The 1994 Genocide against the Tutsi had a devastating impact on children, who made up 60 per cent of the victims. Many were subjected to brutal suffering and long-term consequences, witnessing and experiencing horrific events that no child should see. Children were both politically and forcefully recruited and used as a resourceful tool for killings, lacking a better understanding of their actions and consequences. They were susceptible to manipulation by propaganda that moved adults. Young girls were raped and killed as a genocide strategy, profoundly affecting their health and safety during that period. Majority of the youth participated actively in the Genocide as members of the Interahamwe while others did so as part of the general mobilization of the civilian population. The international community's failure to stop the Genocide was a testament to the neglect and total abandonment of civilian population and children, in particular, in the critical time of need for protection. With the appeal to the United Nations, Rwanda, a small and poor country, did not receive the urgency and assistance it needed from the international community to stop the Genocide. The impact of the Genocide is saddening, but the gravity of genocide on children is unimaginable and unspeakable. The genocidaires shattered the future dreams of the young ones and denied them their childhood opportunities to grow in peaceful families and society. Children experienced 100 days of suffering with no food, water, and proper sanitation. They suffered from malnutrition and starvation while others died of diarrhea due to poor hygiene. Many were left terrified by what they saw, causing them mental health deterioration that transcended the traumas to the current generation born after the Genocide. Up to now, many of the surviving children throughout Rwanda carry physical and psychological evidence and burdens of the Genocide. According to a survey of three thousand children done by UNICEF, 80 percent of children interviewed experienced a death in the family during the period of the Genocide, 70 percent witnessed a killing or an injury, 35 percent saw other children killing or injuring other children, 88 percent saw dead bodies or body parts, 31 percent witnessed rape or sexual assault, 80 percent had to hide for protection, 61 percent were threatened that they would be killed, and 90 percent believed that they would die. Besides those who participated actively, many who managed to survive and belonged to the Tutsi families sought refuge to escape the massacres by hiding with relatives or family friends. Many Tutsi children had to flee the massacres by themselves because their parents had been killed or their families dispersed. Desperate parents separated from their children or pretended not to know them simply because of the hardship they were passing through by then. After the Genocide, it was estimated that over 300,000 children were left orphans with none or a single parent for the lucky ones. “I was 10 years old when the Genocide happened. When my parents were killed, my brother and I followed a big crowd that was seeking refuge in the DRC. we travelled for many days on foot with no food, I didn't know where we were headed yet I was following the Genocidaire but luckily I survived but my brother didn't make it, shared a genocide survivor. The journey of restoring hope and dignity among Rwandans at the end of the Genocide started by recognizing children as a special group that required special care and attention to compensate for the lost generation. This was a great opportunity to restore the lives of innocent children by facilitating their mental rehabilitation and offering family and alternative care and comprehensive rights to their primary needs. The strategies adopted to support the Rwandan child were effective and prevented children from suffering abuse and the horrific consequences of war. The upbringing of the new generation is evidence that the Genocidaire didn't win in the end. The young people are now born in a beautiful, safe and progressive country. The prioritization and protection of children's welfare after the Genocide gave Rwanda hope to achieve humanity again denied by the Genocidaires. For the past several years, Rwanda was ranked among a few African nations that achieved both the Millennium Development Goals and is on track to achieve the sustainable development goals yet it had just recovered from a Genocide. This is a great example that recognizes the position children hold in the Rwandan society. It is also important to highlight that both the nation's vision 2050 and the current National Strategy for Transformation explicitly puts the rights and welfare of children at the centre of endorsed national programmes which guarantees a stable, secure and progressive future for all Rwandans starting with children. Although Rwandans have a dark history, currently, looking at the development measures such as education, health, and survival indicators that assess the rights and welfare of a child, Rwanda could be ranked as one of the best places for a child to be born. Another good example that justifies political commitments to the promotion and protection of the rights of children is Rwanda’s endorsement and effective implementation of international legal frameworks that protects children from all forms of abuses. Examples of these include the international convention on the rights and welfare of children, elimination of child labor, the kigali principles on protection of civilians and the Vancouver Principles on UN peacekeeping missions and the prevention of the recruitment and use of children as soldiers in armed conflict among others. The adoption of these mandates coupled with their cultural considerations of a child in society “Umwana n’umwami” led to the establishment and hosting of the Dallaire Institute for Children, Peace and Security in Rwanda. The African Hub aspires for a world where children are at the heart of peace and security through prevention of the recruitment and use of children as soldiers in violence and transforming the cycles of violence. We should all understand that Genocide was not only a military affair, and its impact was not exclusively felt by combatants. Though easy to describe, the effects of war on children are often hard to quantify and worsens in the context of the 1994 Genocide against the Tutsi. In the case of the Genocide in Rwanda, children suffered unjustifiable weight of serious breaches of humanity and failure of international community. Rwandans and the world should work towards preventing conflict and wars from erupting in the first place for they cause and expose children to terrible and multiple violations of human rights.
