Ex-minister gets life
2004-01-23 16:21
Nairobi - A special United Nations court sentenced a former Rwandan cabinet minister to life in prison for his role in the 1994 Rwandan genocide, a UN court spokesperson said on Friday.
Jean de Dieu Kamuhanda, 51, a former education minister, was found guilty of genocide for leading attacks against hundreds of Tutsi civilians. According to court testimony, he also distributed weapons to Hutu soldiers and policemen and ordered them to kill Tutsis.
Judge William Sekule, presiding at the UN's Rwandan genocide tribunal in Arusha, Tanzania, said Kamuhanda "was in a position to promote the value of tolerance but he instigated and led killings in a place universally recognised to be a sanctuary".
It was the seventeenth conviction meted out by the tribunal, which was established by the UN Security Council in 1995 to prosecute alleged perpetrators of the genocide. Three more judgments for genocide charges are scheduled to be handed down next month.
During the 1994 genocide, Hutu extremists killed an estimated 800 000 Tutsis and politically moderate Hutus.
Sapa-dpa
- SAPA