Free Karake and apologise for arrest, Pan-African body tells UK

The Pan-African Movement-Rwanda Chapter has demanded the UK authorities to immediately release Lt Gen Karenzi Karake and apologise to the people of Africa and Rwanda, in particular, over the “perplexing and unacceptable” incident. “The Pan-African Movement–Rwanda strongly condemns the arrest of Lt Gen Karake that is legally baseless, disgraceful, scandalous, outrageous, politically motivated and humiliating to the African dignity,” it said in a statement signed by its chairperson, Protais Musoni. Karake, the secretary general of the National Intelligence and Security Services (NISS), was barred from boarding a flight back home after an official mission to the UK, on June 20, over a controversial 2008 indictment targeting 40 Rwandans, including himself, issued by a Spanish judge for alleged war crimes, genocide and terrorist acts. Rwanda has long dismissed the indictment and subsequent arrest warrants as unfounded and only instigated by elements linked to the 1994 Genocide against the Tutsi, while the American government has branded the dossier as “outrageous and inaccurate”. Interpol has equally refused to enforce the warrants while a Spanish higher court last year quashed the indictment. “The Spanish special court (“Audiencia Nacional”), that handles such cases in Spain, dismissed the arrest warrants because the Spanish law, which was enacted in June 2013, removed the competence from the Spanish Court to handle such crimes,” the Pan-African Movement-Rwanda said in the statement. The indicted former and current Rwandan officials were all members of the Rwanda Patriotic Front, whose armed wing, the Rwanda Patriotic Army (RPA), is revered in Rwanda for stopping the Genocide against the Tutsi – a three-month slaughter spree that claimed at least a million lives. Researchers have linked the judge who issued the indictment, Fernando Andreu Merelles, to groups that support the FDLR, the DR Congo-based militia largely blamed for the Genocide, which partly explains why the judge set out to criminalise the ntire RPF movement, describing it as a terrorist organisation from inception. According to a 2009 UN Panel of Experts report on DR Congo, Judge Merelles received support to work on the indictment from two Spanish charitable organisations, Fundaciò S’Olivar and Inshuti, that had extended financial support to FDLR. The charities received nearly €200,000 in grants from the local Spanish government of the Balearic Islands (Mallorca) to help prepare the indictments against RPF, the experts said in their report. On the basis of testimonies, original email correspondence, audio recordings of conversations, phone logs analysis and receipts of money transfers, as well as other documents, the UN experts said, FDLR had received regular financial, logistical and political support from individuals belonging to the above charitable institutions. Gen Karake was last week bailed for 1 million pounds and is due to return to the Westminster Magistrate’s Court late September to fight an extradition to Spain. “The Pan-African Movement-Rwanda is deeply concerned about the degrading treatment of people of African descent from the days of slave trade, colonisation, apartheid and neo-colonialism where selective justice is the weapon used under the principle of universal competence,” the statement added. The African Union Peace and Security Council last week added its voice to the growing condemnations of Gen Karake’s arrest, which it described as “a clear violation of the sovereignty and territorial integrity of African states, an attempt to subordinate African legal systems to those of non-African states.” In a communiqué, issued after an emergency meeting at the AU headquarters in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, on Friday, the Council cited the July 1, 2008 recommendation of the AU Heads of State and Government, which “stressed the need for international justice to be conducted in a transparent and fair manner, in line with the principles of international law, and expressed concern that the abuse of the principle of universal jurisdiction may pose a threat to the efforts aimed at promoting the rule of law and stability, as well as building strong national institutions.” Meanwhile, protesters who had staged a sit-in near the UK High Commission in Kigali since mid last week, agreed to end the demonstration on Sunday after appeals from the City of Kigali and Police authorities, who said the protesters’ message had been heard and the issue would continue to be pursued through other means.

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Free Karake and apologise for arrest, Pan-African body tells UK