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Washington, DC, April 6, 2015 – The National Security Archive and the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum today published the proceedings, documents and rapporteur's report from the critical oral history conference that Foreign Policy magazine called "an unprecedented 2014 gathering of former Rwandan officials and international policymakers who managed the response to the world's worst mass murder since the Holocaust." The new documentation draws attention to flaws in international decision-making that continue to hamper the effective prevention of and response to mass atrocity today. Timed to coincide with the 21st anniversary of the start of the Rwanda genocide in April 1994, today's release includes a fully annotated 230-page transcript of a two-day conference attended by many of the principal international actors on Rwanda. The conference, which took place in The Hague from June 1 to June 3, 2014, was sponsored by the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum and The Hague Institute for Global Justice, with support from the National Security Archive at George Washington University. Conference attendees included the architects of the 1993 Arusha peace accords, the leadership of the UN peacekeeping force known as UNAMIR, four former ambassadors to the UN Security Council, as well as senior US, French, Belgian, and Rwandan officials. Under conference ground rules, the discussions were held behind closed doors, pending the release of an authorized transcript with supporting documentation from a wide array of primary sources. "By assembling so many of the key players in the same room, we were able to analyze the fault lines in the international system in a way that sheds light on our modern-day challenges," said Cameron Hudson, director of the Simon-Skjodt Center for the Prevention of Genocide at the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum. "The goal was to identify moments when international action might have made a difference." The Rwanda conference was the first stage in a broader effort to examine "International Decision-Making in the Age of Genocide." This summer, a group of high-level civilian and military decision-makers will gather in The Hague for a follow-up conference marking the 20th anniversary of the fall of the United Nations "safe area" of Srebrenica. "If we are serious about preventing future Rwandas and Srebrenicas, we must examine the functioning of the international system as a whole," said Abiodun Williams, President of The Hague Institute for Global Justice. "This includes not just the UN Security Council, but the actions of a wide range of traditional and non-traditional actors, including the media." Insights that emerged over the course of the 2 ½ day conference on Rwanda are highlighted in a 32-page Rapporteur report also released today:
Each phase of the "International Decision-Making in the Age of Genocide" project is accompanied by an extensive document declassification effort. The National Security Archive of George Washington University has collected more than 20,000 documents on the Rwanda genocide. Many of the documents have already been posted on the websites of the Archive and the Museum. The remainder will be made available for research later this year, along with finding aids. "We want to provide historians, journalists, and scholars with access to the primary source documents that show how decisions were taken in real time," said Tom Blanton, director of the National Security Archive. "We take readers behind the scenes of the closed sessions of the UN Security Council, as ambassadors wrestled with unspeakable atrocities and gut-wrenching decisions." Conference PublicationsRapporteur's ReportInternational Decision-Making in the Age of Genocide: Rwanda 1990-1994 Edited and Annotated Conference TranscriptAnnex I: Agenda and Participants Annex II: Documents Referenced Conference Briefing BookConference InterviewsGen. Roméo Dallaire, UNAMIR Force Commander - Video Maj. Gen. Henry Anyidoho, UNAMIR - Video Monique Mujawamariya, Rwandan Human Rights Defender - Video Ambassador Ibrahim Gambari, Nigerian Representative to the United Nations - Video Conference Photos |
A group of 40 Rwandan, US, European and international former officials and experts met at The Hague in June 2014 for a conference on the failures of the international response to the 1994 Rwandan genocide. [Photo courtesy of The Hague Institute for Global Justice.]
Rwanda Re-Examined"Unprecedented" 2014 Conference Illuminates International Response (and Lack Thereof) to GenocideTranscript, Documents, Rapporteur's Report Published Online, Marking 21st AnniversaryNational Security Archive Electronic Briefing Book No. 508Posted April 6, 2015 For more information contact: |
