Role of France in the Rwandan genocide France made "mistakes" during the genocide, although, according to a BBC report, he "stopped short of offering a full apology". In April 2016, 2017 conservative presidential candidate, Alain Juppé, who was also French foreign affairs minister during the 1994 genocide tweeted "implicating France in the Rwandan genocide is a disgrace and a historical distortion.” Role of France in the Rwandan genocide The role of France in the Rwandan genocide of 1994 has been a source of controversy and debate both within and beyond France and Rwanda. France actively supported the Hutu-led government of Juvénal Habyarimana against the Tutsi-dominated Rwandan Patriotic
Sainte-Famille Church genocide of 1994 thousands of Tutsi and Hutu took refuge in the church and many were massacred, following the death of President Juvénal Habyarimana. Witnesses said that the priest in charge of the church, Father Wenceslas Munyeshyaka, armed himself and helped Hutu militias take people from the church to be killed. Munyeshyaka was responsible for many of the killings, agreeing to "let the militia pick off those they wanted every now and then." Wenceslas Munyeshyaka hated the Tutsis and called them the "inyenzis". Following this incident and similar ones in other churches, many of the Rwandan people converted to Islam.