Category: Justice

Kayishema was arrested on Wednesday afternoon.

He is alleged to have orchestrated the killing of approximately 2000 Tutsis including women, men, children and elderly at Nyange Catholic Church during the 1994 Genocide against the Tutsi in Rwanda. He has been at large since 2001.

In reaction to the arrest, IRMCT Chief Prosecutor Serge Brammertz stated: “Fulgence Kayishema was a fugitive for more than twenty years. His arrest ensures that he will finally face justice for his alleged crimes.”

Genocide is the most serious crime known to humankind.

According to a statement released by IRMCT, the international community has committed to ensure that its perpetrators will be prosecuted and punished where this arrest ‘is a tangible demonstration that this commitment does not fade and that justice will be done, no matter how long it takes’.

IRMCT has revealed that the thorough investigation that led to this arrest was made possible through the support and cooperation of the Republic of South Africa and the Operational Task Team established by President Ramaphosa to assist our Fugitive Tracking Team.

More support was received from similar Task Forces in other African countries, notably the Kingdom of Eswatini and the Republic of Mozambique among others.

Rwandan authorities under the leadership of Prosecutor General Aimable Havugiyaremye also continued to be strongest partners and provided essential assistance.

Kayishema’s arrest demonstrates yet again that justice can be secured, no matter the challenges, through direct cooperation between international and national law enforcement agencies.

“Today is a day to think of the victims and survivors of the 1994 Genocide against the Tutsi. While twenty-nine years have passed, they continue to bear the physical and mental scars of their suffering. My Office reaffirms that we will not rest in our efforts to secure justice on their behalf, and by carrying out our mandate contribute to a more just and peaceful future for the Rwandan people,” said IRMCT Chief Prosecutor through a statement.

Kayishema was indicted by the United Nations International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) in 2001 and charged with genocide, complicity in genocide, conspiracy to commit genocide, and crimes against humanity for killings and other crimes committed in Kivumu Commune, Kibuye Prefecture during the 1994 Genocide against the Tutsi in Rwanda.

The indictment alleges that on 15 April 1994, Kayishema, together with other co-perpetrators, murdered more than 2,000 men, women, elderly and children refugees at the Nyange Church in Kivumu commune.

Kayishema is accused to have directly participated in the planning and execution of this massacre, including by procuring and distributing petrol to burn down the church with the refugees inside. When this failed, Kayishema and others allegedly used a bulldozer to collapse the church, burying and killing the refugees inside. Kayishema and others then supervised the transfer of corpses from the church grounds into mass graves over the next approximately two days.

The investigation leading to Kayishema’s arrest spanned multiple countries across Africa and elsewhere, in strong cooperation with many national law enforcement and immigration agencies.

During his flight from justice, Kayishema utilized many aliases and false documents to conceal his identity and presence. He further relied upon a network of trusted supporters, including family members, members of the ex-Forces Armées Rwandaises and ex-Forces démocratiques de libération du Rwanda, and those aligned with the genocidal Hutu Power ideology. Kayishema was located and arrested through an analysis-driven investigation exploiting multi-source evidence with both traditional and leading-edge methodologies.

His arrest marks a further step forward in the OTP’s strategy to account for all remaining fugitives indicted for genocide by the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda.

Since 2020, the OTP Fugitive Tracking Team has accounted for the whereabouts of five fugitives, including Félicien Kabuga, Augustin Bizimana, Protais Mpiranya, and Phéneas Munyarugarama.

According to the court ruling, Sarkozy will only need to serve one year of house arrest with an electronic bracelet, and his civil rights will be deprived for three years.

Right after the ruling, Sarkozy’s legal team announced that they would continue to appeal at the highest court.

Sarkozy served as French President from 2007 to 2012. He was sentenced in March 2021 to three years in prison for corruption and influence peddling. It was the first time that a former president has been convicted of corruption and sentenced to prison in France.

He was convicted of attempting to bribe, through his then-lawyer, a magistrate with a job offer in Monaco for information about an investigation of his 2007 presidential campaign.

The plaintiffs, who hail from Iran, Iraq, and Syria, are contesting the decision to send them to Rwanda, and they have appealed the High Court’s ruling confirming the implementation of the Migration and Economic Development Partnership between the British government and Rwanda to receive immigrants who enter the UK illegally.

Migrant rights groups have expressed concern that immigrants face the risk of persecution in Rwanda, which is what they fled from in their home countries.

The judges of the British Court of Appeal will examine evidence to show that the High Court’s decision was mistaken in assessing the security situation in Rwanda and the risks faced by immigrants.

Rwanda and Britain have established a joint committee to monitor compliance with the terms of the agreement.

However, the British government intends to revise the immigration law to include provisions that permit the government to send migrants to other countries for national security reasons, despite being refused by the court.

The first migrants were supposed to arrive in Rwanda in June 2022, but the deportation was called off at the last minute due to a swift complaint filed by migrant rights groups.

The hearing is expected to last four days beginning from this Monday, and the results of the British Court of Appeal will have far-reaching implications for the future of the agreement between Britain and Rwanda.

The case also raises broader questions about the responsibility of Western governments towards migrants fleeing violence and persecution in their home countries.

Tuyisenge, who goes by the handle “NTAMA W’IMANA 2,” was arrested on March 21 after making a tweet promoting defilement.

During his April 6 hearing, Tuyisenge was represented by his lawyer, Innocent Muramira.

The prosecution charged him with ‘Publication of Pornographic Images through a Computer or a Computer System’ and requested a three-year imprisonment.

The prosecution stated that Tuyisenge had shared messages encouraging people to defile children, including a tweet on March 13 that read, “Girls under the age of 17 taste good.”

The judge issued a three-year suspended sentence and a fine of Rwf1m to Tuyisenge. The sentence was suspended for a year due to Tuyisenge’s guilty plea, his status as a student, and it being his first offense.

The ruling was read in public on 17th February 2023 with the presence of residents in the area where crime was committed.

Their home is located in Gikingo Village, Bweramvura Cell, Jabana Sector, Gasabo District of Kigali City.

The crime was committed on 5th January 2023 around 3:00 a.m. when the man stabbed to death his wife with a machete.

The Prosecution revealed that the defendant confessed to have committed the crime and apologized.

He was handed life sentence as stipulated in the article 107 of the Law No 68/2018 of 30/08/2018 determining offences and penalties.

Rwamucyo,63, previously served as a doctor at the Maubeuge Hospital (northern France).

The development follows the decision of the Court of Cassation in France which rejected the request to cancel his trial.

Rwamucyo is accused of being at the helm of masterminds that planed the genocide in former Butare prefecture.

On 2nd September 2009, Rwamucyo was handed life sentence in absentia by Ngoma traditional Gacaca court after he was found guilty of creating groups that mobilized the execution of the Genocide, providing weapons for the purpose of killing, capturing female Tutsis and registering the number of deaths.

Upon arrival in France, Rwamucyo secured a job at the University Hospital of Lille and was later hired by Maubeuge Hospital. He was suspended in October 2009 and when the establishment’s management learned that he was the subject of an international arrest warrant issued by Kigali, he was fired.

Rwamucyo was arrested on 26th May 2010 by Interpol based on the arrest warrant issued against him by Rwanda’s Prosecution.

He was arrested at Sannois graveyard while attending the burial of Jean Bosco Barayagwiza who had died in the United Nations detention facility in Benin.

Rwamucyo was taken into custody for four months and released on 15th September 2010. At the time, Versailles Court of Appeal rejected his deportation to Rwanda but ruled that he had to face justice in France being out of jail.