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This News Service is posted by the
International Secretariat of Amnesty International,
1 Easton Street, London WC1X 8DJ
(Tel +44-71-413-5500, Fax +44-71-956-1157)
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 AI INDEX AFR 47/17/96
12 AUGUST 1996


RWANDA: SHARP INCREASE IN KILLINGS COULD PLUNGE RWANDA BACK
INTO A CYCLE OF VIOLENCE

While unarmed civilians continue to be massacred in Burundi
at the hands of the security forces and armed groups, a
similar pattern of alarming intensity is emerging again in
neighbouring Rwanda, only two years after the genocide there
which claimed as many as one million lives in 1994, Amnesty
International said in a report issued today.
      The first half of 1996 has been marked by an escalation
in killings by members of the Rwandese Patriotic Army  (RPA)
and by armed opposition groups.  Between April and July
especially,  violence directed against unarmed civilians,
including women, the elderly, children and even babies,
intensified, claiming more than 650 lives.
        ~Urgent action is needed to prevent a further
spiralling of violence if Rwanda is to be saved from a
repetition of its own recent past, or from becoming a mirror
of the violence which is tearing apart neighbouring Burundi,~
Amnesty International said.

      The victims may have been targeted because of their
ethnic origin, because they were suspected of collaborating
with ~the enemy~, because they have tried to expose the
truth, or killed simply because they were in the wrong place
at the wrong time.

      ~Both the RPA and the armed opposition bear
responsibility for these grave human rights abuses. Their
respective responsibility for the killings should be exposed
and measures taken to prevent further tragic violations of
human rights,~ Amnesty International said.
      The increase in attacks by armed opposition groups --
believed to be members or allies of the former Rwandese army
and militia responsible for the genocide of 1994 -- has led
to a parallel increase in extrajudicial executions of unarmed
civilians by the RPA.

      ~In the present climate in Rwanda, each killing carries
with it the real prospect of reprisal,~ Amnesty International
said.

      Soldiers have killed scores of people during military
~cordon and search~ operations.  For example, on 5, 9 and 10
July 22 people were reportedly killed in Karago commune in
Gisenyi. On 9 and 10 July around 100 others were killed in
Giciye (Gisenyi) and Nyamutera (Ruhengeri). The victims were
shot by RPA soldiers who reportedly suspected them of being
infiltrators, even though they included children as young as
10 years old.  At least 47 more were killed in Ramba commune
(Gisenyi) on 13 July.

      Members of the security forces have also killed several
local officials.  For example, Vincent Munyandamutsa,
bourgmestre (district administrator) of Rushashi, and
Floribert Habinshuti, assistant prosecutor of Rushashi, were
among 18 people killed in Rural Kigali on 7 July.

      ~The RPA appears to be using the ~need to fight the
enemy~ as a pretext for eliminating people whose presence or
influence is perceived as a threat to the current
government,~ Amnesty International said.

      The human rights organization recognizes the need for
the Rwandese Government to apprehend individuals who have
been responsible for crimes against humanity and who continue
to instil fear in the population. However, this should not
provide government forces with a licence to use lethal force
against unarmed civilians who pose no threat to life.

      At the same time, armed opposition groups based in
neighbouring countries continue to carry out deliberate and
arbitrary killings of unarmed civilians in Rwanda. The
victims have included vulnerable individuals such as the
elderly, children and babies. They are almost always killed
at night, often in their homes. Some of these killings are
characterized by especially brutal methods.
      On 27 June, 28 people, including several children, were
killed in Giciye commune in Gisenyi.  The victims were
attacked with guns, grenades, machetes and clubs. Those who
died included Tutsi survivors of the 1994 genocide and Tutsi
refugees who had lived in Zaire for decades and returned
recently to Rwanda.

      However, in some instances, it seems likely that
members of the RPA were in fact responsible for killings
which were publicly attributed to opposition groups, as in
the case of  46 detainees at the communal detention centre at
Bugarama, in Cyangugu, who were killed with guns and grenades
in the night of 19-20 May.

      ~The Government of Rwanda has been quick to expose many
of the recent killings as the work of armed opponents; in
other instances it has claimed that civilians were caught in
cross-fire between insurgents and the RPA.  Yet evidence to
substantiate these assertions is sometimes scarce,~ Amnesty
International said.

      ~Independent investigations should be carried out to
establish responsibility for each incident, unless there is
incontrovertible evidence as to the identity of the
perpetrators.~

      Individuals inside Rwanda who denounce human rights
violations by government forces are subjected to threats,
arrests, and persistent intimidation.  They are publicly
branded as ~genocidaires~ or defenders of the militia allied
to the former regime.

      ~The government is attempting to conceal the truth
about human rights violations by its own forces.  Those who
dare to speak out are the first to suffer,~ Amnesty
International said.

      The absence of freely-available information abouthuman rights  
violations by the RPA confirms a widely-held
perception among some foreign governments, non-governmental
organizations and media that human rights violations by the
current government forces are negligible.
      ~The result is that the international community is
consciously or unconsciously turning a blind eye to the
emergence of another human rights crisis in Rwanda,~ Amnesty
International said.

\ENDS

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For more information, please refer to Amnesty International~s
Report,
Rwanda: Alarming Resurgence of Killings (Index: AFR 47/13/96)




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