the Church of Nyamata - the piles of clothes remind of the thousands of Tutsis murdered there
The iron door was forced open by grenades. Then the killing started. The bloodstains can still be seen on the bullet-ridden ceiling. Thousands of Tutsis, who had sought refuge in the Church of Nyamata, hoped to escape the slaughter.
They actually had good reasons to believe so. In 1992, hundreds of Tutsis hid in this church and remained unharmed. Could they possible assume that a fellow Christian would kill them in the House of God? Today, piles and piles of blood-soaked clothes, taken off the corpses, remind of the massacre.
To this day, Rwanda’s Tutsis believe that it was planned that way, to have as many people concentrated in one spot as possible, and then kill them easily. On the altar, still covered with the same bloodied cloths, other murder weapons are on display: hoes, knives, ropes, bullets... Children were killed by smashing them against the wall. A particular wall.
Outside the church is the grave of Tonia Lorettin, an Italian lady who had lived in Rwanda for a long time and who had watched the increasing attacks on Tutsis for decades. In 1992, she informed the international press, her death sentence. It is openly said in Rwanda that the Archbishop of Kigali was present in the meeting where her murder was planned.
Ntarama was different. Here the Tutsis fought back. The men were in the hills defending their families hiding in the church. In vain… The militia got help from the army and the 5.000 Tutsis in the small church were slaughtered in the most horrifying ways.
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