Tributes

Human Rights Watch Mourns Loss of Alison Des Forges

Human Rights Watch announced the death of their colleague Dr. Alison Des Forges one day after she was killed in the crash of Continental Airlines Flight 3407 from Newark, New Jersey to Buffalo, New York on February 12, 2009. 

Alison Des Forges was senior adviser to Human Rights Watch's Africa Division for almost two decades. She dedicated her life to working on Rwanda and was the world's leading expert on the 1994 Rwanda genocide and its aftermath.

“Alison's loss is a devastating blow not only to Human Rights Watch but also to the people of Rwanda and the Great Lakes region," said Kenneth Roth, executive director of Human Rights Watch. "She was truly wonderful, the epitome of the human rights activist - principled, dispassionate, committed to the truth and to using that truth to protect ordinary people. She was among the first to highlight the ethnic tensions that led to the genocide, and when it happened and the world stood by and watched, Alison did everything humanly possible to save people. Then she wrote the definitive account. There was no one who knew more and did more to document the genocide and to help bring the perpetrators to justice.”

Details of her work and life, together with obituaries from around the globe, and reflections by colleagues are available on the Human Rights Watch website