French rights group gets Rwandan partner in crusade against Genocide fugitives

France-based Collectif des Parties Civiles pours le Rwanda (CPCR), which has over the years worked hard to see Genocide suspects living in France brought to book, now has a local partner to help it carry on with its crusade against Genocide fugitives. Alain Gauthier, President of CPCR, Friday told Sunday Times that the new non-governmental organization, “Les Amis du CPCR,” (ACPCR) French for, Friends of CPCR, will be officially launched tomorrow at Hilltop Hotel, in Kigali. “ACPCR has just been created in Kigali. The objective of this new NGO is to morally and financially support the CPCR in court cases against people living in Gauthier said France and suspected of involvement in the Genocide against the Tutsi. “We have filed 28 complaints with the investigating judges of the “pôle crimes contre l’humanité” established in January 2012 at the Paris Court.” The CPCR believes a positive momentum was engineered in 2012 when a special unit comprising of judges was created in the Tribunal de Grande Instance (TGI) of Paris to investigate cases of Rwandans implicated in the Genocide. France is home to numerous Genocide fugitives, many of whom are suspected to have conceived and executed the 1994 Genocide against the Tutsi. In March 2014, French prosecutors sought a life sentence for Pascal Simbikangwa – intelligence chief of the genocidal regime that planned the massacre of an estimated one million people – at the conclusion of his trial, the first of its kind in France. Simbikangwa’s trial started on February 4, 2014. He was arrested in 2008 on France’s Indian Ocean island of Mayotte where he lived disguised under an assumed name, Safari. He was handed a 25-year prison sentence for genocide and complicity in crimes against humanity but he appealed. The appeal hearing is set for October 25 to December 9 at the Cour d’assises de Bobigny, in the northeastern suburbs of Paris, France. Meanwhile, according to Gauthier, the CPCR also expects that another trial will be held involving Octavian Ngenzi and Tito Barahira, two former Bourgmestres (mayors) of the former Kabarondo Commune now (Kayonza District) between 1977 and 1994. Ngenzi and Barahira are accused of participating in the killings of Tutsi refugees hiding in Kabarondo Catholic Church in April 1994. The duo fled Rwanda in 1994. Ngenzi is particularly accused of supervising the killing of over 1,200 people in the church. Before his arrest in April, 2013, Barahira disguised himself by changing his name to Barahirwa. Like Simbikangwa, Ngenzi was arrested in Mayotte islands in 2010. In 2013, Barahira was arrested in Toulouse, a city in southwestern France. Ngenzi and Barahira’s trial, Gauthier says, will be heard before Paris’ Cour d’assises from May 10 to July 1. Gauthier added: “These judicial proceedings are costly to us. The ACPCR therefore wishes to support the CPCR in the compensation of the lawyers in charge of the files. This is the primary emergency. But this new structure will also want to take its share of moral support to our organization in the taking of evidence or information. There are so many ways to fight against impunity and denial.” Former lawmaker and cabinet minister, Dr. Ezéchias Rwabuhihi, accepted to head ACPCR. Gauthier said the former minister will be surrounded by people for whom justice is fundamental in rebuilding the country. “The crime of genocide is a crime against humanity. It concerns the victims of course, but also all human beings. The creation of the ACPCR is therefore of paramount importance. Impunity is the bed of denial,” Gauthier said. “It is important that the Rwandan community is united in this struggle for justice; the community even becomes an essential part. By taking refuge in France or in other foreign countries, we should not believe that genocide suspects have escaped human justice. The commitment of the ACPCR and its members is essential.” Dr. Rwabuhihi said that their group will, first and foremost, look to see to it that Rwandans get actively involved in the CPCR crusade. “Our own value addition to this effort is ownership by all Rwandans. This is our challenge. Rwandans need to fully and genuinely get involved in this war. We shall urge Rwandans to participate more so as to ease things for the CPCR,” he said. “We shall also help further make known the work that the CPCR has been doing and continues to do. Furthermore, this kind of work requires a lot of money and we will help raise funds for the effort. It is a tough battle as we are up against people and forces that do not want to see justice done”. Dr. Rwabuhihi said the ACPCR founder members are 12 including vice president Francois Sebatasi, a retired economist formerly based in Belgium; Gasana Ndoba, the first president of the National Human Rights Commission; Ignace Beraho, former head of what was previously known as the National Tender Board (NTB); in addition to Gloriose Uwimpuhwe and Violaine Gauthier, the secretary and treasurer, respectively. For over a decade now, Gauthier, his wife Dafroza and others in France, have investigated and tracked Rwandans suspected of participating in the 1994 Genocide but continue to reside in France with impunity. During an interview in April 2014, Gauthier told The New Times that the mission that they set for themselves at the CPCR “is an everyday struggle, which unfortunately will not end.” The motivation to carry on, he explained, “is essentially our faith in justice.” They think, he elaborated, that justice is a prerequisite for sustainable peace; justice, not revenge or hatred and, other than that, they do not expect anything else. “We want to be the spokespersons of the voiceless, those who cannot speak because people decided one day that they no longer needed to exist. Our struggle cannot be imagined as just a commitment by the two of us, Dafroza and me, but as of all members of CPRC,” Gauthier said in a 2014 interview in which he first listed challenges that included “anonymous threats.” editoril@newtimes.co.rw

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French rights group gets Rwandan partner in crusade against Genocide fugitives