Genocide tourism in Rwanda

The Kigali Genocide Memorial (KGM) opened in April 2004 on the tenth anniversary of the Rwandan genocide. Constructed as a joint venture between Kigali City Council and the UK-based Aegis Trust on the site where the remains of more than 250,000 people who died in the genocide are buried, it is primarily intended as a ‘permanent memorial to those who fell victim to the genocide and … as a place for people to grieve those they lost’. ¹ However, it is by no means the only such memorial in Rwanda. Across the country, a ‘national network’ of more than four hundred museums and memorials has been established, ² standing in stark contrast to the vision of the country described by the national tourism authority as ‘a green undulating landscape of hills, gardens and tea plantations’. ³ Often located on the site of massacres and mass graves, these memorials not only reflect survivors’ determination that the atrocities of 1994 should not be forgotten but also act as a ‘constant reminder of the tragic events which transpired at countless sites of violence throughout the country’. ⁴