The Government has described yesterday’s guilty verdicts for FDLR leaders by a German court as an important step in ending the militia’s impunity.

FDLR president Ignace Murwanashyaka and his deputy Straton Musoni received 13 and eight years in prison, respectively, after a court in the south-western German city of Stuttgart concluded a four-year trial.

The court found the two guilty of leading a terrorist organisation.

Murwanashyaka was particularly found guilty of aiding and abetting war crimes, while his deputy was found guilty of leading a terrorist organisation.

Reacting to the ruling, Justice minister Johnston Busingye said: "I am not sure what it [now] means in terms of appeals and so on but this is a good step in giving justice to FDLR victims, and in the fight against the genocide ideology that the militia espouses.”

Busingye, who is also the Attorney-General, said the bigger task, however, is in eastern DR Congo where FDLR continues to operate from and plan the completion of their "genocidal project” in Rwanda, propagate genocide ideology in the region, rape and wreck havoc on the citizens of DR Congo. 

The minister said conviction for war crimes should ideally have seen the FDLR leaders locked away for a longer time, but added that the independence and appreciation of courts must be respected.

"The important thing here is that they were found guilty. Sentencing policies and practices defer. If the prosecution finds the sentences too lenient they will probably appeal in ways consistent with German law and practice,” Busingye said.

Wiping out FDLR

The New Times was not able to get comment from the DR Congo government about yesterday’s developments in Stuttgart, but while in Kigali last week, the outgoing Congolese Defence minister, Aimé Lusa-Diese Ngoi-Mukena, and his Rwandan counterpart, James Kabarebe, signaled that there was consensus that FLDR needed to be eradicated urgently, and agreed to cooperate in that effort.

In 2009, Murwanashyaka and Musoni were arrested on a warrant issued by German federal prosecutors who confirmed that they were leaders of a "terrorist group that is accused of crimes against humanity and different systematic war crimes” against the civilian population in DR Congo.

The duo was initially accused of 26 counts of crimes against humanity and 39 counts of war crimes committed by the FDLR militia under their command between January 2008 and their arrest in Germany in November 2009.

In June 2002, Germany introduced a new International Penal Code to deal with the crime of genocide and other crimes against humanity and terrorism. The law empowers German prosecutors to investigate and prosecute a civilian for responsibility over atrocities committed outside Germany.

However, during the Monday ruling, judge Juergen Hettich told the court that German procedural rules are inadequate for a war crimes trial since they allow the accused to spin out proceedings for ever.

The court also heard that FDLR crimes in DR Congo were war crimes, not crimes against humanity, as a systematic character was not proven.

Dominic Johnson, Africa editor of German newspaper TAZ, who was in court during the trial said, German jail sentences are usually remitted after two-thirds of their actual term.

Musoni has already spent six years in jail and, as such, the arrest warrant against him was lifted. By press time yesterday, The New Times had established that he would walk free with immediate effect.

Johnson said: "Observers will scrutinise the fact that Murwanashyaka was only found guilty of aiding and abetting war crimes, not as a responsible commander. FDLR crimes are qualified as war crimes only, not crimes against humanity, because the court is not convinced they were part of a ‘widespread and systematic attack’ on the civilian population.”

During the trial, victims of the FDLR militia were heard via video telephone, while others were flown to Germany.