Augustin Bizimungu, the chief of staff of the army that backed the 1994 Genocide against the Tutsi, has failed in his bid to overturn a 2011 jail sentence of 30 years by a UN court. Bizimungu, a former army general, was in the courtroom today in Arusha, Tanzania as the appeals chamber of the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) upheld the earlier verdict. The ICTR ruled that Bizimungu, who was arrested in Angola in 2002, had complete control over the government troops during the 100 days the Genocide lasted. Presiding Judge Theodor Meron said the court had “unanimously affirmed the sentence of 30 years in prison.” The ruling comes in the same week Rwanda marks 20 years after the country’s liberation and the halting of the Genocide by a former rebel force commanded by Rwanda’s current President Paul Kagame.
