Monday, December 28, 2009

Google and the FDLR.

Most rebel groups have a website. Of course, also they have to spread their 'noble' objectives to the wider world. Also, the FDLR (the Forces Démocratiques de Libération du Rwanda) has a website. In their own words, the FDLR are [things within square brackets are mine, the rest is from the FDLR website]:

"[mainly Hutu-based] Rwandans [living in Eastern Congo] determined to defend their motherland [Rwanda] kept under constant threats of extermination by a tyrannic and barbaric [Tutsi-based] regime [in Kigali, Rwanda]. The FDLR are a response to contempt, arrogance, ruthless and bloodthirsty repression, and fascism of the Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF) [the current Tutsi-based ruling party in Rwanda and led by the country's president Paul Kagame] and to the opposition by the RPF to diverse initiatives taken in favour of a political dialogue, open democratic activities, and respect of fundamental human rights in Rwanda."

Especially the last sentence is informative. I must have been wrong then for all that time; I always thought that the FDLR was accused by many (human rights workers, the UN, and countless Congolese civilians) of mass rape, murder, forced recruitments, child soldiers, using slaves to illegally exploit minerals, etc.

When I typed in "FDLR" into Google this evening I got the following message:

FDLR - [ Vertaal deze pagina ]
Deze site kan schade toebrengen aan uw computer.
FDLR, easy homepage, Homepages erstellen ohne Programmierkenntnisse, site dynamique sans programmation.
www.fdlr.org/
- Vergelijkbaar -

The second sentence means "This site can damage your computer" in that beautiful language Dutch. Is Google indirectly telling us something here?

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