Dispatches

By ANDREW PURVIS/IN KIGALI

In the gardens of the presidential palace in Kigali, a chunk of fuselage lies in an ornamental pool. Passenger seats litter the once manicured lawn. A tail wing juts through banana leaves. This is ground zero of Rwanda's carnage, where the bloodletting that has taken more than 200,000 lives had its catalyst. On a quiet evening two months ago, a French-made Mystere-Falcon carrying President Juvenal Habyarimana of Rwanda and the President of Burundi from peace talks in Tanzania was hit by rocket fire and slammed into the earth just outside the compound, killing all 10 on board. The impact blasted bodies and wreckage more than 500 ft., through a perimeter wall and up to the steps of the house where Habyarimana's wife and family were awaiting his return. "At least," observed a rebel soldier now guarding the site, "it brought him home."

The death of the President blew the lid off simmering ethnic and political rivalries in the tiny Central African country. Hutu government soldiers and militia blamed the mainly Tutsi rebels of the Rwandan Patriotic Front for shooting down the plane; the rebels and others suspected hawkish extremists within Habyarimana's presidential guard. The same night, the massacres in the streets of Kigali began as Hutu sought revenge. Eight weeks and several hundred thousand lives later, the true cause of the crash is still a mystery.

Until recently, renegade presidential guards zealously protected the grounds from outside inspection. Now the deserted grounds are controlled by rebels who are more tolerant of visitors. As the boom of mortar fire echoes through the surrounding hills, an eerie calm has descended on the mansion. Half a dozen peacocks strut nervously along the garden wall. Inside the house -- a spacious three-story villa of chandeliers and Art Deco furnishings -- papers and clothing litter the floor, presumably from a search for cash or documents. But most of the former First Family's belongings are still here: CDs of Beethoven and the sound track of the film Moonstruck, sterling-silver tea settings, an embroidered cushion presented by another former dictator, Nigeria's Ibrahim Babangida. Greetings from Pope John Paul II and U.S. Secretary of State Warren Christopher, among others, are proudly displayed on shelves. In a teenager's room upstairs, the scent of spilled perfume mingles with the stench of decaying flesh that still pervades most corners of the dying city.

Outside, leaning against the servants' quarters, a larger-than-life portrait removed from the house serves as target practice for bored soldiers. Other photographs of the leader stare blankly, their eyes gouged out with combat knives or bayonets.

Will the crash ever be explained? U.N. officials have yet to conduct an investigation. "It is on our agenda," said U.N. spokesman Pierre Mehu late last week in Kigali, the same day U.N. headquarters was struck by rocket fire. "We have a lot of other problems on our hands."