Paris seeks to extradite Sosthene Munyemana, 'Butcher of Tumba', to Rwanda

By Charles Bremner
Times online
January 22, 2010

A Rwandan doctor who has been working at a French hospital for the past eight years, even though he is wanted on genocide charges at home, is now facing extradition.

Sosthene Munyemana, 45, was detained on Wednesday by police acting on an extradition warrant issued by Kigali. His arrest seeks to end 15 years of dispute between Paris and Rwanda over the massacres that killed at least 800,000 people in the East-Central African nation. Dr Munyemana, who has been working in a hospital emergency ward at Villeneuve-sur-Lot, near Bordeaux, had been on an Interpol wanted list since 2006 and Rwanda has been seeking his return for a decade but French authorities had delayed proceedings.

According to Rwandan investigators Dr Munyemana, an ethnic Hutu and gynaecologist at the University Hospital in Butare, allegedly took part in the massacre of ethnic Tutsis in 1994 and was known as “the Butcher of Tumba”.

Dr Munyemana, on bail and back at work yesterday pending a court hearing, repeated earlier denials that he had been involved and said that he was the victim of false accusations.

Rwandan rights activists welcomed the legal moves, nevertheless, because they testify to a shift from France’s long hostile relations with the Government of President Kagame, who came to power after his Tutsi forces took over in Kigali in 1994.

This month, Michèle Alliot-Marie, the Justice Minister, and Bernard Kouchner, the Foreign Minister, announced plans to create a special judicial investigative service for crimes against humanity and genocide abroad.

“The rising number of pending cases, notably involving more than 15 Rwandans, is prompting us to act quickly,” the ministers said. Until now, France has not sent any wanted Rwandans back to face charges.

Mr Kigali’s Government and international rights groups have always said that France bore some of the blame for the 1994 genocide because its armed forces had backed the Hutu regime of President Habyarimana.

Kigali and Paris restored diplomatic relations in November after a three-year break. Rwanda closed the French Embassy there after a French judge accused Mr Kagame and his senior officials of organising the missile attack that killed his predecessor and triggered the genocide.

A government-appointed panel in Rwanda found last autumn that Hutu extremists in the 1994 Government were responsible for Mr Habyarimana’s death and that France was not involved. Rwanda, which has dropped French in favour of English and has joined the Commonwealth, was gratified when Dr Kouchner visited two weeks ago and came close to voicing regrets over France’s role.

“With regard to the dark moments, we need to ask historians, witnesses and survivors to work together so that our countries know what happened,” he said.

The court will examine the extradition request against Dr Munyemana within a month. “If it turns out that I am extradited and executed Bernard Kouchner will have my death on his conscience,” he said.