Genocide in Rwanda: a look back at Félicien Kabuga's 23 years on the run

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Félicien Kabuga, the alleged “financier” of the genocide of the Tutsis in Rwanda, was arrested this Saturday May 16 in Asnières-sur-Seine. Since the issuance of an international arrest warrant against him, more than two decades have passed during which the genocidaire played with justice.

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With our correspondent in The Hague, Stéphanie Maupas

It was a good fortune and solid networks that allowed Félicien Kabuga to escape the arrest warrant issued by the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda in 1997. Despite a price of $ 5 million by Washington and a file by Interpol, the businessman from northern Rwanda has long pursued his business from Kenya, with the support of the former president.

Horse in Europe

We then find his trace in Belgium, where part of his family resides, in Luxembourg, in Switzerland, in Germany. In 2007, his son-in-law, the former Minister of Planning, was arrested at the request of the ICTR.

 ► Also read: Rwanda: the mechanisms that led to the genocide

But Félicien Kabuga, who was freshly operated on from the heart, escapes and resumes the road. At least twice, the 85-year-old man had attempted negotiation with the international court, a guilty plea against a light sentence, without success. He was therefore finally arrested in Asnières-sur-Seine, near Paris.

Cooperation at the highest level

A judicial source in The Hague indicates that Félicien Kabuga has been resident on French territory for several years. It is the international team in charge of its hunt that would have informed the French authorities.

The noose has tightened in recent weeks, according to the prosecutor's office: the investigators then obtain exemplary cooperation and at the highest level from the French authorities. But gray areas still persist on his long run and the complicity he would have enjoyed for twenty-three years, especially in Europe.

►Read also: The alleged “financier” of the genocide in Rwanda arrested near Paris

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• Rwanda
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