Before embarking on the central subject of my talk, I would like to make several general observations on the subject of peace and other questions closely related to it, such as forgiveness, reconciliation, justice, truth and liberty. When we say "peace," what are we talking about? To begin with, I would like to mention at least three meanings of this term, so rich in content but also so misused and manipulated.

1. Peace as the absence of open war or serious conflict. Peace thus understood does not always presuppose a society that is truly reconciled. Frequently this "peace" is not a question of reconciliation as much as it is of public order, whether it be on the national or the international level. During the so-called "Pax Romana," for example, Rome came to have as many slaves as free citizens. In this sense the present situation in Rwanda would be considered to be peace.

2. Peace as an integrated reality: international, social, personal... For Christians this Peace is at the same time an achievement and a gift, the messianic gift par excellence. It is a Peace in which there is no just social order in the absence of personal conversion. Nor is there personal spiritual progress without justice and solidarity. It is a Peace in which the individual human being is the center of everything, but which will only be complete when the structural roots of conflict have been cleansed. A Peace which even though it is a utopia, still has not been fully realized because many people in positions of power still use their free will to enslave or kill their brothers. A Peace that from day to day can and should be transformed into everyday reality, but which frequently is only able to manifest itself in the arena of personal intimacy, while outwardly conflict prevails.

3. The internal peace of an individual even in the midst of persecution, suffering, war and death. It is to this aspect of Peace that the Lord Jesus refers when, in the gospel of John, he says: "Peace I bequeath to you, my own peace I give you, a peace which the world cannot give."(John 14, 27) It is the peace of the first generations of Christians who became martyrs. But if we look closely at this peace of which Jesus speaks, it is not that peace in which one takes refuge in one’s own interior, running away from the world, or that thinks that one’s personal, internal peace will lead automatically to world peace. About this Jesus also said: "I am not asking you to remove them from the world, but to protect them from the Evil One." (John 17, 15) When he speaks to us of personal peace and tells us not to fear those that kill our bodies (Matt. 10, 26), he is speaking to us of one of the aspects of his Peace, the most intimate aspect. But he is not giving a complete description. His Peace not only differentiates itself from world peace, in that it is a spiritual peace which is beyond all external sufferings, but also in that, in its social dimension, which it also possesses, it is based on universal brotherhood and not only on the maintenance of order. For this reason I do not believe that we can confuse this personal, fundamentally spiritual, peace with peace among nations.

For Christians the mere absence of serious conflict usually is not a particularly satisfactory peace, It is a reductionist concept of peace compatible with slavery. Universal brotherhood requires much more than mutual tolerance. It is something more, something intimately tied to what we could call "reconciliation." A reconciliation that contains many aspects, including reconciliation with oneself and with one’s own personal history. Nevertheless, another example of reductionism exists on the extreme opposite side: That of those who have fallen into "interiority," forgetting that reconciliation also has a social and political dimension that is much broader than the internal world and which includes the interpersonal dimension. I do not believe that we can speak of true peace in the absence of a reconciled population.

I have observed that many religious people tent to slip into positions that we could call "angelic" or "spiritualist." It is as if they believe that world peace will arrive by itself the day that we succeed in pacifying our own personal selves and are capable of perpetual forgiveness, and that this should be the first and only task to accomplish. It is a position which doesn’t respect the existence of the realities of the temporal world: a realities that include the areas of economics, politics and the military, realities that have their own rules and laws and functions. It is as if they expect the kingdom of God to arrive on the back of miracles and conversions like that of Paul on the road to Damascus. It is as if they forget that the Caesars, Pilates Anas and Caiaphas are free and autonomous beings capable of cutting themselves irretrievably off from truth and brotherhood, capable of condemning whole peoples to death in the service of their unspeakable strategies to gain and maintain power. It is as if they took it for granted that the worlds of the judiciary, politics and defense were so earthbound and corrupt that it would be impossible for spirit to act through such means, and therefore would have to act directly and miraculously. Or that, in any case, if this miracle never came, these peoples should expect to be enslaved or massacred.

It is necessary to correctly integrate all the diverse dimensions of a reality which is always complex and rich in nuances which resist facile simplifications. As Christians we also must correctly integrate the diverse dimensions and requirements of our own faith. A faith that asks us that we do not personally defend ourselves from evil but that at the same time asks that we defend those who are defenseless. It asks us to love those who hate us and to return good for evil, but at the same time we are to be the protectors of those who are the most helpless. It is for this reason that I was pleased to read in the last issue of Mundo Negro that Mons. Baker Ochola, recipient of the Mundo Negro Brotherhood Prize, understands very well how to join the two: "He preaches forgiveness and reconciliation and provided a good example of the practice of both virtues when he publicly forgave the rebels who, in May of 1997, caused the death of his wife. But at the same time he openly condemned the crimes of the RLA (Rwandan Liberation Army) against the population, as well as the abuses committed by the government soldiers. He speaks slowly, with conviction, almost always seasoning his speeches with lines from the Bible and African proverbs, and only raises his voice when he needs to defend the weak."

