Former French Prime Minister Edouard Balladur said on Wednesday that in 1994 France avoided becoming an “acolyte” of the Rwandan Hutu genocidal government by preventing a French military operation in Kigali, which he said was called for by the entourage of Socialist President François Mitterrand.
In the spring of 1994, when the Tutsi genocide was underway in Rwanda, “all those who advocated an intervention by the French army were in fact in favour of the Hutu government”, and wanted to support it against the Tutsi rebels of the RPF (Rwandan Patriotic Front), Balladur said in an interview with France 24 and RFI.
France need not apologise for Rwandan genocide - ex French PM africanews.com - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from africanews.com Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
Why France has opened its archives on the Rwandan genocide President Emmanuel Macron’s legacy could yet include a brave reckoning with his country’s recent past. Andrew Renneisen / Getty Images
A ceremony to remember the victims of the Rwandan genocide in Kigali, the country s capital, in 2019. Twenty-seven years ago last week, on 6 April 1994, a plane carrying the Rwandan president Juvénal Habyarimana and his Burundian counterpart was shot down over Kigali, Rwanda’s capital. The assassination was the trigger for the Rwandan genocide, during which around 800,000 people, mostly of the minority Tutsi ethnic group, were massacred by Hutu génocidaires.
France opens archives on Rwanda genocide
President Emmanuel Macron said he hoped that the move would help improve the understanding of France s role in the atrocities that took place in 1994. His Rwandan counterpart, Paul Kagame, welcomed the decision.
Almost 1 million people were killed in a matter of months in Rwanda, many of them hastily buried in mass graves
Macron s office pledged to make about 8,000 documents linked to French activities in the African nation publicly available.
The move follows a government-ordered report released in March, which found that French authorities remained blind to the preparations for genocide.
It forms part of Macron s efforts to improve relations with Rwanda.