I attended an absolutely fascinating discussion this week during this, the first month of the 20th commemorative year of the Rwandan genocide. "Would we take action to stop the genocide if it happened today?" Rwandan Ambassador to the United States Mathilde Mukantabana posed a question that has received much attention over the past two decades. In 2011, the Arab League called for stronger action in Libya and the United Nations Security Council authorized a NATO attack once economic sanctions proved to be a futile means of protecting Libyan civilians. Such "crimes against humanity" have received a different level of response in recent years, but there is much to learn from the action, or inaction, of world leaders and countries during past conflict.
"There is nothing here but people, and there are too many of them as it is," observed one of the generals who came to the aid during the 1994 Rwanda conflict. Ambassador Mukantabana choked up Wednesday while introducing Commander Romeo A. Dallaire of the United Nations Assistance Mission for Rwanda, who in kind observed, "A child stuck an AK-47 up my nose. That child was about 12 or 13, the same age as my son. Was that boy less human than my son? Was he less of an element of the human race than my son? Where have we moved the yardstick?"
