International
Lantos Foundation on vendetta mission against Rwandan leadership
When
former US Congressman Tom Lantos created the Lantos Foundation, his goal was
“to advance human rights and justice by advocating for the United States and
other democratic nations to prioritize these fundamental rights for all global
citizens” and to “carry the noble banner of human rights to every corner of the
world.”
But
according to Michael Rubin, a resident scholar at the American Enterprise
Institute (AEI) and a writer for the Washington Examiner, after the death of
Tom Lantos, a Holocaust survivor, this organisation has “failed” in that
mission. In “Lantos Foundation betrays its principles” published by the
Washington Examiner on June 22, Rubin accuses this foundation of bestowing
honours on “those in the spotlight who have received other awards, big names
whom the glitterati will recognize and then open their check books.”
He
notes that it was in that context, in 2011, the foundation awarded its prize to
Paul Rusesabagina, who had just shot to fame thanks to the Hollywood film Hotel
Rwanda. In 2005, President Georges W. Bush had also bestowed on him the
prestigious Presidential Medal of Freedom. At the time, when Lantos was
offering its human prize to Rusesabagina, multiple organisations of genocide
survivors warned that he didn’t deserve it. But the foundation ignored them.
Rubin
noted that: “The problem is that this spotlight and adulation sparked in
Rusesabagina first ambition and then frustration. He wanted power, and failing
to receive it democratically, he pursued power by other means. The evidence is
damning. Rusesabagina embraced violence. His statements were not mere polemics.
He channelled funds to designated groups that subsequently staged terrible
terror attacks. They targeted not Rwandan officials or the military, but
farmsteads, villages, and buses, where they slaughtered unarmed innocents.”
I’m
not going to revisit the saga of Rusesabagina’s arrest in in August 2020 and
his subsequent trial which ended up with the Court handing him 15 years in
prison for being a mastermind of acts of terrorism which targeted Rwandans on
Rwandan soil. Following Rusesabagina’s arrest, Katrina Lantos Swett, Lantos’
daughter, sprang into action, calling for the punishment of the Rwandan
government for exercising its sovereign rights. It is in this sense that on
June 10, it called for the US government to impose on two senior Rwandan
government officials, Col Jeannot Ruhunga, head of the Rwanda Bureau of
Investigation (RIB), and former Minister of Justice, Johnston Busingye. It
disingenuously accused them of “enforced disappearance” and violating
Rusesabagina’s basic human rights.
When
Busingye was appointed High Commissioner to the UK, early last month, Swett urged Dominique Raab,
then British Foreign Secretary, to reject his credentials because of his alleged
human rights violations. After the sentencing of Rusesabagina on September 20,
the Lantos Foundation doubled down by joining hands with a cabal of
self-seeking Rwandan haters and documentary makers, Benedict Moran and Anjan
Sundaram. These individuals are well known for their genocide denial and
revisionism.
The
duo is planning to produce a documentary seen as an exercise in character
assassination of President Paul Kagame. The Lantos Foundation, in its vengeful
mission, pledged its financial support to this insidious project. In her
statement on October 4, Swett expressed this support in these terms: “The
Lantos Foundation for Human Rights & Justice today announced its financial
support for a forthcoming documentary in the early stages of production – Man
of the Year, a first-of-its-kind film that will take a deep and unfiltered look
at the truth behind the lies of Rwanda’s brutal dictatorship.”
As
indicated in the same statement, the purpose of this documentary is to peddle
genocide denial and revisionism. What does Swett mean when she said that
“President Paul Kagame has manipulated and bent the world’s most powerful
people and organizations to his will, successfully getting them to adopt his
false narrative?” This is what the likes of Canadian journalist Judi Rever and
genocidaires and other revisionists have been propagating.
Late
Tom Lantos must be turning in his grave at seeing how his foundation has become
under the leadership of Swett. It’s hard to believe that this organisation
could have abandoned its core principles to throw its overwhelming support to a
terrorist kingpin and to back a project aimed at promoting genocide denial and
revisionism.
It's
become commonplace to see the so-called human rights organisations like the
Lantos Foundation, Human Rights Watch, and Amnesty International veer from
their guiding principles and embrace a more militant posture. Under the leadership of Swett, the Foundation
has become too political. It is using its resources and influence to prop up a
Rwandan terror mastermind. Since the trial and conviction of Rusesabagina,
Swett and his foundation relentlessly worked hard to whitewash his crimes.
Could
it be because Rusesabagina, a recipient of the Lantos Foundation Human Rights
prize, more than 10 years later, was charged with terrorism offences in Rwanda
and it is an embarrassment to the organisation? Is the Foundation doing all it
can to save face? Note that genocide survivors’ organisations warned the
Foundation not to award Rusesabagina because he did not deserve it.