The trial of Felicien Kabuga, a key suspect of the Genocide against the Tutsi, continued on Thursday, October 13, at the International Residual Mechanism for Criminal Tribunals in The Hague, Netherlands. The court is currently hearing testimonies from different witnesses, regarding the role that the 89-year-old played in the 1994 Genocide against the Tutsi. Kabuga is charged with genocide, direct and public incitement to commit genocide, conspiracy to commit genocide, and persecution on political grounds, extermination, and murder as crimes against humanity. Notoriously known as the “financier of the genocide,” the businessman allegedly played a big role in the atrocities by providing weapons, financial and moral support towards the killers. During Thursday’s session, the judges heard from a witness with pseudonym KAB38, who, in 1994 lived in the Muhima area of the city of Kigali, where a mega building owned by Kabuga was located. According to a public summary of KAB38’s testimony presented to the court by prosecutors, political parties like Juvenal Habyarimana’s MRND and the extremist CDR held meetings on the second floor of Kabuga’s building. The witness said that she heard from the Interahamwe who attended the meetings that they were organised with Kabuga’s authorisation. “When they gathered for meetings, the Interahamwe used sling shots to throw stones at Tutsi nearby, drink alcohol and danced and sang,” said the prosecutor reading KAB38’s testimony. She added that after the meetings, the Interahamwe were aggressive and would target Tutsi families and nearby shops with violence. KAB38 noted that she saw Felicien Kabuga on two occasions in 1993 in the courtyard of his building surrounded by the Interahamwe. When the Genocide started on April 7, 1994, large numbers of the Interahamwe gathered at Kabuga’s Muhima building, according to the witness. She testified that they killed her cousin, and captured her along with her sister and another pregnant female relative and held them captive in several locations from around April 8 until May 1994. “The Interahamwe repeatedly raped and sexually assaulted them. Her cousin was also raped and killed and another cousin’s wife was raped. The rapists were Interahamwe who were amongst those using Kabuga’s Muhima building,” the prosecutor read part of KAB38’s testimony. “In addition to the sexual violence, KAB38 witnessed Tutsi friends and family members being attacked and killed. During the genocide, many of KAB38’s family members were killed including her mother, four siblings and cousins between the 7th and 22nd of April 1994,” the prosecutor added. The witness also spoke of the post genocide consequences of the sexual violence that a number of women suffered, including living with or dying from HIV.
