Editor, RE: “Genocide: France can only conduct show trials” (The New Times, May 12). I agree completely that expecting an accessory to a crime to give an objective trial to its partner in the same crime is the height of naivety. No real trial of suspects for the 1994 Genocide against Tutsi can ever be held by the authorities of the country that was and remains their principal ally. To believe that that is even a remote possibility is to willfully blind oneself, and so far the record of the show-trials organized by France proves this point. I am not even bothering to follow the latest Kabuki Theatre of ‘trials’ on offer as I can already be sure, even if this lot of suspects are ‘convicted’ by the lower court, they will, as usual, eventually be released on appeal, on the interesting basis that, apparently, committing genocide in Rwanda in 1994 was not a crime! It gives a completely new understanding of President Francois Mitterrand’s comment on the crime he actively abetted that: “In those countries, genocide is not too important”, doesn’t it! MK
