By KABIRIMA JONATHAN
A Former Rwandan Refugee in Uganda
On the 20th June of each year the world celebrates the World Refugee Day. This day started on 4 December 2000, when the United Nations General Assembly in Resolution 55/76 decided that, from 2001, 20 June would be celebrated as World Refugee Day. In this resolution, the General Assembly noted that 2001 marked the 50th anniversary of the 1951 Convention relating to the Status of Refugees. African Refugee Day had been formally celebrated in several countries prior to 2000. The UN noted that the Organization of African Unity (OAU) had agreed to have International Refugee Day coincide with Africa Refugee Day on 20 June. However, the story of this day and the Rwandan refugees is more complicated and politicized that one might think.
In 2001, I was a Rwandan Hutu refugees stuck in the jungle of DRC. I had left Rwanda as a 4 year old boy in 1994. This means that I was born in 1990s when the Tutsi led Rwandan refugees from the refugee camps in Uganda took up their arms to come back to Rwanda to overthrow the 30 year old Hutu independence. After they had gotten enough support in Uganda through the support of the US Intelligence Operative Roger Winter who helped the RPF to kill but instead blame the victims.
Like most of other RPF sympathisers such as John Prendergast of the Enough Project, Eric Reeves, Brian D’Silva, Ted Dagne and Roger Winter in conjunction with the UNHCR have worked tirelessly to make sure that the people of Congo and Hutu Rwandans will never get justice of the crimes committed against them by America and the Tutsi led RPF of kagame UPDF of Museveni, and Major Pierre Buyoya of Burundi. These people John Prendergast, Eric Reeves, Brian D’Silva, Ted Dagne and Roger Winter have benefited from the suffering of the Congolese and Hutu refugees where they worked tirelessly to make sure that crimes committed against Hutu refugees and the Congolese people are not talked about. Through Enough Project John Prendergast worked in collaboration with Kigali to make sure that the Rwandan refugees living in DRC and the Great Lakes Region do not have access to services for refugees. However, it is not the first time that UNHCR has worked to make sure that African refugees suffer. This is how all was started by Roger Winter.
In 1980s Roger Winter, as Executive Director of the United States Committee for Refugees and Immigrants, gave direct physical and financial support to the RPF before during and after the Tutsi war to oust Hutu regimes in the region. According to Keith Snow, Roger Winter actively supported the Tutsi refugees to have access to scholarships, finances, and fundraising in USA. Through the Association of Banyarwanda in Diaspora USA, assisted by Roger Winter, organized the International Conference on the Status of Banyarwanda [Tutsi] Refugees in Washington, DC in 1988, and this is where a military solution to the Tutsi problem was chosen. However, the Tutsi also were to give something in back. It was decided that the Eastern region of DR Congo was going to be annexed back to Rwanda. That way it could ease the American companies owned by the Clintons and other shareholders to come and loot Congo without any problems. The deal was approved and the U.S. Committee for Refugees accepted to fund the RPF and reportedly provided accommodation and transportation and worked as the fundraising entity for the RPF. From this time UNCHR which was working in the refugee camps of Tutsi refugees in Nakivala, Uganda started providing small weapons to the Rwandan Tutsi refugees in the refugee camp to prepare their assault against an independent state of Rwanda.
In 1990s the UNHCR assisted the Tutsi RPF a ot especially in bringing weapons into the refugee camps. All RPF weapon caches found inside Rwanda had been brought by UNHCR as food relief. After RPF conquered Rwanda in 1994 UNHCR and Roger Winter, as Executive Director of the United States Committee for Refugees and Immigrants continued their plans to take over DRC. It is in this case that UNHCR started bringing both food and weapons in the Rwandan Hutu refugees camps in DRC. Many American organizations also were involved in supporting the new Tutsi regime in Rwanda and worked actively to bring in US spies to help RPF prepare its last assault against innocent refugees among whom were children, women, and sick people. One of those notorious US notorious organizations that helped RPF to kill and conquer Hutus is The United Methodist Committee on Relief (UMCOR) is a prominent worldwide emergency relief organization. A nonprofit agency of the United Methodist Church. This organization brought US spies into DRC in the refugee camps of NRA, Kavumu, Shabunda, Nyangezi, Panzi, Mugunga and among others to help RPF and Museveni plan for their invention of DRC.
UNHCR lorries were used to bring in weapons from Uganda and Kigali and also helped the RPF to infiltrate its military into Congo. UNHCR lorries used to bring food to Hutu refugees and also Tutsis soldiers to kill them. In the camps of Mugunga, Nyangezi, Kibumba, and Katale, UNHCR brought in soldiers from Rwanda and Uganda who launched the attacks against Rwandan Hutu refugees. At around 3am 11 September 1996 the Tutsi led invasion was launched against the Hutu refugees in the camps not from Rwanda but from the UNHCR warehouses in Hutu refugee camps in Congo.
After the destruction of the Rwandan Hutu refugee camps in DRC and realizing that they plans of repatriating everybody to Rwanda failed the UNHCR continued playing key role in harassing and menacing Rwandan refugees in DRC. In Sake after refugees had left Mugunga and Kibumba, UNHCR ferried in American soldiers who were calling upon refugees to go back before they started shooting at them. When refugees refused to return to Rwanda and continued into the dense and thick forests inside Congo the UNHCR worked hard to meet them at 2000 km away from Goma in a place called Tingi-Tingi. Sadako Ogata the UNHCR High Commissioner came to Tingi-Tingi and told refugees that they deserved to be killed if they didnt want to go back to Rwanda. Sadako Ogata held positions in the United Nations, chairing the UNICEF Executive Board and serving on the UN Commission on Human Rights as its independent expert on the human rights situation in Burma. Sadako oversaw large-scale emergency operations in northern Iraq, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Kosovo, and the Great Lakes region of Africa where she helped RPF of Kagame, Yoweli Museveni, Buyoya, and Ethiopia to come and kill Hutu refugees in Masses in DRC.
In Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania, and Ethiopia Rwandan Hutu refugees were harassed by UNHCR staff this is because Kagame and US government had already put their own people who were charged to single out Hutu refugees and deny them right to asylum. A good example is the UNHCR Kenya case where refugees were sent to SHAURI MOYO SPORT COMPLEX to wait for their resettlement but later to find out UNHCR Kenya had sold their dossiers to Somali and Ethiopian refugees. Majority of Rwandan refugees did not have refugee documents until the Kenyan government volunteered to register all refugees within its borders in 2007.
Kagame's government and UNHCR headquarters did not stop harassing Rwandan refugees around the continent of Africa. In 1997-2000 they were forcefully deported from Congo Brazzaville and Gabon. In 2001 they were forcefully deported by UNHCR from Uganda. The Rwandan Tutsi government has been harassing and killing Hutu refugees found in Malawi, Mozambique, Zambia, and elsewhere. This is because US continue to intimidate UNHCR branches across the continent to intimidate Rwandan Hutu refugees for the fear that one day they might be able to reorganize themselves and come back to liberate their country from the occupiers.
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