ICTR pins Munyakazi on Nyamasheke massacres

The ICTR Prosecution yesterday said that it was in possession of enough evidence implicating former businessman Yusuf Munyakazi in the massacres that occurred in 1994 in Nyamasheke, Western Province. Munyakazi, a former wealthy rice farmer in the Western Province, is charged with counts of genocide, or complicity in the alternative and extermination as a crime against humanity. He is one of the suspects the Tanzania-based UN tribunal had referred to Rwanda for trial by the Chief Prosecutor, a move that was later blocked by the Trial Chamber. The accused, clad in an Islamic head cap, listened to the Prosecution as they listed elaborate gruesome evidence on how, shortly after the death of former president Juvenal Habyarimana, Munyakazi embarked on a terror and murder campaign using the Interahamwe militias he controlled. “On April 16 1994, he transported his armed militia to Nyamasheke parish where Tutsi refugees had survived slaughter a day before, forcefully entered the church with militias and killed hundreds of Tutsi survivors using guns, grenades and machetes,” senior trial Attorney Richard Karegyesa said. Karegyesa, pointed out that Munyakazi was the proud owner of two vehicles in a trading centre where even bicycles were a luxury. He also revealed that the accused was also a leading member of the MRND (Mouvement républicain national pour le développement) political party and presided over its armed wing. Prosecution added that the 74 year old Genocide suspect also stormed Cyangungu Cathedral in company of militias, abducted six Tutsi refugees who were taken to Karambu area from where five of them were killed. Born in 1935 in the Rwamatamu Commune in the Western Province, Munyakazi’s trial had been requested for transfer to Rwanda alongside those of former soldier, IIdephonse Hategekimana, Jean Baptiste Gatete a former Bourgmestre (mayor) of Murambi now in the Eastern Province, and businessman Gaspard Kanyarukiga. The other case that had been referred by Prosecutor Boubakar Jallow is that of Fulgence Kayishema a former prosecutor in Kibuye who is still at large unlike the others who are in the UN tribunal’s detention facility. The prosecution’s transfer motions are within the framework of the ICTR’s exit strategy, which requires transferring some cases to national jurisdictions in order to meet with its completion strategy. The 15-year old court has been given until the end of this year to have completed all cases in substance while appeals have until the end of next year to have been disposed off. Rwanda’s Prosecutor General Martin Ngoga recently said that talks were still on to secure the transfer of the cases to Rwanda from where the crimes were committed. Ends

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ICTR pins Munyakazi on Nyamasheke massacres