The critical and the loving view need to be integrated. Compassion is indispensable, but also, today more than ever, so is clear analysis. In a world that is more globalized by the day, we need to be capable of unmasking the many traps set by the international political-economic-military system. Only with a maturity capable of integrating the astuteness of the serpent with the simplicity of the dove, as Lord Jesus exhorted us to do, can we as Christians understand and follow a disconcerting Master capable of forgiving and praying for his own executioners while at the same time displaying an astonishing energy against those who oppress orphans, widows and all those who are dispossessed. A Jesus capable of seeing openness and faith in the heart of a centurion of the Imperial oppressor and to foresee the conversion of Zacchaeus, the leader of the publican collaborationists. But also, at the same time, a Jesus capable of recognizing with sorrowful clarity the hard-heartedness of those who plotted his death. A Jesus capable of unmasking them without false diplomacy, with a few unequivocal accusations, with a few forceful condemnations made with an authority born of truth and compassion.

It is the view, at once realistic and transfigured, that we, who feel as our own "the great open wound on our planet" that is Africa, feel. And especially those of us who feel called to work, if it be from here in Europe or if it be on African soil, so that a conflict as complex and deceptive as that in the African Great Lakes can come to an end. We need clarity in our analysis of the deep and hidden economic roots of all the genocides that have been passed off as tribal. But also the strength and hope to confront evil, this evil that apparently always seems to triumph. I do not know if, from the comfort of Europe, I have sufficient moral authority to speak of hope, but I believe that, in spite of everything, the Lord continues to work prodigious Wonders in the midst of so much desolation, evil doing and deceit, in the midst of so many traps disguised as negotiation. Traps such as those that were laid for Him by some who lived for power, some in whose hearts lived an unshakeable tendency towards evil.

From the point of view shared by many African and non-African colleagues, colleagues in the fight for peace in this African region, the major stumbling block in the way of this peace has been, for more than a decade, the malevolence and ambition of a small regional and international elite. Just as Albert Einstein, in a European scenario similar to that of the Great Lakes District of Africa today, said "future generations will lament more the silence of the great masses than the evildoing of the few." This silence is often not the result of cold indifference, but of the easily manipulated ingenuousness of the great majority in this region and in the entire international community. This ingenuousness permits the intrigues and manipulations of a few. And this silence is also at other times the result of an unfortunate impatience. In addition to these two great obstacles, the evil of a few and the silence of the great masses, I believe that there is something else that deserves to be considered a key question and merits our attention: reconciliation as an alibi. The maliciousness of these few and the gullibility of the many are playing an important part in this battle.

It would appear that some would insist on convincing us that the primary problem in present day Rwanda is reconciliation and not the huge regional and international economic and geostrategic interests. Thus we once again encounter the idea that it is ordinary people who are not able to reconcile and who are thus responsible for the whole thing. Some of us, however, have been convinced for years that this is, above all, a conflict about power, one of those typical conflicts in which, through the force of repression and manipulation of information, a powerful minority impresses its will on a large majority – a majority that is, in reality, much more prepared and disposed to live together and negotiate their own future than some would want us to believe. We have also been convinced for years that the players and interests in this conflict are neither only nor principally regional. The United Nations itself in a third, harshly worded document, just denounced the depredation of the natural resources of the Democratic Republic of the Congo by many large multinationals.

If the fundamental problem is reconciliation, the conclusion that follows is that all the other problems in the public sector can and must wait. Above all they must wait for democracy and the ethnic desegregation on the army. They systematically confuse the two worlds of the personal and the public, that of the ethnic and the political, that of forgiveness in the personal realm and pardon under the penal justice system. In this ceremony of confusion everything is distorted. I have to say that on my trips to Euskadi I have seen proportionally much more resentment than among the Rwandans I have known. Nevertheless, has it occurred to anyone to remove the forces of public safety until they clean up their private wounds? For Europe, Latin America and so many other regions of our planet, everyone is completely clear about the distinction between these two worlds. But for the populations of the African Great Lakes everything seems to be different.

In order to authorize the Rwandan, Burundian and Congolese peoples to initiate democracies, we require them to reconcile, even though in many of our northern democracies we haven’t achieved that. We require a renunciation of armed conflict which even Nelson Mandela himself did not accept, even though today he is recognized as the model leader on this road to reconciliation. We require from them what we never required from the Latin American revolutions. And those who do not accept these conditions are automatically turned into "genocidal Interahamwes." This is because the question of reconciliation is completely contaminated by the other big question: That of "THE" genocide. For all of this vast region, the genocide of 1994 in tiny Rwanda or, better said, the version of it that has prevailed, is more than just an historical event. Just as is the liberating intervention of the RPF (Rwandan Patriotic Front.)

They exist in their own omnipresent, teleological, atemporal and inevitable categories. Everything has to be seen in the light of these fundamental facts as if one were looking at a new universe. Like original sin and redemption by Christ. With the result that everything, including events outside Rwanda (in Burundi, Zaire, etc.) and even those dating before the genocide of ’94, are influenced by them. It seems as if the entire region must pay for this Rwandan genocide of ’94. The democrats of Burundi beforehand and the Congolese afterwards. In addition "THE" genocide seems to have the power to excuse all the extensive crimes of the Tutsi extremists in the region (before, during and after ’94) which were quantitatively much greater. All of this absurd argumentation only serves to hide another, more realistic, logic: to gain power in Rwanda and, later, access to the exceptional resources of Zaire, they chose people like the RPF for their military allies in the region and had to justify the dictatorship and aggression.

