100 Organisations Demand Accountability: The Global Coalition Against Rwanda's Human Rights Abuses
A Global Coalition
One hundred organisations from thirty countries have joined the Global Campaign for Rwandans' Human Rights in calling for international accountability for Rwanda's systematic human rights abuses. This unprecedented coalition - spanning human rights groups, legal organisations, diaspora associations, faith communities and civil society networks - sends a clear message: the world is no longer willing to ignore what is happening inside Rwanda and beyond its borders.
What the Coalition Demands
The solidarity campaign calls for: - The immediate release of all political prisoners - opposition figures, journalists, lawyers and activists imprisoned on fabricated charges by an oppressive regime - An end to torture in custody - particularly in military intelligence facilities where detainees are subjected to beatings, electric shocks and other forms of abuse with total impunity - Accountability for assassinations abroad - the regime hunts critics across international borders, and several exiled opponents have been killed in circumstances linked to Rwandan intelligence - An end to the weaponisation of genocide memory - the regime cynically exploits the 1994 genocide to silence all criticism, branding opponents as 'genocide ideologues' to criminalise dissent - Restoration of press freedom - journalists are imprisoned, exiled or killed. There is no free media in Rwanda. - An independent judiciary - Rwanda's courts are controlled by the executive, political trials are predetermined, and the conviction rate exceeds 97% - An end to transnational repression - the regime surveils, threatens and attacks exiled critics across Africa and Europe
Why This Matters
Rwanda's regime has long exploited international guilt over the 1994 genocide to shield itself from scrutiny. Western governments, haunted by their failure to intervene, have been reluctant to criticise a government that presents itself as the guarantor of stability. This reluctance has enabled an oppressive regime to commit severe human rights abuses with total impunity.
But the evidence is now overwhelming. Political imprisonment, torture, enforced disappearances, assassinations abroad, the destruction of press freedom, the manipulation of the judiciary - this is the reality of Rwanda under an oppressive regime that uses the memory of 1994 as a weapon to silence all criticism.
100 organisations have said: enough.
The Genocide Card
The coalition specifically condemns the regime's weaponisation of genocide memory. The 1994 genocide was a real and horrific atrocity. Its victims deserve genuine justice and genuine prevention - not the cynical exploitation of their memory to imprison political opponents, silence journalists and eliminate all criticism.
By branding all dissent as 'genocide ideology,' the regime makes human rights work itself a crime. The solidarity campaign demands an end to this exploitation.
Join the Campaign
The Global Campaign for Rwandans' Human Rights invites all organisations committed to human rights, justice and the rule of law to join this coalition. Together, we can break the silence that has enabled an oppressive regime to operate with impunity.
The regime counts on international silence. 100 organisations have broken that silence. Together, we demand accountability - for the political prisoners, for the tortured, for the disappeared, for the exiled, for the journalists behind bars, and for all Rwandans whose fundamental rights are violated every day by an oppressive regime.