Danish Foreign Minister Per Stig Moeller called Tuesday on the international community to work together to ensure that a genocide like the one in Rwanda 10 years ago never occurs again.

Ahead of a ceremony marking the 10th anniversary of the 1994 Rwandan genocide, Moeller said in a statement that "strong international commitment and cooperation is essential and is the best way of making sure that the world never again witnesses a genocide" like that in the central African country.

He urged people to "never forget these horrible events" and to "remember the more than 800,000 who were killed and empathize with the millions who were touched by the conflict".

The genocide began on April 7, 1994 and ended 100 days later with 800,000 dead according to the United Nations, or one million dead according to Rwanda, most of whom belonged to the country's Tutsi minority.

The United Nations peacekeeping force deployed in Rwanda at the time was unable to halt the slaughter.

Moeller called on the UN and European Union to boost conflict-prevention efforts in Africa as well as bolster the continent's regional organisations so it could "manage conflicts on its own".

"The conflict in Rwanda clearly shows how an internal conflict can develop into a regional conflict, influencing development in the region for many years," Moeller said.

"A lot of things could have been avoided if the international community had tried more efficiently to prevent this conflict," he said - Sapa-AFP.