Rebecca Feeley is a research consultant based in Goma, DR Congo. She has lived in the Great Lakes region for nearly four years, previously working for African Rights, the Clinton Foundation, Humanitarian Policy and Conflict Research International, and the Enough Project.

This post is the second in a series about Burundi.  Visit us again in the coming weeks for more posts from Rebecca’s trip.

I was standing next to my Burundian friend Parfait looking down at old flowers and messages left in memoriam. We were at Kibimba Memorial site, roughly an hour and a half east of Bujumbura. In Kibimba, on October 21, 1993, over a hundred Tutsi students and teachers were rounded up and taken to a gas station where they were burned alive by Hutu civilians, angered over the assassination of president Melchior Ndadaye—a Hutu—by members of the Tutsi-dominated army just hours earlier.  Next to the gas station, a memorial had been erected with the words “Plus Jamais Ca” or “Never Again.” Behind it was a spectacular view of Burundi’s countryside. It was a beautiful place for contemplation and reflection.

Surprisingly, despite Burundi’s long history of civil war and conflict, only two memorials commemorate past suffering and loss, and only one—Kibimba—commemorates the loss of Burundian citizens.  The other memorial in Gatumba, near the Congolese-Burundian border, honors the 166 Congolese refugees (mainly Tutsi) who were massacred on August 13, 2004, by the National Liberation Forces (FNL) and a mixture of other regional pro-Hutu rebel groups.

Parfait was reading messages at the memorial site, when I saw a cross placed among the flowers that said “Child Victims of Genocide, October 21, 1993.” I was surprised to find the word “genocide” used to describe what happened in Kibimba. Most experts would agree that an isolated, reactionary event like Kibimba would have difficulty qualifying as genocide under international law. I nudged Parfait and asked him what he thought, if he agreed that it was genocide. He turned to look at me, tilting his head. “It was genocide,” he responded. “It was targeted towards a specific ethnic group and it was planned.”

Most academics and regional analysts would agree that genocide did indeed take place in Burundi, but in 1972. After a local Hutu-led insurgency killed several hundred Tutsis in late April 1972, the Tutsi-led government responded to the threat by killing an estimated 200,000-300,000 Hutus from May to September.  Yet it is the massacre at Kibimba and other events in 1993 that appear to be in the collective consciousness of Burundians, not the 1972 genocide. Why is this? Is it simply a matter of time, a case of the most recent civil conflict eclipsing the former?  Does collective memory only have room to record one tragic history?

Often after conflicts governments promote peace over justice as a passive way of moving on. Furthermore, if the government was involved in violations against their own citizens, peace can translate into a policy of silence.  This is what happened after 1972 in Burundi. The Tutsi government erased all references to their sanctioned massacres of Hutus.  The official silence is only challenged by a weak patchwork of stories and information from missionaries and those Hutus who were able to flee. I asked several Burundians about 1972. Was there ever any talk of it? The general response was a shrugging of shoulders, a shaking of heads.  One 30 year old man told me that “probably only people that were directly affected by the genocide remember it or want to talk about it.” It is a genocide left up to individual records. 

There is no national memorial, no day or week of remembering, and there is no international tribunal to bring the perpetrators to justice. But should there be?  As Burundi currently attempts to move on and heal from the civil war that began in 1993, should it go back even further and attempt to remember and honor those who lost their lives in 1972?  If remembering is the first step in helping to prevent such atrocities from happening again, then I say yes.

Posted By: Michael Graham | August 28, 2009 | Comments (0)

Rebecca Feeley is a research consultant based in Goma, DR Congo. She has lived in the Great Lakes region for nearly four years, previously working for African Rights, the Clinton Foundation, Humanitarian Policy and Conflict Research International, and the Enough Project.

This post is the first in a series about the current situation in Burundi.  Visit us again in the coming weeks for more posts from Rebecca’s trip.

