<u>Government officials downplayed the severity of the crimes committed.</u>
<u>Explanation:</u>
Remember, it was a question asked by a journalist to a US state department press conference in which the US spokeswoman Christine Shelley avoids applying the term "genocide" to the what was happening in <em>Rwanda</em>. Despite the fact that there had been an ethic cleansing of the Tutsi tribe, with more thousands of dead bodies on the streets. Thus, government officials initially showed a lack of admittance to the severity of what was happening in Rwanda.
"With a bald spot in the middle of my hair—" and "They will say: “How his hair is growing thin!”
Explanation:
The lines that indicate that the speaker is concerned about what others think of him are: "With a bald spot in the middle of my hair—" and "They will say: “How his hair is growing thin!”