Synopses & Reviews
This award-winning and acclaimed history of the Rwandan genocide has been fully updated for this paperback edition.
In April 1994 up to a million people were slaughtered in Rwanda during a murderous campaign of horrifying efficiency. The ferocity of the killing and the cruelty inflicted on defenseless people has no comparison in modern times.
Conspiracy to Murder is the story of how that genocide was planned. It reveals how, from as early as 1990, the political, military and administrative leadership of Rwanda became involved in planning the complete extermination of the Tutsi population. A vicious hate campaign filled the media, urging Hutus to kill; a network of roadblocks was devised to prevent any escape; civil-defense groups were established throughout the country, with eventually every third Hutu being armed; half a million machetes and other agricultural tools were imported, and 85 tons of munitions were distributed country-wide, in the year leading up to the genocide.
In an outstanding example of investigative journalism, Linda Melvern reveals the full story behind the conspiracy, detailing the involvement of world governments whose responses ranged from complicity to apathy. She shows how the killers outmaneuvered the Security Council and led UN peacekeepers into a steady trap; how the French military trained the killers and how their 'humanitarian intervention' in June 1994 enabled many of those killers to escape justice; how the John Major government ignored warnings and then proceeded to mislead the British Parliament about what was really happening; how the US is still withholding wiretap and satellite evidence showing that the genocide had begun; and how significant was the knowledge of then Secretary General Boutros Boutros-Ghali.
Review
"Melvern's Book is outstanding... Her research has been exhaustive and the clarity of her chronology is the most dfamning of all indictments against those who looked the other way in the years leading up to 1994." Robert Kirby
Review
"The definitive account of the origins of the [Rwandan] tragedy... Essential. Accessible to all readers." Choice
Review
"An epic and shaming story of culpability and missed opportunities... in the finest traditions of investigative journalism." John Pilger
Review
"A frank condemnation of the world's broken promise to 'never again' allow genocide to happen." UN Chronicle
Review
A devastating account of the West's failure to act. --Magnus Linklater
Review
"A meticulous reconstruction of how the genocide happened." Magnus Linklater
Review
"The best overall account of the background to the genocide, and the failure to prevent it." New Internationalist
Review
"A devastating account of the West's failure to act." Mail & Guardian
Synopsis
Conspiracyto Murder is a gripping account of theRwandan genocide, one of the most appallingevents of the twentieth century.Linda Melvern'sdamningindictment of almost all the key figures and institutions involved amounts to acatalogueof failures that onlyserves to sharpen thehorror of a tragedy that could have beenavoided.
Synopsis
The definitive account of the Rwandan genocidevoted Best Book on Africa by Foreign Affairs.
Synopsis
Conspiracy to Murder is a gripping account of the Rwandan genocide, one of the most appalling events of the twentieth century. Linda Melvern’s damning indictment of almost all the key figures and institutions involved amounts to a catalogue of failures that only serves to sharpen the horror of a tragedy that could have been avoided.
About the Author
Linda Melvern is a widely published investigative journalist. She is an Honorary Fellow of the University of Wales, Aberystwyth, and was a consultant to the Military One prosecution team at the International Criminal Tribunal on Rwanda. Her previous books include The Ultimate Crime and A People Betrayed.