1994 Rwandan Genocide victims commemorated

PanARMENIAN.Net - The remains of thousands of victims of the Rwandan genocide are to be reburied in Uganda, it has been announced - 15 years after the killings began.



Some 800,000 people were killed during the genocide, with many of the bodies thrown into Rwandan rivers. Nearly 11,000 of them were eventually recovered from Lake Victoria in Uganda and buried by villagers.



Rwanda's ambassador to Uganda said they will now receive proper burials in three permanent mass graves. "We have decided to accord a decent burial to those genocide victims," Ignatius Kamali said. "We want the exercise done within 100 days from today."



The Rwandan embassy in Uganda said the exhumation and reburials will start after Easter.



The embassy's first secretary John Ngarambe said the Rwandan community would go to Golo, the likely main re-burial site, to mark the official commemoration of the genocide on Tuesday.



Ugandan officials said that they welcomed the plan.



The genocide began on the evening of 6 April 1994, after a plane carrying Rwandan Hutu President Habyarimana was shot down. Hutu militias began a campaign of orchestrated killing.



Some 800,000 ethnic Tutsis and moderate Hutus were slaughtered in 100 days, BBC reported.