The Interahamwe, meaning "Those Who Stand Together" in Kinyarwanda, was the largest of the militias formed by the Hutu ethnic majority of Rwanda and was responsible for many of the deaths in the Rwandan Genocide of 1994.
Following the liberation of Rwandan capital Kigali by the Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF), many members of the Interahamwe fled to neighbouring countries, most notably to what at the time was Zaire, now Democratic Republic of Congo. Not officially disbanded, members still take part in border raids, such as those that led to the First and Second Congo Wars and the genocidal massacre in August 2004 of 150 Tutsi refugees in a United Nations refugee camp in Burundi.
Once the Interahamwe moved to Zaire they and the Hutu ex-government soldiers began to be known as the Rassemblement Démocratique pour le Rwanda (roughly, Rally for a Democratic Rwanda). Following the recruitment of significant numbers of Congolese Hutu the organization took the name Armée de Libération du Rwanda (ALiR).
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Last updated: 05-21-2005 14:54:41
