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President Kagame speaks on the DRC conflict and relations with Uganda

Question: What is Rwanda’s feeling about the situation following the eruption of Mt. Nyiragongo?

President KAGAME: The Congolese population has suffered enough already from other problems. They didn’t this disaster to compound their problems. It was a natural disaster that nobody could have prevented.

The Congolese need immediate help to get them out of the situation they have been put in by this disaster. Some of the people on the Rwandan side of the border also need help because they have lost their property, their houses and many other things. We believe that this situation deserves the full attention of the humanitarian organisations and the international community.

We have done our best as a country to receive the Congolese who are suffering and to provide assistance for them in the best way we can. However, we have our limitations. We cannot satisfy their every need ourselves. We shall continue to provide help where we can.

Question: There have been some criticism saying that some Congolese refused to enter camps in Rwanda and refused to receive Rwanda’s assistance. What do you think about that?

President KAGAME: Well, I do not know what the basis of the criticism is. I really do not know what the basis is. We provided the camps where the displaced persons could be received and given emergency assistance from the Government and other international bodies. I have heard that our assistance has been refused and some Congolese tried to go back even before the eruptions had subsided. That was risky on their part, but one cannot blame Rwanda for that. Receiving and helping those who sought our assistance is all we could do, and we did that. I don’t see what would attract any criticism.



Perhaps some people were being unreasonable. When you are fleeing a disaster like the one in Goma, I don’t think that is the time to make demands, and to chose where to go and where not to go. I would have thought that the emergency situation itself dictates that the first priority is safety.

There is nothing else we could do. We received those who came to us for assistance, and allowed those who wanted to return to do so, even though it was risky for them.

Question: It has been said that the Congolese prefer to be with the volcano than with the Rwandese ….

President KAGAME: That is OK. They are free to make that choice. But I think that the decision does not only affect Rwanda, it also affects those who possess such unreasonable opinions. It is clearly a very poor choice.

Question: Do you think that perhaps the fact that Rwanda invaded Congo twice might be the reason for their dislike of Rwanda?

President KAGAME:We cannot simply wish away the problems in Congo. The presence of our troops in Congo causing some resentment among Congolese is not the whole story. The focus should be on why we had to fight these wars there in the first place. That is the beginning of the problem. The origin of the problem is why we went into the Congo in the first place. Why did we have to fight these wars?

The reasons are well known, and I do not place the blame for this on the Congolese people per se. I would blame it on their leaders. A large part of the Congolese population have nothing to do with the ex-FAR and Interahamwe being based in their country and supported by their Government. The Governments in Kinshasa, first under Mobutu and then the Kabilas, are responsible for that situation.

I would only blame the population for not being able to make the distinction. We are in the Congo for no other reason apart from the security concerns of our country associated with the 1994 Genocide. The leadership in Kinshasa have been part of the problem by closely associating themselves with this problem and supporting those responsible for the Genocide.

The people of Rwanda, perhaps because of the explanation we have given, have not generated any hatred for the Congolese. I am aware that the people of Rwanda make a clear distinction. They do not bear a negative attitude towards the Congolese, even though there are problems affecting Rwanda that originate in Congo. The understanding is that it is not the population of Congo to blame, but their leaders. It is not good enough for them to hate Rwandans for being in Congo as if there is no serious reason for which they are there.

Question: Is that what you are trying to do by supporting some rebel movements, to have some leaders in Congo who understand Rwanda’s point of view better and organise their country in a new, different way?

President KAGAME: The philosophy behind supporting Laurent Kabila and his alliance against Mobutu was to help them to fight for their just cause of creating a new political dispensation in the Congo, so that they can liberate themselves, and by doing that, Congo will no longer be a base for problems affecting neighbouring countries, at that time specifically Rwanda and Angola.

It is about the fact that there must be a political situation in the Congo that does not allow the emergence of problems affecting neighbouring countries. That is how we have become associated with these groups.

Question: There is a perception, both in Congo and the international community, that Rwanda has a hegemonic plan. The perception exists in the minds of the Congolese people, who do not want to be part of the so-called ‘Rwandese empire’, and also in the minds of the international community.

President KAGAME: I believe that there is intellectual laziness among many people, because if you begin to analyse a problem from the middle, and not at the origin, then you miss the whole point.

