[Rwanda, a retrospective to aid rendered following the 1994 genocide]

Some 700,000 Tutsi were killed in Rwanda in 1994, and 1.2 million Hutu fled to neighbouring countries. The United Nations and the non-governmental organizations recently issued a document assessing the aid given. Several matters could have been better. Security in the camps, for instance, was a crucial problem and relief workers and armed forces were unprepared for the involuntary cooperation. Also, estimates of numbers of refugees were inadequate and such estimates were manipulated for political purposes. Relief organizations resorted too quickly to import of goods that were available locally, thereby making the aid unnecessarily expensive. The refugees themselves were involved too little in establishing relief priorities. Life of the original population round the camps was disrupted, a fact that received hardly any attention.