So this is why I'm always say happy that somebody mentions Rwanda, because behind Rwanda, we have Africa.

The failure of the United Nations - My failure is maybe, in retrospective, that I was not enough aggressive with the members of the Security Council.

A genocide in Africa has not received the same attention that genocide in Europe or genocide in Turkey or genocide in other part of the world. There is still this kind of basic discrimination against the African people and the African problems.

Rwanda was considered a second-class operation; because it was a small country, we had been able to maintain a kind of status quo. They were negotiating, they'd accepted the new peace project, so we were under the impression that everything would be solved easily.

So this is why I'm always say happy that somebody mentions Rwanda, because behind Rwanda, we have Africa.

For President Clinton, according to this discussion I had with him, Rwanda was a marginal problem.

The fact that you had disruptions in the peace process was not only in Rwanda. We had the same problem in Cambodia, we had the same problem in Mozambique, we had the same problem in Salvador.

I used to say I never talk about my successor, neither about my predecessor.

But at the beginning, our definition of the genocide was what happened to Armenia in 1917 or 1919, it's happened to the Jew in Europe, and we were not realizing - In our point of view, they have not the tools to do a genocide.

When you have an accident, they will save their own people, and those who have worked with you or with the NGOs are left. Unfortunately, this happens always. It is not an excuse at all.

But definitely, when a decision is taken, or when you are trying to oppose a decision, you are in a weaker position than the member states, because they know more about the situation than you. We gave information, but they never gave us any information.

There is a greater fatigue concerning the African problem today than five or 10 years ago. The situation now in Africa is worse today than it was 10 years ago.

The problem is when you are writing something in retrospective, it needs a lot of courage not to change, or you will forget a certain reality, and you will just take in consideration your view today.

The change began in Somalia, where we discovered that we were involved in an operation where there was no peace, so there was no more a peacekeeping operation because there was no peace.

The real problem was not the troops; the real problem was that only the United States had the infrastructure to do the transport of troops with big planes, and then who will pay?

For us, genocide was the gas chamber - what happened in Germany. We were not able to realize that with the machete you can create a genocide.

In Yugoslavia, I'd asked for additional forces too. I even went to meet the French prime minister, and I proposed additional forces... Nobody wanted to send troops.

We were not realizing that, with just a machete, you can do a genocide.

We got involved in the Rwanda peace process for the simple reason that there was a decision which was taken by the Security Council, because the troops were in Uganda, and we decided to have a military presence.

It was a mistake. I was wrong, but I discovered this many years later. I was acting on the basis of this mandate given me by the most important leaders of the world: President Bush's father, prime minister of France, President Mitterand, the Chinese, everybody.

But I believe that the DPKO at this time was very much involved with American administration and was acting, taking on consideration the demand or the recommendation of the American administration. American administration was very powerful.

In archaeology, context is the basis of many discoveries that are imputed to the deliberate workings of intelligence. If I find a rock chipped in such a way as to give it a sharp edge, and the discovery is made in a cave, I am seduced into ascribing this to tool use by distant, fetid and furry ancestors.

With devotions visage and pious action we do sugar oer the devil himself.

I'm into heavy duty, psychedelic, foreign music. That's what I like listening to.

I think all old folk's homes should have striptease. If I ran one I'd have a striptease every week.

I really care about what I put out, and probably more than the fans care. At times, I think I over-care. But I just know that the body of work has such a high standard that it's kind of like, in my own head, I need to at least match it if not get over that, so that's the challenge.

Fitness is not about being better than someone else... It's about being better than you used to be.

If you're not willing to risk, there are no rewards.

What we really have to do is stop the adjective before the job title - whether it's 'black actor,' a 'gay actor' or anything actor.

Each pineapple plant produces only one fruit per year. It can take up to two years for the pineapple to ripen, and it's important to wait, because once it's picked, it can't ripen any further. The unripe pineapple is not only horrible tasting but poisonous.

I've been to almost every country in the world, and the most frustrating thing for me has been that my schedule has always been so busy that there's so little time before and after performances to explore where I'm visiting.

I've yet to meet a person in my life who doesn't have some moral ambiguity.

I love that, even after jumping through hoops forever, I can still get that buzz, that hook. That's very healthy, but it's bittersweet, too, because if you don't get the part, you have to deal with the disappointment. I don't think I'll ever negotiate those peaks and troughs wholly healthily.

We make mistakes, we have our faults, and God knows some of us have more than our share, but when danger threatens and duty calls, we go smiling to our own funeral.

Drama comes more naturally to me. It's the comedy you really have to delve into.

Life expectancy in many parts of Africa can be something around the age of thirty five to thirty eight. I mean you're very fortunate if you live to that age. In fact when I went to Uganda for the first time one of the things that occurred to me was that I saw very few elderly people.

We are weak, writing is difficult, but for my own sake I do not regret this journey, which has shown that Englishmen can endure hardships, help one another, and meet death with as great a fortitude as ever in the past.

That's the story of life - when you start enjoying people, it's always too late.

Indecision is the seedling of fear

And what better way to reinvent the form than to toss virtually 99% of everything that's been done with it and start with a brand-new canvas, reinvent it from the ground up? Digital comics gave me the opportunity to do that, and producing things digitally gave me the opportunity to do that.

There are some fine books and essays about that. Lewis Hyde has written about alcoholism and poets and the role that society gives its writers - encouraging them to die.

Happiness lies neither in vice nor in virtue; but in the manner we appreciate the one and the other, and the choice we make pursuant to our individual organization.

Books that do a tenth of what Left Behind has done are smashing successes.

Shields were generally made of wood, covered with leather, or some similar substance. To secure them, in some sort, from being cut through by the sword, they were surrounded with a hoop of metal.

In a world where everyone is behaving honestly, any dishonesty constitutes a big infraction. But, in a world where many people are behaving dishonestly, and the news is filled with stories of their infractions, even big infractions can feel small to the perpetrator.