No hearing for Nkunda
2010-03-26 20:03
Kigali - Rwanda's supreme court ruled on Friday it is not competent to hear a plea seeking the release of Laurent Nkunda, a former rebel chief in the Democratic Republic of Congo, held since January 2009.
"The court ruled it is not competent and sent the case back to a military tribunal," Aime Bokanga, one of Nkunda's lawyers told AFP.
The court's argument is based on the military status of General James Kabarebe, Rwanda's chief of defence staff, designated as the person responsible for Nkunda's detention.
Neither Kabarebe nor Nkunda was present in court Friday.
"For us it's a disappointment. The supreme court could have taken cognisance of this case," Bokanga said.
"It didn't take into account the human aspects of the case. Our client has been held without trial for more than a year. But we hope that the military courts will rule on the case since it has been sent back to them by the highest court in the land."
Nkunda's lawyers in December complained to the supreme court that their client's continued detention, first in Gisenyi, a town in northwestern Rwanda on the border with DR Congo, and then in Kigali, was "illegal".
Nkunda was arrested in Gisenyi on January 22 2009, when he was head of the rebel National Congress for the Defence of the People (CNDP) movement, according to people close to him.
In October 2008, Nkunda's men routed the DR Congolese army in Nord-Kivu province and threatened to take the strategic provincial capital, Goma, near the border with Rwanda.
But after a shift in alliances, the Congolese and Rwandan armies in January 2009 launched an unprecedented joint operation targeting Rwandan Hutu rebels in eastern DR Congo which also resulted in Nkunda's arrest.
- SAPA