We have made significant progress – Kagame on CNN

USA - President Paul Kagame has expressed doubt over reports by Human Rights organizations on the situation of human rights in Rwanda. In a recent interview with CNN’s Christiane Amanpour, President Kagame said that human rights activists base their reports on views of a small group of people to judge the situation in the country.

Tuesday, March 16, 2010

USA - President Paul Kagame has expressed doubt over reports by Human Rights organizations on the situation of human rights in Rwanda.

In a recent interview with CNN’s Christiane Amanpour, President Kagame said that human rights activists base their reports on views of a small group of people to judge the situation in the country.

"I have an issue with this, you tend to make a judgment of a country, 11 million people, on what a couple of people have said and don’t take into account what Rwandans say,” President Kagame said.

Kagame’s reaction follows a number of reports compiled by human rights activities based on interviews conducted with self-exiled Rwandans.

"Nobody has asked Rwandans. It’s as if they don’t matter in the eyes of the human rights people. We Rwandans have to be given peace to make our own decisions,” Kagame said

Justifying his statement, President Kagame hastened to add in the interview that; "It’s our leaders... It’s our choices... It’s our democracy... It’s our processes. And for one person, a journalist or a human rights activist, to think that we sit there and dictate what Rwandans should do, I don’t agree with it.”

Also in the interview, Kagame said Rwanda has made significant progress in reconciliation after the 1994 Genocide against the Tutsi.

"When I see the country stable as it is, when I see the citizens going out there to work on their farms and going to school together, addressing different programs together, I think it is working,” Kagame said.

"That’s why the country is stable. That’s why the country is moving on. That’s why the country’s developing.”

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