Testimony on the Rwandan Genocide, France
A firsthand account referring to the genocide of the Tutsi, perpetrated in Rwanda in 1994
April 2004
This testimony comes from
Luc Pillionnel
Chemin des Ecoliers 2a
2065 Savagnier - Switzerland
Contact: premium.bananas@bluewin.ch
Dear Sir,
Thank you for your reply. I have forwarded this information to you for your own awareness, but given its importance, it would be even better if you could pass it on. The original website is http://www.survie-france.org/IMG/doc/Conclusions_provisoires_CEC2.doc. You may cite me as the person who sent you this information. The association Survie, which originally produced this document, is a serious French NGO. Regarding French complicity in the genocide, I can also testify to that. I was present with French soldiers at the Kamembe base (Cyangugu airport, Turquoise Zone) on Tuesday, July 19, 1994. After leaving the base with a detachment from the 2nd REI (3 vehicles, 14 men plus one Swiss civilian who signaled the guard to raise the barrier), we traveled just a few dozen meters before encountering our first bodies on the road. About fifteen people had just been massacred mere meters from a French military base—well-supplied, surrounded by barbed wire, trenches, and machine gun and mortar positions. The French had offered to evacuate the people, and even promised to help me "extract" them from the hell of the genocide. But when they realized they were Tutsi, they simply left me in Bukavu. Cruel irony: the French army helped me save 10 members of my wife’s family, but without their intervention in Rwanda, a million others would still be alive. As journalist Patrick de Saint-Exupéry said: "Soldiers from our country trained, on orders, the killers of the third genocide of the 20th century." We gave them weapons, a doctrine, and a green light. I discovered this story, despite myself, while wandering through the Rwandan hills. (L'inavouable, la France au Rwanda, ed. des Arènes, March 1994.) At the same address:
http://www.arenes.fr/livres/page-livre1.php?numero_livre=103&num_page=335
we find the testimony of a militia leader’s driver, who recounts how French Turquoise soldiers helped the killers finish off those who had survived three months of genocide in Biserero. I have partially verified this testimony with survivors in Switzerland. It is entirely credible.
In addition to the ten members of my wife’s family, I personally saved and funded the evacuation of 50 other people. I live almost daily with survivors of this genocide. I have a rare personal experience of this genocide, and I can assure you that all of this is true—unfortunately.
In Rwanda, the network of politicians, businessmen, and special forces—some call it Francafrique—manipulated indigenous auxiliaries to carry out the massacres. But in 1963, in Cameroon, the 300,000 Bamileke were massacred directly by French troops, as part of the final solution to the "Bamileke question." Similarly, hundreds of thousands of Malagasy were killed between 1945 and 1949. What about the Tabors and Senegalese Tirailleurs, who earned glory liberating France—especially during the winter of 1944–45 around Colmar and Strasbourg? As a reward, they were demobilized like dogs, their officers attempting to steal their war spoils. They mutinied, and the repression resulted in hundreds of deaths along the quays of Le Havre. This happened in 1946. The French army quickly learned from those it had just defeated—and ever since, millions of Africans have died.
For me, these are not just words. I am also a survivor.
Luc Pillionnel
No comment.
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