Kigali Genocide Memorial
Two hundred and fifty thousand people are buried here, and the route explains how it came to that.
Duration
2 hrs – 3 hrs
Best time
In the morning
Open
Every day
Entry price
Free
The Gisozi memorial opened in 2004, ten years after the genocide against the Tutsi that killed around eight hundred thousand people in a hundred days. Two hundred and fifty thousand are buried in the mass graves in the garden, under concrete slabs.
The route does not begin in April 1994: it goes back to the colonial period, to the ethnic identity cards introduced by the Belgian administration, and shows the gradual construction of the category that made the massacre possible. One room is given to the children, with their photographs, their favourite food and how they died. Another covers other twentieth-century genocides.
Getting there
Gisozi district, fifteen minutes by car from central Kigali. Taxi or moto-taxi.
Rules on site
Entry is free; the audio guide is charged and worth it. The content is extremely hard, the children's room especially: it is not a place for young children. Photography is not allowed inside.
