check here:

http://www.redpepper.ug/column.php?AuthorId=1&PHPSESSID=e0fc12bb6b135fa75fabf911d0d6c2f5

[Of course the 80% figure is outlandish and speculative, and putting a '=' between FDLR and Interhamwe is very questionnable at best, and calling Uganda and Rwanda 'sister countries' will piss many Ugandans off (I won't speculate on Rugyendo's background) - but the problem is captured.]

The FDLR are in fact INTERESTED in Nkunda’s presence because as long as CNDP are there, the frustration of Pareco, Mayi-Mayi and Hunde in general is directed against Nkunda, not all ‘rwandaphones’ in general. It’s Hunde, not Hutu who are Nkunda’s no.1 enemy, and the conflict is more about land than ethnicity.

I guess peace will occur when one group is driven to extinction.

Without doubt the FDLR in the region is a group of genocidal mad-people.

Looks like Nkunda is going to need good lawyers more than PR tips.

How is it that his Rwandan Tutsi brethren turned against him ? Can you explain that to us ? Silly question. I am quite sure you see clearly through all this fog and that you will explain it all to us.

I guess that the Rwandans did not entirely share your opinion on Nkunda any more. Ignorant, blind fools these Rwandans.

I thought that,according to you, Kagame and his peops were the good guys in this story. Does that mean that Nkunda is not the hero you thoug hthe was or that the Rwandan government are now the super-villains ?

Or maybe is it that things are a little more complex than you think ?

Could it be that you got a little carried away in your analysis ?

You know, different shades of grey.

I admit there IS a small RDF force (a battalion task force, apparently) in the DRC which entered the country on Tuesday, officially to join 2 Congolese battalions in an operation aimed at forceful disarmament of both FDLR and those CNDP elements which might remain loyal to Nkunda after his ‘toppling’ by Ntaganda.

I was too much concentrated on the events surrounding Ntaganda’s ‘coup’ and the subsequent arrest of Nkunda in Rwanda, and failed to pay attention to this development.

However that proves my point regarding the “army of genocidaires”. Which kind of “army” is this that you can “forcefully disarm” (not just disperse!) with a force of 3 battalions, of which 2 are unlikely to engage in combat at all?

One possibility is that there’s really no “disarmament”, and nobody to disarm, at least in the operational area, the whole operation being just a cover-up of a deal made between Kabila and Kagame at Nkunda’s expense.

The best way you can understand Central African politics is by comparing it to 16th century Europe. Sex, lies.. and again lies..

Ok, some countries have more sex (Uganda), others more lies (Rwanda) in the ‘cocktail’, but that depends more on the personality of the respective presidents..)

I’ve never claimed to be an expert on the Great Lakes. I do know a lot more about the history than your average Joe, but certainly nowhere near as much as you. However, despite your knowledge you seem to ignore important points which are critical to the narrative.

You’ve never mentioned the RPA invasion of Oct 90, which as pakk points out, could clearly be defined as an aggression on the part of Uganda. These same RPF forces who you praise for their restraint were guilty of the supreme crime of international aggression.

Why? Why do you ignore this? Why was the invasion not stopped by the, ahem, international community. The same international community who at precisely the same time were getting their titties in a twist about Saddam Husseins invasion of Kuwait.

Why? That’s a rhetorical question by the way. Though if you choose to try to explain it, I welcome the amusement it’ll provide.

As much as I despise the RPF/RPA, it’s nothing compared to the disdain I have for western leaders whose manipulation of the situation for their personal and national benefit allowed, nay, caused it to escalate to ‘genocide’.

I’m perturbed by your persistent dismissal of Kagame’s responsibility for the shootdown, based entirely on putting your fingers in your ears and repeatedly shouting ‘make the bad man go away.’ Still if your integrity isn’t important to you who am I to interfere.

Finally, ‘at the best…???’ Interesting way to put it… To clarify, I’m not anti-Tutsi. I’m also not anti-RPF, but only because it’s NOT ABOUT ME. If I had any jurisdiction here, I’d be so anti-RPF it’d make your head spin. My jurisdiction is the aforementioned western leaders, of whom I am decidedly anti.