To the excuse of genocide, which since ’94 has justified widespread barbarism, it is necessary to add that of reconciliation. It is a strange situation. More and more the RPF feels the necessity of showing the world a reconciled Rwanda, but it is not willing to take the steps that would lead to it: those of truth and justice. Thus they try to impose "their" reconciliation, a reconciliation that, like "EL" genocide, claims to be unique. It is "THE" reconciliation. But this supposed reconciliation would be nothing more than public submission to a profoundly oppressive system which only aspires to perpetuate itself both in duration and also by aggressive expansionism. And anyone who does not want to submit to the dogma of "THE" genocide and "THE" reconciliation proves, according to the RPF, their "guilt." Antoine-Th. Nyetera spoke these words before the European Parliament on November 27, 1998: "How can we dare to speak of reconciliation between Hutus and Tutsis when some are demonized and others sanctified? Can you tell me that there could be reconciliation between the English and the devils? How can you install an International Tribunal for the Hutus who were attacked and not for the Tutsis who were the attackers?" These farsighted questions, which do not diplomatically or hypocritically hide the strong ethnic component that in this conflict is so tied to who controls the power, do not come from a racist Interahamwe, but from a Tutsi from the royal family who has lived in Rwanda during all of the regimes which have succeeded each other during this century: the monarchy, Kayibanda and Habyarimana. He fled from the RPF and lives in Belgium.

On the other hand, with this newest distracting maneuver centered on a false and for that matter impossible reconciliation, we find ourselves once again locked into diminished regional confines. Again we loose sight of the larger and more realistic target of the international economic and strategic interests of the lobbies of the big corporations and governments such at the United States. They, together with the extremist minorities in the region, have been and are still present in the planning of the ferocious depredation of this region and they have sustained it. In the face of these important international actors in this conflict, what is the sense of the word "reconciliation?" One supposes that governments seek the general welfare of the population, which is a lot to suppose. We could begin by asking ourselves if American society, for example, offers anything important to the rest of the world. Even our questions will lead us too far astray. But what is clear is that, at least in the world of money, if not at the heights of politics, there is no other law than that of profit. How do you reconcile yourself with the inhuman machinations that generate the maximum profit in the shortest time possible while destroying anyone you need to? Only humans have hearts that can generate the miracle of reconciliation. Against a global system that dehumanizes and destroys so many of our brothers, sons of the merciful Father, nothing works better than confrontation. A confrontation as direct as that which the Lord Jesus displayed in all of his strength.

I want to finish with this question of reconciliation by referring to some recent events that could be of the greatest importance: Tanzania, once again with the acquiescence of UNHCR, has given an ultimatum to the Rwandan refugees that they leave their territory before December 31. To be exact, the Tanzanian Minister of External Affairs, Mohammed Seif Khatib, declared the following last October 9: "Now there is peace in Rwanda and the government has agreed to welcome the refugees back. The time has come for them to return to their homes." The tens of thousands of refugees are a stronger denial than any other of the fact of a "reconciled" Rwanda. It seems that many of the military forces now returning from the DR Congo to Rwanda could be sent to Tanzania, crossing Burundi, in order to accomplish this expulsion. It is a familiar scenario: that of Kibelo, of Kivu …

Such an ultimatum contravenes the most elementary of the rights of the refugees, the right not to be repatriated by force, and clearly violates the prohibition against expulsion and devolution, agreed upon and accepted by all the signatories of the Geneva Convention on the Status of Refugees. And it also gives proof of the moral bankruptcy of the RPF. That Kagame who today makes reconciliation an important imaginary question and who intends to impose it by an act of congress, is the same one who for years energetically rejected it. It is always the same, the dictatorships only talk of reconciliation in the later stages when they begin to be difficult to maintain and when their crimes are hard to hide. While they feel strong, they only talk of order and national security. This newest forced repatriation of tens of thousands of refugees, the return of other tens of thousands of soldiers coming back from the Congo, and the farce of the implementation of Gacca, circumstances that add to the systematic international impunity that the RPF enjoys point to a worrisome 2003 for the people of Rwanda who are suffering in the midst of international unconsciousness and indifference.

This November UNHCR organized a conference in Portugal on reconciliation in the Great Lakes region, with a large attendance of experts on the subject, a conference that is scheduled to conclude in Barcelona in 2004. At the same time UNHCR is reaching agreements with the Tanzanian and Rwandan governments for the forced repatriation of tens of thousands of Rwandan refugees. The tenth chapter of the book by Marie-Beatrice Umutesi, Flight or Death in the Congo, comes to mind, in which she tells how the UNHCR put a price of ten dollars on the head of each one of the Rwandan refugees who in 1997 fled the attacks on the refugee camps and the killings that followed. On the one hand UNHCR organizes conferences on reconciliation, while on the other it makes agreements with the Tanzanian and Rwandan governments for the forced return of the refugees. How can they achieve such a high degree of hypocrisy? How can they, after so much time and after the terrible forced repatriations of 1996 and 1997, which were followed by widespread killings, once again force the refugees to go back? How can they not fear for the lives of these refugees? Do we have to stand by impotently and watch these impending massacres?

If, from the beginning, the organizations who have been collaborating closely for years have agreed on one thing, it is an extremely pessimistic assessment of the hidden intentions of the leaders of the RPF. It is our conviction that it is an organization whose only goal is power at any price and that they bear serious responsibility for everything that has happened in the region since 1990. Their dominance in Rwanda and in the whole region is sustained solely by their important international supporters, their bellicosity, the ferocity of their repression and their mastery of the art of manipulation. Above all their success in the manipulation of information has been especially remarkable, as Serge A. Desouter contends in "The Usurpation of the Term Genocide." The intensity of the propaganda has reached heights that are difficult to imagine. Among the media outlets that have the most impact only a few, as in the case of Mundo Negro, have been able to escape the pressure.