Let us look at the history of Rwanda and see if at any point there was any suggestion of plans to create a hegemony in the region.

The armed struggle which began in 1990 was waged by people who had been forced to live outside their country as refugees. I was a refugee myself for over 33 years. How can one think of a hegemony when you live in a refugee camp and have no rights ?

When we were a stateless people living in Congo, in Uganda, in Kenya, in Tanzania, in Europe and America, did anyone raise a finger about the problem ? Did the international community challenge the Government of the day as to why its people were stateless all over the world ?

When the struggle began in 1990 to regain our rights, we were joined by many people within Rwanda who had no say, no voice, no rights. They had no rights, even in their own country. And they had come to accept that situation. This was a known fact. So when we were trying to change this situation, within our own borders, there came a Genocide in 1994. Genocide was not just a phenomenon of 1994. It had happened before in our history, in 1959 when people as a result became refugees. It happened again throughout the 1960’s and 1970’s. Go to Bugesera, for example, and speak to the ordinary people there. They will tell you how thousands of people were wiped out.

This is the crux of the matter, the beginning of the story. When we are trying to solve this problem, foreign factors came into play. They came in at different stages of our history. We had the colonial problem, we had the French and Mobutu proping up the Habyarimana regime and so on. So a problem which should have been resolved internally, because of these external dimensions, spread out, and that is how the refugees went into Congo in 1994.

We asked the international community to solve the problem of the refugees for us. They did not, exposing Rwanda to the threat of another Genocide. That is why we had to move into Congo. We did so to close the camps and fight the Genocidaire who were based there and were being assisted by the Government. That is how the chain of events began.

So one really has to sober when looking at this situation. If you look at this background, there is nothing to suggest a hegemonic plan. It can only be suggested today by those who are guilty by association of having caused these problems in Rwanda, or by people who have failed to find solutions to the very serious problems we are raising. They look for another channel by raising such intimidating propositions in the hope that we will go on the defensive and be weakened. They hope that this will make us run away from the problems in the Congo. But we are not about to do that. It is a question of our very survival.

Question: But you cannot go so far back to explain your problems with Uganda.

President KAGAME: No. With Uganda, it is a totally different situation.

< Question: What is the situation regarding your relations with Uganda now?

President KAGAME: The situation between Rwanda and Uganda has improved. There has been good progress on how we have handled the issues that affected our relationship. With the intervention of the UK Government, we have come together to discuss a number of issues and put in place mechanisms to follow up these issues and find out the truth about the allegations that have been made by both sides. The investigations were carried out well, and with good results in terms of establishing the truth. There has been quite some progress.

Question: What is the truth?

President KAGAME: A statement was made recently by the teams that were investigating the allegations. The allegations have been found not to be true. They did not discover any camps anywhere. They did not identify any direct support for groups that have been moving to either country from the other, accused of wanting to destabilise their countries of origin. We think this is progress.

Question: The problems seem to be very unpopular among the ordinary people of both countries.

President KAGAME: Yes. It is not a problem between the ordinary people of both countries. I think the people of both countries want to live together in peace. That is where the responsibility falls on us as leaders to seriously address the problems between us.

Question: You recently received the Foreign Ministers of France and the UK. How was the dialogue between you and them and what were the main issues discussed?

President KAGAME:We had very good discussions with the French and UK Foreign Ministers. We mainly discussed regional issues focussing on peace and stability. These issues, naturally, centred on the Democratic Republic of Congo. The discussions went very well.

Question:The Belgian Foreign Minister came to discuss the internal dialogue and the process and the war in Congo. How did the talks go?

President KAGAME: The Foreign Minister briefed us on the meeting that was organised by the Belgian Government for the Congolese parties and civil society. He mentioned to us that the initiative was in support of the Lusaka peace process and the inter-Congolese dialogue. We discussed the progress of the Lusaka peace process, and we stressed both to him and to the French and UK Ministers that central to this problem, which would help lead to our pull-out from Congo, is how this ex-FAR/Interhamwe issue is addressed. For as long as people avoid doing something concrete about it we shall continue to be a long way from finding an agreeable solution to the problem.



© The Government of Rwanda.