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Category: News

  • Rwandan suspect denies British assassination claims

    With his Belgian passport and job as a Brussels bus driver, Norbert Rukimbira would not have stood out as a suspected international assassin as he sat on board the Eurolines coach that pulled into the passport control building at Folkestone’s Eurotunnel terminal three weeks ago.

    According to British newspaper The Independent, within moments of his arrival on British soil, the 43-year-old teaching graduate found himself surrounded and being quietly taken aside by counter-terrorism officers, and questioned about his suspected involvement in an assassination squad allegedly sent to London by the Rwandan government to kill two critics of the government of Rwanda.

    Acting on information supplied by Scotland Yard, the Kent Police detectives knew that while Mr Rukimbira is now a public transport worker in a glittering European capital, he was until 2001 an officer in Rwanda’s intelligence services with 20 years of experience in Rwanda’s military and police.

    After six hours of questioning during which his baggage was searched and a mobile phone SIM card confiscated, Mr Rukimbira was sent back whence he came – put on a late-night coach back through the Channel Tunnel. Yesterday, he spoke for the first time to strongly deny any role in the alleged plot, saying it was an “insult” to his knowledge of the shadowy world of national security.

    The interception at Folkestone had its roots in a six-month investigation which last month led the Yard to serve extraordinary notices to two Rwandans living in the UK, stating that police had “reliable intelligence” that the Rwandan government posed an “imminent threat” to their lives.

    Rene Mugenzi, a 35-year-old community worker, and Jonathan Musonera, an opposition political activist, were warned to improve security at their homes, change their daily routines and never walk unaccompanied.

    Mr Rukimbira, who was travelling to London he says to attend a conference for the Rwandan National Conference, a new political party co-founded by Mr Musonera, was removed from the coach taking him from his home in the Belgian capital at the Channel Tunnel terminal in Folkestone by Kent Police officers on 13 May – the same day that Scotland Yard officers visited Mr Mugenzi and Mr Musonera to warn their lives were in danger.

    The disclosure of the alleged assassination plot on British soil is the latest incident that threatens to cool the hitherto close relationship between Rwanda and Britain, which is the single largest aid donor to Kigali with an annual package worth £82m.

    The Independent revealed in April that the High Commissioner to London, Ernest Rwamucyo, had been warned by MI5 to halt a claimed campaign of harassment against critics of Mr Kagame among Rwandan expats and MPs called for Britain to review its relationship with Kigali in the light of the Yard’s latest investigations.

    Police sources told The Independent that Mr Rukimbira, a former investigator in a special intelligence unit of the Rwandan police who fled the country in 2001 and now works as a driver for the Brussels bus service, was stopped under counter-terrorism legislation because of a suspected link with the alleged assassination plot. He was served with a document, known as a Schedule 7 notice, stating that he was being questioned to determine whether he “is or has been concerned in the commission, preparation or instigation of acts of terrorism”.

    In a statement, the Metropolitan Police said: “At approximately 7pm on 13 May, a 43-year-old man was stopped by Kent Police. He was not arrested and subsequently left the UK.”

    Mr Rukimbira, who is currently sitting exams to become a taxi driver, insists that he was the victim of misinformation about the purpose of his visit London, where he had been due to stay in the home of Mr Musonera, a childhood friend and former comrade in the Rwandan Patriotic Front – the army led by Mr Kagame which stopped the 1994 genocide.

    Speaking in a Brussels tea salon after insisting that he wanted to clear his name, Mr Rukimbira dismissed the idea that he had been sent to assassinate Mr Musonera, describing him as a “brother” because “we grew up together and served in the same army”.

    In a remarkable statement, the tall, balding former police inspector said: “I wasn’t going to carry a weapon and risk being searched on entry to the UK. As a former member of Rwandan intelligence, that would be an insult to my 20 years of career experience.

    “When you’re planning an operation like that, I would have taken all the precautions, not leaving anything. I wouldn’t have used my own mobile number, [I] would have used a public telephone. I’m not an idiot, I am a cop, and you can imagine I wouldn’t have brought my contacts with me.”

    While working as a lieutenant in the Rwandan intelligence services, Mr Rukimbira was named by relatives of Assiel Kabera – a former ally of Mr Kagame shot dead in 2000 – as a suspect in the killing. Mr Rukimbira strongly denies the allegation and insists that he fled the country a year later after refusing money to investigate the defection of eight colleagues.

