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2009-04-07 Africa Subsaharan
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Rwanda lambasts 'cowardice' of UN
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Rwandan President Paul Kagame has accused the international community of cowardice during a speech marking the 15th anniversary of Rwanda's genocide. He told a rally of 20,000 people in the capital, Kigali, UN troops abandoned their posts without firing a shot.
Thousands of candles were lit at the stadium, spelling out the word 'hope'.
Mr Kagame also led commemorations at Nyanza, where more than 5,000 people were slaughtered after peacekeepers pulled out.
Some 800,000 people were killed within 100 days by ethnic Hutu militia after the assassination of the president. The genocide began when Juvenal Habyarimana's plane was shot down on 6 April 1994 and came to an end when Tutsi-led rebels under the current president took control.
The massacre at Nyanza took place after Belgian troops withdrew following a Rwandan militia attack that claimed the lives of 10 peacekeepers on 7 April that year.
The BBC's Geoffrey Mutagoma in Kigali says the site of the former peacekeepers' base is seen as a symbol of the UN's failure 15 years ago.
| We've had plenty of symbols of UN failure both before and after ... |
President Kagame said: "We are not like those who abandoned people they had come to protect," reported AFP news agency. "They left them to be murdered. Aren't they guilty? I think it is also cowardice. They left even before any shot was fired.
"We are not cowards. They [the international community] are part of that history and the root causes of the genocide."
He laid a wreath at the hill site in Nyanza and lit a torch in memory of the victims. 
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Posted by john frum 2009-04-07 17:33||
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