YUNGHI KIM PHOTOGRAPHY

RWANDA

Deadly Road Home

Goma, Zaire

In 1996, the deadliest refugee crisis in modern history came to an abrupt close as hundreds of thousands of Rwandan Hutus began their journey home to Rwanda. The refugees had left their homeland for camps in neighboring Zaire (Congo) in 1994, fleeing a genocidal fury that killed a half-million Rwandans. Another half-million died of cholera in the refugee camps.

The Mugunga camp, the world's largest refugee camp, surprised many by moving on Nov. 15 despite months of fighting between rebels nearby, and intimidation by the camp's own Hutu militia not to return to Rwanda. Within four days, some 800,000 refugees had crossed the border back into Rwanda. Families that had been separated for two years were reunited.

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After weeks of fighting in and around Goma, garbage burns in the streets after looting.
   
Residents of Goma cut off from outside and without food, desperately chase after a World Food Program truck distributing the last of its supplies.
   
Residents who had fled Goma, to escape the fighting have their bags searched upon returning home.
     
  
Food riots were a daily occurrence in Goma, as guards tried to control the crowds fighting to get inside a warehouse.
  
At Goma Central Hospital, no pain killers were available to relieve the suffering of those wounded in the fighting. This man's leg had been amputated after he was injured in fighting.
  
After enduring disease, hunger, and war for two years in the refugee camps, 800,000 Rwandans on Nov. 15 suddenly leave the refugee camps for the long walk home.
     
  
After enduring disease, hunger, and war for two years in the refugee camps, 800,000 Rwandans on Nov. 15 suddenly leave the refugee camps for the long walk home.
  
  
Old Hutu government soldiers who controlled Mugunga camp massacred refugees in attempts to keep them from returning home to Tutsie-controlled Rwanda. This women and 24 other people were found dead at this site. Two survived and were taken to the hospital by Medidin San Frontier workers.
     
  
A man tries out a guitar in a truck filled with looted goods, Mugungu refugee camp.
  
A soldier's body lies on the road in Mugunga camp. Old Hutu government soldiers in the camp massacred refugees in attempts to keep the refugees from returning home to Tutsie-controlled Rwanda.
  
At a transfer station set up by the United Nations near Kigali, Rwanda, thousands of Rwandans scrambled to board trucks that would take them to their homes in more remote areas of Rwanda.