In the same vein it is possible to mention a few true experts on this conflict who stand out by their authority from the all too numerous crowd of so-called experts. I am going to limit myself to recognizing the opinions of Herman Cohen and the aforementioned Serge A. Desouter. In both cases the relevance of their positions, the quality of the information they present and the topicality of their statements are worthy of consideration. The first is the former American Under Secretary of State for Africa. The latter was for many years the Director of the Belgian Committee of Missionary Institutes. After the invasion of the Congo and the systematic plundering of its resources, some as strategic as coltan or as valuable as gold and diamonds, the reality of the situation is so obvious that it is almost not worth the effort to spell it out. But it seems that the great inertia created by the untenable "sole" version of the conflict and the resistance many feel towards recognizing that they have fallen into a trap, make it necessary to once more make the effort to interpret the facts.

It is surprising that after the latest revelations and events there are still those who continue to speak of "THE" genocide and who speak of it only in the regional sense. It is not possible to understand this genocide without taking into account the earlier history of Rwanda and, in particular, all the events since 1990. And it is not possible to understand all this together with past events without taking into account the outcome of this history: the ultimate and recent depredation of the Congo. Also, on the other hand, it is impossible to understand the present situation in the region, to understand the absolute triumph of the lies and the oppression, without taking into account the triumph of the official version of "THE" genocide. This has been the key to the propaganda war. It is surprising that some even persist in not seeing the direct relationship between all that has happened. It is also surprising that during more than a decade many prestigious experts on conflict and human rights have been incapable of seeing the hand of the United States in all of this. And precisely that it has been American experts who have denounced what these experts have either not seen or have hidden.

H. Cohen, in an interview published in Le Phare (Kinshasa) on the 17^th of October, said in respect to this: " …the Rwandan and Ugandan governments have admitted to having invaded the Congo for their own objectives and have given as their principal reason the elimination of their own rebels, who used Congolese territory as a base from which to mount guerrilla operations across their borders … According to them (the Rwandans) the genocidal Interahamwe who benefit from Kabila’s hospitality had to be eliminated. In fact, the major part of the Interahamwe who escaped the first invasion of the Congo in 1996, lived in Central Africa outside of the Congo. After the Rwandan invasion, the Interahamwe were well content to go to the Congo to fight against the invaders of the PAR (Patriotic Army of Rwanda, the armed branch of the RPF). Ironically, you only have to see that from 1998 until today, the majority of the Interahamwe combatants have been active in the eastern part of the Congo, the sector controlled by Rwanda and the DRC [a rebel group created by Rwanda, as Cohen has affirmed earlier] …

Why has there been so little fighting between the Rwandan soldiers and the Interahamwe? The Rwandans have fought against the Mai-Mai, the Banyamulenge, the dissident soldiers of the DRC and civil society. Why have the Rwandans established a peaceful co-existence with the Interahamwe while the main reason which, according to them justifies the invasion of the Congo was to eliminate these genocidal criminals? The continual presence of Interahamwe provides Rwanda with a perfect excuse to maintain a presence, which has become essentially an economic presence, in the Congo ... I believe that one of the political and strategic objectives of Kigali has been and continues to be the dismembering of the Congo. The main objective is to create an independent state in Kivu, which would be governed by surrogates from Kigali and would become the engine for economic development in Rwanda. To the surprise of Rwanda, the people of Kivu showed a high degree of Congolese nationalism. Despite the fact that the supporters of Mobutu systematically sacked their riches, the population of Kivu considers itself above all Congolese. ... We have all read news according to which the last Rwandan troops on Congolese soil retreated on the 4^th of October at 13 o’clock. Can you confirm the truth of this news? Yes, the Rwandan army left, but the DRC, taking the place of Rwanda, is still there with cadres PAR in disguise and will work towards the secession of Kivu if they cannot overpower Kinshasa ...by military means, of course…

One can not truthfully talk about the history of the Congo and disassociate it from the presence of the USA in this part of the continent. The USA has been present on the political scene since the time of King Leopold II. The were present until the 1960’s. They were present from the beginning until the end of the reign of Mobutu. And they were present during the war that began in 1996 and which continues today. And all of these "presences" were not on the level of a super power there to promote the values of democracy ... After the arrival of Kabila, the Clinton administration, from my point of view, did not understand the nature of the conflict. They saw it as a civil war and not as a "proxy war." The Clinton administration therefore had the tendency to see the Congo through the eyes of Kigali. This was an unfortunate misjudgment.

Paul Kagame claims to have come to drive the Interahamwe out Today he retreats without having neutralized those whom he claimed to be looking for and who are, on the other hand, very active in the East. What does this tell you? The failure of the PAR to destroy the Interahamwe combatants in the eastern Congo which was controlled by the PAR is an important indicator that the Rwandans did not go to the Congo to fight the genocidal criminals. In effect we all know that the majority of the Interahamwe combatants reached the refugee camps and participated in the genocide in the interior of Rwanda in 1994. It is also important to observe that the majority of the PAR soldiers in the Congo are Hutu and have been taken out of the prisons of Kigali where they were waiting to be tried for their participation in the genocide ... The PAR was trained to destroy the Interahamwe. It is ironic that Rwanda now requires the Kabila government to occupy itself with the armed Hutus in the Congo, after having itself failed to do the same.

