Retired Lt. Colonel Rose Kabuye, Rwanda’s Chief of Protocol, was arrested at Frankfurt Airport last Sunday, 9th November, 2008. She was on official duty and she was carrying a diplomatic passport.

Her arrest, on a French warrant, should be construed in a much bigger picture than is presented by the arrest warrants issued by French Judge, Jean-Louis Bruguière.

Although the French Government keeps saying that they do not interfere in matters to do with the judiciary, we know that Jean-Louis Bruguière’s indictments were remote-controlled by his political masters.

Rose’s arrest, therefore, should be seen as France’s desire to punish or get even with Rwanda for their aborted military intervention in Rwanda (Opération Turquoise), Rwanda’s decision to sever diplomatic relations with them, and more recently, Rwanda’s decision to downgrade French as a means of communication and a medium of instruction.

In all these cases, Big Brother has come out with a bloody nose and Big Brother finds this unacceptable.

Let us recall that the French provided political, military, diplomatic, and logistic support to the genocidal government in 1994.

The recently released Mucyo report exposes this support in no uncertain terms and has named 13 French political leaders and 20 military officers as having played a leading role in the preparation and execution of the 1994 genocide of the Batutsi.

And it is no secret that the French Government continues to harbour well known architects of the genocide of the Batutsi.

Instead of taking them to the courts of law and making them pay for the terrible crimes they committed, they give them safe haven and provide them with social benefits normally given to bona fide refugees.

They still cling to the hope that one day they will return to Rwanda with the same old ideology of genocide and division among the Rwandan people. Well, times have changed and the sooner they know it, the better. 

Mrs Rose Kabuye has now bravely volunteered to go to France to be tried under anti-terrorism laws. Our readers should be reminded that Rose flew to Frankfurt well aware that there was a possibility of her arrest.

She went ahead and travelled because she knows that she is innocent and because she wanted an occasion to expose France’s flagrant desecration of international jurisdiction, their political hand in these indictments, and the dirty game they played in Rwanda.

This is the moment of truth for France and the ball is in their field. Rose will present her side of the story, remove the smoke screen, and ensure that in future, the French officials desist from attempting to drag our senior officers in the mire.

I can only hope that the French courts will expedite her trial so that the truth is told. The signs are, though, that they are not eager to do that because they know who will ultimately lose and be exposed.

For close to two years now, another two of the nine senior military offers indicted have challenged those bogus indictments but a Paris Court that is supposed to hear the case has chosen to be tight lipped.

Soon Rose will be there and they had better learn before she gets there that she is a fighter. No amount of intimidation will subdue her or stop her from exposing the hidden agenda of the French.

In any case, as we say in Kinyarwanda, "Ukuri guca mu ziko ntigushye”. In other words, facts are facts, the truth never dies.   

Ends