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\nArusha, April 27, 2007 (FH) - Father Hermisdas Nsengimana re-entered a not-guilty plea for genocide and crimes against humanity Friday at the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR).
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\nA former rector at the prestigious college of Nyanza (southern Rwanda), Nsengimana, aged 53 years, is the third Catholic priest prosecuted by the ICTR after Father Athanase Seromba and Father Emmanuel Rukundo.
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\nSeromba, a former priest in Nyange (west) where around two thousand Tutsis were killed in 1994 was sentenced to fifteen years in prison. \u00a0His trial is in appeal. \u00a0The trial of Rukundo, who was a military chaplain, is still ongoing.
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\nArrested in Cameroon on March 21, 2002, Nsengimana pleaded not-guilty for the first time on April 16 of that year.
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\nThe new plea was made necessary after a recent amending of his indictment.
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\nNsengimana is now being charged under three counts of genocide and crimes against humanity (assassinations and extermination). \u00a0The crime of conspiracy to commit genocide which was included in the first incitement was withdrawn and new detail was added to the remaining counts.
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\nThe prosecution alleges that Nsengimana was the \u201cspiritual leader\u201d of a group called the Dragons or Death Squads which committed numerous massacres in Nyanza and in his region.
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\nThe prosecution accuses Nsengimana of having personally attacked an older Tutsi priest who lived in his college and \u201cstabbed\u201d six women from the suburbs. \u00a0He also aided the murder of three other colleagues.
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\nNengimana is also accused of ordering his employees and students to seek out and kill Tutsis in the neighbourhoods surrounding the college,
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\nNsengimana is represented by the French lawyer Mr. Emmanuel Altit. \u00a0Mr. Altit regretted \u201cthe inequality of arms\u201d in favour of the prosecution and asked the Chamber to remedy it.
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\nThe French lawyer declared that he would not be ready if the start of the trial was kept at June 4, given that the Registrar had still not approved his work program. \u00a0The Registrar, who pays for the salaries of lawyers for indigent detainees, froze the allotments for Mr. Altit and his team \u201cfor budgetary reasons,\u201d the lawyer regretted.
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\nThe presiding judge, the Tanzanian William Hussein Sekule indicated that the pending questions would be debated during a status conference which will take place in the near-future.
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\n\u00a0AT\/PB\/KD \u00a0
\n\u00a9 Hirondelle News Agency<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
\u00a0 Arusha, April 27, 2007 (FH) - Father Hermisdas Nsengimana re-entered a not-guilty plea for genocide and crimes against humanity Friday at the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR). \u00a0 A former rector at the prestigious college of Nyanza (southern Rwanda), Nsengimana, aged 53 years, is the third Catholic priest prosecuted by the ICTR after […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":64,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[555],"tags":[],"ji_location":[],"class_list":["post-18687","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-hirondellenews"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n