tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16711557.post4564708543215136314..comments2024-03-24T20:40:46.666-04:00Comments on Pan-African News Wire: Thousands of Rwandans Stage Anti-France Demonstrations Over Arrest
WarrantsPan-African News Wirehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10958190577776906688noreply@blogger.comBlogger1125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-16711557.post-66404995462349656512006-11-24T13:40:00.000-05:002006-11-24T13:40:00.000-05:00Rwanda cuts ties with France
Kagame denies i...Rwanda cuts ties with France <br /> <br />Kagame denies involvement in the death of Rwandan president Juvenal Habyarimana in an air crash <br /><br />Rwanda has cut diplomatic ties with France and given France's ambassador to Rwanda 24 hours to leave the country.<br /> <br />Earlier, Rwanda recalled its ambassador from Paris after a French judge requested that Paul Kagame, the Rwandan president, stand trial over the killing of a former leader which sparked a 1994 genocide.<br /> <br />Charles Murigande, the foreign minister, said: "We have ordered the French ambassador to leave our country within 24 hours and given other French diplomats 72 hours to leave." On Thursday, Rwandans held protests against Jean-Louis Bruguiere's move to put Kagame on trial for a 1994 plane crash.<br /> <br />Juvenal Habyarimana, Rwanda's then president, was killed when his plane was shot down in 1994.<br /> <br />Rwanda has rejected the French investigating magistrate's statement that Kagame should face prosecution over his "suspected involvement" in Habyarimana's death. <br /> <br />The accusations have infuriated the Kagame government, which has called them a cover-up for France's alleged role in training soldiers who carried out the genocide, now being investigated in Rwanda.<br /> <br />"Given the level of enmity as expressed by the latest move, we are beginning to question the need of maintaining diplomatic relations with such a country that is aggressive to us," Murigande said.<br /> <br />Suspected involvement<br /> <br />Kagame has immunity from prosecution as an acting head of state, but France hopes to ask the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR), based in Tanzania, to pursue the case.<br /> <br />Formed in 1994, the ICTR is currently hearing the cases of several former high-ranking Rwandan army officers accused of genocide. The court has so far tried 31 suspects, convicting 26 and acquitting five.<br /> <br />Alongside the Rwandan president, James Kabarebe, the chief of Rwanda's armed forces, and Lieutenant-Colonel Charles Kayonga are among the nine aides under suspicion.<br /> <br />Habyarimana's plane was shot down over Kigali, the Rwandan capital, on April 6, 1994. Cyprien Ntaryamira, the Burundian president, and a four-man French crew also died in the crash.<br /> <br />The then-president's death provoked genocide in the country.<br /> <br />Between 800,000 and one million people, mostly minority Tutsis and moderate Hutus, were killed by mainly Hutu militia groups.<br /> <br />Kagame led the Tutsi forces that took power in July 1994, ending the fighting. He denies involvement in the attack on the aircraft carrying Habyarimana.<br /> <br />France accused<br /> <br />Rwanda has accused France of supporting and training Hutu fighters in the knowledge that they would carry out the genocide.<br /> <br />Murigande, the Rwandan minister, said: "The French are trying to appease their conscience for their role in the genocide and are now trying to find someone else to hold responsible for their acts here."<br /> <br />France denies the claim and a French parliamentary investigation in 1998 cleared France of responsibility for the genocide.<br /> <br />France maintained close links with Rwanda, a former-Belgian colony, between 1975 to 1994, giving the government financial and military support and sending troops to Rwanda at the height of the genocide under a UN-authorised operation.<br /> <br />Bruguiere has been investigating the Habyarimana crash since 1998, when a complaint was filed by the families of the French crew flying the plane and Habyarimana's widow Agathe.Pan-African News Wirehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10958190577776906688noreply@blogger.com