Rwanda to probe France's role over 1994 genocide

KIGALI (AFP) - The central African state of Rwanda is to investigate France's alleged role in genocide there 10 years ago in which the United Nations (news - web sites) estimates 800,000 people died, the Rwandan government said.

A cabinet meeting chaired by President Paul Kagame on Friday adopted a bill "to create a national independent commission charged with assembling the evidence of France's involvement in the genocide perpetrated in Rwanda in 1994," said a statement sent to AFP.

Rwanda's Foreign Minister Charles Murigande said here Sunday France was willing to "accept an equitable share of the blame" for what happened during the massacre.

Last month, France and Rwanda agreed to work together to review events leading to the 1994 genocide in a bid to improve relations.

French Foreign Minister Michel Barnier said on a visit to South Africa: "We discussed ways to improve and normalise relations between Rwanda and France following some misunderstandings and we agreed to forge a new spirit and work together on genocide remembrance."

France has always denied any involvement in the Rwanda massacres and a French parliamentary commission in 1998 cleared France of responsibility for the genocide while admitting that "strategic errors" had been made.

But Murigande told AFP here Sunday that at their meeting in Pretoria last Wednesday, Barnier had "confirmed that he was willing to accept an equitable share of the blame."

Speaking partly in French, partly in English, Murigande said: "He (Barnier) also said France is not ready to accept an exaggerated role. Therefore there is a need to establish exactly what was the role of France, what was her behaviour, what did she do. The commission has been put in place to establish that."

Asked about the commission's membership, the minister said the members had not yet been appointed:

"The draft law is going to be submitted to Parliament," he said: "Once Parliament accepts it, membership will come after that."

Among all the countries that Rwanda has pointed the finger at over their alleged behaviour during the genocide, to date France is the only one never yet to have apologised to Rwanda.

France is regularly accused by the present Rwandan government of responsibility for the genocide in which hundreds of thousands of the minority Tutsi ethnic group, and many moderate majority group Hutus, were butchered by Hutu militias.

Last April, on the 10th anniversary of the tragedy, new accusations were levelled, even causing a diplomatic incident with the abrupt departure of a French junior foreign minister, Renaud Muselier.

This was prompted by a speech by President Paul Kagame in which he accused France of having knowingly trained and armed the government troops and militias who went on to commit the genocide.

Muselier described the remarks as "unacceptable, humiliating and untrue." Tutsis claim that France armed and trained the Hutu killers and provided a safe haven for them when they were militarily defeated.

Barnier acknowledged in Pretoria last week that there were recriminations from Rwanda over France's role in the genocide, and that a review of that painful chapter would help improve ties.

"We do not share the view of the Rwandan side about what France did. We have to talk about this very painful past in an impartial and objective manner, work on remembrance, draw lessons from this collective inability by the international community to avert the genocide," Barnier said.

"We agreed on this and on moving forward," the French foreign minister said, adding that he was "pleased by this first exchange" with his Rwandan counterpart.

FRom Reuters - Movies on Yahoo

'King Arthur' Star Enters Rwanda Killing Fields

LONDON (Hollywood Reporter) - Rising young British actor Hugh Dancy, who played Galahad in Disney's "King Arthur," has joined John Hurt in the cast of "Shooting Dogs," a movie set against the 1994 genocide in Rwanda.

Directed by Michael Caton-Jones, the BBC Films project began shooting on location last month in and around Kigali, Rwanda, and plans to use several of the actual locations where the atrocities took place. Producers said Friday that the production would shoot with survivors involved in the cast as extras and within the crew.

Hurt plays Michael, a priest who forges a friendship with Joe (Dancy), a young teacher. Together they have to confront the limits of their courage as they decide whether to stay or leave in the face of the Rwandan tragedy.

Reuters/Hollywood Reporter

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U.N. Begins Aid Airdrops in Sudan's Darfur

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ROME - The United Nations (news - web sites) began airdrops of food into Sudan's conflict-ridden Darfur region, a U.N. agency said Monday, the same day Egypt said it was airlifting medicines and other necessities.

The Rome-based U.N. World Food Program said that it had dropped 22 tons of food supplies to the farming town of Fur Buranga in western Darfur on Sunday using an Antonov-12 plane.

The agency plans to deliver a total of some 1,400 tons of food in a first round of airdrops to help more than 70,000 people displaced by the 17-month conflict. The agency has said it anticipates that the air-supply effort in Darfur will exceed the Berlin airlift of the late 1940s.

Meanwhile, Egypt began airlifting food, medicine and other basics to Darfur.

One Hercules C-130 cargo plane left Cairo and will be followed by four others carrying medicine, tents, vaccines, ambulances and a medical team, Defense Ministry officials said.

They said the supplies were donated by the Egyptian Red Crescent with the help of the ministry.

The World Food Program said it intends to continue airdrops throughout the rainy season, which lasts into September. During that period trucks carrying food get bogged down in mud and take an average of three weeks to reach Darfur from Port Sudan on the Red Sea, the agency said.

Trucks are also at risk from bandits, the agency said.

"Dropping food by air is always an expensive last resort, but for many parts of Darfur we simply have no other option at this time of year," said Ramiro Lopes Da Silva, the agency's country director in Sudan.

The agency appealed for funds, saying it had so far received only $78.5 million of the $195 million to cover its emergency work in Darfur this year.

An estimated 30,000 people have been killed in the 17-month conflict in Darfur. A million people have been forced to flee their homes, and an estimated 2.2 million people are in urgent need of food, medicine and other basics.

International aid organizations have accused the Sudanese government of supporting the Arab militias, known as Janjaweed, in a brutal campaign to drive Sudanese citizens of African origin out of Darfur.

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