“Historic” genocide trial to open in Belgium

Four Rwandan genocide suspects are due to appear before Belgium’s ‘Cour d’Assises’ [Crown Court] in Brussels on Tuesday in what has been dubbed an “historic” trial. The four are Vincent Ntezimana, 39, a former professor at Butare university; Alphonse Higaniro, 52, the former director of a match factory; and two nuns Consolata Mukangango, 42, and Julienne Mukabutera, 36, known as sisters Gertrude and Maria Kisito. The two, who are currently at the Benedictine convent in Sovu, Belgium, originate from Butare in southern Rwanda and have been living in Belgium since the 1994 genocide in which at least 800,000 Tutsis and moderate Hutus were slaughtered. The “Butare Four”, as they are known, are accused of having “voluntarily, with the intention of premeditated killing” committed one or several homicides against specific people as well as against “an indeterminate number of people whose identity is not known to this day” in the Butare region. They are standing trial freely, including the two male defendants who have been in preventive detention in Belgium for over a year. The trial, due to last six weeks, has been described as “historic”. “This is the first time a jury of [12] ordinary people will judge ordinary people of another country who have been accused of such terrible crimes,” the New York-based organisation, Human Rights Watch, noted. It is also the first time that defendants will be tried in Belgium under a 1993 law which allows Belgian courts to judge war crimes and human rights violations committed by foreigners on foreign soil, including armed conflict within a country. “Due to its very extensive idea of ‘universal responsibility’, Belgium is spearheading the fight against the impunity of dictators and executioners,” noted the Belgian magazine ‘le Vif-l’express’. Other Rwandans arrested in Belgium have been transferred to the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) in Arusha, Tanzania, notably the former chief of the gendarmerie, Augustin Ndindiliyimana. Some 170 witnesses are due to testify at the trial, including dozens who have travelled from Rwanda. They have been located by Belgian rogatory commissions on the basis of lists presented by civil society and defence lawyers. They are being brought to Belgium in three batches and will be accommodated at the Royal Military School in Brussels at the expense of the Belgian state. “For decades we have all decried crimes against humanity,” said Alison des Forges of Human Rights Watch, who is one of the expert witnesses at the trial. “This trial in Belgium offers the hope of transforming our anguish into something more effective, a way to punish and perhaps even prevent such horrors.”