October 1990
With animosities brewing since many people fled Rwanda in 1959-1960, civil war erupts.

December 1993
A new government, by the minority Tutsis, is put in place. Restlessness from displaced Hutus increases.

April 6, 1994
Rwanda president Habyarimana is killed after a still-mysterious missile shoots down his plane. Hutu extremists take control of the government.

April 7
Hutu militia start tracking down and assassinating moderate Hutu politicians and Tutsi leaders. The U.S. decide to evacuate all Americans. Canadian general Romeo Dallaire, head of the U.N. peacekeeping force in Rwanda, is told not to intervene and to avoid armed conflict.
Est. death toll on day one: 8,000

April 9-11
Massacres target ordinary Tutsis, with neighbors killing neighbors. Nearly 3,300 Americans, French, Italians, and Belgians are evacuated by troops sent in from their countries.
Est. death toll by day four: 32,000

April 16
The New York Times reports the shooting and hacking to death of some 1,000 men, women, and children in a church where they sought refuge.
Est. death toll by day nine: 72,000

April 19
Human Rights Watch estimates the number of dead at 100,000 and calls on the U.N. Security Council to use the word "genocide." Belgian troops leave Rwanda; Gen. Dallaire is down to 2,100 troops. He loses communication lines to outlying areas and has only a satellite link to the outside world.
Est. death toll by day 12: 100,000

April 21, 22
The U.S. and the entire U.N. Security Council vote to withdraw 90 percent of the peacekeepers in Rwanda. At the urging of the Human Rights Watch, the White House issues a statement calling on four Rwandan military leaders to end the violence. It is the only time during the three months of genocide in which high-level U.S. attention is directed at the genocide leaders.
Est. death toll by day 14: 112,000

April 28
Curfews enforced at the start of the killings are relaxed to allow business owners and heads of organizations to check on their businesses.
Est. death toll by day 21: 168,000

May 13
Horrified by the scale of the killings, some members of the U.N. Security Council are ready to increase Gen. Dallaire's force to 5,000 additional troops to secure Kigali and create safe havens in the countryside. The U.S. State Department instructs U.N. ambassador Madeleine Albright to work to modify the plan. The U.S. wants to create protected zones at Rwanda's border areas, a less risky option for intervening troops.
Est. death toll by day 37: 296,000

June 22
Eleven weeks into the genocide, with still no sign of a U.N. deployment to Rwanda, the U.N. Security Council authorizes France to unilaterally intervene in southwest Rwanda. French forces create a safe area in territory controlled by the Rwanda Hutu government. But killings of Tutsis continue in the safe area.
Est. death toll by day 77: 616,000

July 17
Tutsi RPF (Rwandan Patriotic Front) forces have captured Kigali. The Hutu government flees to Zaire, followed by a large number of refugees. The French are replaced by Ethiopian U.N. troops. The RPF sets up an interim government in Kigali. Although disease and more killings claim additional lives in the refugee camps, the genocide is over.
Est. death toll by day 100: 800,000