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All Boutros Boutros-Ghali Quotes
For us, genocide was the gas chamber - what happened in Germany. We were not able to realize that with the machete you can create a genocide.
Boutros Boutros-Ghali
65% of people like this quote
A genocide in Africa has not received the same attention that genocide in Europe or genocide in Turkey or genocide in other part of the world. There is still this kind of basic discrimination against the African people and the African problems.
Boutros Boutros-Ghali
62% of people like this quote
Rwanda was considered a second-class operation; because it was a small country, we had been able to maintain a kind of status quo. They were negotiating, they'd accepted the new peace project, so we were under the impression that everything would be solved easily.
Boutros Boutros-Ghali
61% of people like this quote
The change began in Somalia, where we discovered that we were involved in an operation where there was no peace, so there was no more a peacekeeping operation because there was no peace.
Boutros Boutros-Ghali
59% of people like this quote
The problem is when you are writing something in retrospective, it needs a lot of courage not to change, or you will forget a certain reality, and you will just take in consideration your view today.
Boutros Boutros-Ghali
57% of people like this quote
I used to say I never talk about my successor, neither about my predecessor.
Boutros Boutros-Ghali
56% of people like this quote
But at the beginning, our definition of the genocide was what happened to Armenia in 1917 or 1919, it's happened to the Jew in Europe, and we were not realizing - In our point of view, they have not the tools to do a genocide.
Boutros Boutros-Ghali
56% of people like this quote
It was a mistake. I was wrong, but I discovered this many years later. I was acting on the basis of this mandate given me by the most important leaders of the world: President Bush's father, prime minister of France, President Mitterand, the Chinese, everybody.
Boutros Boutros-Ghali
55% of people like this quote
We got involved in the Rwanda peace process for the simple reason that there was a decision which was taken by the Security Council, because the troops were in Uganda, and we decided to have a military presence.
Boutros Boutros-Ghali
55% of people like this quote
The failure of the United Nations - My failure is maybe, in retrospective, that I was not enough aggressive with the members of the Security Council.
Boutros Boutros-Ghali
55% of people like this quote
But definitely, when a decision is taken, or when you are trying to oppose a decision, you are in a weaker position than the member states, because they know more about the situation than you. We gave information, but they never gave us any information.
Boutros Boutros-Ghali
55% of people like this quote
We were not realizing that, with just a machete, you can do a genocide.
Boutros Boutros-Ghali
54% of people like this quote
There is a greater fatigue concerning the African problem today than five or 10 years ago. The situation now in Africa is worse today than it was 10 years ago.
Boutros Boutros-Ghali
54% of people like this quote
For President Clinton, according to this discussion I had with him, Rwanda was a marginal problem.
Boutros Boutros-Ghali
53% of people like this quote
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