The International Residual Mechanism for Criminal Tribunals (Mechanism) has convicted Augustin Ngirabatware, Anselme Nzabonimpa, Jean de Dieu Ndagijimana, and Marie Rose Fatuma of contempt for witness interference.
They were convicted for intimidating witnesses to help overturn the trial of Ngirabatware, who was previously convicted by the UN court for his role in the 1994 Genocide against the Tutsi.
A former Minister of Planning in the in the Genocidal government, Ngirabatware, is a son in law to Genocide mastermind Felicien Kabuga who himself is in the custody of the same UN Court.
Ngirabatware is serving a 30-year prison sentence for crimes of Genocide.
The Mechanism was established by UN Security Council Resolution 1966 (2010) to complete the remaining work of the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda and that of former Yugoslavia after the completion of their respective mandates.
The quartet was convicted on Friday June 25, by Judge Vagn Joensen who sentenced Ngirabatware to two years which he will concurrently serve with his substantive jail term and the rest were sentenced 11 months.
The trio will be released in consideration of time already served in pre-trial detention.
"The case against the Accused was principally based on allegations of witness interference from 2015 into 2018 with key protected Prosecution witnesses who testified in Mr. Ngirabatware’s Genocide trial before the ICTR,” reads a statement from the tribunal.
These witnesses had been relied upon by an ICTR trial chamber in 2012 to convict Ngirabatware of incitement to commit genocide and genocide.
Besides Ngirabatware who was already in custody, the other co-accused were arrested in 2018 in Rwanda on an apparent mission to track and intimidate or bribe witnesses who had testified against him during his trial.
The witness interference was found to have occurred during preparations for review proceedings requested by Ngirabatware that sought to overturn his convictions based on purported recantations of these witnesses.
"The judge found that the evidence demonstrated that money was paid and offered to witnesses to facilitate recantations of their trial testimonies and that the Accused sought to manipulate and improperly influence potential witness evidence in anticipation of Ngirabatware’s review proceedings,” reads the statement.
Ngirabatware, Nzabonimpa, Ndagijimana, and Fatuma were also charged with incitement to commit contempt but the judge entered a finding of not guilty on this charge.
Who are the accused?
In July 1990, Augustin Ngirabatware was appointed Minister of Planning, a position he retained as part of the Interim Rwandan Government in April 1994. He was also a member of the Prefecture Committee of the National Republican Movement for Democracy and Development ("MRND”) political party in Gisenyi Prefecture, the National Committee of the MRND, and the technical committee of Nyamyumba Commune.
Nzabonimpa was the bourgemestre of Kayove Commune, Gisenyi Prefecture, Rwanda, before mid-1994.
Jean de Dieu Ndagijimana was a teacher and school administrator in the Gisenyi area before mid-1994, including at Kiloji and Bwitereke schools
Marie Rose Fatuma is the widow of Augustin Ngirabatware’s half-brother Édouard Byukusenge, also known as "Cenge”.