The effort to separate "THE" genocide from all these other events (before, during and after) is surprising, even though some of these events also have the characteristics of genocide. "THE" genocide, the official version of it, is the cornerstone of the campaign of disinformation, it is omnipresent and it is unquestioned. Surely the assassination of two of the nine or ten Spanish missionaries assassinated in Rwanda, Quim Vallmajo and Isidro Uzkudun, were connected with the unquestionability of this genocide. It is surprising that they also don’t talk about the genocide of 300,000 Hutus in Burundi in 1972, or about the responsibility of the RPF for many of the large massacres in 1994 in Rwanda, or of the genocide of hundreds of thousands of Hutu refugees in the Congo starting in 1996, or of the death of millions of Congolese killed by causes directly related to the invasion that they had suffered. It is even more surprising when there is no lack of investigations, including by the UN, which attest to them. It is surprising that even today, when the responsibility and the guilt of the RPF in the double assassination of the 6^th of April 1994 are starting to be recognized, that they deny the relevance of this attack despite the fact that within hours the genocide was unleashed. This zeal to isolate "THE" genocide is evidence that they are taking a particular interpretation of events to the limits in order to reinforce a predetermined conclusion. Serge A. Desouter, in his article "The Usurpation of the Term Genocide," offers an extremely lucid analysis of this whole process of the distortion of reality:

"Genocide is a legal term defined by international law. In the case of Rwanda –and not only there– this term has also gotten a political and economic connotation because they abuse the original meaning. Genocide, in this last instance, equals a safe-conduct in the face of which no one asks questions. Until recently no one dared to tackle this theme. If you want to talk about genocide in Rwanda it is understood that one must be clear that this concerns "the" genocide against the Tutsis. But it rapidly became clear that it wasn’t only Tutsis who had been killed. To defend their reasoning, a new social class was invented and signaled out as victims: "the moderate Hutus." Clearly they were killed by the same guilty parties ..."

"The manipulation of the term "genocide" by Kigali is simple enough: It is carried out in three phases. First it has to do with imposing an easily understood way of looking at things: good guys and bad guys, cowboys and Indians, assassins and victims, Hutus and Tutsis. For this they have no hesitation to use the media, exhibiting dead bodies, lies and half truths. They play insistently on the emotions of an ignorant public and also on a good number of ignorant politicians. In the second phase, public opinion thus established is consecrated and repeated until it turns into sacred and untouchable proof. It is convenient to use big slogans made up of words intended to shock, such as genocide, mock trials, death squads, revisionism, minimalism, planned extermination . . . Anyone who would raise their voice is condemned beforehand.

In the end the myth is ready to go to work. Now no one will dare to try to debate anything because even the most honorable organizations have been compromised and no not permit other alternatives. It is political and diplomatic terrorism of the worst ilk, because it excludes any negotiation or any opening for dialog. On the other have the result of this situation has already led to a new phase of the war, this time in the whole region. But to get to this point it is necessary that the "others" –read Hutus– first be demonized in a way that they can be hated by everyone. The "good guys" –read Tutsis– thus get all the understanding. This order of thinking functions well in the advertising world of soft drinks: it is garbage, but the whole world says it tastes good. Is there really any such thing as "good guys" and "bad guys?"

All of this is the result of what Tony Waters calls "conventional thinking." Generally accepted ideas and theses that because of their simplicity, are very comfortable. If they approximate reality or not is a question that is asked only rarely, above all because politicians and representatives of the media have to make rapid decisions and have a justification for these decisions ready. Nevertheless, experience should teach them that decisions and judgments based on conventional thinking are rarely reliable and rarely lead to good results.

The manner in which information is gathered and transmitted should be enough to put us on guard when we are forming opinions. Since this information is habitually gathered at times of crisis and catastrophe emotions play an enormous role. Every journalist or anyone who has even minimal historical training has to take this into account. Ask the high officials of the UNAMIR about what conventional thinking they should use in their strategy and their politics. They are still bitterly licking their wounds.

Usually it is organizations dedicated to humanitarian aid, both those on the scene and diplomatic missions, that, at times of crisis, send the first news. Thus they quickly arrive at ideas that generally are acceptable and simplistic. Frequently this contributes to the justification for the presence, strategies and financial needs of the informant. Others, who have a better understanding and knowledge of the reality of the situation, of the culture and of the local language (we are thinking particularly of missionaries) don’t count. Worse still, in the case of Rwanda they imposed silence, eventually accusing them of complicity, minimalism, fascism, racism, etc. . . . or intimidating them. Some among them were physically eliminated.

Here we have an example of the terminology used by an expert witness about the Church in Rwanda, information put together by the public prosecutor of the International Tribunal at Arusha: obsessive preoccupation with race; plotting a destructive theology of racial division; preaching racism, ethnic superiority, and genetic superiority; playing the ethnic card; preaching a perverted and racist theology; etc. In short, about a hundred pages in this vein. But given the urgency of the situation, they had to arrive at some easily understood ideas and they still have neither time nor interest in a more serious analysis. On others who have differing opinions, a better knowledge or view of the situation, they have to impose silence. They do not search for the truth; they form an opinion as quickly as possible, take a position, and make it fit in with a few facts with which there isn’t necessarily a relationship of cause and effect."

