Ravaged by a civil war, the country was described as hell on earth.

In April that year the genocide of the Tutsi, Twa and some moderate Hutu people began. It's estimated that more than 800,000 people died in the genocide. As many as 75 per cent of Tutsis were killed during the war.

Yet despite the dire situation in Rwanda, Dr Pang was proud to be a part of a five-person Care Australia team that was due to leave for Goma that day.

"This is a great honour, it's no ordinary crisis, the situation is an historical first," he said.

Dr Henry Pang was a well-known physician and active member of Canberra's community.

During his career he had worked in difficult places. He worked for the Royal Flying Doctor service, remote Indigenous communities and had a stint working in Saudi Arabia.

The medical team deployed to Rwanda would aim on treating issues common to most refugees.

Meanwhile, Parliament was still finalising what Australia's effort in Rwanda would look like.

One concern was which cities Australian aid would be deployed to.

Then opposition leader Alexander Downer raised concern about the creation of a field hospital in Kigali.

"It seems to me the priority in Rwanda is the plight of the refugees on the Rwanda-Zaire border and Australia should be making its resources as available as possible to assist those people," he said.

Cabinet was due to make a decision about an additional deployment of 200 medical personnel and a 100-person protective element to support the Kigali based United Nations humanitarian mission.

This plan faced criticism, with aid organisations arguing that peacekeepers should focus on directly the 2.5 million refugees rather than focus on assisting UN troops.

Care Australia spokeswoman Suzi Clark told The Canberra Times that sending troops to Kilgali would ignore the humanitarian catastrophe in Goma.

Australia would send about 600 troops for peacekeeping operations in Rwanda.

See: https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/page/13358627