The former head of a care home for the disabled in Rwanda has beend detained in Belgium on suspicion of involvement in the African nation's 1994 genocide, prosecutors said Saturday.
The public prosecutor's office said the man, described only as "R", was arrested in Belgium late September on suspicion of having committed "serious violations of international humanitarian law," in particular acts of genocide and crimes against humanity between April 1 and May 25, 1994.
It added a judge had placed him in preventive detention on September 28.
"On April 24, 1994, Interahamwe militias are said to have stormed the town centre in Gatagara. They are said to have, on R.'s instructions, taken away all the Tutsi men who were hiding in the town centre," the prosecutors stated.
"These Tutsis were then reportedly taken to a location outside the town centre, where they were subsequently killed. A few days later, on May 9, 1994, the Interahamwe militias are said to have returned to the town centre once again.
"On that day, once again on R.'s instructions, they are also alleged to have killed several other Tutsis, mainly women and children."
The man is additionally accused of being in contact with Interahamwe militias before the genocide for which he is alleged to have organised and attended preparatory meetings.
He is further alleged to have required staff and patients at the care home in Gatagara to carry an identification card stating their ethnic origin.
Prosecutors said investigators had interviewed witnesses in Rwanda in June.
The Rwandan genocide began in April 1994, and over around 100 days some 800,000 people, mostly minority Tutsis, were murdered following the downing of an aircraft carrying then President Juvenal Habyarimana, an ethnic Hutu.
Belgium, the former colonial power, can prosecute and try alleged perpetrators of genocide under international humanitarian law for crimes committed abroad.
To date, seven genocide trials have taken place in Belgium, bringing 12 convictions, with sentences ranging from 10 years' imprisonment to life imprisonment.
The next trial is scheduled to start in Brussels in March.
