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Nyarubuye Genocide Memorial Site

Rwanda

Nyarubuye Genocide Memorial Site

A convent and school where 20,000 people were killed. These people had been trying to escape over the border to Tanzania. During 2003, the school became functional again; the convent, however, remains empty, apart from the bones of the victims, and will be turned into a memorial and education centre.

The Nyarubuye Genocide Memorial is located about 35 kilometers from the southern town of Kibungo. Located in the Kirehe district, of the Eastern province, this former church and its accompanying school and buildings of the Benebikira Sisters are a reminder of the horrific violence that took place at this site during the Genocide against the Tutsi. More than 20,000 people were killed there during the 14th and 15th of April 1994.

It is internationally known because it was the place that Fergal Keane, a BBC correspondent who was in Rwanda in late May and early June 1994, visited and filmed and for having been visited by dignitaries among those who came were Dr Boutros Ghali, the UN general secretary at the time. In 1995, it was visited by Mr. Yoweri Museveni, president of Uganda. The Rhénanie Palatinate Government has contributed to its rehabilitation with 10,000 DM.

In Nyarubuye Genocide Memorial, you can find genocide remains like clothes, thermoses, dishes, and shoes abandoned by victims. These are kept in the nunnery buildings.

 

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