***

As we were dodging potholes my taxi driver, Roger, was shaking his head.  “Is this your first time in Bujumbura?” he asked me.  I nodded.  “I wish you could have seen this city before the war.  It was beautiful,” he sighed. 

I looked out the window.  It was 2006 and the post-war transitional period had officially ended a year earlier with the election of Pierre Nkurunziza as President.  Bujumbura, the capital of Burundi, did indeed bear the marks of a difficult and war-torn past but we were driving along Lake Tanganika and able to see the striking mountainous terrain that frames the city. “Still looks beautiful to me,” I remarked. Roger shook his head again. “No no, you don’t get it.  I mean no potholes, nice buildings, infrastructure….things used to work. We’ll see now if Nkurunziza can make it all work again.”

Three years later it appears that Nkurunziza has started to make Burundi work again, or is at least giving it a major facelift.  While traffic remains bad in Bujumbura, it is most often due to the major road repairs that have been taking place throughout Burundi.  Many older buildings have been rehabilitated and more health care centers and hospitals have opened in recent years. But perhaps the most significant recent development is the agreement reached in April of this year between the armed opposition group, the Forces Nationales de Libération or FNL, and the Burundian government. The government finally agreed to the registration of the FNL as a political party. The FNL—the last of 19 armed groups that once operated in Burundi-- agreed to disarm and demobilize their combatants. Burundi appears to be on the track towards peace after years of negotiations and multiple agreements.

While most know about the genocide in Rwanda that took place during the spring of 1994, Burundi’s struggle during that period is less well known .  For years, the Burundian government, and more importantly the army, was dominated by the Tutsi minority.  In the summer of 1993 Melchior Ndadaye, a Hutu, was democratically elected as President. The army, however, still dominated by Tutsis, feared losing their control within the state and, in an act of overthrowing the Hutu government, assassinated Ndadaye, the Speaker and the Deputy Speaker of the National Assembly on October 21, 1993. Anti-Tutsi violence by Hutus ensued just hours after Ndadaye’s death, which then triggered anti-Hutu violence by the army.  Ethnic extremism snowballed and armed groups proliferated, enabling conflict in Burundi to continue for over a decade, killing an estimated 200,000 people.

Most Burundians would agree that ethnic relations have improved in their country and that it would be difficult for ethnic violence to occur again in Burundi. Augustin, a young Burundian who works at a youth center in Bujumbura, recently told me “We realized after years of war that the politicians had manipulated ethnicity for their own political gains. We didn’t really care much about ethnicity before the war, and we don’t really care about it now. We are tired of war and just want peace.”

But don’t check Burundi off the list of post-conflict countries to watch just yet.  Human rights groups and regional analysts have been seeing a steady increase in politically-motivated violence in the past year as Burundi approaches its 2010 presidential and parliamentary elections.  In Burundi—not unlike other countries in the region—to capture state power is to capture the money, and thus the political party in control will do just about anything to stay there.  The ruling party—Conseil National pour la Défense de la Démocratie-Forces pour la Défense de la Démocratie, or CNDD-FDD, has been accused of killings, beatings and arrests in an attempt to intimidate and weaken their opposition, which is mainly the FNL.

President Nkurunziza had long refused to recognize the non-military wing of the FNL as a political party because of fears that such a party could split the Hutu vote—a vote his CNDD-FDD party heavily relies upon. Thus, the majority of reported politically-motivated violence in recent months has been between the CNDD-FDD and the FNL.  The CNDD-FDD has targeted FNL supporters and combatants and the FNL has responded in-kind and have been accused of burning down several CNDD-FDD meeting places. Many fear that the violence will only increase as elections near.

I asked Christophe, a young Burundian working for an NGO in Bujumbura who he thought would win the elections next year.  “The CNDD-FDD for sure,” he replied.  I nodded, waiting for him to elaborate.  “Yeah, I’m pretty sure….but you never know. This country is still learning how to ride a bicycle.  You get on and you fall off a lot in the beginning.  But eventually, if you are determined, you can learn to ride smoothly.” “So you think Burundi is determined?” I asked.  He shrugged, looking away. “Yeah, I think so. I hope so.”

