The 100 days of killing that became known as the Rwandan genocide began on 7 April 1994. Hutu extremists murdered about 800,000 Tutsis while major powers, led by the US, found reasons not to save them.

Even as evidence of the atrocities mounted, Bill Clinton ordered his own staff not to call the killings a genocide, because that would have drawn political and legal pressures for US intervention, and blocked the United Nations security council from sending troops to stop the slaughter.

The US wasn’t alone. French soldiers in Rwanda rescued foreigners and their pets but did nothing to save ordinary Tutsis. Instead, France indulged its colonialist fantasies about regions of influence and sought to prop up the Hutu extremist government leading the genocide.