Comment to Blair's article "Stand with Rwanda"

Begin forwarded message:

From: Tiana Mwiza <tianamwiza@yahoo.com>
Date: February 22, 2013, 2:15:33 PM EST
To: "Democracy_Human_Rights@yahoogroupes.fr" <Democracy_Human_Rights@yahoogroupes.fr>
Subject: Re: *DHR* Stand with Rwanda
Reply-To: Democracy_Human_Rights@yahoogroupes.fr

A nice comment to this article:
Rwandankunda
It is articles like this that continue to stir hatred in the region and convince the majority of people that there is an international conspiracy to support Kagame's interests at any cost. There has been MANY UN reports, consistently showing that Kagame is a maniac killer and a hateful despot. At this time, such allegations are hardly mere speculation. International organizations cannot consistently accuse Kagame of heinous crimes if he is the clean guy he purports to be.

So do Mr. Blair and his ilk continue to support this gangster? One may want to assume that they have concluded that he is the least evil in a land full of monsters. But is that the reality of Rwanda? Can't you find a Rwandan who is less tainted with innocent blood out of 11 million? The justification given in this piece for supporting Kagame are not only unconvincing, they are OFFENSIVE. Put into perspective that the level of death tool in DRC is more than five times that of Rwanda. Consider the number of rape victims, the babies smashed to death and the people "buried alive" by Kagame's supported militias. Does the growth in Rwanda really justify such heinous acts? It is really difficult to understand how Blair draws his conclusions.

Blair has been on the record saying before that he "fully supports Kagame". In other parts of the world, this wouldn't matter at all. Otherwise, good people support dictators all the time. Friendships sometimes triumph over logic and common sense. Even Hitler had his admirers. But the problem here is that Blair is not just an ordinary person. Together with Bufftet, their views will influence international policy makers on how to treat Kagame. At a time when most reputable scholars have been urging the world to take a tougher stance, this essay is both outdated and misplaced.

Yet we are all fully aware that the future of the region will not be determine by the likes of Tony Blair or even Buffet. The future is for the people of Rwanda and the Congo to decide. We will work with true friends of Rwanda, those who choose to support justice, freedom and democracy. This is a temporary setback, but the overall struggle for a region free of murderous dictators will continue--regardless of what both Blair and Buffet think.

Blair and Buffet are disingenuous by linking together the FDLR and the Kagame supported M23. There is NO evidence to support the claims that M23 exists to fight FDLR. In fact, M23 has made it clear that their aim is regime change. They do not want control of swaths of Walikale (where what remains of FDLR inhabit) but they want to overthrow Kinshasa. The DRC has continuously cooperated with Rwanda on various operations against the FDLR. In fact, at the time when M23 decided to take over Goma (the Congolese town of eastern Congo), Rwandan special forces were already on DRC's soil by Kabila's invitation. Rwanda has lauded the cooperation as a success--and most observers agree that these operations completely weakened the FDLR. So why would Rwanda go ahead to support a militia pursuing regime change in DRC? The answer is as old as politics.

Lastly, Blair does not even bother to discuss the other side of the Rwandan story. Just today the BBC reported that an island prison was being used to detain military deserters. Opposition activists are languishing in jail, the president does not condone any freedom of speech and civil society is severely curtailed. Surely Mr. Blair as a Rwandan "adviser on governance" must be fully aware of these issues. Could it be that the man who supported the invasion of Iraq to support democracy does not see the merits of democracy in Rwanda?
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On Feb 22, 2013, at 1:30 PM, "agnesmurebwayire" <agnesmurebwayire@yahoo.fr> wrote:

Tony Blair, Howard G. Buffet, February 21, 2013

http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2013/02/21/_stand_with_rwanda_aid_un_report

Over the last 15 years, the Democratic Republic of Congo has witnessed unspeakable tragedy. Between 1998 and 2008, the Second Congo War claimed an estimated 5.4 million lives, making it the most deadly conflict since World War II. Today, the underlying causes of conflict remain unresolved -- as shown by the recent escalation of fighting in the country's eastern provinces over the last year. In the last six months alone, the United Nations estimates that fighting between the government and the M23 insurgency has displaced up to 900,000 people, with reports of serious human rights abuses on all sides.

In November 2012, a group of experts commissioned by the U.N. Security Council released a report that centered primarily on Rwanda's alleged role in the conflict. The U.N. report makes serious allegations against the government of Rwanda -- allegations the government strongly denies -- and has led a number of Western governments and multilaterals to suspend aid to Rwanda, totalling $245 million.

We believe this is the wrong approach. Slashing international support to Rwanda ignores the complexity of the problem within DRC's own borders and the history and circumstances that have led to current regional dynamics. Cutting aid does nothing to address the underlying issues driving conflict in the region, it only ensures that the Rwandan people will suffer -- and risks further destabilizing an already troubled region.

Cutting aid to Rwanda also risks undoing one of Africa's great success stories. In the last five years, Rwanda has lifted 1 million people out of poverty, created 1 million new jobs, and is poised to meet most of the U.N. Millennium Development Goals. It has safe streets, functioning Internet and communications, and is building roads and schools at an astonishing rate -- all without the benefit of natural resource wealth or access to the sea. Much of this has been accomplished with the help of Western aid. Moreover, Rwanda ranks as one of the most effective investors of aid in the world. It is frequently cited for its aid effectiveness by the World Bank and Britain's Bilateral Aid Review acknowledged that aid to Rwanda "offers the best value for taxpayers' money in the world."

Instead, the international community should continue to work with Rwanda while strengthening its support to the DRC, particularly in the area of governance. At the same time, it should support proposals currently being agreed to through the International Conference for the Great Lakes Region and the current peace negotiations underway between M23 and the DRC government in Kampala. Already, there are encouraging signs of progress. On Feb, 6, 2013, the government of DRC and M23 signed a preliminary agreement in which both parties accepted responsibility for the failure of an earlier peace agreement. The international community should support the three regional governments -- DRC, Rwanda, and Uganda -- in their efforts to build a sustainable solution to the conflict.

Such a solution will need to account for the enormous complexity of the situation in eastern Congo. First, there is the simple geographical challenge of securing a region separated from the capital, Kinshasa, by a dense jungle roughly the size of Western Europe. To guarantee security and rule of law in the eastern Kivu region will require a significant strengthening of the DRC state.

Ethnicity and nationality pose a second challenge. The M23 insurgency was initially formed to defend the Tutsi minority in eastern Congo, where the Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda (FDLR), the rebel army that played a central role in the Rwandan genocide, is still active and too often free to operate with impunity. And the M23 and FDLR are just the most prominent of a host of militias and mini-militias operating in and around Kivu, where some 30,000 Congolese Rwandans currently reside.

Then there is the international presence: the largest and most expensive U.N. peacekeeping operation in the world with almost 14,000 troops. At a cost of $1.5 billion each year, Western governments are paying a huge sum of money to maintain a U.N. force that does not have the mandate to actually secure the region. The international community should instead focus its support on African-led solutions to security, ideally through an African Union-led security force similar to AMISOM in Somalia.

As the United States, Britain, United Nations and other governments and multilaterals take action and make policy around the DRC, it's important that these decisions are fully informed with a clear understanding of the context and the consequences they will have on millions of Congolese. We cannot afford to get this wrong or maintain the status quo. It is time to end conflict and suffering and promote peace and prosperity. This requires a new approach and a focus on addressing the fundamental failures in the region.

__._,_.___

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