Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Acknowledgments
- 1 Introduction: Problems of Genocide
- PART A THE NATURE AND VALUE OF GROUPS
- PART B THE HARM OF GENOCIDE
- PART C ELEMENTS OF GENOCIDE
- PART D RESPONSIBILITY FOR GENOCIDE
- 9 Complicity and the Rwandan Genocide
- 10 Incitement to Genocide and the Rwanda Media Case
- 11 Instigating, Planning, and Intending Genocide in Rwanda
- PART E SPECIAL PROBLEMS OF GENOCIDE
- Bibliography
- Index
10 - Incitement to Genocide and the Rwanda Media Case
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 June 2012
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Acknowledgments
- 1 Introduction: Problems of Genocide
- PART A THE NATURE AND VALUE OF GROUPS
- PART B THE HARM OF GENOCIDE
- PART C ELEMENTS OF GENOCIDE
- PART D RESPONSIBILITY FOR GENOCIDE
- 9 Complicity and the Rwandan Genocide
- 10 Incitement to Genocide and the Rwanda Media Case
- 11 Instigating, Planning, and Intending Genocide in Rwanda
- PART E SPECIAL PROBLEMS OF GENOCIDE
- Bibliography
- Index
Summary
Several of the genocide cases in Rwanda have been prosecuted as incitement cases. In this chapter I will look at the difficult case of a group of three media leaders who were convicted of genocide in Rwanda for their role in disseminating the message of hatred that seemed to incite the massacre of Tutsis by Hutus in 1994. This investigation will broaden our sense of how to understand and assess participation in such massacres. One scholar has said that it is rare that there are prosecutions for incitement, but the Rwanda case was extreme because “grotesque caricatures in racist newspaper and broadcast appeals to participate in such killings marked the 1994 genocide.” Indeed, as the Trial Chamber of the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) said: “RTML broadcasting was a drumbeat, calling on listeners to take action against the enemy…. The nature of radio transmission made RTML particularly dangerous and harmful, as did the breadth of its reach.”
In this so-called Media Case, those who incited mass murder and mutilation against members of the Tutsi ethnic group were prosecuted. Barayagwiza and Ngeze founded the newspaper Kangura, which editorialized in invective terms against the Tutsis. Barayagwiza, along with Nahimana, also founded a radio station, RTLM, which routinely referred to Tutsis as “‘enemies’ or ‘traitors’ who deserve to die.” Both the newspaper and the radio station were used to incite hatred against the Tutsis by the Hutus and even to target specific Tutsis for attack.
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- Information
- GenocideA Normative Account, pp. 180 - 201Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2010