Rwanda ex-officer jailed for life after ‘attack plot’ trial – Yahoo News
Kigali (AFP) – A Rwandan court on Friday convicted ex-army officer Joel Mutabazi on charges of plotting attacks against the central African nation and ordered he spend the rest of his life behind bars.
Mutabazi, a former member of the presidential guard protecting Rwandan President Paul Kagame, fled the country in 2011 but was extradited by Ugandan authorities last year, despite criticism from rights groups.
Police had accused him of being behind a string of grenade attacks carried out in Rwanda.
“The court finds Lt. Joel Mutabazi guilty on all charges. The court orders that, due to the seriousness of the crimes he committed, he is sentenced to life and will effectively be stripped of his military ranks,” said the presiding judge, Major Bernard Rugamba Hakizimana.
Mutabazi, whose trial opened in January, was indicted on charges of “terrorism, setting up an armed group, spreading rumours with the intention of inciting the public to rise up against the state, murder, crimes against the state and illegal possession of a firearm.”
He was accused of working with the Rwanda National Congress (RNC), a banned dissident group, and of links to the Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda (FDLR) based across the border in the Democratic Republic of Congo.
The RNC, based between South Africa and the United States, is headed by defectors from Kagame’s ruling Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF).
The FDLR are the Democratic Republic of the Congo-based descendants of the ethnic Hutu militia who carried out Rwanda’s 1994 genocide.
Mutabazi said he would appeal.
“I cannot consider this trial as fair trial. I am a refugee. I was kidnapped. They have no evidence,” he said in response to the verdict.
The judge also sentenced co-accused and former FDLR officer Joseph Nshimiyimana to life in prison for terrorism, setting up an armed group, spreading rumours with the intention of inciting the public to rise up against the state, murder and crimes against the state.
Another former presidential bodyguard, Innocent Kalisa was sentenced to 25 years in jail, while a group of several other co-accused were handed sentences ranging 25 years to three months.
“It is not a fair trial,” Kalisa whispered to reporters after the verdict was read out.
Two others who were on trial alongside Mutabazi — Jean de Dieu Nizigiyeho and Dativa Murekeyisoni, both students at the University of Rwanda — were acquitted.
