Acquitted Rwandans seek haven
2004-08-24 08:53
Arusha - Two Rwandan former officials who were cleared of genocide charges by the UN war crimes court have been searching in vain for a land of exile since their acquittal in February.
The tribunal is expected to find a refuge for those it acquits, who could be in danger of their lives if they returned to Rwanda.
Currently the two men - former transport minister Andre Ntagerura, 54, and former government prefect Emmanuel Bagambiki, 56 - must remain at their guarded house in Arusha, northern Tanzania, where their board and lodging is paid for by the court, as the prosecution has appealed their acquittal.
Accused of taking part in the genocide in which the UN says at least 800 000 Tutsis and moderate Hutus were killed by Hutu extremists, they were acquitted for "lack of solid proof".
A date for a retrial demanded by Hassan Bubacar Jallow has not been set.
Ntagerura's family fled to Cameroon and Bamgambiki's to Belgium in the aftermath of the genocide as the Tutsi-led Rwandan Patriotic Front, now in power, overthrew the old leadership.
The court has sought a land of asylum, but no one appears to want to take them in, fearing strains in their relations with the current Rwandan government of President Paul Kagame, according to a European official at the tribunal who asked not to be identified.
Hamuli Rety, a lawyer for Ntagerura, said the UN, which set up the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda immediately after the genocide in 1994, was "doing nothing about the reinsertion and re-adaptation" of his client. ]
Ntagerura, a former university teacher, was transport minister when a plane carrying then Rwandan president Juvenal Habjarimana was shot down in April 1994 in what appeared to be a signal for the bloodletting to begin.
Bagambiki is a former high school teacher who worked for Habjarimana's intelligence service.
The court has so far completed 22 cases, and is in the process of hearing 20 others. Twenty-five cases are pending, and suspects wanted in connection with 10 other cases are still at large.
The court has acquitted three people and found a place of asylum, in France, for one of them, former mayor Ignace Bagilishema. He left for his new home four months after his acquittal but before an appeal hearing that confirmed the initial verdict.