Rwandan genocide suspect Kabuga dies in custody

Felicien Kabuga, a Rwandan suspect charged in connection with the 1994 genocide, died in a hospital while in custody in The Hague, a UN court said on Saturday.

Kabuga, 91, was accused of encouraging and financing the mass killing of Rwanda’s Tutsi minority. His trial began in 2022. In 2023, judges declared him unfit to continue standing trial due to dementia. They said they would establish a procedure to hear evidence without the possibility of convicting him.

The UN International Residual Mechanism for Criminal Tribunals said Kabuga died while hospitalised in The Hague. The medical officer of the UN Detention Unit was notified immediately. An investigation into his death has been ordered to establish the circumstances.

An arrest warrant for Kabuga was issued in 2013 with a $5 million bounty. He was arrested in 2020 in France, and his trial started in 2022.

Kabuga was charged with genocide, incitement to commit genocide, conspiracy to commit genocide, persecution, extermination and murder. He pleaded not guilty. If convicted, he would have faced life imprisonment.

After the court declared him unfit to stand trial, he remained in detention pending a decision on his provisional release to a state willing to accept him. His lawyer said he would not return to Rwanda, which had offered to take him.

The genocide in Rwanda began on April 6, 1994, when a plane carrying President Juvenal Habyarimana was shot down. Kabuga’s daughter married Habyarimana’s son.

SOURCE: MRA