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Since the genocide of Rwandan Tutsis perpetrated in 1994, current affairs journalists have conducted a campaign to denounce France's diplomatic & military interventions in Rwanda carried out between October 1990 & August 1994. These authors & their publishers have set out to reveal the secret & criminal dealings attributed to senior civilian & military officials. In the 1994 to 2004 period studied, these accusations have convinced mainly the small circle of activists already involved in unveiling political intrigues. In 2004, year in which the tenth anniversary of the genocide was commemorated, a "Civil Investigation Commission on France's Role in Rwanda during the Genocide of Rwanda Tutsis in 1994" was organized by journalists in conjunction with legal experts. According to the conclusions of the report issued by the Commission, France not only facilitated but devised the plan to exterminate the Tutsis. The article studies the investigative models used by the Commission & their coherence, deemed sufficient to implicate France in the genocide. Adapted from the source document.

Die Autorin führt aus, daß viele Kommentatoren die Gründe für den Völkermord in Ruanda mit ethnischen Gegensätzen zwischen Hutu und Tutsi erklärt haben. Sie verweist darauf, daß es seit langem Spaltungen zwischen den beiden Ethnien gegeben hat, aber was die Präkolonialzeit anbelangt, können Hutu und Tutsi nicht als Ethnien im modernen Sinne des Wortes bezeichnet werden. Vielmehr wird versucht, in diese Zeit eine moderne "ethnistische" Vorstellung des Hutu-Tutsi-Dualismus zu transportieren. Der Beitrag geht darüber hinaus auf den Völkermord von 1994 mit seiner extremen Grausamkeit ein und zeigt auf, wie er durch einen wirksamen Unterdrückungsapparat und Propaganda vorbereitet wurde. (DÜI-Ott)

The economic imperatives of capitalism were responsible for the cultural uprooting of the peasantry in Europe aswell as Africa. In France, for example, the school system opposed the languages spoken by national minorities. In Africa the deculturation of the peasantry was brought about through the destruction of the native religions.
Rwanda provides an exemplary case in point. Catholicism was so successful there that ancestor worship seemed to disappear completely. This brilliant success is explained by an analysis of the Belgian colonial policy which was based on the preservation of the traditional feudal authority, but the representatives of that authority forced their subordinates to convert. However, the conversion was merely superficial : the peasantry continued to practise the rituels of the Rwanda religion in secret.
During the decade following Independence the new rulers of Rwanda mode their loyalty to Catholicism an essential characteristic of their policy. For this reason the traditional religion remained secret. But the failure of development programmes and the loss of prestige suffered by the authorities led to a growing awareness among the peasantry of State oppression. They are beginning to refuse to follow injunctions emanating front the authorities, notably in religious matters. Ancestor worship is coming back into the open and with it there is overt criticism of the Church and government.