The appeal of the former Director of Cabinet in the Ministry of Defence during President Juvenal Habyarimana’s regime, Col. Theoneste Bagosora, will be held in April. Bagosora, who was sentenced to life imprisonment in 2008 for his role in the 1994 Genocide against the Tutsi, will appear before five Appeal court at the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR). He is believed to be the key architect of the Genocide, in which over a million people were killed. Bagosora was convicted for killing several politicians including the former Prime Minister, Agatha Uwilingiyimana, Joseph Kavaruganda, the president of the Constitutional Court as well as Frederic Nzamurambaho. Others are Landoald Ndasingwa and Faustin Rucogoza who were opposition party officials and ministers designate in a transitional government that was in the offing. It had earlier been reported that Gen. Marcel Gatsinzi, the Minister for Disaster Preparedness and Refugee Affairs, would testify in Bagosora’s case as the chamber’s witness. Gatsinzi was, in 1994, the acting Chief of Staff of the armed forces. Colonel Anatole Nsengiyumva, and Major Aloys Ntabakuze, the other two who were sentenced alongside Bagosora, will also have their appeals heard in March and early April. Ends
