The Democratic Republic of Congo and Uganda host the largest number of fugitives wanted in Rwanda for their role in the 1994 Genocide against the Tutsi, statistics from the National Public Prosecution Authority show.
According to the prosecution, DR Congo is home to 372 indicted Genocide suspects and Uganda 260. Malawi has the third largest concentration of Genocide fugitives, with 47.
Together, the three African countries host more Genocide fugitives than all other foreign countries combined.
A document from NPPA sent to The New Times shows that Rwanda has, over the last 12 years, sent more than 1000 Genocide indictments to 32 countries in Africa, Europe, North America, and New Zealand.
In Europe, France and Belgium host the largest number of indicted suspects – 42 and 39, respectively.
While it has not extradited any Genocide suspect to Rwanda, Belgium leads the rest of Europe on acting on the indictments, having tried more fugitives (eight) than any other country on the continent.
Belgium, a former colonial power in Rwanda, was represented at the highest level of government in the ongoing 25th commemoration of the 1994 Genocide against the Tutsi. Prime Minister Charles Michel led the Belgian delegation to the commemoration events (known as Kwibuka) in Kigali, where, on Sunday, they joined Rwandan leaders and other foreign dignitaries to pay tribute to Genocide victims and survivors at major Kwibuka25 ceremonies.
Speaking Monday at a ceremony in the capital Kigali in honour of 10 Belgian soldiers that were killed guarding slain Prime Minister Agathe Uwilingiyimana on April 7, 1994 by the then government army, premier Michel said his government was in the middle of an effort to criminalise denial of the Genocide against the Tutsi on its territory.
Other regional countries with a high number of Genocide fugitives, the prosecution says, include Tanzania, 37, Kenya, 30, and Congo-Brazzaville, which hosts 16 indicted suspects.
The US hosts 23 indicted Genocide suspects, while The Netherlands has 15 on its territory.
Meanwhile, a total of 19 fugitives were returned to Rwanda, through extradition or deportation, by the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR), Uganda, US, Canada, The Netherlands, Denmark and Norway.
NPPA says that 22 suspects were tried abroad, resulting into 21 convictions. Belgium tried eight suspects, France three, Canada two, Sweden three, The Netherlands two, while Switzerland, Norway, Finland and Germany tried one each.
United Kingdom, which also hosts a number of Genocide fugitives, has not tried any of the suspect, neither has it extradited or deported any. Instead, UK has in recent years set free five high-profile fugitives after protracted deportation battles in courts.
Rwanda’s prosecution office says it is frustrated by the slow progress – and in some cases indifference – that has met efforts to bring to book key architects of a genocide that claimed the lives of more than a million people.
"The pace of response is generally slow,” Prosecutor General Jean-Bosco Mutangana said on Tuesday. "Our position has always been that countries (hosting the suspects) should either prosecute them in their own courts, or extradite them to Rwanda, but not failing in both options.”
However, Mutangana commended nations that have been cooperative in Rwanda’s quest for justice.
"Some countries have extradited fugitives, others have used their own jurisdictions to hold perpetrators to account; we are grateful to those ones,” he noted.
Rwanda has also called on countries with any sort of reservations on any indictment or those that choose to try the suspects themselves to carry out their own investigations in Rwanda.
editor@newtimesrwanda.com