Romeo Dallaire

Lieutenant General Romeo Dallaire served for 35 years with the Canadian Armed Forces and is revered worldwide as a hero of the Rwandan conflict.

In 1994, as commander of the UN Assistance Mission for Rwanda and as the threat of extremist Hutus massacring both their own and Tutsi tribesman grew, Dallaire pleaded for 2,000 more peacekeepers. Instead, the UN cut back Dallaire’s force. Despite saving 30,000 civilians, his troops were forced to stand by helplessly as nearly one million people died in the civil war. The horrifying images left Dallaire to fight back against his own mind as a victim of post-traumatic stress disorder.

Recently retired, Dallaire has become an outspoken leader for reforms in the Canadian Forces’ mental health system. He was awarded the Meritorious Service medal and the Vimy Award for distinguished, outstanding service. Dallaire received a fellowship at the Carr Center for Human Rights Policy, at Harvard, to pursue his research in conflict resolution.

He is the author of Shake Hands With The Devil: The Failure of Humanity in Rwanda, released in October 2003.