Activists decry extradition delay

A Genocide justice activists’ group, Collectif des Parties Civiles pour le Rwanda (CPCR), has castigated the French judiciary for delay on ruling on the extradition to Rwanda of Genocide fugitive, Sosthène Munyemana. A French Court of Appeal in the port city of Bordeaux rescheduled the ruling in the case for June 3, 2010. Speaking to The New Times yesterday, the group’s president, Alain Gauthier, said that his group is not surprised at the adjournment. “French magistrates have responded like this before asking for additional information, in other related cases.” “In all cases of extradition requests, they (French judges) have carried on like this. I had already announced that this is what would happen,” Gauthier said. “No surprise, then. Behind this, there is of course the work of Munyemana’s lawyers who are opposed to extradition,” he reiterates, warning that nothing much is likely to change on June 3, given what has happened in the past. The decision taken yesterday comes at a time, when French court authorities have requested for additional information on the nature of the charges against Munyemana. In April 1994, Munyemana was a prominent gynaecologist at the University Hospital in Butare, where he allegedly participated in killing sprees and earned himself the name “The Butcher of Tumba”. He was until recently working as a doctor in the hospital of Villeneuve-sur-Lot (Lot-et-Garonne), where he has been for the past eight years. Ends

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Activists decry extradition delay