Rwanda: Another Example Of Human Rights Watch As An Arm Of US Empire
blackagendareport.com
By Ann Garrison, www.blackagendareport.com
March 24th, 2017
Note: Rwanda is the latest example of Human Rights Watch serving US foreign
policy. We have published articles that show how the board of Human Rights
Watch includes people who have served in presidencies going back to Richard
Nixon through working for Madeline Albright who though the mass killings of
Iraqs through economic sanctions was acceptable and has continued through
the Obama years. The article also exposed the close connections between HRW
and Wall Street interests. Published articles have also highlighted the
biased, misinformation put out by HRW against progressive governments in
Latin America, especially Venezuela. Articles also show how HRW is a
revolving door where war criminals and intelligence abusers go in and out of
government, almost as if they were one entity and how these affiliations
with ex-CIA and NATO officials generates perverse incentives and undermines
any reputation for independence. We also published an open letter from 131
Nobel Laureates for Peace urged them to shut the revolving door between HRW
and the US government. HRW continues to be used by the mass media to promote
US empire policy.
Rwanda: The Absolutist Truth of Human Rights Watch
Human Rights Watch acts as an arm of U.S. foreign policy. This phony
rights organization backs the deportation and prosecution of Rwandan
dissidents like Joseph Nkusi, who dared to maintain that Hutus were also
massacred in the Rwanda bloodbath. Under a minority Tutsi dictatorship,
even using the description Rwandan Genocide is a crime; authorities
enforce a law passed in 2008 making genocide against the Tutsi the only
legal description.
Human Rights Watch is OK with Nkusis prosecution because its own
absolutist conclusions about the genocide are compatible with those of
Rwandas absolutist, totalitarian government.
Human Rights Watch (HRW) is well known for accepting U.S. wars of aggression
so long as theyre conducted according to the Geneva Conventions. HRW
famously crusades for the same U.S. wars of aggression for the purpose of
protecting citizens of other nations from their own governments. Its
warmongering catechism includes Halabja, Rwanda, Srebrenica and now Aleppo,
all of which it cites as failures to protect civilians that compel the U.S.
to humanitarian war evermore.
This month HRWs Central Africa Director, Ida Sawyer, produced an HRW
absolutist classic, A March 8th HRW dispatch. It tells the story of Joseph
Nkusi, a Rwandan blogger and political asylum seeker who was deported from
Norway after a court rejected his claim that he would be persecuted if he
were deported to Rwanda. Nkusi was arrested upon arrival, like most Rwandan
emigrés who fail to convince Western courts that they will be persecuted in
Rwanda. He is now on trial for genocide ideology, a Rwandan crime modeled
on European Holocaust denial laws, which makes it illegal to publicly
deny, revise, trivialize, or negate the Rwandan Genocide. In Rwanda, even
using the description Rwandan Genocide is a crime; authorities enforce a
law passed in 2008 making genocide against the Tutsi the only legal
description.
Both Kagames Tutsi army and Tutsi civilians targeted Hutu people for mass
killing.
Joseph Nkusi is on trial for claiming that both Hutus and Tutsis were
targeted in a double genocide, meaning that members of both groups killed
each other during the Rwandan war and massacres of 1990 1994. Human Rights
Watch is OK with Nkusis prosecution because its own absolutist conclusions
about the genocide are compatible with those of Rwandas absolutist,
totalitarian government:
Some of the writings on Nkusis blog relay claims about the genocide that
are unfounded stating, for example, that both Hutus and Tutsis were
targeted in a double genocide. This is offensive to genocide survivors
[Tutsis], and contrary to research findings by Human Rights Watch and other
independent organizations. Other writings criticize the Rwandan governments
human rights record.
There is abundant evidence that both Kagames Tutsi army and Tutsi civilians
targeted Hutu people for mass killing, not only in Rwanda but also in the
Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC). Canadian journalist Judi Rever has
documented the massacre of Hutu people committed by Kagames army with the
help of Tutsi technocrats in, for example, What Remains Hidden in Rwanda:
The Role of Tutsi Civilians in Killing Hutus. Australian peacekeepers and
Australian artist George Gittoes observed and documented the Kibeho Massacre
of Hutu refugees in Rwanda on April 22,1995. The UN Mapping Report on Human
Rights Abuse, 1993 2003, documented the massacre of Rwandan Hutu refugees
who fled into DRC to escape Kagames advancing army. In Dying to Live: A
Rwandan Familys Five-Year Flight Across the Congo, Hutu refugee
Pierre-Claver Ndacyayisenga recounts their harrowing journey all the way
through the Congolese jungle, from east to west, with Kagames Rwandan
Patriotic Army in pursuit. In Surviving the Slaughter, Marie Beatrice
Umutesi recounts the same horrors, as does the five part documentary Tingi
Tingi Hutu Refugee Massacre.
The UN Mapping Report on Human Rights Abuse documented the massacre of
Rwandan Hutu refugees who fled into DRC to escape Kagames advancing army.
Other well documented challenges to the Human Rights Watch narrative include
Robin Philpots Rwanda and the New Scramble for Africa: from Tragedy to
Useful Fiction, Peter Erlinders The Accidental Genocide, and Barrie
Collinss Rwanda Genocide: The Myth of the Akazu Genocide Experience and
Its Consequences.
It seems that none of this evidence has reached Human Rights Watch or, if
it did, the organization remained unwilling to recant its own absolutist
conclusions about genocide against the Tutsi. According to Ida Sawyer,
Nkusis arrest for daring to differ is justifiable. However, Sawyer is
concerned about Rwandans freedom to criticize the Rwandan governments
human rights record:
Nkusis trial is an opportunity for Rwanda to show that it clearly
distinguishes between genocide ideology a criminal offense in Rwandan
law and free speech, or the freedom to criticize the government or the
ruling party.
While some of his writings are reprehensible, the Rwandan authorities
should ensure that Joseph Nkusi gets a fair trial and is not prosecuted nor
convicted for criticism of the government or the ruling party. International
actors, including the government of Norway, should closely monitor the trial
proceedings and be prepared to publicly denounce any breaches of fair trial
standards or violation of free speech.
As is so often the case, Human Rights Watch knows the one, the only, and the
absolute truth and deploys it to justify human rights crimes, from bombing
Libya and Syria to the imprisonment of a Rwandan blogger who dares to differ
with the Rwandan government and with HRWs own research findings.
