There were several causes to the genocide in Rwanda. The Rwandan genocide started after World War I, when the country was taken over by the Belgians. When the Belgian colonists arrived in 1916, they produced identity cards classifying people according to their origin. The Tutsis are often taller and thinner than Hutus, with some saying their origins lie in Ethiopia. The Belgians considered the Tutsis to be superior to the Hutus. Not surprisingly, the Tutsis
welcomed this proposal, and for the next 20 years they enjoyed better posts and educational opportunities than their neighbors. Acrimony among the Hutus gradually built up, culminating in a series of riots in 1959.
The people involved were the Hutus and the Tutsis. The Tutsis were treated better than the Hutus, and that resulted in the Hutus killing 750,000 Tutsis, and the Tutsis killing 50,000 Hutus. Only about 130,000 Tutsis survived the massacres. Vengeful Hutu elements murdered about 15,000 Tutsis between 1959 and 1962, and more than 2 million Hutus and Tutsis fled to neighboring countries. An estimated 500,000 Rwandan Tutsi were killed, or more than three-quarters of their population.
The outcome in Rwanda was horrific. The three month period resulted in almost 800,000 deaths. The Rwandan genocide resulted in over a thousand refugees.