    He said: “Since leaving Africa, the way I see life has changed. Here I am free man, I love music and do other things. What I do is drive a bus, I work in a public company, I am known. I cannot do anything bad.”

    The image of hit squads roaming London was denounced by the Rwandan government, which has now asked the Metropolitan Police to provide details of its allegations. In a statement, a spokesman for Mr Kagame said: “Never does the Government of Rwanda threaten the lives of its citizens, nor use violence against its people wherever they live.”

    Mr Musonera said he had no view on the reasons why Mr Rukimbira had been stopped by police. He added: “I’ve faced death a million times.”

    For his part, the bus driver said he was dedicated to finding a peaceful solution to Rwanda’s political problems. He said: “My motivation is that I am a person who hates persecution. And I love peace because I know its price. And even here, I will try to make sure that among all the people they have peace because I like it. There can be problems but these need to be solved through dialogue.”

    Yoletta Nyange is a Rwandan-born freelance journalist.

  • Ease restrictions on free speech-Rights body tells Govt

    American based human rights body Amnesty International is calling on Rwanda to ease restrictions on free speech.

    According to several news sources including AFP and Reuters, the rights group says the months leading up to last year’s presidential election were marked by a crack down on freedom of expression.

    Amnesty is calling on Rwanda to allow opposition politicians, journalists and human rights activists to express their views without fear for their safety.

    Amnesty, which has often been accused by the Government of unfair criticism, also wants Rwanda to revise laws on genocide ideology and divisionism, which it says Rwanda uses to curb free speech.

    The laws were put in place after the 1994 genocide, when extremist Hutus killed an estimated 800,000 Tutsis and moderate Hutus.

    Amnesty says the laws prohibit hate speech but are so broad they criminal other expression, including criticism of the government.

  • Supreme court hands jail term to Umuvugizi editor

    The supreme court Friday sentenced Umuvugizi editor Jean Bosco Gasasira to two and a half years in jail, after finding him guilty of inciting civil disobedience and insulting the president.

    Gasasira was acquitted by a lower court in September but the prosecutor appealed against the acquittal and asked for a 10-year sentence.

    “The supreme court found him guilty of inciting civil disobedience, and insulting the head of state and sentenced him to two years and six months in prison,” a source at the court said.

    Umuvugizi was suspended for six months on 13 April 2010. As tension mounted in the run-up to the August 2010 presidential election, Gasasira went into exile in order to continue working, and launched an online version of the newspaper.

    In June 2010 Jean-Leonard Rugambage, Umuvugizi’s deputy editor, was shot and killed at the gate of his home in Kigali.

    Two men have been jailed for life for the killing but rights groups have charged that the authorities were behind it, a claim they have repeatedly dismissed.

  • Mountain Gorilla gives birth to twins

    As plans to host the annual Kwita Izina ceremony gather steam, a mountain gorilla has given birth to twins, a rare occurrence for an endangered species whose numbers have dwindled to less than 800, the Rwanda Development Board-Tourism announced Friday.

    “The two babies, one male and one female, were born May 27,” said Rica Rwigamba, head of tourism and conservation at the Rwanda Development Board.

    “The two new-borns and their mother Ruvumu are well,” she said.
    It is only the seventh time in the last 40 years that a gorilla has given birth to twins. Twin gorillas were last born in February.

    Twenty-two baby mountain gorillas will be “baptised” in a name-giving ceremony on June 18 in Rwanda’s Volcanoes National Park.

    The twins born in February will be among those baptised but the latest two will only be named at next year’s ceremony.

    According to a 2010 census, the total number of mountain gorillas has increased by a quarter over the past seven years to reach more than 780 individuals.

    Two-thirds of them are found in the Virunga chain that straddles Rwanda, Uganda and the Democratic Republic of Congo. They were brought to the attention of the outside world by the renowned US primatologist, the late Dian Fossey.

  • Rwanda expects Japan to recover from tsunami

    Foreign Affairs and Cooperation Minister Louise Mushikiwabo, who is presently on a visit to Japan, has expressed hope that Japan will balance its efforts to rebuild from the devastating quake and tsunami and keep supporting the world’s poor.