Now stop being impressed and start answering the charges.

a) If you had read my post carefully, you would not have got an impression that I’m “triumphantly declaring” the investigation by the French prosecution as “ultimate proof” of anything. It is clear however that the RPF leadership DOES have a case to answer. The fact that instead of answering the charges of murdering 2 French citizens (which are legally, not just politically, enforceable - unlike the ICC charges against Karadzic or El-Bashir) and proving them wrong the RPF is engaging in PSYOPS against the French government, is curious at least.

Interestingly, by doing what they are doing, the Rwandan government has mirrored the ignorance of the Russian government which the latter demonstrated in its futile attempts to have Zakayev extradited. It’s outright stupid to counter justice with propaganda; the only outcome is infuriating the judge.

b) Just as there is no “ultimate proof” as to who actually was behind the shooting down of the plane, there is no “ultimate proof” that FAR as an ORGANIZATION was part of the genocide against Tutsis - unless you are willing to trust the RPF 100%, which I am not inclined to do considering that these fellows could even call a person like Bizimungu a “Hutu extremist”.

By the way, the reason why the Rwandan government hates the pro-RPF “Hotel Rwanda” (oh, yeah, they do!) so much is because the FAR were not shown as ‘genocidaires’, but as “murderers by negligence” at worst.

c) Mugunga WAS a REFUGEE CAMP. The fact that the ex-Rwanda government and Interhamwe cadres had considerable political influence among the refugees does not change this fact.

d) You might need to consider the following question: if infiltration of Rwanda in 1990 by a Tutsi insurgent force was not stopped by “the International Community” (whatever that is), even though it could be clearly defined as an aggression on the part of Uganda in terms of the UN Charter, why did a [possible] infiltration by a Hutu force in 1996 have to be prevented through an attack at refugee camps, resulting in hundreds of thousands of Hutu civilians “disappearing”? A difficult question, unless you can label any politically conscious Hutu a “genocidaire”.

The RPF by that time had already developed its own extremist ideology, that of “countergenocidairianism”, and they were branding any dissident a “genocidaire” just like today they brand them “genocide denialists” or “genocide apologists”.

Remember also that this “preemptive action” triggered events that resulted in MILLIONS of Congolese deaths - and those Congolese were not Hutu or Tutsi, but Luba, Kongo, Azande, Mangbetu and Lendu to mention just some of the tribes..

Ask the Congolese whether what the RPF was doing in the DRC constitutes “genocide” - they can only give you one answer. A huge country was raised, pillaged and decimated under the pretext of protecting the 200,000 Tutsi who (if you consider genocide statistics correct) would have remained in Rwanda by that time. The West has for 14 years been so stigmatized by the 1994 genocide, that it has ignored the murderous irrationality of what was going on.

Lastly, I would not advise arguing in terms of “who started first” becasue we will then only end up with those shields of Tutsi kings decorated with dried Hutu penises..

e) About “bigger numbers of murderous FAR soldiers and Interahamwe militias” - you would probably need to check the UN and MONUC data on the forces involved in the DRC conflict to see that there has been no serious Hutu force in the DRC, at least from abt 1998, and the fighting took place among very different forces.

Officially, there are no foreign forces in the DRC at the moment except the UPDF who are conducting their “Operation Thunder Lightning” (if an operation has a stupid, name, it will definitely have a stupid concept! haha). The story of an “army of genocidaires” is plain irrelevant today. It is CNDP which is the aggressor, surpassing even the standards of “preemption” set by Kagame in 1996, and the Congolese who are targeted have nothing to do with either Hutu or Tutsi.

f) As for the glorified “restraint” of Tutsi soldiers - it would probably be needed to interview the Congolese living in CNDP-controlled area, otherwise I would restrain myself from any judgement. I suspect though, they would not quite share the same view..

Beyond some authentic cases of human right violations by RPA soldiers, that are and should continue to be investigated and punished, those soldiers demonstrated an unbelievable level of restraint that I can not even start to compare to what soldiers of our own western armies would have done in comparable circumstances. As their soldiers fought bigger numbers of murderous FAR soldiers and Interahamwe militias, they found as they were advancing, the bodies of their own parents, sisters, children, etc. but managed not to turn their machine guns against any Hutu passing by.
Yes, there have clearly been a number of collateral victims of RPA military campaign and yes, there have been cases of Human Right violations. But the numbers are, proportionately, extremely small compared to the civilian victims of the Allies bombing raids in Dresden or the innocent populations killed by US troops in Vietnam or Iraq where our soldiers were not exposed to a fraction of what RPA soldiers faced.
When and if you have been to Rwanda, did you take a little time to analyze the extremely complex and vicious nature of the battles between the RPA/RDF and the exFAR/Interahamwe in 1994, 1996, 1997 and later on within the DRC?

