Citation
Republic of Guinea junta leader, Lt-Gen Mamadi Doumbouya and his wife, Lauriane, at the Kigali Genocide Memorial in January 2024. African leaders have made regular pilgrimages to Kigali, belated witnesses to one of the great crimes of the 20th century. Photo courtesy: Kigali Genocide Memorial
I. Attack against the Presidential aircraft
The most fiercely debated issue is the assassination of Juvénal Habyarimana, the late president who died on 6 April 1994 when his private jet was shot down over Kigali.[3] The Genocide began shortly afterwards, suggesting a link between these events. Some scholars suspect the assassins were Hutu extremists while others believe the Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF) of current president Kagame was responsible.[4] However, because the shooters were never identified, the question of culpability remains to some extent a matter of conjecture.
Over the years, several investigations were carried out, by magistrates from Belgium and France,[5] parliamentary inquiries in those countries,[6] and the Rwandan government.[7] These efforts accumulated many witness statements that contradicted each other on essential points. A major obstacle in assessing the value of those investigations was the absence of proper forensic research.
II. The technical report
In 2010, the French judiciary decided to change this situation. Two investigating judges, Marc Trévidic and Nathalie Poux, brought together a group of specialised scientists attached to several French courts. In September 2010, they travelled to Kigali on a fact-finding mission.[8] The elaboration of the data they collected was presented in January 2012 in a 338-page technical report,[9] plus supplements containing annexures – pictures of visited locations and the plane wreckage, and technical drawings. In May 2013, additional research was published that determined whether the pilots had tried to avoid the missile.[10] This was proved not to be the case. Evasive manoeuvres would have caused the plane to crash at a different location.[11]
The main result of the exhaustive investigations was the exclusion of “La Ferme”, an abandoned farm at the foot of Masaka Hill, mentioned as the shooters’ location in most witness statements.[12] La Ferme and the crash site were too far apart.[13] When the plane was targeted, it had already passed Masaka, and the angle of a missile trajectory from that direction did not match the part of the plane that was hit: the underside of the left wing.[14] A missile from that area, guided by its infrared sensor,[15] would have hit one of the jet engines attached to the tail.[16] The inspection of the wreckage showed no missile damage to the engines.[17]
This situation map by the author is based on data from Oosterlinck et al. (2012 and 2013), and Serre (2012). According to the experts, the shooters’ most likely position was inside the yellow area. The circles represent the sound wave (m/s) produced by a hypothetical missile shot at La Ferme near Masaka Hill.
Because the engines on this type of aircraft are placed higher than the wings, a missile from the vicinity of Masaka could not have hit the wing from below.[18] That was possible only if it was fired from Kanombe Hill, diagonally in front of the plane.[19] The most likely position of the shooters, according to the experts, was a clearing inside the Kanombe military domain between a woodlot on the edge of the hill and a residential area where French officers and employees of the military hospital resided.[20] The designated area was a ten-minute walk from the barracks of the Presidential Guard.[21] According to the scholarly consensus, this site was not a realistic option for the RPF.[22] Based on these findings, the rational conclusion would be to seek the assassins among Habyarimana’s elite troops.[23]
III. Sound velocity
Wreckage of the downed plane that killed presidents Juvenal Habyarimana of Rwanda and Cyprien Ntaryamira of Burundi on 6 April 1994, triggering the Genocide. Courtesy: Saligoma Fils
This observation led to fierce criticism from a group of academics and journalists who firmly believed the witnesses who claimed to have been present at La Ferme when the rockets were fired.[24] The discrepancy leaves two possibilities: The French judges and scientists did a poor job, or the “Masaka” witnesses were unreliable.
