The Cause Of Rwanda Genocide

What leads groups to carry out genocide against other people? what can be the triggers or motivations behind these atrocities? It seems that there are various reasons why genocide may occur and it is often a combination of circumstances that leads to genocide. However, we first better have a definition of genocide: According to UN Convention on Genocide, genocide is defined as “any one of the numbers of acts ‘’ committed with the intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethical, racial or religious group “. The genocide of Rwanda [it is a central African country] is one of the genocides of twentieth century that fits that definition. However, it was the most chilling one due to the most rapidly executed state sponsored mass murder. Between April and July of …show more content…
The present essay will investigate some of the underlying conditions that make this genocide possible, including politics (like involvement of other countries or government propaganda), power of dehumanization and fear of violence. For this purpose, we will refer to left to tell, a book written by Immaculee Ilibagiza, one of the survivors of Rwanda genocide, whenever is necessary. One of the main causes of the genocide in Rwanda can be traced back to the period of colonial rule over Rwanda where numerous policies of the imperialists left the Rwandan society divided with tensions searing among its population. Rwanda had been a Belgian colony and Belgians divided the people in to various ethnic groups –the Hutu, Tutsi and Twa- on the basis of the physical appearance like height and nose, and gave preference to the Tutsis, who were a minority group and used them to rule