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| President Habyarimana as Prime Minister |
President Juvenal Habyarimana was president of Rwanda from March 8, 1937 to April 6, 1994. He was a Hutu, who was married to Agathe Habyarimana who was also assassinated by Hutu extremists after becoming Prime Minister after her husband's death. She was one of the moderate Hutus who were against the genocide and wanted to negotiate some kind of treaty or agreement with each side. The Hutu extremists saw her as a threat to their bloody campaign and decided to assassinate her as well. Habyarimana was assassinated on April 6, 1994 onboard his presidential plane, which was shot down by a missile.
The murder of President Habyarimana is extremely important in the Rwanda genocide for a few key reasons. The Hutus blamed Tutsi Paul Kagame and his rebels (the RPF) for killing the president, thus initiating their genocide.
This article describes whether or not the Tutsis were responsible for this attack. The article blames the Hutus for the killing of their president. It is said that Habyarimana's own people planned out his death and fellow Prime Minister of Burundi Cyprien Ntaryamira’s death (Tutsi -- also on Habyarimana's plane). The Hutus killed their president for another reason as well, which is explained in the article. It states that the Hutus shot down the president to destroy a peace agreement with the Tutsis. In my opinion this article is right, mainly for one reason. The genocide happened too quickly, as if it was planned out. After the death, Hutus exclaimed that they now had a reason to start the killing. Almost immediately after the death, people were being assassinated. People who were thought to be able to stop the conflict were also immediately killed. I don’t think the Tutsis would have wanted to start the massacre of their own people.
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| A map of Rwanda |
Jaime, you did a really good job with your blog. It was really interesting and it was apparent that you understood what you were talking about the whole time. The format and the pictures were also very cool. It was really interesting to learn new things about the President of Rwanda, Juvenal Habyarimana, and his family that I did not find in my own research. It was also interesting how you went into a subject that is very controversial and how you tried to uncover what really happened to President Juvenal Habyarimana’s plane. You presented a lot of solid points and overall did an amazing job with your blog!
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