Discuss the conflict between the different ethnicities in Central Africa and how that has led to genocide

Question

What will be an ideal response?

Answer 1

Answer: In Central Africa, conflict between the Hutus and the Hutsis have led to ethnic wars and genocide in the last few decades. The Hutus were settled farmers, growing crops in the fertile hills and valleys of present-day Rwanda and Burundi, known as the Great Lakes region of central Africa. The Tutsis on the other hand, were cattle herders who migrated to present-day Rwanda and Burundi from the Rift Valley of western Kenya beginning 400 years ago.

Historically, Hutus constituted a majority of the population of Rwanda historically, but Tutsis controlled the kingdom of Rwanda for several hundred years and had turned the Hutu into their serfs. As a colony of Germany and then Belgium during the first half of the twentieth century, Tutsis were given more privileges than the Hutus. Shortly before Rwanda gained its independence in 1962, Hutus killed or ethnically cleansed many Tutsis out of fear that the Tutsis would seize control of the newly independent country.

After an airplane carrying the presidents of Rwanda and Burundi was shot down in 1994, probably by a Tutsi, the genocide began. Hutus murdered hundreds of thousands of Tutsis and Hutus sympathetic to the Tutsis. This conflict spilled into neighboring countries, especially the Democratic Republic of Congo, where several million have died in the Congo in a war that began in 1998 and is the world's deadliest since World War II.

The war there started after Tutsis helped to overthrow of the Congo's longtime president, Mobutu. After succeeding Mobutu as president, Laurent Kabila relied heavily on Tutsis and permitted them to kill some of the Hutus who had been responsible for atrocities against Tutsis back in the early 1990s. But Kabila soon split with the Tutsis, and the Tutsis once again found themselves offering support to rebels seeking to overthrow Congo's government. Kabila turned for support to Hutus, and armies from neighboring countries came to Kabila's aid. Kabila was assassinated in 2001 and succeeded by his son, who negotiated an accord with rebels the following year.