Paul Rusesabagina speaks in SF on the genocides in Rwanda and Darfur: audio and photos

During the Rwandan genocide in 1994, Paul Rusesabagina helped shelter over 1,200 people from slaughter by using his influence as general manager of the Hotel des Mille Collines in Kigali, Rwanda. Almost a million others were killed in about 100 days. His heroic and resourceful actions inspired the 2004 film "Hotel Rwanda" starring Don Cheadle. As a result of the genocide, the ratio of woman to men today in Rwanda is about 7 to 1 and the country is still struggling to move beyond the horrors of the 1990s. Paul Rusesabagina now lives in Belgium with the surviving members of his family.

Campaigning for world action to help stop the ongoing genocide the Darfur region of Sudan, and in support of his new book, AN ORDINARY MAN: AN AUTOBIOGRAPHY, Paul Rusesabagina spoke and took questions from the public. His talk ranged from his experiences in Rwanda, some of the similarities and differences between what happened in 1994 and depictions of them in the film, the relationship between Tutsis and Hutus in Rwanda then and now; the current genocide in Darfur; the failures of the UN, the United States, and the rest of the world to take action; the state of democracy in a number of African nations; and prospects for the future.

Paul Rusesabagina also spoke in San Francisco earlier in the day at the World Affairs Council of Northern California.

There will be rallies across the nation on Sunday April 30th to demand action from US political leaders to bring pressure on those responsible for the genocide in Darfur to stop the killing. There will be a rally locally in San Francisco. The largest will be held in Washington, DC.