Twenty-five years ago, Rwanda descended into an orgy of violence in which some 800,000 Tutsis and moderate Hutus were massacred by the majority Hutu population over a 100-day period in what was the worst genocide in recent history. The massacres, mostly by gangs wielding machetes, swept across Rwanda and groups of people were killed in their homes and farms, and where they sought shelter in churches and schools. A Rwandan Hutu refugee child desperately tries to waken his mother (Javier Bauluz/AP)The mass killings started after a plane was shot down on April 6 1994, in the capital, Kigali, killing President Juvenal Habyarimana. A Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF) rebel walks by the plane wreckage in which Rwanda’s president Juvenal Habyarimana died (Jean-Marc Bouju/AP)The killers were encouraged by hate messages broadcast on radio stations while Rwandan police, military and other government authorities did not stop the killings. Some of the 334 inmates, who were accused of committing war crimes and participating in the genocide, in prison in Kibungo, Rwanda, in 1994 (Javier Bauluz/AP)The scale of the killings in 1994 was unimaginable but the reporting and photographs taken at the time helped to inform the world of the horrors of the genocide.

Source: Irish Examiner April 06, 2019 07:52 UTC