1. There is a silence that is born of indifference and, also, to a greater or lesser degree, of complicity. Above all it is the silence of the vast majority of our comfortable democratic societies who have, more than other poorer societies, a certain ability to make decisions, but for whom sub-Saharan Africa is just too far away. In our global village the instances of true globalization are in the economic sector, control of information, etc. There is a long way to go to globalize others such as justice and democracy. Above all, it will be a long time before we have the consciousness of being one human family. To be sure, there is still no country for whose voters the most important thing are questions of international importance such as peace or the suffering of three quarters of humanity instead of local matters. Until all us who encourage the development of a more just and unified world succeed in making this part of the electoral platform for the political parties, we will not be leading the way to authentic globalization.

2. There is another silence that is the result of ingenuousness, an ingenuousness incapable of recognizing plotting and psychopathology. This is a danger that those people who are most generous and spiritual, such as missionaries and collaborators are exposed to. C. M. Overdulve (a Presbyterian pastor and a missionary in Rwanda since 1961) states in his book, Rwanda, a Country With a History: "Only foreigners had any illusions about the negotiations and peace treaties. All the well-intentioned initiatives ignored the psycho-historical context of this conflict. Not so the Rwandan people, because deep in their hearts, they kept the memory of their age old experiences. . . . If the RPF had not invaded Rwanda, the Tutsis in the interior would not have suffered genocide. It is known that eminent Tutsis (among whom is included the former Mwami Ndahindurwa Kigueri V) warned the leaders of The RPF about the carnage that their invasion would unleash among the Tutsis in the interior. Nevertheless, to gain power, they were prepared to sacrifice tens of thousands of them, because in any case they considered them traitors, people for whom they didn’t need to feel much pity. This does not in any way lessen the culpability of the Hutu extremists, but it shows the complexity of Rwandan drama. . . . To imagine that the Inkotanyi (of the RPF) would capitulate, cede or share power is a contradiction of terms: the Inkotanyi will not step down."

At the end of 1999, Christopher Hakizabera, the only surviving original member of the RPF, who later left it, sent a letter to the UN Commission in charge of investigating the responsibility of the UN in the Rwandan tragedy. The well known map, which was exceptionally valuable and was published by Mundo Negro in April of 2000, unveils the terrible machinations of the criminal elements of the RPF of which Desouter, Cohen Overdulve and so many others had spoken. Already in the first paragraph he mourns the gullibility of so many employees of the international organizations faced with the Machiavellian RPF. And it continues by questioning the exaggerated figures of "THE" genocide. Such intrigues are so barbaric and diabolical that a normal person has a hard time accepting that they are possible. This initially leaves us an indefensible position.

In one of their brilliant papers the Belgian group, SOS Ruanda-Burundi, also regrets how easily manipulated so many of the prestigious experts have been: "These experts testified assiduously from all sides, indirectly through their writing or directly as witnesses for the prosecution. Today, when the lies that they spread have been uncovered, there is evidence that these illustrious experts allowed themselves to be involved in a whitewash, in an historical lie, like common drug dealers." And it ends with a quote by Jose Antonio Bordallo, the former Spanish ambassador to Kinshasa, who stated a few months ago in the magazine Vida Nueva: "The (Lusaka) agreements presuppose rebel legitimacy and, at the same time, our paralyzed inaction ... There is no political will for putting an end to this war. On many occasions there is bad faith and interest that they do not succeed. Meanwhile, there are three million dead and 900,000 displaced people, terrifying statistics that don’t seen to trouble anyone’s conscience.

3. Finally, there is a silence that is the consequence of our feelings of impotence faced with these enormous conflicts and our dependence on "efficacy," so much a part of our culture of visible and immediate results. Nevertheless, the most productive lives have been lived by those who were able to go beyond the very human feeling of impotence and uselessness when faced with realities that seem to completely overwhelm our feeble strength and possibilities. In the face of, for example, the great international media farces and enormous genocides almost no one undertakes anything. Who is going to change the decisions and agendas of the great powers? But Gandhi saw it differently: "Our feelings of helplessness in the face of injustice and aggression come from deliberately excluding God from our daily affairs." Frequently there exists, also among Christians, a direct relationship between this lack of confidence in the presence and the strength of the Spirit in human history and the lack of validation of the spiritual power of the word (of God) and "paralysis." And often the consequence is a surrender to immediate and visible results, technical assistance, for example, while the true roots of poverty and war are left hanging. Don Helder Camara was well aware of this: "When I give the poor something to eat they call me a saint, when I ask why there are so many poor, they call me a communist."

A few days ago H. Cohen again repeated what has been clear for so many years to all those who have a little common sense, although not, it seems, to the experts: "You were the American Secretary of State for African Affairs. The Great Lakes Region was in your sphere of activity. What would you like to come back and do to create the foundations of a stable Great Lakes region?" There are two replies to this question. First, you have to give majority rule to Burundi and Rwanda combined with guarantees of safety for the minorities. After having insisted on and accomplished the end of apartheid in South Africa, The African Union and the international community have to insist on the end of minority rule in Burundi and Rwanda. The great instability of the Great Lakes region since 1990 stems from the problem of minority rule in these countries. The democratic elections in Burundi in 1993 were free, transparent and fair; and the majority government was moderate and fair, the same way that the majority government in South Africa was moderate and fair to the minorities. The international community should not be so tolerant of the coup that toppled the government of Burundi in 1993. Until majority rule applies to Burundi and Rwanda, there will be no peace in the two countries and there will be grave danger for the entire Great Lakes region. In the second place, the Congo needs to go through a real transition to the norms of democracy.

