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Outrunning Genocide

Gilbert Tuhabonye
Sub-Saharan Africa
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Burundian athlete Gilbert Tuhabonye tells the incredible story of how he survived genocide during the civil war in his country and went on to become a successful athlete, author, and philanthropist. Tuhabonye explains how, for decades, Burundi’s Hutus and Tutsis struggled over political power, a struggle that erupted in 1993 with the assassination of Burundi’s ethnically Hutu president Melchior Ndadaye at the hands of a Tutsi extremist. Tuhabonye urges the international community to watch the upcoming Burundian election closely in order to ensure that it occurs in a peaceful and democratic manner. The lessons of the 1993 conflict, Tuhabonye says, should lead to a new era of forgiveness and tolerance.

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