\nArusha, 20 October, 2008(FH) - The sixth and final defendant in the so called "Butare Trial", former Mayor of Muganza Commune, Elie Ndayambaje, started his own defence Monday before the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR), reports Hirondelle Agency.\n<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
\nNdayambaje and his five co-accused colleagues have denied genocide and crimes against humanity in the largest and longest trial before the UN Court.\n<\/p>\n
\nThe accused asserted that he ceased to occupy the position of Mayor in 1992, after serving in the post for nine years, on his own conviction as he wanted to pursue further studies.\n<\/p>\n
\n"I voluntarily chose to step down in order to give myself time for studies," he stressed before three bench judges made up of William Sekule of Tanzania (Presiding), Arlette Ramaroson (Madagascar) and Solomy Bossa (Uganda).\n<\/p>\n
\nNdayambaje, 50, continued Monday afternoon his testimony.\n<\/p>\n
\nSome 24 witnesses have testified for the defence of Ndayambaje when the trial was adjourned on 24 September.\n<\/p>\n
\nThe defendant was re-appointed as the Mayor on 22 June, 1994 at the peak of the 1994 killings.\n<\/p>\n
\nThe trial started in June 2001 and is expected to close before end of the year.\n<\/p>\n
\nAccording to UN estimates about 800,000 ethnic Tutsis and moderate Hutus were killed in the April-July slaughter.\n<\/p>\n
\nSC\/GF\n<\/p>\n
\n© Hirondelle News Agency<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Arusha, 20 October, 2008(FH) - The sixth and final defendant in the so called "Butare Trial", former Mayor of Muganza Commune, Elie Ndayambaje, started his own defence Monday before the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR), reports Hirondelle Agency.<\/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-20664","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-hirondellenews"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n