Citation
BENACO CAMP, Tanzania, May 9 (Reuter) - I've seen him. He is here,
the Rwandan youth said. He had spotted a man at a relief camp on Monday
who last month led executions of hundreds in his home village.
Most of the 193,000 Rwandans who spilled across the frontier into
western Tanzania late last month appear to be Hutu civilians running
from Tutsi guerrillas advancing against government forces, camp inmates
and aid workers say.
But among them, refugees say, are former members of Hutu militias which
butchered countless thousands from the minority Tutsi tribe.
They also slaughtered Hutu opposition party supporters in an orgy of
killing that began after president Juvenal Habyarimana was killed in a
mysterious rocket attack on his plane on April 6.
There are people amongst them who are killers. It's a fact. When they
cross they don't have arms with them and they are civilians,
said one
United Nations Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) official.
Some refugees say they have recognised militia members and their
leaders moving freely about the camp in gangs or with their families
and accuse them of stealing food aid being distributed to refugees.
They allegedly include Jean-Baptiste Gatete, district chief of Murambi
in eastern Rwanda, who has been mentioned in past human rights reports
as being behind the massacre of Tutsis.
Gatete was killing anybody who wasn't MRND (Habyarimana's party)...He
killed many people,
said one half-Hutu, half-Tutsi refugee from
Murambi who said three of his cousins had been killed by Interahamwe
last month.
The refugee said Gatete moved about the camp with Interahamwe members,
including their leader Nkundabazungu who allegedly distributed grenades
to militias who attacked local churches where hundreds of people had
taken refuge.
Interahamwe
-- Those who Attack Together
-- was the militia of the
MRND party. Members of Impuzamugambi
-- Those who Come Together
--
of the hardline Hutu Coalition for the Defence of the Republic (CDR)
are also in the camp, refugees say.
Outside one hut pointed out as the makeshift home of a militia chief, a
man denied he was a member but said Interahamwe was simply a youth
movement and had not killed anybody.
When asked why Tutsis had been killed in Murambi he said: This was to
defend the Hutu.
Only about 5,000 of the refugees are Tutsis. Dozens of them trickle
back daily across Rusomo bridge to territory held by the Rwanda
Patriotic Front (RPF). The rest are Hutus, says the International
Federation of the Red Cross (IFRC).
Piles of machetes, clubs with nails driven into them, army helmets and
boots were abandoned on both sides of the border at Rusomo Falls.
Identity cards also litter the border post, suggesting some refugees
did not want to be known by their real names.
Inside Rwanda, the documents are a matter of life or death. Ethnic
groups are marked on the cards and militias routinely check them at
roadblocks, Rwandans say.
Jealousy and greed appear to have motivated the militia leaders'
brutality as much as tribal hatreds.
Charlotte Sautux, a Swiss citizen, told Reuters in the eastern town
Gahini that Habyarimana's militias had mounted roadblocks before the
recent violence started and once threatened to beat her for not paying
them off.
They always wanted money,
she said.
(c) Reuters Limited 1994
