119-SRES151

Resolution is currently in: Senate
Passed:

119th CONGRESS

1st Session

S. RES. 151

Expressing the sense of the Senate that the United States should recognize the 1994 genocide in Rwanda as "the genocide against the Tutsi in Rwanda".

IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES

April 1 (legislative day, March 31), 2025

Mr. Rounds (for himself and Mr. Coons) submitted the following resolution; which was referred to the Committee on Foreign Relations

RESOLUTION

Whereas, in 2018, the United Nations General Assembly amended the title of the annual observance of the genocide in Rwanda on April 7 to be the "International Day of Reflection on the 1994 Genocide against the Tutsi in Rwanda";

Whereas United States officials have noted publicly that the genocide in Rwanda was "intended to destroy Tutsi";

Whereas, on April 7, 2023, Secretary of State Blinken stated, "The U.S. stands with Rwanda … in remembering the Tutsi victims of genocide. We also mourn the others who were murdered for their opposition to a genocidal regime.";

Whereas the United States Integrated Country Strategy for Rwanda (approved March 14, 2022) refers to the "1994 genocide against the Tutsi ethnic group";

Whereas Rwandan officials, in appropriately opposing genocide denial or revisionism, aptly note that any nomenclature that does not specifically use the phrase "genocide against the Tutsi" is "ambiguous" and conducive to genocide denial or revisionism;

Whereas the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum notes in its public educational materials on the "genocide in Rwanda" that the victims were "predominantly Tutsi" and that the goal of Hutu extremist leaders was for "Rwandan Tutsis to be exterminated";

Whereas the United States-based nongovernmental organization Human Rights Watch, which played a central role in documenting the genocide in Rwanda and in supporting international efforts to bring the perpetrators to justice, found that the "Tutsi were being targeted for elimination";

Whereas European diplomats refer to the "genocide against the Tutsi" in public statements;

Whereas, starting in 2022, the Government of the United Kingdom has used the terminology "genocide against the Tutsi"; and

Whereas the United States is the only major country in the world to publicly reject the terminology "genocide against the Tutsi": Now, therefore, be it

That it is the sense of the Senate that—

(1) - the United States should recognize the 1994 genocide in Rwanda as "the genocide against the Tutsi in Rwanda";

(2) - the Secretary of State should publicly affirm that terminology; and

(3) - other types of atrocities occurred alongside the genocide against the Tutsi, and the history of the genocide should clearly affirm the other experiences of mass violence against Rwandans during the same period, including the killings and other violence experienced by Hutus and the Indigenous Twa community, perpetrated by Hutu extremist militias.