France approves Rwanda genocide suspect’s transfer to UN tribunal

01 Oct, 2020

PARIS: France’s top appeals court ruled Wednesday that alleged Rwandan genocide financier Felicien Kabuga be transferred to a UN tribunal in Tanzania to stand trial on charges of genocide and crimes against humanity.

Kabuga, arrested near Paris in May after 25 years on the run, had asked to be tried in France, not Arusha.

But judges at the Court of Cassation ruled there was no legal or medical obstacle to executing an international warrant for Kabuga’s transfer to UN custody. The octogenarian will be put on trial over his alleged role in the 1994 Rwanda genocide by Hutu extremists of some 800,000 minority Tutsis as well as moderate Hutus.

Once one of Rwanda’s richest men, Kabuga is accused of having helped create the Interahamwe Hutu militia group and the Radio-Television Libre des Mille Collines, whose broadcasts incited people to murder, and of helping to buy machetes in 1993 that were distributed to genocidal groups.

Read Comments