Adam Hochschild, in the New York Times Book Review, writing about Jason K Stearns’ new book, Dancing in the Glory of Monsters: The Collapse of the Congo and the Great War of Africa:
Stearns is somewhat easier on Rwanda here than he has been elsewhere, for example, in a United Nations report he contributed to. But he does quote the Rwandan strongman and current president Paul Kagame as calling his military intervention “self-sustaining,” and cites an estimate that the Rwandan Army and allied businesses reaped some $250 million in Congolese minerals profits at the height of the second war. Such figures are backed up in abundant detail in a series of United Nations reports, and ultimately led Sweden and the Netherlands to suspend aid to Rwanda.
Not so the United States. It has supported Kagame for years, contributing indirectly to Congo’s suffering. How this media-savvy autocrat has managed to convince so many American journalists, diplomats and political leaders that he is a great statesman is worth a book in itself.
Is Hochschild calling out Philip Gourevitch?
So this must’ve been the day that the Obamas posed with a series of African autocrats/misery-makers with or without their outrageously coiffed wives. Michelle O’s amber dress and toe-killing shoes are present in pics of the Biyas (http://africasacountry.com/2011/03/16/cameroon-is-cameroon/) an.d others
Indeed it was.
Here’s the whole set which I plan to mine as the spirit moves:
http://bit.ly/hDCi1o
I don’t like to see Kagame stand with Obama’s couple or family. Obama is peacemaker, Kagame is warmaker. Obama is wisdom man, Kagame is stupid man. Obama is carer, Kagame is killer. Could you remove this pic on this article please!