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African Affairs 103:1-22 (2004)
© Royal African Society 2004

Article

Britannia waived the rules: The Major government and the 1994 Rwandan genocide

Linda Melvern and Paul Williams

Linda Melvern is an investigative journalist and an honorary fellow of the Department of International Politics at the University of Wales, Aberystwyth.
Paul Williams lectures in the Department of Political Science and International Studies at the University of Birmingham.

Abstract

Ten years after the 1994 Rwandan genocide occurred, serious questions remain about the circumstances of the British government's response. This article critically evaluates the response of John Major's government to the genocide. It does so in four stages. The first section provides a brief overview of the Major government's international agenda in 1994, focusing on British policy towards the war in Bosnia and the African continent in general. The second section deals with the substance of Britain's Rwanda policy, while the third discusses the ways in which this policy has been almost totally omitted from mainstream accounts of this period. The final section provides a critical evaluation of some of the tactics that British officials employed to avert criticism of their government's policies. Based on the evidence presented we conclude that the British government displayed a deeply troubling indifference towards the victims of Rwanda's genocide.


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