Rwandan genocide: the role of Paris once again mentioned in court
Hubert Védrine, former French Minister of Foreign Affairs.
RFI/Pierre René-Worms
Text by: Nathanaël Vittrant
2 mins
The 17th chamber of the Paris Criminal Court in turn examined, Friday February 18, 2022, the genocide of Tutsis in 1994 in Rwanda.
Former Foreign Minister Hubert Védrine, at the time secretary general of the Élysée, attacked Guillaume Ancel for defamation.
This former officer of Operation Turquoise has for years accused France of having supported the genocidal regime under François Mitterrand.
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From our special correspondent,
“
This room is not the tribunal of history.
The prosecutor lays the foundations of the debate: it is above all a question of judging the defamatory nature of 24 publications, tweets and blog articles posted last spring by Guillaume Ancel.
But it was necessary, during the approximately seven hours of hearing, to look into the history of the Rwandan genocide and the French involvement.
At the helm, Guillaume Ancel recounts the ghosts brought back from his engagements in Cambodia, Rwanda and Sarajevo.
He tells how, once he returned to civilian life and a brilliant career in the business world, he could not forget his questions.
“How can there be overwhelming responsibility without accountability?
»
Author of two books on the subject, and hundreds of articles published on his blog, his defense wants to present him as "
a whistleblower
" that the recent Duclert report commissioned by Emmanuel Macron ended up confirming after years.
Hubert Védrine, too, welcomes the seriousness of this report, but disputes its conclusion, which underlines the absence of complicity in genocide while pointing out "
France's overwhelming responsibilities
".
“
How can there be overwhelming responsibility without accountability?
“, is surprised Guillaume Ancel.
And to point the finger at the small circle around François Mitterrand, who coordinated French action in Rwanda and of which Hubert Védrine was the cornerstone.
“If France had not intervened, the genocide would have taken place two years earlier”
The former minister wants to be the defender both of the memory and of the policy pursued at the time by the socialist president.
If the Élysée supported the Rwandan army before 1994 against Paul Kagame's RPF rebels, "
it was to avoid a massacre
" and force the rebels to return to the negotiating table.
“
France's involvement does not lead to genocide, it leads to the Arusha peace accords.
I even think that if France had not intervened, the genocide would have taken place two years earlier
,” said Hubert Védrine.
In some of the offending publications, Guillaume Ancel goes so far as to compare the former head of French diplomacy under Lionel Jospin to Maurice Papon, a former senior state official convicted in 1998 of complicity in crimes against humanity.
Have the limits of freedom of expression been exceeded?
Judgment will be rendered on May 16.
►To re-read: French justice closes the file of the attack triggering the Rwandan genocide
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