A UN court trying masterminds of Rwanda’s 1994 genocide yesterday gave a 30-year sentence to a former interior minister accused of tricking thousands of people to hide on a hill before they were killed.
The Tanzania-based International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) said Callixte Kalimanzira, a close ally to the president and prime minister during the killing spree, was guilty of genocide and complicity to commit genocide.
Hutu militias butchered 800,000 minority Tutsis and politically moderate Hutus in a 100-day massacre that shocked Africa and the world.
In its 2005 indictment, the ICTR accused Kalimanzira of encouraging thousands of Tutsi civilians to take refuge at Kabuye Hill in Ndora commune with promises of food and protection, only for militias to kill them in his presence. He was also accused of seeking military and police reinforcements for the massacre.
Kalimanzira (54) was arrested in 2005 and entered a not-guilty plea. His sentence raises the number of ICTR judgments delivered to 38. Six were acquittals. – (Reuters)