To answer this question, I asked a specialist in plane crashes, Joris Melkert of Delft Technical University, to review the expert reports. He agreed and drew the following conclusion:
"What I take from it is that a solid investigation was carried out, both in the initial report and the supplementary report. I think the conclusions drawn by the authors also established the most likely cause. As with any research, assumptions have been made. As far as I can tell, these are reasonable assumptions."[25]
The critics were sceptical. Four days after the forensic report was presented in Paris, historian Bernard Lugan published an article on his website denouncing the work of Jean-Pascal Serre, the acoustics expert of the French scientists.[26] Serre had measured the sound intensity of missile shots to determine what the various witnesses could have heard at their positions. The tests were conducted at a special test site in France.[27] Lugan, not an expert in this field, called Serre’s approach “amateurish” because the terrain in France was different from Kigali and no SA-16s – the type of missile that downed the plane – were used.[28]
I contacted Serre who told me that in 2011, when he conducted the test, SA-16s were no longer available.[29] It made little difference because the theoretical sound levels were established for both the SA-16 and the tested missiles.[30] Serre’s objective was to measure the difference between theoretical and realistic values. This could only be done under controlled conditions and not along a public road in Kigali, as Lugan suggested. The test determined a calculation factor, useful to estimate the realistic value of an SA-16.[31] The terrain conditions were only a marginal influence, according to Serre.[32] Moreover, four other experts were present to observe the test procedure. Their names and functions are listed in the acoustics supplement.[33]
Ironically, the test result did not lead to the exclusion of La Ferme.[34] Under normal circumstances, all relevant witnesses could have heard the shots. Lugan had aimed his arrows at the wrong part of the acoustic research. The decibels were not the problem, but the speed of the sound. The most reliable witnesses, a group of Belgian military doctors and a French officer in Kanombe,[35] heard the missile shots before the plane was hit. That would have been impossible if the missiles had been fired from La Ferme or another location in the Masaka area.
Anyone with a high school education will remember that the propagation of a sound wave depends on the weather conditions, temperature and air pressure. The meteorological data from Kigali on 6 April 1994 were on record, making the speed of the wave easy to calculate (343 m/s).[36] The distance between La Ferme and the witnesses was over 2.7 km.[37] Simple arithmetic shows that the sound of a shot from La Ferme would travel almost eight seconds before reaching the witnesses’ ears.[38] This is longer than a missile would take to hit the plane (6.46 s.).[39] In that scenario, the witnesses could not have heard the shots before seeing the explosion. Combining the witness statements with the acoustic data, the shooters’ position was inside the Kanombe military domain, a few hundred metres from the witnesses.[40]
IV. From hypothesis to conspiracy theory
Despite Lugan’s error, his suggestion of sloppy science appealed to the imagination. A few weeks later, Belgian scholar Filip Reyntjens repeated it in Le Monde.[41] Barrie Collins followed,[42] then Pierre Péan,[43] Judi Rever,[44] and many others.[45] In 2020, eight years after the initial report was presented, Reyntjens still repeated Lugan’s mistake in a working paper dedicated to the Habyarimana assassination which contained dozens of similar errors.[46] However, while the scientific reports were available only in French, most critics published their opinions in English. Their misinformation got the upper hand, inspiring conspiracy theories about ‘a diplomatic deal between France and Rwanda’ to cover up what ‘really’ happened.[47]
Fascinated by these developments, I wondered about the origins of the ‘Masaka Hoax’. Like much of the other misinformation about Rwanda and the Genocide against the Tutsi, it could be traced back to a broadcast of the notorious hate radio station Radio Télévision Libre des Mille Collines (RTLM). On 13 April 1994, a day after Belgian peacekeepers in Kigali told the media that the missiles had come from Kanombe,[48] RTLM propagandist Georges Ruggiu countered with the claim that “after close examination, it appears that this plane was shot down from an unofficial position: the Masaka position of Belgian UNAMIR soldiers”.[49]
Masaka, like Kanombe, was controlled by the FAR, the government army at the time, but Ruggiu’s suggestion of a Belgian military position created the impression that the area was easily accessible to the RPF. Rumours of a conspiracy between Belgium and the RPF were repeatedly broadcast during the Genocide. Afterwards, the story took on a life of its own, stripped of the “Belgian soldiers” and fuelled by other diversions such as the “accidental” discovery of SA-16 launch tubes at La Ferme.[50] [51] Unsurprisingly, those tubes disappeared without a trace before an independent authority could investigate them.[52]
