RWANDA:The five-year trial of Theoneste Bagosora, the alleged mastermind of the Rwandan genocide, ended yesterday with the former colonel insisting he was "a victim of ignominious propaganda".
Dressed in a pink shirt and tie - the colour worn by convicted "genocidaires" in Rwandan prisons - and speaking without emotion, Mr Bagosora (65) denied responsibility for any killings and urged the judge to "rehabilitate" him in society.
Together with three top army commanders, Mr Bagosora was accused of planning and co-ordinating the slaughter by Hutus of 800,000 Tutsis and moderate Hutus in 1994. Prosecutors at the international criminal tribunal for Rwanda have described the case as "the most important genocide trial" since the term was legally defined in 1948.
Seated behind their defence team in the narrow court in Arusha, Tanzania, the accused men listened impassively as Drew White closed the prosecution case by describing them as "enemies of the human race".
Gratien Kabiligi, the former chief of military operations who read a Reader's Digest during the closing arguments, and Aloys Ntabakuze, the former head of Rwanda's paracommandos, declined to make final statements but have pleaded not guilty to charges of genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity. Anatole Nsengiyumva, who commanded the army in the Gisenyi sector, said the accusations against him were "cock-and-bull stories".
Mr Bagosora retired from the military in 1993 but kept a cabinet post in the defence ministry.
On April 6th, 1994, when president Juvenal Habyarimana, a Hutu, was killed after his aircraft was shot down, Mr Bagosora assumed control of the military.
What followed, he said, was beyond his control. "I request people of goodwill to free their minds of intoxication and poison.
"I solemnly declare that I did not kill anyone or issue orders for anyone to be killed," he said.
Prosecutors produced evidence that they say shows a different picture: the mass killing that ensued was not a spontaneous act carried out in a time of war against Tutsi rebels, as all four defendants claimed, but one they had planned for years.
In 1991, Mr Bagosora, Mr Ntabakuze and Mr Nsengiyumva helped draft a document that described the minority ethnic group as the enemy and was widely circulated in the Hutu-dominated army. Together with Mr Kabiligi, they are also accused of supporting media outlets that spread the hate messages, and of drawing up lists of victims.
At dawn on April 7th, 1994, Mr Bagosora is alleged to have given the order for the genocide to start. The Tutsi prime minister, Agathe Uwilingiyimana, was shot by Hutu soldiers and sexually assaulted. Hours later, three other opposition cabinet ministers were killed with their families. In a move allegedly designed to push the United Nations out of Rwanda, 10 Belgian peacekeepers were also killed.
Gen Romeo Dallaire, the UN commander in Rwanda, one of the prosecution's 82 witnesses, said that while these murders were occurring, Mr Bagosora was calmly sitting behind his desk as if everything was going to plan.
Mr Bagosora made little attempt to win over the three judges. Asked to illustrate how a subordinate would carry out an order, he gave the example of assigning someone to kill a member of the courtroom.
Asked about a report that he had appeared at roadblocks alongside the death squads, he said it was an insult to a man of his rank.
Referring to a prosecution statement comparing him to Hitler, he said: "Neither Hitler, Himmler or Goering ever went running around in Berlin to flush out Jews to be killed."
"He has a very cold attitude," Mr Bagosora's lawyer, Raphael Constant, admitted. "But the point is not whether he is a charming fellow, but to analyse the evidence."
A verdict is expected this year. - (Guardian service)