AP Photo/Jean-Marc Bouju

For fifteen years, the question of who brought down the aircraft belonging to Rwandan President Juvénal Habyarimana has gone unanswered.

The incident holds tremendous historical significance since it kicked off a long-planned genocide that claimed the lives of over one million people in one hundred days.

Those who perished and those who bravely ‘lived to tell’ deserve a thorough, impartial investigation and recitation of the facts. Anything less would dishonor their memory and bestow impunity upon the perpetrators of one of the worst killing sprees in recorded history.

For this reason, an independent Committee of Experts was created via prime ministerial decree in April 2007 and given the task of “establishing the truth regarding the circumstances of the crash of the Falcon-50 airplane, registration number 9XR-NN on April 6, 1994.”

For over two years, this seven-member panel has worked tirelessly, collecting and analyzing thousands of documents and interviewing nearly 600 witnesses who either observed what happened or had information directly related to the attack.

The Committee brought in top experts from the United Kingdom’s National Defence Academy to provide scientific advice and analysis. By painstakingly comparing witness testimony against ballistic evidence, this team helped the Committee produce a rigorous report that not only corrects the historical record, but also lays bare the shoddy and politically‐motivated work of those who have sought to render judgment from afar.

Many nations turned a blind eye to Rwanda’s suffering in 1994 while still others actively colluded with the killers. With this report, we ask all nations to hold the perpetrators accountable wherever they are found.

(From the Report’s Media Guide)

REPUBLIC OF RWANDA Committee of Experts Investigation of the April 6, 1994 Crash of  President Habyarimana’s Dassault Falcon-­50 Aircraft

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