Dr Jean-Damascène Bizimana, Executive Secretary of the National Commission for the Fight against Genocide (CNLG), has said the trial and conviction of Fabien Neretse for Genocide, murder, war crimes and crimes against humanity is highly symbolic for other trials to come. This comes after the Brussels Assize Court on Thursday night found Neretse guilty. He was prosecuted for the crime of Genocide and war crimes committed in Nyamirambo, Kigali, where he resided and Mataba, his native region, as well as elsewhere in Rwanda between April 6 and July 14, 1994. According to CNLG, Neretse called the genocidal army who executed 13 people in Kigali alone. In his native region of Mataba, Neretse created, armed and paid Interahamwe militia. “His conviction is a landmark decision for several reasons,” Bizimana noted, explaining that it was the first time in Belgium that criminal prosecution and conviction was based on a law punishing Genocide. “This first case law in Belgium of recognition of the Genocide committed against the Tutsi,” Bizimana said. He underlined another dimension of the trial which showed a negationist defence, in particular in the person of defence lawyer Jean Flamme who was, throughout the entire trial, “very virulent with regard to the Prosecutor and the civil parties.” “For the first time in Belgium, the denial of the Genocide committed against the Tutsi was used as the main means of defence, thereby tending to obscure the responsibility of the accused. “Several people were shocked to hear Flamme say that the genocide against the Tutsi was not perpetrated and that therefore his client was innocent since he was being prosecuted for a crime that does not exist,” Bizimana said. Flamme also requested the court to hear people like Belgium-based former Rwandan Prime Minister [Faustin] Twagiramungu who supports genocidal forces and Belgian scholar, Filip Reyntjens, another known denier of the 1994 Genocide, and others, as witnesses. In addition, as soon as the Neretse trial was announced, Bizimana said, the defence lawyer set up a team to bribe witnesses. In-kind donations were distributed to witnesses including cash and land to encourage them to exonerate him. For months, Neretse’s family donated land, distributed money to key prosecution witnesses. The corruption of witnesses was accompanied by intimidation. Shortly before Neretses trial, Bizimana recalled, denial initiatives were successively organized in France, Canada and Belgium, with the aim of influencing public opinion in those countries. “In this context, the emergence of denial of the Genocide against the Tutsi was linked to one idea: to explain that there was a Genocide which targeted the Hutu and was perpetrated by the Tutsi.” Neretse’s sentencing verdict is a triumph against impunity and the culture of hate, he said. “We thank the examining magistrates, the court, witnesses, and the lawyers for the civil parties at the heart of this trial,” Bizimana said. “25 years after the Genocide perpetrated against the Tutsi, this trial shows that the crime of Genocide is imprescriptible, and that wherever suspects hide they must be arrested and tried”.
