La présence des Américains à Kigali, Edouard Balladur la juge voyante et il ne cesse de répéter que les Français ont été les premiers à réagir au drame du Rwanda

Bromberger, Dominique

Torre, Isabelle

Brunetti, Denis

Mach, Jean-Étienne

28 juillet 1994

19940728

20:00:00

CEST

Journal de 20 heures [3:49]

La présence des Américains à Kigali, Edouard Balladur la juge voyante et il ne cesse de répéter que les Français ont été les premiers à réagir au drame du Rwanda

Le chef d'état-major de l'armée française, l'amiral Lanxade, a rendu visite aux troupes françaises.

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Journal télévisé

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- Edouard Balladur will visit the French troops of Operation Turquoise on the border between Zaire and Rwanda on Sunday [July 31]. He announced it this morning while he was in Senegal, the first stop on an African tour that will also take him to Côte d'Ivoire and Gabon.
- Edouard Balladur is a little upset: he organized this trip two months ago with the aim of making his mark in French-speaking Africa and explaining to Africans that he does not break with the traditional policy of France in the for Africa. But then, the events that have occurred in the meantime in Rwanda scramble his message a little and force him to speak more than he would have liked about the presence of France in Rwanda. Like this afternoon for example in front of the French forces based in Senegal. Edouard Balladur: "And now all the countries of the world are discovering, while we were sincere, the exceptional gravity of the situation and are starting to mobilize".
- The Prime Minister will have found in any case in the person of the President of Senegal, Abdou Diouf, a partner. Together, they are working to convince other African heads of state to take over from France in Rwanda.
- The presence of the Americans in Kigali, Edouard Balladur the clairvoyant judge and he has not stopped repeating since the beginning of his trip that the French were the first to react to the tragedy in Rwanda. It is also not excluded that the Prime Minister will go on Sunday [July 31] inside this country, more exactly in the humanitarian zone of the southwest, just to mark the French presence a little more.
- Britain in turn is preparing to send troops to Rwanda. But this will not happen for a fortnight. The Americans, for their part, are still hesitating about the quantity of soldiers to send there.
- The Chief of Staff of the French Army, Admiral Lanxade, visited the French troops. First of all to those who bury the remains of cholera victims, in Goma, then to the soldiers who hold the humanitarian security zone.
- They bury corpses by the thousands, 4,000 a day here since Sunday [July 24]. They organize the collection of the dead from cholera. They dig mass graves with a backhoe in an unbearable smell without seeing the end. This is the task of the French soldiers in Goma, the one that the Chief of Staff of the Armed Forces, Admiral Lanxade, came to honor first. Jacques Lanxade: "It is the French who do the dirty work. It is their honor. It is the honor of the French army".
- Admiral Lanxade also went to Rwanda to fly over the Safe Humanitarian Zone where some three million people are often in fairly organized camps. After reluctance about the military presence, humanitarian associations, such as the ICRC or Caritas, are starting to join in.
- Calm reigns in the area according to Admiral Lanxade. But the situation is far from being resolved with serious food shortages.
- France is going to get away from Rwanda. The elite of the special operations command and the ALAT helicopters have already started their withdrawal. Only the logistics and humanitarian base in Goma could be maintained. Jacques Lanxade: "We will not leave without others having taken our place and it is likely that in Zaire itself, we will continue our action beyond August 21".
- Le Nouvel Observateur dated today has decided to pay five francs per copy sold in newsstands at Médecins sans frontières.