Talk:1993 ethnic violence in Burundi

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I'm concerned that the current title is POV, as well as not meeting COMMONNAME for these events. Many sources do not consider it a genocide, and the article itself states that many Hutu were killed, as well as Tutsi people.

• René Lemarchand refers to this event as an invented genocide, as opposed to the 1972 events which he classifies as a genocide[1] (p. xii)
• Gerald Caplan describes it as "Almost a year later, Burundi’s first elected president, a Hutu, was assassinated by his own Tutsi soldiers, leading first to massacres of both sides by each other, then huge migrations of frightened Hutu to Rwanda, then quickly to a new movement in Rwanda known as “Hutu pawa”, meaning power."[2]
• Another article by Tom Bundervoet discusses "1993 Killings in Burundi", "October 1993 massacres in Burundi", and "October 1993 mass killings in Burundi", but he doesn't seem to agree with the genocide label[3]
• A fourth article states: "In the immediate aftermath of the attempted military coup of 21 October 1993, there were widespread massacres of Tutsi – sometimes qualified as genocide 14 – and of Hutu alike"[4]

One option would be merging with 1993 Burundian coup d'état attempt, another renaming to something like "1993 massacres in Burundi". I favor the first because there's not enough material here to justify a separate article at the moment. (t · c) buidhe 13:01, 13 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

• Unfortunately for us, both Burundian genocides (this one and the 1972 Ikiza) are not "settled" events and even now as the Burundian Truth and Reconciliation Commission tries to investigate both affairs it is marred by (not entirely unfounded) charges of bias, favoritism, and political opportunism. Domestically, I don't think there will ever be consensus that either of these events was a genocide, and even if there was there'd still be disagreement about who was the target and who was the perpetrator (hence the "double genocide" accusations). Now, I do think there is more international agreement that some sort of genocide occurred in Burundi in 1993 than in 1972, since more people were paying attention at that time. However, I understand why we might not want to make a "genocide argument" in the title of the page. This is partly why I thought "Ikiza" well-suited the 1972 events, as it simply translates to "catastrophe". I would support a renaming along the lines of "1993 massacres in Burundi" or "1993 killings in Burundi." I would oppose attempts to merge this into other articles. The coup attempt article, most of which I wrote, needs a lot more attention devoted to the international reaction, the return to civilian governance, and the investigative attempts to find out who actually holds responsibility for it. The Burundian Civil War likewise has enough on its own to deal with. In my experience combining two different topics simply because a single article article would be rather small for the time being is a bad idea and prevents proper reorganization that allows for the topic to be fleshed out in full e.g. Talk:Switzerland during the World Wars. The 1993 tragedy warrants its own article. Pinging @Brigade Piron: for their thoughts. -Indy beetle (talk) 22:02, 13 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

• • I think Indy beetle has summarised the problem well. I do think that the two subjects need separate articles not least the practice before the articles were separated a few years ago was for the two events to be conflated or merged into one long period. I can see the rationale for keeping Ikiza for the 1972 events and adopting a WP:NDESC for the 1993 events but I think reducing it to "massacres" or "killings" is not ideal. How would 1993 Burundian ethnic violence sound? —Brigade Piron (talk) 11:15, 14 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
    • Although it's not the common name, I wouldn't oppose 1993 ethnic violence in Burundi as a title. (No one disputes that there was indeed ethnic violence.) However, mass killings or massacres are a superset of genocide, and we also have Massacres of Hutus during the First Congo War, considered by many to be a genocide. (t · c) buidhe 14:11, 14 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]
      • Considering how the events of 1993 range from outright slaughters to warfare, I think "ethnic violence" would not be inappropriate. -Indy beetle (talk) 21:42, 14 November 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Why on Earth is genocide not in the title of this article despite its being classified as such in the first line? Explain please. This makes no sense. Why call it genocide, as it is, yet ban the title from stating so? A.l.burley.7 (talk) 12:10, 13 September 2021 (UTC)[reply]

The introduction is a hallmark of when this article was a low-quality mashup of the 1972 Ikiza and these events. The intro was never fully fleshed out. To be clear, the UN Commission of Inquiry calls it a genocide, but that's not the same as there being academic consensus that there was a genocide. Lemarchand and Reyntjens are both somewhat skeptical of that conclusion, far as I've read. Both this and the 1972 events are highly controversial in Burundi and I think it's best we not play into that country's ethnically partisan politics and divided view of history. Thank you for adding more to the intro, but the consensus here was that portraying this thing outright as a genocide, particularly in the title, is not the best way to do that until we have evidence that scholarly consensus favors such a conclusion. -Indy beetle (talk) 14:38, 13 September 2021 (UTC)[reply]