V. The Masaka hoax sticks
Meanwhile, sceptical journalists and academics do their best to keep the Masaka hoax afloat. Amsterdam University Press (AUP) published a translation of Judi Rever’s book, In Praise of Blood – entitled De Waarheid Over Rwanda (The Truth About Rwanda).[53] Despite the aura of academic accreditation, the publisher forgot to consult specialists at the university first.[54] This negligence is apparent throughout the book, especially in the chapter about the plane shooting where the author repeats Lugan’s mistake and other hoaxes.[55] The same applies to some prominent scholars. For instance, Professor André Guichaoua ignored the forensic science and consistently misspelt Marc Trévidic’s name in his book From War to Genocide.[56] René Lemarchand glossed over the French research altogether in Remembering Genocides in Central Africa.[57] Omar McDoom, in an otherwise excellent book, published the same errors as Reyntjens, including Lugan’s errors.[58]
Things are no better in the media. In 2012, the BBC reported the conclusions of the French reports,[59] but two years later, it produced a controversial documentary which discussed outdated studies but neglected the forensic research of 2010-2013.[60] American journalist Helen C. Epstein erroneously claimed that the experts couldn’t exclude the possibility that the missiles were fired from Masaka Hill.[61] British journalist Michela Wrong, who praised Epstein’s book, reserves just one sentence for the French investigation in Do Not Disturb.[62] The remaining 99.6 percent of her chapter about the Habyarimana assassination is for the Masaka witnesses and the suggestion that the French effort served a diplomatic agenda. The following year, she defined that agenda as a deal between the French and Rwandan presidents: “In return for exculpation, Kagame has repeatedly offered up his army, sending troops into places where Western governments have no intention of sending their own men.” [63]
VI. The evasive “Truth”
Science denial needs alternative explanations to rationalise one’s belief. However, proponents of international conspiracy theories seldom realise how many individuals it takes for such intricate deceptions to work. Michela Wrong’s “deal” requires one to accept that all who worked on the case, from surveyors and specialised scientists to clerks and magistrates, were persuaded to violate their professional ethics and cooperate with the political scheme. Even the Masaka witnesses would have played a part, as the inconsistencies in their testimonies contributed to the court’s decision to dismiss the case.
From the opposite perspective, it may be equally tempting to suspect a concerted effort to discredit the French scientists. However, none of the critics are specialised experts and most of them never read the French reports. Ignorance and negligence may result from cognitive dissonance and belief perseverance but not necessarily from evil intentions, although the effect on reconciliation attempts in Rwanda may be just as harmful. Nevertheless, it is important to realise that propaganda targets people who take the suggestions at face value. The best defence, therefore, is rational reflection. For instance, to accept that the sound of a shot in Masaka could have reached the Kanombe witnesses in time, one must refrain from calculating the temperature needed for the necessary sound velocity. Otherwise, the result – more than 1230 °C – will instantly cure the most gullible believer.[64]
Georges Ruggiu’s ad hoc remarks in April 1994 and the additional suggestions that expanded the story later were meant to shift the focus of attention to the enemy. After the Genocide, the fugitive former government,[65] the prisoners of the ICTR,[66] and some of their defence lawyers carried the story forward.[67] By killing President Habyarimana, they argued, the RPF and their foreign allies were responsible for the slaughter, which the rebels probably planned in advance to benefit from the “chaos.” Few observers would agree with that version o[1]f events if it wasn’t for Hollywood celebrity Paul Rusesabagina, who believed and shared it in a pamphlet,[68] and during interviews.[69] Rusesabagina is no genocidaire, so Western journalists took his word for it, copied stories from his pamphlet or its sources and presented them as research.[70]
It feels counter-intuitive to doubt a movie hero, a best-selling author or a prominent scholar, all capable of formulating eloquent rationalisations to support their beliefs. In the polarised world of Rwanda research, however, facts and opinions tend to blur into each other, get reversed, and everything is politicised, even largely technical issues such as a plane crash investigation. If there is a lesson to be learned from all this, it will be that relying on others to speak The Truth, assuming that someone must have verified their assertions so you won’t have to, is not always a safe bet.
