12.01.07 - ICTR/MILITARY I- THE HEARING OF FRENCH MILITARIES WILL MARK THE CONCLUSION ...

ICTR/MILITARY I - THE HEARING OF FRENCH MILITARIES WILL MARK THE CONCLUSION OF THE MOST IMPORTANT TRIAL OF THE ICTRArusha, January 12th 2007 (FH) – The testimony of three French officers which is to begin Monday via video-conference will mark the conclusion of the hearings next week in the trial of Colonel Théoneste Bagosora, considered as the most important trial ever opened before the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR). Bagosora, cabinet director of the Ministry of Defense in 1994, is presented by the prosecution as « the brain » of the genocide which took place the same year in his small country. He is judged alongside three other officers: brigadier general Gratien Kabiligi, former head of military operations at the army staff, lieutenant-colonel Anatole Nsengiyumva, ex-commander of military operations in the sector of Gisenyi (norht), and Major Ntabakuze, ex-commander of the paracommando unit. They are charged with crimes of genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes. All four plead not guilty. As a result of Paris’ security concerns, the hearing of the three French officers, said to have led the military/humanitarian operation « Turquoise », will be conducted entirely behind closed doors via video-conference from The Hague (Netherlands). This operation, launched with the agreement of the UN, was officially tagged as humanitarian. Once in power, the rebels denounced it, saying it had allowed the defeated regime and its army to take refuge in the Democratic Republic of Congo. Furthermore, the three witnesses, under the pseudonyms SX-1, VIP-1 and TT-02, will testify in the presence of a delegate from the French government authorized, still for reasons of national security, to require that any of the three men doesn’t answer certain questions. Another French officer, the first to have been heard by the ICTR, had testified last December in the same conditions. Several officers of other foreign countries, and notably the now retired commander of the UN forces in Rwanda in 1994, General Roméo Dallaire (Canada), have testified openly before the ICTR. The chamber seized of the trial has also subpoenaed the sitting Rwandan Minister of Defense, General Marcel Gatsinzi, whose hearing is demanded by Bagosora’s defense team. The modalities for the testimony of Gatsinzi, the head of the army staff during the first ten days of the genocide in 1994, were debated last November by delegates of the Rwandan government and the ICTR. Interrogated on the topic, Bagosora’s attorneys declared Thursday that they are still looking forward to the Rwandan Minister’s testimony but that the chamber hasn’t yet defined the modalities of his hearing. Last November, Bagosora’s lead council, Mr. Raphaël Constant (France), had confided to Hirondelle Agency that his client was demanding « impossible conditions ». This trial, one of the oldest going on before the ICTR, started in April 2002. ER/PB/MG © Hirondelle News Agency