    The minister, who came to Japan for a two-day international meeting on poverty reduction through Friday, said in a recent interview with Kyodo News that she appreciates Tokyo for hosting the conference as scheduled, despite the massive disaster.

    “I applaud Japan for making sure that some of its important commitments are maintained,” Mushikiwabo said.

    “That does not take away from the necessity for Japan to pay close attention to investing into this reconstruction,” she said. “But in this global world, it is also to the benefit of Japan, as a country that is quite well-positioned globally, to keep its commitments.”

    The minister said Rwanda respects Japan’s sovereign decision to cut its official development assistance by around 10 percent for fiscal 2011 from the initial plan to raise funds for recovery efforts from the March calamities.

    “I have no doubt that this reconstruction is going to cost money, and it’s quite normal that the Japanese people want to rebuild their own nation,” Mushikiwabo said. She added that the Central African country, not foreign donors, is responsible for the well-being of its own nationals.

    “So long as the spirit of support and help for other nations remains, I think this is just a time that has brought that necessity,” the minister said.

    At the ministerial meeting to explore effective ways to implement the eight-point U.N. Millennium Development Goals on poverty reduction, Rwanda expects to learn lessons from other countries in its endeavor to fulfill the targets set in 2000 to be achieved by 2015, Mushikiwabo said.

    The MDG include halving abject poverty by 2015 from 1990 levels, stopping the spread of HIV/AIDS, reducing child mortality and ensuring primary education is made available to all.

    The minister said Rwanda, whose economy has been expanding at a fast pace, has “done very well” with many of the targets and is set to achieve all of the MDG by 2015. But she noted that the level of poverty “don’t necessary come down quickly,” if the wealth is not shared properly.

    She said Rwanda counts on technical and vocational training from Japan, as the country has “a number of retired, very skilled people.”

  • Genocide survivor named recipient of American Award

    The St. Thomas Aquinas High School Lux in Tenebris (“Light in Darkness”) Award was established in 2006 to honour members of the St. Thomas Aquinas High School community who have made significant and enduring contributions to humanity. Humanitarian acts aimed at alleviating suffering and helping to build a just world lie at the heart of this award.

    This year’s recipient is Beata Umugwangwali, parent of three St. Thomas Aquinas graduates, Roger ’99, Gloria ’02 and Doris ’08. A native of Rwanda, Beata and her children fled their homeland during the genocide of 1994. Her husband had been killed on his way to the hospital; he had been transporting his father who had suffered a heart attack. After a year in Burundi and Kenya, Beata and her children and her sister — with no more than the clothes on their backs — came to New Hampshire in March 1995. Their arrival was made possible by Catholic Charities and the parish of St. Thomas More in Durham.

    Almost alone, Beata knew she simply had to start over. But starting over was not easy — she didn’t speak English and her nurse’s credentials were not recognized here; she kept her family together by cleaning rooms in hotels.

    Understanding the importance of education, Beata went back to school, learned English, earned her LPN license and made a life for herself and her family in the United States.

    However, Beata’s story is not merely one of survival, nor even of overcoming the odds her accomplishments are far more than that. In 2005, she returned to Butare, Rwanda to show her children where she grew up. She was devastated to see the condition of the school she attended as a child, and at that moment, she committed herself to restoring the school to its previous glory.

    Through Habitat for Humanity, Beata and friends raised nearly $100,000 in two years. They repaired abandoned and destroyed school buildings, creating new classrooms, fixing bathrooms and equipping some schools with a computer lab to teach English using the Rosetta Stone computer program.

    Even after the graduation of her children, Beata has continued to share her experiences with the students of St. Thomas Aquinas. A few years ago, STA Social Studies teacher Jennifer Duprat asked Beata to give a presentation to one of her classes.

    “She is such a compassionate person,” said Jennifer. “She never focused on placing blame for the genocide, but instead her focus was on moving forward and helping people rebuild. She first worked incredibility hard to give her family a new life here in the United States. She faced incredible adversity, but new gave up. Then she set about helping to rebuild in her home country, Rwanda.”