With regard to Eastern DRC, recent developments, including the fact that Rwandan troops are today back on the Congolese territory, but this time by invitation from the Congolese Government are quite telling. They explain to those who really want to understand that the existence of the CNDP and the source of its strength is nothing but the consequence of the failure to address one core problem: the presence of armed ‘genocidaires’ in the region. This evil that the International Community and western “experts” have continued to ignore will remain a persistent source of conflict in the region as long as it is not dealt with.

So, Tomarse, I am truly impressed. As a long time observer of the region myself, I am impressed by the depth of your research on the history and dynamics of the Great Lakes region. But precisely, you clearly know too much about this complex history to pretend ignoring naked truths such as the terrible and painful reality of the genocide against Tutsis. And that is why I can not describe you as anything else that an anti-Tutsi or, at the best, anti-RPF activist.

I will find some other time to respond to Pakk who triumphally presents the French investigation as the ultimate proof of RPF responsibility in the 7 April incident and conveniently forgets that the attack on Mugunga (See http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,985572-1,00.html if you want to understand how much of a “refugee camp” Mugunga was) came after numerous complaints and warnings to the International Community and as a full scale attack from the reorganized exFAR army and Interahamwe on Rwanda was imminent.

Then, about “close to a million Hutu refugees” who “walked back, unhindered, to Rwanda”. Who was there to attest that they “walked back” voluntarily? And if yes, what could’ve happened between 1994 and 1996 that made them change their opinion on the RPF 180 degrees?

“Refugee camps containing 1.2 million people then broke up and more than 500,000 Rwandans went home. But reconnaissance flights managed to locate only a fraction of the remaining hundreds of thousands.”

(www.cnn.com/WORLD/9612/06/zaire/index.html)

Nobody ever bothered to investigate how the “remaining hundreds of thousands” disappeared.

And by the way, attacking refugee camps is criminal - in a strictly legal sense, - for which one has to be charged and tried. The fact that these guys are now serving as advisors to the Clinton Global Initiative and hosting Bill Gates - while Karadzic rots in the Hague - only serves to show that the the whole international criminal justice system is nothing but a piece of politicized rubbish.

As far as I know, Kagame and his guys were indicted by a French court mostly because the French prosecution has succeeded in providing evidence that the two Igla-1 SAMs used in the attack had been supplied to Uganda on an official state contract just prior to the event. All the RPA weaponry came from Uganda, as a matter of fact.

Apparently, the UN investigation, while never concluded, has not shown it would have been impossible for the RPA to penetrate the vicinity of the airport and launch the missiles at the target.

There was already a battalion of RPA stationed in Kigali since 1992, by the way.

It would not be inconceivable that some of Habyarimana’s PG officers were part of the conspiracy. Power and money are great motivators, much better than any tribal sentiment.

FAR was a joke as it had swollen in numbers 4xfold sine 1990. I’ve also heard quite often that Interahamwe had been thoroughly penetrated by RPF/CMI agents (such as Anastase Gasana and Desire Murenzi) by that time, but, honestly speaking, I can’t make a qualified judgement on this one.

Concerning the role of Hutus in the RPF government: they even had a Hutu president, Bizimungu, 1994 to 2000, who was forced to step down immediately he showed first signs of independent behavior, labeled a “Hutu extremist” in 2004, sentenced to 15 years same year, and released in 2007. In Rwanda, the government is not controlled by either Tutsi or Hutu. It is controlled by Kagame and his few close associates who followed him in the bush. In this respect, it is similar to Uganda, with one major difference that in Rwanda PREVENTIVE repression (yes, USSR-1937 style) is commonplace.

Well, honestly, the 1994 story is a bit off-topic. But it is important in one respect. At the moment, there is no violence against the Banyamulenge in the DRC. None of it. But there’s plenty of violence committed by the CNDP who allegedly act on behalf of Banyamulenge/Tutsi. So the question which begs attention is whether Nkunda/Ntaganda are trying to actually PROVOKE mass violence against the Banyamulenge to make sure this gold/diamond/columbite party goes on.

Whatever goes on here, seems to be much more about power and money than about Hutus or Tutsis..