Key genocide suspect extradited to Rwanda
March 20, 2016
Ladislas Ntaganzwa's arrest in the Democratic Republic of Congo in 2015 came more than two decades after the genocide. He was flown from Kinshasa to Kigali to face trial three months after his arrest.
Rwandan authorities said they would try the 53-year old former mayor on nine counts of genocide, crimes against humanity and violating the Geneva Conventions with charges concretely referring to his participation in the planning and execution of a massacre of more than 20,000 Tutsis over a four-day period.
Rwandan authorities say Ladislas Ntaganzwa personally gave the order for a massacre in Cyahinda Parish on April 15, 1994, and then incited others to kill those who tried to escape.
"We are very happy to see this effected," said Jean-Bosco Siboyintore, head of Rwanda's Genocide Fugitive Tracking Unit. Until his arrest, Ntaganzwa remained one of nine top fugitive Rwandan genocide suspects.
Ntaganzwa had a $5 million (4.6 million euros) US bounty on his head, having already been indicted by a UN-backed court for genocide and crimes against humanity.
Extremist Hutus slaughtered a total of more than 800,000 ethnic Tutsis and moderate Hutus in the course of 100 days in 1994.
ss/jm (AP, AFP)