    These days, Beata is a nurse in the Endoscopy Department at Wentworth Douglass Hospital, and in 2009, she was honored with WDH’s President’s Award for her contributions to the hospital and to others. Her three children all graduated from St. Thomas Aquinas High School and have since gone on to college. Beata made great sacrifices to send her children to St. Thomas Aquinas; she wanted her children to grow in their Catholic faith, and the continuity of a Catholic education was important to the lives of her children — children who themselves had suffered the great tragedy of the Rwandan genocide.

    Beata’s children have inherited more than their mother’s courage. They, too, have also committed themselves to aiding the schoolchildren of their mother’s home. Over the years, they have raised money for school renovations, uniforms and school supplies in Rwanda.

    Principal Kevin Collins spoke of Beata’s passion for serving others.

    “There have been few tragedies as overwhelming as the Rwandan conflict, certainly in my lifetime — indeed in the history of humankind. For someone to have survived the horrors of that event is evidence of courage; to have returned to help rebuild is evidence of compassion. The world has too little of either¿and to possess both is proof positive of God’s goodness in the world,” said Collins.

    The Lux in Tenebris Award will be presented at the St. Thomas Aquinas High School graduation ceremony on June 5 at noon.

  • HRW Report questions whether gacaca should have tried rape cases

    The Human Rights Watch report continues to spark debate. This time, it queries whether the Rwandan government “betrayed” women who were raped during the 1994 genocide by letting the gacaca courts process their cases.

    The Human Rights Watch (HRW) report marks one of the first attempts by an advocacy group to assess how the gacaca handled rape cases, which were transferred from conventional courts in 2008. (Gacaca means “grass” in Kinyarwanda, symbolizing a gathering place and referring to a system of public conflict resolution once reserved for minor civil disputes.)

    Because of the community-based nature of gacaca, HRW says the privacy of rape survivors was “seriously compromised” by the transfer. The government, however, argues that appropriate safeguards were put in place to keep testimony confidential, and stresses that gacaca was the only means of administering justice in a timely fashion. Some Rwandan civil society groups share this view.

    Philip Clark, political scientist and author of The Gacaca Courts, Post-Genocide Justice and Reconciliation in Rwanda: Justice without Lawyers (2010), said the resource constraints placed on conventional courts, which, before 2008 had failed to take action on genocide-related rape cases, made gacaca “the most obvious process to deal with those particular crimes”. Still, he conceded that some problems had emerged.

    More than 800,000 Tutsis and moderate Hutus perished in the genocide. The resulting arrests saw dramatic prison overcrowding: by 1998, 130,000 detainees were being held in a system designed for just 12,000.

    The government in 2002 formally launched trials by gacaca, which were to be adjudicated by ordinary citizens. The cases of so-called “category 1” suspects, including rapists, as well as organizers and leaders of the genocide, remained in conventional courts until 2008. (Those deemed “most responsible” for the genocide were processed by the UN-backed International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda in Arusha, Tanzania.)

    By 2008, gacaca had tried hundreds of thousands of genocide cases, moving at a much faster pace than conventional courts, which tried just 222 between January 2005 and March 2008. In May that year, parliament transferred most remaining “category 1” genocide cases to gacaca, including at least 8,000 rape or sexual violence cases.

    One official told HRW this decision was made in response to pleas from rape victims, who said they were dying of HIV/AIDS and wanted to see their assailants brought to trial.

    Denis Bikesha, director of training, mobilization and sensitization in the National Service of Gacaca Jurisdictions, also stressed the relative speed of gacaca. “This was done in a bid to render timely justice to many, as before 2008 the rape cases were mostly pending in the Prosecution Authority,” he told IRIN. Fear of exposure

    Rape survivors feared their identities would be revealed to their communities despite the fact that testimony in rape cases was to be heard behind closed doorsBut Leslie Haskell, author of the HRW report, noted that of the more than 20 rape survivors interviewed for the report, only one expressed a preference for gacaca over conventional courts. For others, who said they had been reluctant to come forward and file complaints but had done so because they believed conventional courts would protect their privacy, the transfer to gacaca “took them by surprise and left some feeling betrayed”, the report states.

    Rape survivors feared their identities would be revealed to their communities despite the fact that testimony in rape cases was to be heard behind closed doors, Haskell said. Because trials were held near administrative offices or schools in many cases, third parties would still be able to see a complainant enter a room with a judge and her alleged assailant. “You’d still know it was a rape case, but if all went well you wouldn’t know what the details were,” Haskell said.

