There has been a spike in denial of the 1994 Genocide against the Tutsi in academia and media, Claver Gatete, the Permanent Representative of Rwanda to the United Nations, warned Thursday, April 7, in a message to mark the 28th commemoration of the 1994 Genocide. 

Gatete said remembrance is an important tool to counter genocide denial, which in turn is vital to genocide prevention.

"By keeping the flame of remembrance alive we counter intentional deceit with truth and facts, thereby preventing trivialization of the experiences of survivors, and erasing the memory of the Genocide victims,” he said.

"Education is also integral to fighting genocide denial. To this end, we believe that the United Nations Outreach Programme on the 1994 Genocide against the Tutsi should be given all the necessary tools and resources it needs to be able to carry out its mandate. Strong support should also be extended to the UN Office on Genocide Prevention and Responsibility to Protect in order to fulfill its mandate.”

Claver Gatete.

Given the prevalence of genocide denial and hate speech, the envoy said, Rwanda calls for an international global conference to provide an opportunity for member states to discuss how to counter and criminalize Genocide denial.

Gatete, like most other envoys, noted that the priority of Rwanda is the search for justice to reaffirm the dignity of survivors and genocide victims.

"Justice is also critical to genocide prevention as holding perpetrators accountable for their crimes prevents them from spreading their hateful ideology. All member states have a moral duty to arrest, try or extradite fugitives on their territories. Judicial cooperation is required not only by the principle of international law but also by our common decency and humanity,” Gatete said.

"To this end, we commend the work of the Office of the Prosecutor of the International Residual Mechanism for Criminal Tribunals on the efforts to apprehend genocide perpetrators still at large.”

The 1994 Genocide against the Tutsi was neither an accident nor unavoidable, António Guterres, the Secretary-General of the United Nations, said in his message to mark the 28th commemoration of the 1994 Genocide.

Collective responsibility 

On the same day, at the Palais des Nations, the home of the UN office in Geneva, Switzerland, Rwanda’s Permanent Representative to the United Nations in Geneva, Ambassador Marie Chantal Rwakazina, led a procession for wreath laying at the Memorial Stele in the morning before a commemoration ceremony where she called on the international community to step up their efforts to put in place laws condemning genocide and to eradicate the culture of impunity.

"Genocide is a crime against humanity,” she said.

"Members of the international community have the collective obligation to take measures to prevent and punish the crime of genocide, including by enacting existing legislation and punishing perpetrators.”

Rwakazina called upon members of the international community to step up their efforts, both individually and collectively, to take concrete measures that are necessary: to put in place laws criminalizing genocide and genocide ideology; and to eradicate the culture of impunity.

There are hundreds of genocide suspects who still live freely in different countries. 

Timely justice is one of the ways to honor the victims of genocide against the Tutsi, she said. 

"It is the collective responsibility of the international community to take concrete measures necessary to prevent genocide and to deal with its consequences where it happened.”

Rwakazina recalled that in its Resolution 2150 (2014), the UN Security Council called on states to recommit themselves to preventing and combating genocide and other serious crimes under international law; and underscored the importance of taking into account lessons learned from the 1994 Genocide against the Tutsi in Rwanda.

The 1994, Genocide against the Tutsi was systematically prepared in all different stages of genocide namely: classification, symbolization, discrimination, dehumanization, organization, polarization, preparation, persecution, extermination, and now denial. The Appeal Chamber of the now defunct International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) ruled that between April 6, 1994 and July 17, 1994, genocide was committed against the Tutsi in Rwanda.

"Some genocide deniers spent years alleging that it is the clash of the airplane of Habyarimana Juvenal that triggered the genocide. A recent decision of France's Highest Court, the Cour de Cassation, has refuted conclusively these false allegations,” she noted.

"Regrettably, in total disregard of both the facts and decisions of the international and national competent courts of law, under the pretext of freedom of expression, some people have been engaging in the denial and revisionism of the genocide perpetrated against the Tutsi.

The freedom of expression is no right when it is exercised abusively to propagate genocide ideology and hate speech, she said, adding that such acts must be punishable by law no matter where and by who they are committed - and deserve no sympathies.

"The long arm of the law should catch any one engaged in any forms of genocide denial and revisionism. Genocide is a crime against humanity. Members of the International Community have the collective obligation to take measures to prevent and punish the crime of genocide, including by enacting relevant legislation and punishing perpetrators.”

"In the field of education: the history of the Genocide perpetrated against the Tutsi must be taught in schools so that both present and future generations are well aware of the crime of genocide and are prepared to work together to prevent it from being repeated anywhere again.”