Are the peoples of the Great Lakes region by any chance different from the rest of the world and does the universal principal of democracy not apply to them? The road to peace can only begin with the end of oppression and repression. This is a platitude that not everyone in the world wants to hear, much less require to be implemented. Mons. Romero, Mons. Munzihirwa, Mons. Kataliko and many other Christians did understand this and called out: "End the repression." Throughout much of history this end has almost always led to a military victory on the part of a group with a different moral code. Less often, it has been followed by means of arming the opponents not by disarming the oppressor. In this we are followers of non-violence. Although we try to make this utopia the norm, we cannot impose this option on anyone, just as one cannot force a missionary vocation or the dedication of one’s life to the poor.

No one has the right to criminalize those who choose armed resistance. By accepting this demonizing it could be that we are falling into a new trap and are reinforcing the other violence, that of the aggressor. Thus governments of the victors subtly change into guarantors of established disorder in the face of supposed chaos in order to become the unlawful perpetrators of legal violence against every type of Interahamwe and terrorist. Even language is affected and the major media who create public opinion legitimize this lie. It is unfair to systematically condemn all armed resistance. There can be a lot of generosity and heroism among those who take part in it, as in the police forces of any society. In fact, in the course of history, many have given their lives this way for the cause of justice. One cannot forget that not only was the former Zaire attacked by the RPF, but also Rwanda in 1990. Many of the experienced soldiers of the genocidal Interahamwes, were not only not in Rwanda in 1994, as H. Cohen has said in his former statements, but they heroically defended the refugees who were massacred. There are many witnesses to this fact. Violent, heartless, hopeless revolutions historically only lead to societies that are on just as low a level and have just as impoverished values as the one that preceded it. But hope and courage are not the exclusive patrimony of non-violence or of believers. Nelson Mandela is a good example of this. He never accepted the blackmail of those who tried to get him to renounce armed resistance, and for this he suffered in jail for almost thirty years. Nevertheless, the whole world, including his enemies and jailers, recognizes his goodness and generosity.

H. Cohen also refers to this: "In a sub-regional context, and by this I mean Burundi, Rwanda, Uganda, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Congo-Brazza, the problem that exists for the reestablishment of peace and that invokes unanimity among all the African and international experts, is that of impunity. Can you believe in a lasting peace in this part of the continent without bringing all the authors of the war crimes and crimes against humanity which continue to be the norm in this region to justice, without being uneasy?" It is important that the general population is assured that those who have committed crimes will be brought before justice. Nevertheless, this cannot be confused with the politicians who have acted incorrectly on the economic level and have fallen into corruption. If this road is followed, it will be impossible to stop. I think that the various governments in the region need to follow the South African model of the Commission for Truth and Reconciliation to find the appropriate way to deal with the question of impunity. It is also important not to use the term "terrorist" improperly. The political opposition, including those who may be armed, are not terrorists, although they may be prosecuted if they have committed crimes against humanity. Once we begin to call the opposition terrorists, the term loses all its significance.

In order to not, once again, fall into the kind of ingenuousness that leaves us defenseless against manipulation, we must be aware that we are confronted with a problem that is fundamentally military. But now is the time to ask ourselves about possible roads to peace that don’t reduce us to that tired truism, "If you want peace, prepare for war," that is so dangerous for humanity. There are many historic instances of decolonization, of the fall of a dictatorship, of the end of apartheid that have come about without recourse to violence. The protagonists in these changes have always been the affected populations themselves. But the support of the international community has been crucial. The characteristics of this conflict make the ending of the dictatorship difficult for various reasons, most especially: 1. The lack of interest in the peoples of Sub-Saharan Africa on the part of those who could be their true allies, namely the civilian societies of North America and Europe. 2. In contrast to this the extreme interest of veritable economic empires in despoiling what is left to despoil in the region. 3. The weight of "THE" genocide of 1994 which continues to cause reluctance among those who could be of great help in achieving peace. The systematic provocation of the RPF, which C. Hakizabera shed light on in his letter to the UN, achieve their objective, the most extreme among the Hutu majority fall into the trap, they throw themselves into killing each other and all of the people of the region pay the price.

However, it is no less true that "The law of charity and justice asks that the institutions of a country truly safeguard equal fundamental rights and the equal possibility for human advancement and participation in public affairs. Institutions that sanctify a regime of privilege, favoritism, protectionism, whether it be for individuals or for social groups, do not conform to Christian morality." These assertions that are so valid and topical for the present Rwanda and for the entire region, have been so for almost half a century. They come from the famous pastoral letter of November 11, 1959 written by Mons. Perraudin. Today it is not necessary to train democratic leaders, but the best organizations of the democratic opposition and the victims’ associations that exist already need all of our support from now on.

