Rwandan Genocide Suspect Appears Before French Court

By Sarah Benczik
Impunity Watch Reporter, Europe

PARIS, France - Rose Kabuye today appeared for the first time before a court in France on accusations regarding her involvement in the assassination which sparked the 1994 genocide in Rwanda. 

Kabuye, who is currently the chief of protocol for Rwandan president Paul Kagame, was arrested in Frankfurt, Germany on Wednesday and then transferred to France under a European arrest warrant.   She is suspected of having housed the militants who shot down the plane carrying then-president Juvenal Habyarimana.  Specifically, she has been charged with “complicity in murder in relation to terrorism.”

Kabuye denies all allegations.  She is a popular figure in Rwanda, and the BBC reports that thousands of people gathered in Kigali on Wednesday to protest her arrest.  Viewed by many in Rwanda as a hero, she is a former guerrilla fighter with the Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF) and is currently one of President Kagame’s closest aides.  Rawandan Foreign Minister Rosemary Museminali called the arrest "illegal and flawed".

France is investigating the crash because the pilots were French nationals.  The investigation initially caused Rwanda to break off all diplomatic ties with France in 2006, but the relationship between the two nations, although rocky at times, has been restored through a special effort by French President Nicolas Sarkozy.  France issued the arrest warrant for Kabuye and eight other Rwandans.

After Habyarimana’s plane was shot down in 1994, Hutu extremists killed around 800,000 Tutsis until Kagame’s forces gained control roughly 100 days later.  The Hutus accused the RPF and Tutsis of the assassination, while the RPF accused the Hutus of the attack, used as a supposed pretext for carrying out the genocide.  France, who had military forces on the ground in Rwanda at that time, was absolved of responsibility in 1998.  However, it was also known that France gave diplomatic and military aid to support the Hutu extremist government between 1990 and 1994.  The current Rwandan government continues to claim France armed the militias that carried out the genocide. 

For more information, please see:

AllAfrica.com – Rwanda: Rose Kabuye Arrives in France – 20 November 2008

BBC – Rwanda aid questioned in France – 20 November 2008

AP – Germany sends Rwandan suspect to France – 19 November 2008

Deutsche Welle – Germany Extradites Rwandan Politician to France – 19 November 2008