Report

Disarmament and Reconciliation Rwanda’s Concerns

“The main aim of this paper is to try and bring to the fore the complexities behind the conflict in Rwanda with a focus on the need to link disarmament to the entire post-conflict confidence building and reconciliation process now underway. The paper first assesses the impact of the 1994 genocide and then reviews the various post conflict approaches currently being implemented in Rwanda. It concludes by proposing that there is a need to make these
structures compatible with disarmament as prevention against possible recurrence of the conflict. The basic questions are: What triggered the massive quest for weapons used in the genocide? What is Rwandan society doing today to prevent a recurrence of a
similar situation? The research is based on fieldwork and interviews by the author during visits to Rwanda in 2004.”