Pascal Simbikangwa, who has been paralysis after a car crash was said to have been arrested in 2008 on the French island of Mayotte on the Indian Ocean.
In 1996, French authorities passed a law that allows Rwandans suspected of being involved in the genocide to be tried in a French court. Rwanda was a former French Colony.
Mr. Simbikangwa, 54, appeared in court on Tuesday for the first day of the commencement of the trial. More than 50 prosecution witnesses are expected to describe his alleged role in arming and directing Hutu killers against the Tutsis. The Tutsis were the highest hit casualties in the genocide that lasted for hundred days.
He has been charged with complicity in genocide and crimes against humanity. He denied the charges with his lawyer describing the trial as wanting to make him a scapegoat for the killings. Analysts say he risks a life sentence if found guilty.
Mr. Simbikangwa was said to be a devoted ally of President Juvenal Habyarimana who was assassinated on April 6 1994 that sparked the bloody genocide. Simbikangwa was said to have incited an anti-Tutsi sentiment through radio and television broadcast.
Rwandan Justice Minister, Johnston Busingye told reporters that the start of the trial against Mr. Simbikangwa was a good sign.
Human rights activists, journalists and observers from Rwanda crowded the court chamber to witness the landmark trial ever on French Soil.
The founder of the Rwanda victims’ Support Group, Alain Gauthier who also serves as a party to the case told reporters that they wanted justice for the people of Rwanda who suffered in the genocide.
“We’re not here in our own name, but in the name of the million victims who were exterminated in Rwanda in 1994,” he said.
The Rwandan Genocide was a mass slaughter of mostly ethnic Tutsis by ethnic Hutus that took place in 1994 following the killing of a Hutu led president, Juvenal Habyarimana. President Habyarimana private jet was shot down by an unknown people close to the Kigali International Airport. The president of Burundi, Cyprien Ntaryamira who was also in Habyarimana’s plane also lost his life.
Over the course of approximately 100 days of fighting, about 800,000 people were said to have died in the bloody clash as both sides (Hutus and Tutsis) accused each other of being behind the assassination of the president.
Issaka Adams / NationalTurk Africa News
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