Posted By: Michael Graham | August 04, 2009 | Comments (0)

This photoessay is the result of collaboration with a colleague in Chechnya, who could not be named for fear of threats or violence. We sent him a camera and asked him to take photos of what Grozny looks like today and to explain to us how these photos reflect a society changed by conflict.

In 1944, Josef Stalin ordered the deportation of the entire Chechen population to Central Asia.  As many as three out of every ten Chechens died, and those who survived were not allowed to return home until 1957.  Targeting not only a people, but also their memory, Soviet authorities demolished mosques and cemeteries.  Gravestones were used in the construction of roads, livestock sheds, and foundations.  Recovered in part, these gravestones now lie in a memorial dedicated to the victims of the 1944 deportation.  Our colleague told us that this memorial “is the main connection between the past and future.  The gravestones of fathers and mothers who were at one time deported into faraway lands were returned to their own roots and their land.”

It was not the last time Chechens would face destruction and violence. In 1994, Russian President Boris Yeltsin militarily crushed Chechnya’s move to post-Soviet independence.  And then in September 1999, a massive Russian military force again entered Chechnya, all but destroying the Chechen capital of Grozny and initiating a policy of targeting Chechen civilians.

In the years since, Chechens have struggled to remember the past as they recover from its trauma.  It has not been easy.

Over the winter months in 2008, our colleague captured images of daily life in Grozny.  His work reveals a city immersed in contradictions: sparkling new buildings tower over squares of rubble; women sift through the ruins of once thriving marketplaces; and new monuments guarded by well-armed militiamen celebrate former President Akhmad Kadyrov and his son, pro-Russian Chechen President Ramzan Kadyrov, whose personal paramilitary guard is well known for its ruthlessness.  Mandatory displays of presidential posters populate every state, educational, and cultural institution.  Our colleague writes, “They are at every entrance to every village and town, at intersections, at markers for administrative borders.  Everywhere that it is possible and even where it is not.” Even evidence of the city’s post-war calm – a photo of a man fishing by the river – reminds the photographer of the corpses that once floated by in water that could still be contaminated today. 

A few of the photos portray the Akhmad Kadyrov Mosque. Construction of the mosque began in 1997, in between the wars when the Chechen government was de facto independent. Situated on the location of some of the most brutal fighting of the first Russian-Chechen war, the mosque was intended to be a memorial to scores of volunteers who died defending Grozny. However, the project was not completed until 2008, under the pro-Moscow Kadyrov administration on what is now named Kadyrov Square, which sits on Kadyrov Avenue, opposite a monument to Kadyrov.

These photos illustrate a nation in the midst of rebuilding. Grozny, a city reduced to rubble, is slowly returning to life.  Beneath the surface, however, questions remain: Will stability hold? At what price?  What will the legacy of violence mean for future generations?  Will human rights be protected and group identities preserved? In the answers to these and many other questions lies the future of the Russian republic.

Posted By: Michael Graham | July 27, 2009 | Comments (0)

Our MI-17 transport helicopter rumbles to life and lifts up from the UN base outside of Dungu, above American-made Humvees parked next to piles of supplies and prefabricated offices squatting alongside the dirt runway.  UN staff in blue Kevlar and helmets buckled in next to me put on a jovial air, but there is an undercurrent of tension.  We are flying into the heart of Lord’s Resistance Army territory, just a few miles from their former base in Garamba National Park.

The UN peacekeeping operation in Congo, MONUC, is opening a base in Duru to be staffed by Moroccan soldiers arriving by road.  Charged with protection, MONUC soldiers and Congolese army troops are ill-equipped to combat the LRA, and hard pressed to protect civilians from the lean and mobile rebels who are masters at navigating this vast and inhospitable terrain.

