What Human Rights Watch (HRW) does on Rwanda is not human rights advocacy.

Munyambo Peter
Aug 8, 2017 · 2 min read

What Human Rights Watch (HRW) does on Rwanda is not human rights advocacy. It is political advocacy which has become profoundly unscrupulous in both its means and its ends. HRW’s Board of Directors should hold Executive Director Kenneth Roth and the HRW personnel who cover Rwandan issues accountable for this travesty, which has dangerous implications for Western policy toward Rwanda and for the overall credibility of Western human rights advocacy. Donors to HRW should think seriously about what causes their money might serve. Western governments should be careful about following HRW advice, and courageous enough to challenge them publicly when need be.

HRW’s discourse on Rwanda over the past twenty years has been viscerally hostile to the Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF) which defeated the genocidal Hutu Power regime in 1994, and systematically biased in favor of letting unrepentant Hutu Power political forces back into Rwandan political life.

My purpose here is not to defend the Rwandan government, which is accountable first and foremost to its own people as well as to a variety of outside institutions. My purpose is to expose and perhaps alter the conduct of HRW. With substantial funding and a mission statement whose nobility matches that of any established religion, HRW has enormous influence on Western media and foreign policy makers, particularly with regard to countries like Rwanda which are outside the core areas of Western interest and familiarity. But HRW’s decision-making process is not transparent, the aura of sanctity around its professed mission deters public scrutiny of its policies and practices, and the degree of accountability of HRW to anyone is quite unclear. This situation of unchecked power is one where things can go seriously wrong. With regard to Rwanda, they have.

HRW’s discourse on Rwanda is a threat to that country and to peace and stability in Central Africa. It discourages Western governments from doing what they should to support Rwanda’s recovery from the 1994 genocide. It perpetuates impunity for important genocide perpetrators.

It pains many Rwandans and particularly the genocide survivors. It crowds out the potential for a more constructive dialogue between the West and Rwanda, and raises the risks of cynicism and a bunker mentality in Kigali. Above all, it encourages the leaders of the still extant “Hutu Power” movement — most visible as a small stratum of upper class extremists among the Rwandan diaspora who are unrepentant about and often implicated in the 1994 genocide against the Rwandan Tutsi — to keep blowing on the embers of that genocide in the hope of restoring Hutu Power governance in Rwanda.

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