Rwanda Releases Genocide Prisoners

The Rwandan government is releasing 9,000 prisoners who were put in jail after the 1994 genocide. Since a 2003 provisional release decreed by President Paul Kaganem, Rwanda has freed up to 60,000 genocide suspects. These releases are said to be due to overcrowding in prisons as well as to foster reconciliation. This group of prisoners does not include any major figures involved in the genocide, and the government reports that most are the sick, elderly and children. Genocide survivors in Rwanda have expressed outrage and accuse the released inmates of carrying out more ethnic killings. The president of a local genocide survivors group, Theodore Simburdali, stated, “They should ensure that they keep an eye on these people because some of them continue to harbour a genocide ideology.” The government plans to send the prisoners to rehabilitation camps for two months before they are allowed to go home.

Is it worth freeing prisoners to ease the overcrowding of prisons? Are there any real hopes that this will foster reconciliation? Understandably, genocide survivors and critics are concerned about the release of more prisoners accused of participating in the slaughter of over 800,000 people in 1994. This move, in fact, may be detrimental to reconciliation if these prisoners continue to embrace a “genocide ideology.”