After World War I, Rwanda — which had previously been part of German East Africa — was put under Belgian control. As was the case in the 1990s, the Tutsis were a minority ethnic group, while the Hutus made up the majority of the country. However, according to History, the Belgians had a preference for the Tutsis, which was enough for them to gain control of Rwanda for decades.
According to the BBC, in 1959, the Hutus took over the country and switched the government from a Tutsi-led monarchy to a Hutu-led republic. A few years later, Rwanda was given independence from Belgium, and eventually, the nation elected Major General Juvenal Habyarimana as president in 1973. He stayed in power for the next two decades, but the entire time, animosity between the two groups was boiling.
In the early '90s, some Tutsis formed a Rwandan Patriotic Front, or RPF, and attempted to overthrow the government. Many of those in the RPF had previously been exiled from Rwanda, so they entered their home country from neighboring Uganda. This led to three years of conflict, which ended with a 1993 peace deal that included the provision that a new government would be created with RPF input.
