The Chief Prosecutor of the Mechanism for International Criminal Tribunals (MICT), Dr. Serge Brammertz, has said Rwanda deserves a seat on the table of decision makers when it comes to setting conditions for granting early release to Genocide convicts by the court.  

Early release is a practice in most countries where convicts can be set free after serving a certain part of the sentence.

Over the past years, there has been a spate of decisions granting early release to genocidaires convicted by the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda, which has since been replaced by MICT.

Addressing the press, alongside the Prosecutor-General Jean-Bosco Mutangana on Wednesday, Brammertz said that there are many countries where early release is more of a conditional release where it is linked to a number of conditions to be imposed adding that the government should be involved in deciding what those conditions should be.

"Early release is a decision that courts all over the world exercise but in the case of the genocide, I think that strict conditions should be put in place and Rwanda should be given an opportunity to determine which conditions these are. The conditions could include reparations, an apology and the convict could be prohibited from ever denying the genocide,” he said.

Over 11 convicts have been unconditionally released by the tribunal, under its President, Judge Theodor Meron and most are already actively negating the same Genocide for which they were convicted.

This unconditional release of convicts without the consultation of Rwanda has been condemned by Genocide survivors and the government.

Commenting on the issue, Mutangana said that Rwandans was not happy about the early releases and felt that it had a right to be involved in some decisions.

"The genocide happened against Tutsis, they were Rwandans. It’s Rwandans who suffered and still suffer from the consequences of the genocide. We feel that we should be given a say in some of these decisions whenever possible,” he said.

Parole hearings are common in other courts where early release is recognised. A prosecutor or a victim can sit on the committee that decides whether someone should be released or not.

The search for Genocide fugitives continues

Speaking on the fugitives – commonly referred to as the Big Fish – whom the mechanism is supposed to track down and bring to trial before it closes down,  Brammertz said that the crime of genocide does not "expire” and those that committed these crimes will be searched for and eventually apprehended.

Among these is notorious former businessman, Felicien Kabuga, who is also known as the Financier of the Genocide, who has eluded capture for nearly 25 years.

"There are those that fake their deaths but without DNA tests, we don’t declare someone as deceased. These suspects have been hiding for a long time and we know that they have different identification papers and different many people protecting them and we also know that they have lots of money but our pursuit for them will never stop and we will eventually bring them to justice,” he said.

On the pursuit of fugitives, Mutangana said that though Rwanda continues to receive suspects from different countries, it was still challenging to go after them especially on the African continent because of porous borders.

"Most borders are porous and there are many places to hide especially in rural Africa and being able to trace someone who is not moving from a village is complicated. However, our prosecution and tracking teams are getting stronger and they won’t hide forever,” he said.