RWANDAN GENOCIDE INSTIGATOR GIVEN LIFE SENTENCE
PanARMENIAN.Net
18.12.2008 18:51 GMT+04:00
Former senior defense official Theoneste Bagosora has been convicted
of instigating Rwanda’s 1994 genocide and sentenced to life in
prison. Bagosora and two co-defendants were found by a UN tribunal
to have led a committee that plotted the massacre of ethnic Tutsis
and moderate Hutus. It is the first time the Rwanda tribunal has
convicted anyone of organizing the killings.
More than 800,000 people were killed in Rwanda’s genocide.
Along with Bagosora, former military commanders Anatole Nsegiyumva and
Alloys Ntabakuze were also found guilty of genocide, crimes against
humanity and war crimes, and given life sentences.
Bagosora, 67, and the two senior military officers were found to
have organized, trained and armed the Interahamwe militia, which was
responsible for most of the killing.
They were also responsible for drawing up a list of Tutsis and moderate
Hutus who opposed their vision of an ethnically pure Rwanda. The
International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR), based in Tanzania,
rejected the defense’s argument that the killing was not organized,
and therefore not genocide.
Bagosora’s lawyer, Raphael Constant, said his client would appeal
against the verdict.
Brigadier Gratien Kabiligi, the former chief of military operations,
who was on trial with Bagosora and the two other men, was cleared of
all charges and ordered to be released from custody immediately.
In another verdict on Thursday, the tribunal sentenced Protais
Zigiranyirazo, 57, to 20 years in jail for his part in the genocide.
Mr Zigiranyirazo, a brother-in-law of former President Juvenal
Habyarimana, was accused of ordering Hutus to kill 48 people in
two incidents.
The sentences will be welcomed by the government in Rwanda, which has
come to regard the tribunal as a key part of the process of justice
and reconciliation.
Bagosora has been in custody since 1996, when he was arrested in
Cameroon.
Prosecutors said Bagosora assumed control of military and political
affairs in Rwanda when President Habyarimana’s plane was shot down
in 1994 – the catalyst for the genocide.
However, the indictment alleges that he set out to "prepare the
apocalypse" as far back as 1990, BBC reports.
From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress
