From Deseret News archives:
Rusesabagina fears Rwanda's backlash
As the manager of the Belgian-owned luxury hotel the Mille Collines during the "terrible 100 days" of genocide in Rwanda, he rescued some 1,200 people who used the hotel as a safe haven.
Now that he is promoting his book "An Ordinary Man," speaking out against genocide as he tours the United States, he is once again fearful he may lose his life, he said from a hotel in St. Louis.
Rusesabagina, whose accent is very thick, said that he has discovered that "speaking out" has caused the Rwandan government to worry about him.
"I'm a threat to them," said Rusesabagina. "The Rwandan ambassador to London has moved from his residence and is now staying behind my house in Belgium. The President of Rwanda has a death squad. In Brussels, I worry more for my life than anywhere else. Some of my friends have advised me to forget about my house and go elsewhere. I'm thinking about it."
Rusesabagina and his family miraculously lived through the wholesale butchering of friends and loved ones, so now they are practicing some therapy of their own. "The best therapy is sharing. Talking about it with my wife and children has helped us solve a lot of problems. My family was sickened by the genocide, and at first they didn't want to recall it. But I had to sit down with them and talk about the details. The best teacher is to repeat a good lesson."
The worst part for Rusesabagina remains the memory of watching his neighbors as they cut each other down with machetes. Some people who feared being killed in such a horrible way jumped off buildings. It was devastating as a million people were displaced. "It was like an explosion and when the whole region was burning, they added oil to the fire. Imagine how many generations were lost."
Rusesabagina also resents the fact that the United States and the United Nations failed to come to the aid of the genocide. He believes that, had they done so, they could have stopped the horrible killing in a comparatively short time with a few thousand troops.
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