Support from here not only in the face of the RPF, but, above all, in the face of the powerful lobbies which, also from here, make this untenable apartheid possible. For years our utopian objective has contributed, with the help of accusations and the use of pressure, to converting the RPF into an uncomfortable ally, a genocidal ally, for those lobbies that, from inside governments like the United States, make it possible for these dictatorships to continue in power. Non-violence renounces physical force, but without the moral force of the truth, without clarity and energy in our accusations, we are like salt that doesn’t season or yeast that doesn’t rise. It is a paradox that some realities that are small on a human scale can, if they stay true to their innermost nature, cause considerable transformations in their surroundings. Without this moral force, even dialog and negotiation, irreplaceable in the progress towards democracy, tend to change into partisan transactions which forget the true interests of the true protagonists, the people.

Neither justice in the strictly legal sense nor human justice understood in a wider sense is completely equivalent to divine justice. Nevertheless, we can assert that, even though they do not coincide in their limitations, the three can be juxtaposed in a specific common area. This shared territory is large enough that any Christian or any human being concerned with the creation of a more just and peaceful world, can turn to the courts as an exceptional instrument not only for achieving justice but also for bringing the truth to light. Frequently, denunciation of the criminal before the corresponding appeals court is more than just a possibility: it is a legal, ethical and Christian obligation. The contrary has a name: approval, which permits the criminal to continue creating new victims. But this idea, which in principal is so clear, encounters a multitude of obstacles in practice: Insistent calls for the necessity of practicing "Christian" forgiveness while forgetting the offenses and injustices, exhortations for reconciliation equally for defenseless victims and for victimizers committed to keep on killing, the ever-present assertion that "now" is not the opportune moment, the "realistic" and omnipresent thesis that "accusations won’t help anything," etc. We can’t ask international justice alone to bring about Peace, but, without any doubt, it has become essential in breaking the cycles of violence that impunity perpetuates and accentuates.

For a follower of Jesus Christ of Nazareth who gave us the gospels, such objections to denouncing what should be denounced are difficult to reconcile with the doctrine and practice of the master. This sort of unambiguous accusation led to his death. In the words of this same Jesus, I believe that such "thoughts are not those of god but of man" (Matt. 16,23) of "flesh and blood" (16,17) and not of the Spirit, which had "anointed" him and "sent him to bring the Good News to the afflicted, ... liberty to the captives … liberty to the oppressed . . ." (Luke 4,18) His words and attitudes were unequivocal: "Alas for you, scribes and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You pay your tithe of mint and dill and cumin and have neglected the weightier matters of the Law: justice, mercy and good faith!" (Matt. 23,23) And this energetic behavior doesn’t come from nowhere, but is embedded in a people and a spiritual tradition that for centuries has walked the same path: "For the Semites, justice is not as much an attitude of passive impartiality as it is of passionate engagement . . on the side of those in the right." (X. Leon Dufour, Vocabulary of Biblical theology, p. 402).

More than three thousand years ago Moses confronted the Pharaoh, not to negotiate with him as a human being, but to make demands in the name of Yahweh. But the only thing that he accomplished at first was to provoke more reprisals on the part of the Egyptians, more suffering for his own people and more complaints. Two thousand years ago it was a case of trying to avoid rebellion, according to the High Priest Caiaphas, which provoked the reaction of imperial Rome, because it was preferable that one man die instead of an entire city. (John 11,49-50). Recently, in the case of Pinochet, it was preferable to leave things as they were, many said, because it would surely cause destabilization in Chile with more disadvantages than advantages. Stability, order, peace ... always the same excuses while the people continue to suffer and die. In the face of these fallacies the great masters of true Peace (Jesus, Gandhi and so many others), were true destabilizers ... of the unjust established order, authentic provocateurs ...of profound change. Jesus proclaimed it with complete clarity: He didn’t come to bring peace, but war ... Gandhi, in addition, was a lawyer, and made use of his profession in his non-violent struggle. Now, for many, it doesn’t look like the opportune moment to take legal action against the RPF, responsible month after month for so much death and destruction.

H. Cohen, when asked about the impunity of the crimes committed by the PAR in the north of Rwanda and in the Congo, responds like this: "This is an extremely important question. When there were reports of the massacres of the Hutu refugees in the equatorial jungles around Kisangani in 1996, the United States and others asked for a UN investigation. At this time, Laurent Kabila was working closely with the regime in Rwanda which had help to bring him to power. For that reason he opposed the investigation .. . When Rwanda became Kabila’s enemy in 1998, he invited the UN to come and make its investigation. But, of course, the Rwandan army controlled the area, thus impeding the investigation. Today there are Congolese eye witnesses to the fact that the PAR went systematically to the Congolese villages assassinating every Hutu the met. I believe that they massacred more than 350,000 Hutu refugees. For them, every Hutu who had not returned to Rwanda after the refugee camps in Kivu were destroyed, was automatically considered to be Interahamwe. This investigation should be revived, there certainly are enough reasons, and a war crimes tribunal should be created to take care of the guilty. It is also interesting to see that the prosecutors in the Arusha Tribunal want to examine the crimes committed by the PAR in Rwanda against the Hutus when they assumed power after the genocide of 1994. The Rwandan government refuses to cooperate with the magistrates over this question. Finally, it is important to listen to the testimony of the Congolese from Kivu, North Katanga, Maniema, Kisangani and the eastern Congo with respect to the crimes against humanity committed by the PAR, the DRC and the CLM (Congolese Liberation Movement). We have already heard enough reports coming form human rights groups which indicate that serious crimes were committed in the eastern Congo."