Notes
[1] “UN pays tribute to victims and survivors of the 1994 Genocide against the Tutsi in Rwanda,” United Nations, 12 April 2024.
[2] Philip Verwimp, “Death and survival during the 1994 genocide in Rwanda,” Population Studies 58.2 (2010), p. 233; Marijke Verpoorten, “How Many Died in Rwanda?” Journal of Genocide Research 22.1, 1 January 2020, 94-103. Online version: p. 9. https://doi.org/10.1080/14623528.2019.1703253; Omar McDoom, The Path to Genocide in Rwanda, Cambridge University Press 2021, p. 294. Verwimp mentions 75 %, Verpoorten uses a range of 70-80%. McDoom’s estimate is slightly lower (± 2/3) assuming a higher survival rate than other researchers.
[3] “Presidents Killed in Attack on Plane”, The Guardian, 7 April 1994; “Presidenten Rwanda en Burundi omgekomen”, NRC, 7 April 1994.
[4] Academics who proclaim the RPF guilty usually belong to the older generation of Rwanda scholars, such as René Lemarchand, Filip Reyntjens, and André Guichaoua.
[5] From 13 April 1994 onward, a week after the assault, investigators of the Belgian Military Court and Magistrate Damien Vandermeersch collected many witness statements. After 1998, French judge Jean-Louis Bruguière heard different witnesses resulting in arrest warrants against nine RPF officers. The case was dismissed in 2018 for lack of evidence. See Jean-Louis Bruguière, Delivrance de Mandats d’Arret Internationaux: Ordonnance de Soit-Communique, Cour d’Appel de Paris, Tribunal de Grande Instance de Paris, 17 November 2006 ; Marc Herbaut en Nathalie Poux, Ordonnance de Non-Lieu, N° du Parquet: 9729523030. N° Instruction: 272/00/13 & 1341. Cour d’Appel de Paris, Tribunal de Grande Instance de Paris, Section Anti-Terroriste, 21 December 2018.
[6] In Belgium: Philippe Mahoux and Guy Verhofstadt, Commission d’Enquête Parlementaire Concernant les Événements du Rwanda, Sénat de Belgique, 1997; In France: Paul Quilés, Rapport d’Information Sur les Opérations Militaires Menées Par la France, d’Autres Pays et L’onu au Rwanda Entre 1990 et 1994, Assemblée Nationale, 1998.
[7] Jean Mutsinzi et al, Report of the Investigation into the Causes and Circumstances of and Responsibility for the Attack of 06/04/1994 Against the Falcon 50 Rwandan Presidential Aeroplane, Registration Number 9XR-NN, Independent Commission of Experts, Kigali 2009.
[8] “Le juge Trévidic en Septembre à Kigali”, Jeune Afrique, 1 July 2010; “French judges launch week-long Rwanda probe,” Radio France Internationale, 13 September 2010.
[9] Claudine Oosterlinck et al, Rapport d’Expertise: Destruction en Vol du Falcon 50 Kigali (Rwanda), N° du Parquet: 9729523030. N° Instruction: 272/00/13 & 1341. Cour d’Appel de Paris, Tribunal de Grande Instance de Paris, 5 January 2012.
[10] Claudine Oosterlinck et al, Rapport d’Expertise: Complément De Mission (Manoeuvre d’évitement). Cour d’Appel de Paris, Tribunal de Grande Instance de Paris, 10 May 2013.
