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By Eric Toussaint
April 7, 2014 -- Committee for the Abolition of Third World Debt -- Twenty years ago, beginning April 7, 1994, in less than three months, nearly 1 million Rwandans were exterminated – the exact figure has not yet been determined – because they were (or thought to be) Tutsis. Tens of thousands of moderate Hutus were also slaughtered. This was indeed a genocide, that is, the deliberate destruction of an entire community through mass murder in the aim of preventing their biological and social reproduction.
In this context, it is crucial to investigate the role played by international financial institutions. Everything we know leads us to believe that the policies imposed by these institutions, the main financial backers of General Juvénal Habyarimana’s dictatorial regime, accelerated the process resulting in the genocide. In general, the negative impact of these policies is not taken into consideration to explain the tragic unfolding of the Rwandan crisis. Only a few authors highlight the responsibilities of the Bretton Woods institutions |1|, which have rejected any kind of responsibility.
