The development announced on Tuesday 15th February 2020, complements the ruling of the Court of Appeal of Paris in July 2020.
The ruling rejects investigation carried out by Judge Jean-Louis Bruguière which led to the issuance of arrest warrant for top Rwandan officials who were on the front line of the Rwanda Patriotic Army that stopped the 1994 Genocide against the Tutsi accused of shooting down the aircraft.
The court backed findings of Judge Marc Trévidic who reported that the plane was shot down by missiles from Kanombe Military Barracks that was controlled by Hutu extremists that planned and executed the 1994 Genocide against Tutsi.
The ruling puts an end to a case that has been spoiling relations between France and Rwanda for more than 27 years.
Agathe Kanziga, the wife of Habyarimana is among people who filed an appeal along with families whose relatives perished during the incident.
Rwanda’s interests during the court case, were represented by Lawyer Léon lef Forster and Bernard Maingain who have expressed optimism that the ruling will contribute to justice for more than one million victims of the 1994 Genocide against the Tutsi.
Former Rwandan President Juvenal Habyarimana’s private Falcon 50 jet was shot down on April 6, 1994, near Kigali International Airport, leaving Habyarimana dead. Cyprien Ntaryamira, the then President of Burundi, with everybody else on board also died in the plane crash.
The plane shooting was followed by the 100-day Genocide that left more than a million Tutsis killed.
In 1997, a family member to one French citizen filed a lawsuit to a court in Paris which saw the Judge Jean-Louis Bruguière start an investigation the following year on who shot down the plane that was carrying President Habyarimana.
Judge Bruguière carried out the investigation without stepping on Rwanda’s land and issued arrest warrants for nine Rwandan officials who were on the front line of the Rwanda Patriotic Army that stopped Genocide.
Lawyer Léon lef Forster and Bernard Maingain have through a joint statement paid tribute to officials who were totally prosecuted in a defamatory manner.
In 2010, Judges Nathalie Poux and Marc Trevedic came to Rwanda for investigation on Habyarimana’s plane shooting, heard testimonies of witnesses in Rwanda and Burundi.
The investigation came with a resolution that the plane had been shot down by Hutu extremists who opposed to Arusha accords that directed for the sharing of power among political parties in Rwanda including RPF with MRND, Habyarimana’s single political party that operated in Rwanda since 1973 until 1990 when the RPF launched a liberation struggle putting Habyarimana on pressure to open the political space and accept the multiparty political system in Rwanda.
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