Raid in South Africa. One of the last four fugitives wanted for their role in the genocide of the Tutsi in Rwanda in 1994 was arrested Wednesday in South Africa, and will be tried, announced Thursday, May 25, the UN prosecutors investigating the case.

Fulgence Fulgence Kayishema is accused of murdering, along with other individuals, more than 2,000 men, women, elderly people and children who had taken refuge in the Nyange church around or on or about 15 April 1994.

He "was arrested yesterday afternoon," said prosecutors of the International Residual Mechanism for Criminal Tribunals (the "Mechanism"), responsible for completing the work of the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR).

Participation in the "planning and execution" of the "massacre"

Wanted for his role in the 100-day genocide that killed 800,000 Tutsis and Hutu opponents, Fulgence Fulgence Kayishema had been on the run since 2001, they said in a statement.

A former police inspector born in 1961 according to the court, he was charged with genocide, complicity in genocide, conspiracy to commit genocide and crimes against humanity.

The suspect was apprehended at a wine farm in Paarl, about 60 kilometers from Cape Town, and lived under the false name of Donatien Nibashumba, South African police said in a statement.

The accused "directly participated in the planning and execution" of the "massacre" of the church of Nyange, in the commune of Kivumu, "including obtaining and distributing gasoline to burn the church with the refugees inside," according to prosecutors.

"When that failed, Mr. Fulgence Kayishema and others used a bulldozer to cause the church to collapse, burying and killing the refugees inside," they said.

In the days that followed, the accused and others allegedly supervised the transfer of the bodies from the church to mass graves.

"The survivors of the genocide tried to show his crimes and call for his arrest," Naphtali Ahishakiye, executive secretary of the umbrella association of survivors Ibuka, told AFP.

He hopes the arrest sends a clear message to other fugitives and masterminds of the genocide that "they can never escape justice."

Brought to justice

The arrest of Fulgence Kayishema "guarantees that he will be brought to justice for the crimes of which he is accused," said the prosecutor of the Mechanism Serge Brammertz, quoted in a statement. "Genocide is the gravest crime known to humanity," he added.

Kayishema used numerous aliases and forged documents and relied on "a network of trusted supporters" to conceal his identity and presence, according to prosecutors.

These supporters included family members, members of the former Rwandan Armed Forces and the Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda, "as well as supporters of the genocidal ideology of Hutu Power," they said.

Serge Brammertz praised the cooperation of the South African authorities and said he had also received "vital" support from the Rwandan authorities and other African countries, in Eswatini (formerly Swaziland) and Mozambique.

Many Rwandans have been convicted by the courts of their country, international justice or that of Western countries for acts related to the genocide of the Tutsi in 1994.

The ICTR sentenced 62 people, including 30 years' imprisonment for former Rwandan minister Augustin Ngirabatware.

Hope for exemplary justice

Prosecutors for the Mechanism said they had found the trace of five fugitives since 2020. Among them are Augustin Bizimana, one of the main architects of the massacre, as well as Protais Mpiranya and Phéneas Munyarugarama, who died without facing international justice.

The trial of alleged genocide financier Félicien Kabuga opened in September 2022, but was suspended in March while he was decided whether he was healthy enough to remain in the dock.

Fulgence Kayishema will appear in Cape Town Magistrates' Court on Friday (May 26th) pending extradition to Rwanda, South African law enforcement said.

"We hope that his trial will be expedited and that the machinery of justice will not experience the kind of delays that the Kabuga trial has experienced," said the executive secretary of the umbrella association of survivors Ibuka.

There are currently only three fugitives under the jurisdiction of the Mechanism, according to the court.

With AFP

The summary of the week France 24 invites you to look back on the news that marked the week

I subscribe

Take international news with you everywhere! Download the France 24 app