From April to July of 1994, the country of Rwanda was a bloodbath. Hutus slaughtered Tutsis and their supporters in droves with whatever weapon lay on hand – machete, club, or gun. The world did nothing. When world leaders started to speak out, the administration changed their tactics but did little else. 800,000 people died, and more were displaced from their homes.

Tragedies happen every day, but organizations like the United Nations were built to stop genocides from occurring. The Rwandan genocide was seen as a failure not only on the part of Rwanda, but on the UN, especially since they had peacekeeping troops on the ground. These troops were ordered to stand their ground and not get involved. They managed to save almost 30,000 refugees who were under their jurisdiction, but the genocide didn’t end until the Rwandan Patriotic Front took control of the country.

Events like these don’t happen in a vacuum. The colonization of Africa was hugely detrimental to most people groups living there. The space later known as Rwanda was inhabited by the Hutu and Tutsi tribes. To survive, they divided the labor. Tutsis took landowner responsibilities while Hutus took worker responsibilities.

When Germany took over in the late 1800s, they saw this as proof that the Tutsis were superior to the Hutus. Their policy was to select a group of the indigenous people and groom them to be intermediaries between the other inhabitants and the ruling country. In this way, they set the people against each other. When Belgium took over during World War I, they continued this practice. Rwanda gained autonomy through Hutu rebellion in 1962, and by then the lines had already been drawn.

The Tutsis were discriminated against severely. They had to fight to send their children to school and were not allowed participation in government. Several escaped to Uganda, and it was there that the Rwandan Patriotic Front was created in order to protect the Tutsi people and to work toward returning them to Rwanda.  There were almost forty years of conflict, death, and misery. Hatred and fear were the means of keeping the government in power.

It erupted in April of 1994 with the deaths of the military-installed Rwandan president, Juvenal Habyarimana, and neighboring Burundi president, Cyprien Ntaryamira. The Tutsis were accused of their murder, and the government told the Hutu people through radio to wipe the Tutsis out. First, Hutus who weren’t anti-Tutsi should be killed, and then Tutsi wives or husbands. The genocide began, house by house.

No one tried to keep it a secret. Journalists, television cameras, and UNAMIR (United Nations Assistance Mission in Rwanda) all gave steady reports, but the little that made it out to the West was described as “ethnic violence.” The most that was done by the participants to keep it quiet was the government’s request that there be no more bodies in the streets. The agonizing thing about this genocide was that it pitted friend against friend and relative against relative. Ordinary people did awful things. The rest of the world stood by. It was June before anyone called it a genocide – a term that here means “the racially based and institutionalized killing of a group of people.”  It ended in July when the Rwandan Patriotic Front engaged in a military offensive that gave them control of the country.

Several Hutus became refugees themselves, then, fearful for their lives and of retaliation. Where the Tutsis had fled to Uganda, the Hutus fled to the Congo. In their absence, the RPF established a new government and held Rwanda’s first elections. Some Hutus made plans to reconquer Rwanda, but the Congo wanted to clear the camps. In 1996, they were forced out, and several returned to Rwanda. Many of these were still Hutu loyalists.

The Rwandan government surprised everyone with its reception of these refugees. Contrary to the harsh treatment given to the Tutsis, it declared that suspected génocidaires would not be put on trial. The government had no room for new prisoners, and these were Rwandan citizens. The new president said,

“The Rwandan people were able to live together peacefully for six hundred years and there is no reason why they can’t live together in peace again. Let me appeal to those who have chosen the murderous and confrontational path, by reminding them that they, too, are Rwandans: abandon your genocidal and destructive ways, join hands with other Rwandans, and put that energy to better use.”

Survivors and killers had to live side by side and work together to survive. Some of the génocidaires returned to killing, but several went back to normal life. The leaders of the genocide have been tried. The Rwandan government is stable, and the UN reworked how it reacted to international crises. From tragedies and horrors like these, there is no easy recovery and no immediate solution. Memories are still fresh, and the victims still live. Maybe Rwanda will be healed two generations from now; maybe three.

But, for now, the country is whole, and its people are incredibly strong.