First Net Print, December 18 1999
Second Net Print, October 30 2001

REPORT OF THE INDEPENDENT INQUIRY INTO THE ACTIONS OF THE UNITED NATIONS DURING THE 1994 GENOCIDE IN RWANDA

Approximately 800,000 people were killed during the 1994 genocide in Rwanda. The systematic slaughter of men, women and children which took place over the course of about 100 days between April and July of 1994 will forever be remembered as one of the most abhorrent events of the twentieth century. Rwandans killed Rwandans, brutally decimating the Tutsi population of the country, but also targetting moderate Hutus. Appalling atrocities were committed, by militia and the armed forces, but also by civilians against other civilians.

The international community did not prevent the genocide, nor did it stop the killing once the genocide had begun. This failure has left deep wounds within Rwandan society, and in the relationship between Rwanda and the international community, in particular the United Nations. These are wounds which need to be healed, for the sake of the people of Rwanda and for the sake of the United Nations. Establishing the truth is necessary for Rwanda, for the United Nations and also for all those, wherever they may live, who are at risk of becoming victims of genocide in the future.

In seeking to establish the truth about the role of the United Nations during the genocide, the Independent Inquiry hopes to contribute to building renewed trust between Rwanda and the United Nations, to help efforts of reconciliation among the people of Rwanda, and to contribute to preventing similar tragedies from occurring ever again. The Inquiry has analysed the role of the various actors and organs of the United Nations system. Each part of that system, in particular the Secretary-General, the Secretariat, the Security Council and the Member States of the organisation, must assume and acknowledge their respective parts of the responsibility for the failure of the international community in Rwanda. Acknowledgement of responsibility must also be accompanied by a will for change: a commitment to ensure that catastrophes such as the genocide in Rwanda never occur anywhere in the future.

The failure by the United Nations to prevent, and subsequently, to stop the genocide in Rwanda was a failure by the United Nations system as a whole. The fundamental failure was the lack of resources and political commitment devoted to developments in Rwanda and to the United Nations presence there. There was a persistent lack of political will by Member States to act, or to act with enough assertiveness. This lack of political will affected the response by the Secretariat and decision-making by the Security Council, but was also evident in the recurrent difficulties to get the necessary troops for the United Nations Assistance Mission for Rwanda (UNAMIR). Finally, although UNAMIR suffered from a chronic lack of resources and political priority, it must also be said that serious mistakes were made with those resources which were at the disposal of the United Nations .

In a letter dated 18 March 1999 (S/1994/339), the Secretary-General informed the Security Council of his intention to appoint an independent inquiry into the actions of the United Nations during the 1994 genocide in Rwanda. In their reply (S/1999/340), the members of the Council expressed their support for the initiative in this unique circumstance. In May 1999, the Secretary-General appointed Mr Ingvar Carlsson (former Prime Minister of Sweden), Professor Han Sung-Joo (former Foreign Minister of the Republic of Korea) and Lieutenant-General Rufus M Kupolati (rtd.) (Nigeria) to conduct the inquiry.

The Independent Inquiry was given the mandate of establishing the facts related to the response of the United Nations to the genocide in Rwanda, covering the period October 1993 to July 1994, and to make recommendations to the Secretary-General on this subject. The present report is submitted pursuant to that mandate.

The terms of reference stated that the Inquiry should establish a chronology of key events pertaining to UN involvement in Rwanda from October 1993 to July 1994. It should evaluate the mandate and resources of UNAMIR and how they affected the response of the United Nations to the events relating to the massacres. The Inquiry was asked to draw relevant conclusions and identify the lessons to be learned from the tragedy and to report to the Secretary-General not later than six months from the commencement of the inquiry. The terms of reference also stated that the Inquiry would have unrestricted access to all UN documentation and persons involved.

The Inquiry began its work on 17 June 1999.

The mandate of the Independent Inquiry covered the actions of the United Nations as a whole. The task of the Inquiry thus included studying the actions of UNAMIR, the Secretary-General and the Secretariat, as well as the Member States of the organization and the political organs in which they are represented. With respect to actions of Member States, the Inquiry has focussed on positions taken which affected the response of the United Nations to the tragedy in Rwanda. It will be task of other bodies to analyse the broader issues raised by individual countries' positions on the Rwandan issue.

The Organization of African Unity (OAU) and other regional actors played important roles throughout the peace process and during the crisis in Rwanda. The mandate of the Inquiry being focussed on the role of the United Nations, emphasis is placed in this context on the influence which regional actors had on that role. The OAU International Panel of Eminent Persons, whose report is due to come out next year, will no doubt be able to reflect fully all the various aspects of the regional perspective on the genocide in Rwanda.

In the course of its work the Inquiry interviewed a large number of persons with knowledge relevant to its mandate. A list of those interviewed is contained in Annex II.

The Inquiry conducted research into the archives of the United Nations as part of its work. In addition to documents contained in the central archives of the organization, the Inquiry also studied files maintained by different departments within the United Nations, including the Executive Office of the Secretary-General, the Department of Peacekeeping Operations and the Department of Political Affairs, and files from the archives of UNAMIR. The Inquiry also benefitted from documents and materials made available to it by governmental and non-governmental sources. In a letter dated 8 September, the Inquiry invited all countries which contributed troops to UNAMIR during the period covered by the mandate to make available comments or information to the Inquiry.

The 1948 Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide lays down the criteria for what acts are to be considered a genocide, one of the most heinous crimes which can be committed against a human population. Essentially, the Convention requires both that certain acts have been committed, and that they be done with a particular intent: that of destroying, in whole or in part, a national, ethnic, racial or religious group, as such. The Security Council used the same criteria in outlining the mandate of the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR), contained in resolution 955 (1994). The ICTR has determined that the mass killings of Tutsi in Rwanda in 1994 constituted genocide. It was a genocide planned and incited by Hutu extremists against the Tutsi.

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