[11] Oosterlinck et al 2013, 82.
[12] Oosterlinck et al 2012, 57, 314.
[13] The explain the damage to the aircraft with a missile from La Ferme, the crash site should have been closer, on the side of Rusororo Hill, north of Masaka Hill, according to my calculations.
[14] Oosterlinck et al 2012, 301.
[15] Oosterlinck et al 2012, 196, 235-236.
[16] Oosterlinck et al 2012, 312.
[17] Oosterlinck et al 2012, 92-95, 100-101.
[18] Oosterlinck et al 2012, 312.
[19] Oosterlinck et al 2012, 313.
[20] Oosterlinck et al 2012, 313.
[21] The headquarters of Kanombe Military camp were ± 800 meters from the shooter’s location. The RPF battalion was fifteen kilometres away, guarded by UN peacekeepers and watched by government soldiers. See Romeo Dallaire, Shake Hands with the Devil, Random House Canada 2003, pp. 157, 165, 193. On the evening of the assault, Dallaire’s assistant Henry Anyidoho, and Philippe Gaillard of the ICRC were visitors at the RPF location.
[22] Filip Reyntjens, The RPF Did It, Working Paper, Universiteit van Antwerpen 2020, p. 3. According to Reyntjens, “it is unlikely that the RPF would have carried out the attack from the military domain or its immediate surroundings, but it could have accessed the area of Masaka.” Reyntjens does not clarify how the RPF would have accessed the Masaka area.
[23] “Rwanda genocide: Kagame ‘cleared of Habyarimana crash’,” BBC News, 12 January 2012. https://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-16472013
[24] Tom Lansford, Political Handbook of the World 2015, Sage publications 2015, p. 5139; Erin Jessee, “Rwandan Women No More,” in Conflict and Society 1 (2015): 60-80, online version: p. 34. The consequence of focusing solely on the RPF is that other, more likely suspects were not seriously considered.
[25] Email Joris Melkert of 11 April 2024.
[26] Bernard Lugan, “Rwanda: Réponse de Bernard Lugan à l’Association Enquête Citoyenne Rwanda”, L’Afrique Réelle, 14 January 2012. https://bernardlugan.blogspot.com/2012/01/rwanda-reponse-de-bernard-lugan.html
[27] Jean-Pascal Serre, Rapport Complementaire En Acoustique, Cour d’Appel de Paris, Tribunal de Grande Instance de Paris, 4 January 2012.
[28] Oosterlinck et al 2012, 174.
[29] Email Serre of 17 February 2022.
[30] 170 dB(A). See Serre 2012, p. 16, table 10.
[31] Email Serre 2022; Serre 2012, 16. The calculation factor was determined at 0.94, which reduced the sound intensity of the shot to 170 x 0,94 = 160 dB(A); Serre 2012, 18, 26: By the time the sound wave reached the witnesses, that level would have dropped to 102 dB(A), still loud enough to be heard in Kanombe.
[32] The terrain influence could not be accurately determined anyway (Serre 2012, 26). Information about possible obstacles in 1994 was missing and the buildings and vegetation had changed. However, that information would not significantly have altered the result, according to Serre.
[33] Serre 2012, 8.
[34] Oosterlinck et al 2012, 257: Every witness in the eastern part of the military domain could, in theory, hear the sound.
[35] The Belgian doctors were in Rwanda as part of the peace treaty. They worked at the Kanombe military hospital and occupied a row of villas on the outskirts of the domain. On the evening of the attack, Massimo Pasuch and his wife Brigitte Delneuville, Daniel Daubresse and Denise van Deenen were gathered at Pasuch and Delneuville’s house. The French officer, Lt. Colonel Grégoire de Saint Quentin, was at home, about 100 metres behind them.
[36] Serre 2012, 18-19.
