KIGALI — Two of Rwanda’s highest-profile opposition leaders
accused French President Emmanuel Macron on Tuesday of ignoring political
repression and rights abuses in their country ahead of his historic trip to
Kigali.
اضافة اعلان
Macron will arrive in Rwanda on Thursday and meet with his
counterpart Paul Kagame, a former rebel leader who has ruled the east African
country since the end of the genocide in 1994.
It will be the first visit by a French leader since 2010,
and represents a step in the diplomatic thaw between two countries long at odds
over France’s role in the killing of some 800,000 Rwandans.
But his visit has been described as “an insult” by government
critics Victoire Ingabire and Bernard Ntaganda, who have spent time in exile
and jail and whose political parties are banned in Rwanda.
“French President Emmanuel Macron does not hesitate publicly
to bluntly castigate dictatorial regimes but keeps silent with regard to the
authoritarian rule and human rights abuses by the Rwandan regime,” Ingabire and
Ntaganda, both 52, said in a statement.
“Thus, for President Emmanuel Macron, there are good
dictators and bad dictators.”
Kagame, the head of Rwanda’s ruling Rwanda Patriotic Front
(RPF), has been accused by critics of crushing opponents and ruling by fear.
Ingabire returned from exile in 2010 to run against Kagame,
but was arrested and jailed for eight years on terrorism charges, a term later
extended to 15 years. She was released by presidential pardon in 2018.
Ntaganda — who also sought to challenge Kagame in 2010 — was
jailed for four years for stoking ethnic divisions.
Human Rights Watch described the charges against the pair as
politically motivated.
“It is clear that today President Emmanuel Macron no longer
discusses subjects which anger the Rwanda Patriotic Front (RPF) which rules
with an iron hand,” said Ingabire and Ntaganda.
Macron said his visit would “write a new page in relations”
with Rwanda, and follows the release of a landmark report that concluded
France was “blind” to preparations for the genocide and bore overwhelming
responsibilities for the killings.
Kagame, who in the past has accused France of participating
in the genocide, has said he accepted the findings of the report, and that both
countries had a “good basis” to restore ties.
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