Key Rwandan Genocide Suspect Arrested
Interpol agents have arrested one of the most wanted suspects in Rwanda's 1994 genocide, a former top intelligence official accused of sending soldiers to execute the Rwandan queen, officials said Tuesday.
Officers of the Lyon, France-based global police agency arrested former Rwandan deputy intelligence chief, Idelphonse Nizeyimana, on Monday in Kampala, said Uganda's government spokesman Fred Opolot.
Ugandan police spokeswoman Judith Nabakooba said Nizeyimana is believed to have entered Uganda through neighboring Congo using fake travel documents.
Nizeyimana will be flown to Arusha, Tanzania, where the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda sits.
More than half a million members of the Tutsi ethnic minority and moderates from the Hutu majority were slaughtered during the 100-day Rwandan genocide in 1994.
Rwanda's genocide began hours after a plane carrying President Juvenal Habyarimana was shot down.
The former captain in Rwanda's army is wanted on charges of genocide by the tribunal. Under the U.S. State Department's Rewards for Justice program, there is a reward of up to $5 million on Nizeyimana's head for any information leading to his capture.
According to a 2000 indictment prepared by the tribunal, Nizeyimana is alleged to have formed secret units of soldiers that carried out the execution of the then-Queen of Rwanda, Rosalie Gicanda, a symbolic figure for all Tutsis, among other prominent Tutsis.
A former mayor, Gregoire Ndahimana (left, with his Duty Counsel Bharat Chadha), appeared before the tribunal last week after being captured in Congo in August.
Ndahimana had been on the run for 15 years and had a similar bounty on his head, but no one claimed it when he was arrested.
The court has charged Ndahimana with being responsible for the deaths of about 2,000 Tutsis, most of whom died when bulldozers knocked down the church where they had sought refuge in the western Rwandan town of Kibuye. Ndahimana pleaded not guilty in court last Monday.
With Nizeyimana's arrest, 11 top suspects remain with similar bounties on their heads for their alleged roles in the 1994 genocide.
For more info:
Wanted: Idelphonse Nizeyimana (Rewards for Justice)
International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda
By Associated Press Writer Godfrey Olukya