[37] Oosterlinck et al 2012, 249.
[38] Oosterlinck et al 2012, 250; Serre 2012, 19.
[39] Oosterlinck et al 2012, 249; Serre 2012, 22.
[40] Email Serre.
[41] Filip Reyntjens, “Attentat de Kigali: ‘la vérité a gagné’?” Le Monde, 31 January 2012. https://www.lemonde.fr/idees/article/2012/01/31/attentat-de-kigali-la-verite-a-gagne_1636326_3232.html
[42] Barrie Collins, “Shooting Down the Official ‘Truth’ About Rwanda,” Spiked, 15 March 2012. https://www.spiked-online.com/2012/04/16/shooting-down-the-official-truth-about-rwanda/
[43] Pierre Péan, “Recit d’un Manipulation,” Le un Hebdo, 1 February 2017
[44] Judi Rever, In Praise of Blood: The crimes of the Rwandan Patriotic Front, Random House Canada, 2018, 184–185. For a critical review, see Jos van Oijen, “Review: ‘In Praise of Blood’: Sensational, But Does it Fit with Reality?” ZAM Magazine, 18 December 2018. https://www.zammagazine.com/arts/1056-in-praise-of-blood
[45] E.g.: Masako Yonekawa, Omar McDoom, Michel Robardey, Alain de Brouwer, and so on.
[46] Reyntjens 2020. Many errors deny, distort or conceal the facts of the French investigation. Reyntjens also cites as relevant information previously debunked controversies such as Michael Hourigan’s famous memo (1997). Like other authors such as Judi Rever, René Lemarchand and Michela Wrong, Reyntjens conceals what is stated in the last paragraph of that memo: that Kagame planned the attack, but government soldiers carried it out. According to Hourigan, two FAR soldiers fired the rockets from Gasogi and Masaka Hills. Mission control was Camp Kanombe. If true, the RPF and the Presidential Guard were in cahoots. Moreover, Gasogi Hill was on the plane’s right, whereas the missiles came from its left. ICTR Chief prosecutor Louise Arbour became sceptical after she read the memo and shut down his investigation, enough for Hourigan and others to believe she was covering up the ‘truth’.
[47] E.g.: Michela Wrong, “Priti Patel is Playing into Paul Kagame’s Hands,” The Spectator, 23 April 2022. https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/hotel-rwanda-why-does-kagame-want-to-take-in-britains-asylum-seekers/
[48] Mark Huband, “Belgians Say Rebels Could Not Have Killed President,” The Guardian, 12 April 1994; Scott Peterson, “Violence Lurks round Every Corner,” The Daily Telegraph, 12 April 1994.
[49] Georges Ruggiu: “Apres une enquête minutieuse tout porte a croire que cet avion a ete descendu au depart d’une position non officielle. Position Masaka des soldats Belges de la MINUAR.” Broadcast on RTLM radio, 13 April 1994. Cassette A/910, Exhibit P103/064 in Case N°. ICTR-99-52-T: The Prosecutor vs Nahimana et al, International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR). NB: UNAMIR was the United Nations Assistance Mission for Rwanda – the UN peacekeeping force.
[50] Letter from lawyer Luc de Temmerman to investigating judge Damien Van Der Meersch, subject: ‘Bagosora/Tribunal International,’ Overijse (B), 10 July 1995. Attached to the letter was a faxed copy of a handwritten note sent to De Temmerman by his client Colonel Théoneste Bagosora. The note listed the serial numbers of two SA-16s that, according to Bagosora, were ‘used in the assault on the head of state on 6 April 1994.’
[51] The launch tubes were reportedly found near La Ferme on 25 April 1994, see Filip Reyntjens, Rwanda: Trois Jours Qui On Fait Basculer L’histoire, Institut africain-CEDAF 1995, 44-46.