    The report states that “a few” of the women – some of whom had not told their families about the rape and did not want the community to know – decided to drop their cases after they were transferred to gacaca.

    However, the report also notes that provisions were put in place to make it easier for rape survivors to testify: they were able to challenge judges they believed were biased or would not respect their privacy; and they could write letters detailing their allegations rather than appearing in person.

    Bikesha highlighted these “safeguards” in claiming that the rape cases had been “really successful”, adding that “whoever dares to reveal secrets” could be subject to “punishment”. (He did not specify what that punishment might be.)

    Privacy compromised

    According to the report, the process of bringing rape cases before gacaca ended up being “less traumatic” than many survivors expected. “For most women, the experience of appearing in gacaca was emotionally difficult, and more difficult than they believed a conventional court trial would have been, but their cases proceeded relatively smoothly,” the report states.

    However, the report does cite some cases in which privacy appeared to have been compromised, with reports of intimidation and accusations of false testimony.

    Clark, who observed many gacaca trials as part of his research, said “maintaining privacy was a real problem. A lot of this has to do with the closeness of Rwandan communities. It’s almost impossible for any legal process to hide people’s identities. People know each other. They’re very aware when people are summoned to give testimony.”
    Despite reports of intimidation, Jane Abatoni Gatete, former executive secretary of the Rwandan Association of Trauma Counsellors, who now works independently with trauma victims, including some who have brought rape cases before gacaca, said she believed the system had generally served survivors well.

    “Steps were put in place by the government, and they were acting to make sure those women were protected and maybe counselled and advised to come forward and give the testimony,” she said. “If they didn’t then maybe their cases would not have been heard.”

    Fair trial rights

    Beyond the privacy rights of rape survivors, the HRW report also raises concerns about the fair trial rights of the accused.

    Because gacaca does not involve lawyers, the process has long been open to criticism that suspects are unable to prepare an adequate defence. One of the government’s justifications for not involving lawyers – in addition to the fact that there simply were not enough – is that community participation negated the need for them. If a witness lied, for instance, community members could speak out.

    With rape cases being held in camera, however, the community cannot participate at all, Haskell noted.

    “It was sort of a Catch-22, right? The gacaca system was built on this idea of public participation to call out prejudicial partiality or lies on account of any of the parties who were testifying,” Haskell said. “The problem with that is because they are behind closed doors, because there’s no public participation, because there’s no monitoring by rights groups, it could’ve been easier to manipulate.”

    Clark said Rwandans had been taken aback by this feature of the rape cases. “There was a great deal of frustration at the community level that people had had very public hearings for all of the previous crimes, and then suddenly these very contentious rape cases were being held behind close doors where the community couldn’t hear and couldn’t participate,” he said.

    But he added that, in light of HRW’s concerns about privacy, this criticism struck him as “a bit rich. I have to say on that particular point it does look like Human Rights Watch are having their cake and eating it, too,” he said. “They can hardly criticize open rape cases and then turn around and criticize the fact that they’re being held behind closed doors.”

    The Rwandan government has said that there are no more than 100 gacaca cases remaining, and Clark said he expected the government, which has missed previous deadlines, to stick to the current plan of shutting down the system by December.

    If gacaca does end this year, Clark said its record on sexual violence cases would be decidedly mixed, but that the decision to transfer them from conventional courts would also be remembered as “inevitable. I really don’t think there was any other way the government could have done it,” he said.

  • Rwandans react to human rights body’s report

    Rwandans from different walks of life have denounced the Human Rights Watch recent criticism of the country’s Gacaca traditional courts terming the courts a massive success story that ought to be modeled across board.

    The report released on 31 May 2011 was titled “Justice Compromised: The Legacy of Rwanda’s community-based Gacaca Courts.”

    “The Gacaca was conducted in our own traditional way regardless of the challenges it faced,” said Emmy Arsonval Maniriho, a student at the National University of Rwanda.

    “Rwanda could not solve everything in a single day. The timing of HRW report is not appropriate as the government has promised to evaluate the Gacaca courts and review cases that did not go well,” said Maniriho.

    A Remera resident, Steven Gatete said that the quoted cases were few in comparison to the over one million cases the traditional courts handled. “The 350 cases they quoted are a drop in the ocean,” he emphasised, terming the report “abusive and partial.”