We touch down on long grass, surrounded by Moroccan soldiers who secured the field moments before, and duck under helicopter blades.

I walk over with Congolese army guards past a razed church, a muddy water hole and refugee families huddled under makeshift huts, and arrive at the village’s elementary school.

The first thing I notice are the school’s doors.  Bright green, they have been scrawled upon by the LRA soldiers who attacked Duru last December, with the students’ own colorful chalk.  Ghastly depictions of a woman being killed, words of gloating and warning to the Congolese army, promises of retribution.  A disturbing display of pride in workmanship.

In this case, their work was to abduct children and teachers alike from the school after razing the town, killing dozens and burning down the church.  At least 65 children were taken, according to Human Rights Watch interviews.  Locals say they took many more.

I step carefully inside the door of the second grade classroom, its hinges hacked and broken off by a machete.  The floor is strewn with the torn out pages of French notebooks, the tiny wooden desks now occupied only by wasps.  The teacher’s morning message to his students lies untouched on the chalkboard.  Above this, written on the chalkboard’s frame, a simple request.

“kill kony please”

Many experts believe Joseph Kony will never agree to peace, that the military solution needs to be pushed to completion and the LRA leadership destroyed after 20 years of bringing untold misery to the people of Uganda, Congo, and the region.  But without real protection of civilians by the UN peacekeeping mission as well as the Congolese Army, such operations are sure to result in many more Congolese bearing the brunt of Kony’s revenge.

Posted By: Michael Graham | June 24, 2009 | Comments (0)

This guest post is part of a series on southern Sudan by Enough Project policy assistant Maggie Fick, who is currently conducting research for Enough in the region.

I was recently sitting on the bank of the Nile River in Juba, the capital of southern Sudan. I am in Juba to research some of the myriad challenges facing Sudan and the international community in the next 19 months—before the “interim period” of the Comprehensive Peace Agreement, or CPA, ends, and southern Sudan votes in a self-determination referendum for “unity” with or “separation” from northern Sudan. It would be untruthful to say that the situation in southern Sudan is anything other than very grim.  The recent violence and death tolls in the South have surpassed the deaths this year in Darfur, and the number of risks and dangers threatening the fragile peace (fostered by the CPA when it was signed in 2005) between Sudan’s North and South are poised to multiply in the run-up to Sudan’s general elections in 2010 and the 2011 referendum to determine whether Sudan will remain as one country or split into two.

When I was sitting by the Nile, I was thinking about some of these dangers and becoming increasingly depressed by what I had learned during my research in Juba. I was absentmindedly watching an old, decrepit barge struggle upstream in the direction of the Nile’s source in Uganda. The barge moved slowly as it fought a rather strong current, and I observed the sorry state of the boat, its hull covered in rust and a torn flag of southern Sudan flying from its mast. Then I noticed that there were about eight men on a small, high platform where the flag was flying. They were dancing up a storm. I couldn’t hear the music, but it was clear that they were enjoying it, because they didn’t stop dancing for as long as I was able to see the barge making its slow progress on the Nile. They were just having fun on an ordinary afternoon of work on their barge.

These men may not know where their next meal is coming from, and their families may have been affected by the recent violence across southern Sudan, from Unity to Jonglei to Lakes states and beyond. I think it is fair to generalize and say that many people in southern Sudan also likely face a great deal of obstacles in their every day lives that would be hard for outsiders like me to fathom, much less grapple with myself. But they were still enjoying themselves that afternoon as they cruised down the Nile. I felt lucky to have witnessed this small moment of joy in the midst of broader circumstances that seem so grim. Witnessing this scene reminded me not to forget the human side of every “charged political climate” or “complex humanitarian emergency.” People are more than “IDPs,” and “inter-communal violence” is more than arms and proxy militias. Sometimes it takes having an unexpected, random experience like this one to remind oneself of the humanity we all share.

Posted By: Michael Graham | June 22, 2009 | Comments (0)