Canada charges another Genocide suspect

KIGALI - A court in Canada has formally proffered genocide charges on Jacques Mungwarere, a genocide suspect arrested in Canada earlier this month. Mungwarere who was arrested by the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) after a tip-off by a citizen on November 6, becomes the second genocide suspect to be charged on Canadian soil. His appearance in courts comes barely a month after a similar court slapped a life sentence on another genocide suspect Desire Munyaneza, for his role in the Genocide against the Tutsi. Mungwarere, a former school teacher who has been hiding in the North American country, was arrested in his home in Windsor, Ontario, following cooperation between the RCMP and Rwanda’s Genocide Fugitve Tracking Unit (GFTU) “Though Canadians have had his file since 2003, the investigations intensified earlier this year when a team of Canadian policemen came here to carry out investigations,” revealed Bosco Mutangana, Head of GFTU. Mungwarera who taught at school by the name ESPANA in the former Kibuye Prefecture, now in the Western Province, is accused of having participated in killings of Tutsis in four different areas. “He participated in killings at Mugonero Hospital, Murambi Adventist Church, Gitwe Catholic Church and in Bisesero,” said Mutangana. Canada has doubled its cooperation with the GFTU, with both the Canadian police and prosecution intensifying the search for the many genocide fugitives hiding in the North American country. Canada is also the current home to Leon Mugesera a former lecturer at the National University of Rwanda who is known for his hate ideology in the pre-genocide era. Mugesera was tried and convicted and awaits deportation from Canada. His conviction was before Canada adopted a new law on empowering its courts to try crimes against humanity and war crimes. He was the first person to make public the theory of killing Tutsis and throwing them into Nyabaronga River, a tributary of River Nile which he said would make it easy for them to flow to Ethiopia where he said they originated. Ends