    “They are content to continue talking ill about our country without any basis,” Gatete lamented.

    Rukira Wa Muhizi, 45, a resident of Huye district and a former judge with the Gacaca in Rwaniro and Simbi sectors of the district, said that Gacaca was a role model since it had provided rapid justice to genocide victims and lent a hand to families to easily locate genocide victims and accord them decent burials.

    “Gacaca accorded everyone an equal platform and no one felt intimidated,” Muhizi observed.

    “Why did HRW ignore the justice rendered by the courts,” he wondered.

    He noted that the Gacaca courts had brought together families and managed to identify Genocide suspects wherever they were hiding, which the human rights watchdog completely overlooked in their report.

  • IFC invests US$7.2m for SME development

    The International Finance Corporation an arm of the World Bank, is investing US$1.6 million in equity in Business Partners Rwanda SME Fund (BPI Rwanda). The fund aims to provide financing and management support for up to 70 SMEs, increasing employment and local entrepreneurship in Rwanda.

    IFC’s investment comprises about 20% of the fund’s total committed capital of $7.2 million. The target size for the fund is $8.0 million. Other key investors include the Rwanda Enterprise Investment Company (REIC) and DOEN, a Dutch NGO. The Business Partners private equity fund responds to a growing need for risk capital and quality management advice in Rwanda.

    Jean Philippe Prosper, IFC Director for East and Southern Africa, said “Business Partners’ Rwanda chapter provides a much-needed option for socially responsible financing. By supporting small and medium enterprises, the fund will help Rwandan entrepreneurs build businesses and create jobs across the country. IFC and Business Partners share a commitment to responsible business models, which should increase focus on social and environmental performance standards in Rwanda.”

    Business Partners International is a South Africa based financier of SMEs, established in 2004 as a joint venture between IFC and Business Partners. The BPI Rwanda fund will be managed by a local team, under the oversight of Business Partners International. The fund will tap into the expertise of locally based managers and combine financing with business advisory services.

    Nazeem Martin, BPI CEO, said “The partnership with IFC will enable BPI to provide comprehensive technical services to Rwandan SMEs. This includes the installation of management information systems, market research and product development; quality assurance; process efficiency improvements; and staff training and skill development. With this wide range of services, BPI aims to improve corporate governance with an eye towards social and environmental returns.”

    BPI Rwanda is IFC’s fourth investment in a local investment fund managed by Business Partners International. To date, IFC has invested $5.0 million in BPI Kenya, $3.7 million in BPI Madagascar and $2 million in BPI Mozambique.
    The International Finance Corporation (IFC) promotes sustainable private sector investment in developing countries. IFC is a member of the World Bank Group and is headquartered in Washington, DC. It shares the primary objective of all World Bank Group institutions: to improve the quality of the lives of people in its developing member countries.

  • Kigali set to host Commonwealth Parliamentary Association forum

    Starting from 10-18 June Rwanda will host the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association Conference; the event will also see the country’s inauguration into the association. The event follows Rwanda’s approval into commonwealth nearly three years ago.

    The conference will attract 300 participants from the association’s 18 countries; other participants will come from East Africa Legislative Assembly (EALA) Southern African Development Community (SADC) and International Conference of the Great Lake Region (ICGLR).

    Among the main issues to be discussed include how to introduce genetically modified crops in Africa as a way of ensuring food security, the next agenda will focus on how to improve sustainable livelihood through poverty alleviation measures.

    In addition, the conference will address issues related to gender equality especially in land matters where some cultural practices have denied women the right to own property; democracy will also be at the core of the talks since it facilitates good governance and fair elections.

    Vincent Biruta, the Rwanda’s senate president, noted that the conference was timely given the country’s development progress. In this light, Biruta was optimistic that some participants might show interest towards Rwanda’s investment opportunities.

    Biruta further highlighted that the conference will be a success despite the fact that out of 18 African countries invited only three won’t attend, the absentees include Seychelles, Mauritius and Sierra Leone which has not yet confirmed their attendance.

    Rwanda’s parliamentarians in CPA total 95. These include 79 members of parliament and 16 Senators. The association’s objectives include; promotion of democracy and good governance, human rights and promotion of justice in Africa among others.