[52] According to the French Court, the note had been in the possession of the French military intelligence agency DRM as early as May 1994, but despite extensive research, the tubes were never found. Pictures of a launch tube from May 1994 could not make clear whether it had been used. See Herbaut and Poux, 2018, 25-26.
[53] Judi Rever, De Waarheid Over Rwanda, Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press, 2018.
[54] I checked this with the University of Amsterdam and the Netherlands Institute of War Documentation (personal communications in 2018). The AUP relied on the reputation of Random House Canada, which published the original version (email AUP, 3 April 2018). The responsible staff member was persuaded by Peter Verlinden, a Belgian journalist she knew from her previous job at Davidsfonds Publishers.
[55] Rever 2018, 184–185.
[56] André Guichoua, From War to Genocide: Criminal politics in Rwanda. Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 2015: 172, 339, 340. The reports of Oosterlinck et al and Serre’s acoustics supplement are not referenced.
[57] René Lemarchand, Remembering Genocides in Central Africa, New York: Routledge 2021, published in the series Mass Violence in Modern History, eds. Uğur Ümit Üngör and Alexander Korb. None of these scholars were willing to comment.
[58] McDoom 2021, cited above, 201–205.
[59] BBC News, 2012.
[60] John Conroy, director and producer, Rwanda’s Untold Story, London: British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC), 2014.
[61] Helen C. Epstein, Another Fine Mess: America, Uganda, and the war on terror, New York: Columbia Global Reports, 2017 (eBook version), Ch. ‘Invasion’. Epstein ignored the forensic reports a year later while claiming that “a growing number of academic studies, judicial reports, and other investigations now suggest RPF responsibility.” See Helen Epstein, “The Mass Murder We Don’t Talk About,” The New York Review of Books, 7 June 2018.
[62] Michela Wrong, Do Not Disturb: The Story of a Political Murder and an African Regime Gone Bad, New York: Public Affairs, 2021 (review copy). Wrong does not mention the scientists or their reports but in endnote 4 on p. 467 she acknowledges that “France’s Marc Trévidic and colleague Nathalie Poux identified Kanombe’s military barracks as the likely site from which the missiles were launched, suggesting Hutu extremists were to blame.” Note that the missiles were not launched from the barracks but 800 metres away, toward the edge of the military domain.
[63] Wrong 2022, cited above.
[64] Considering the time-lapse of a few seconds between hearing the shots and seeing the explosion’s light, the sound of a shot in La Ferme needed to reach the doctors after 3.5 seconds at a speed of 777 m/s, which requires an air temperature of 1230 ֩C.
[65] E.g. Alison Des Forges, “Rwanda: A New Catastrophe?” Human Rights Watch/Africa, Vol. 6, No. 12. New York: Human Rights Watch, 1994: 3–4; Fiona Terry, Condemned to Repeat? The Paradox of Humanitarian Action, Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2002, Ch. 5; Moerland, The Killing of Death: Denying the Genocide of the Tutsi, Cambridge: Interstentia, 2016, 153-178.
[66] Les détenus du TPIR, Les crimes commis par le Front Patriotique Rwandais (FPR), Arusha, January 2000.
[67] E.g., anything by John Philpot and Christopher Black.
[68] Paul Rusesabagina, Compendium of RPF Crimes – October 1990 to Present: The case for overdue prosecution, Brussels, November 2006.
[69] E.g., Keith Harmon Snow, “The Grinding Machine: Terror and Genocide in Rwanda,” Global Research, 27 April 2007 https://www.globalresearch.ca/the-grinding-machine-terror-and-genocide-in-rwanda/5507; Anthony Evans (District Judge), The Government of the Republic of Rwanda v Vincent Bajinya, Charles Munyaneza, Emmanuel Nteziryayo, Celestin Ugirashebuja, London: The City of Westminster Magistrates Court, 6 June 2008: 101.
[70] E.g., Do Not Disturb almost literally copies the story of the floating corpses, point 8 on pp. 5–6 of Rusesabagina’s Compendium.
