C'est pour sauver des Tutsi, principale ethnie victime du conflit, que 2 000 soldats français reprennent le chemin du Rwanda

Leenhardt, Étienne

Rochot, Philippe

19 juin 1994

19940619

20:00:00

CEST

Journal de 20 heures

C'est pour sauver des Tutsi, principale ethnie victime du conflit, que 2 000 soldats français reprennent le chemin du Rwanda

En prélude à cette opération, plusieurs centaines de Hutu et de Tutsi ont pu être évacués grâce à l'initiative de Bernard Kouchner.

ScriptFrance2JournalDe20Heures19061994.pdf

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2

France 2

INA

Transcription d'une émission de télévision

FR

- Charles Pasqua denounced the inability of the international community to mobilize to put an end to the massacres in Rwanda.
- The Red Cross hospital in Kigali, the capital, was hit by three shells today, while the humanitarian operation decided by France should be launched quickly.
- These combatants of the Rwandan Patriotic Front have sworn to oppose by arms the intervention of France. They accuse the French army of training General Habyarimana's soldiers who started the massacres. And yet it is to save the Tutsi, the majority ethnic group in this movement and the main victim of the conflict, that 2,000 French soldiers are heading back to Rwanda.
- It is in the south-west of the country that most of the Tutsi populations are found. They fled the massacres unleashed by the Hutu last April. These people are therefore victims of the withdrawal of the Rwandan army which withdraws in the face of the RPF offensive and pushes the Tutsi populations towards the South-West.
- The most likely hypothesis for a French intervention would be through Zaire and the city of Bukavu. The scenario would be more or less the same as last April, with the difference that this time French troops will be placed under a UN mandate to help not foreigners but Rwandans.
- As a prelude to this operation, several hundred Hutu and Tutsi trapped in the Hotel des Mille Collines in Kigali were able to be evacuated this morning thanks to the initiative of Bernard Kouchner. They were able to regain the areas controlled by their forces.
- But the children of the Saint-Michel orphanage in Kigali are still stuck in the establishment with this French volunteer who does not want to abandon them, Marc Vaiter. Bernard Kouchner hopes that they will be the first to benefit from France's intervention in Rwanda.

The 20 o'clock news of France 2 of June 19, 1994 is visible in its entirety here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pjbfJvjrIZQ