Deo Mushayidi’s arrest major blow to terrorists’ alliances

KIGALI - The arrest and transfer to Rwanda of terror suspect Deo Mushayidi, has dealt a heavy blow to a host of terrorist groups operating in the region. Though Mushayidi was arrested in Burundi and extradited on Friday, according to security sources, he had been criss-crossing the region for the past year in a bid to set up a network for his armed group, PDP-Imanzi. Prosecutor General, Martin Ngoga, announced shortly after the arrest that Mushayidi had been working closely with renegade former army officers, Gen. Kayumba Nyamwasa and Patrick Karegyeya, said to be behind the recent grenade attacks in the country. Mushayidi has had a long history of alliances and collaborations with terrorist organisations targeting Rwanda. Before Mushayidi moved to the region, he was based in Belgium where he ran intoxication campaigns against the Rwandan government on behalf of several organisations allied to the rebel FDLR and former senior members of the Habyarimana regime. Mushayidi joined forces with the Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda (FDLR), remnants of the Ex-FAR and Interahamwe militia responsible for the 1994 Genocide against the Tutsi. Between 2001 and 2002, he went into alliances with a number of groups, mainly in Europe coalescing around the FDLR. Most of the time he has acted as Secretary General and spokesman for these groups In 2004, Mushayidi decided to form PDN-Igihango becaming the Secretary General and went into an alliance with Lt. Col. Christophe Hakizabera’s faction, FDLR-CMC. In 2008, PDN joined forces with Gen Emmanuel Habyarimana, Theobald Rwaka, and another offshoot of the FDLR, RUD-Urunana to form Partenariat Intwari. Again Mushayidi was elected Secretary General. Later, Deo Mushayidi decided to go his own way, announcing the launch of his own violent activities, under the PDP-Imanzi banner in 2009. He claimed several times, on his internet postings, that he was carrying out military operations in Rwanda and that his headquarters were at Kinihira, in Northern Rwanda. Ends