Ensure trial of released detainees, Amnesty urges Kigali

Human rights NGO Amnesty International (AI) has urged the Rwandan government to establish a monitoring system to ensure the trial of more than 25,000 genocide suspects who have been granted provisional release.

"Government figures state that 25,029 detainees out of the approximately 112,000 Rwandans in the country's detention facilities were provisionally released in the first phase of scheduled prison releases, ending 30 April," AI reported on Wednesday.

AI said it welcomed the Rwanda government's efforts to correct the serious overcrowding in its prisons, adding that a final group of detainees, whose confessions were verified after the first release, would be released "shortly".

Rwandan President Paul Kagame issued a decree on 1 January granting the provisional release of up to 49,376 genocide suspects, targeting mostly the sick and the elderly as well as those whose case files did not have sufficient evidence to warrant their detention. Those who had confessed to genocide crimes and those who would have already spent more time in prison than they would if convicted, were also targeted for provisional release.

"All releases are provisional. All of the detainees still have to be tried by either the ordinary or Gacaca [community-based] courts," AI reported.

AI urged the government to continue the sensitisation campaigns within the home communities of released detainees so as to facilitate their reintegration and avoid potential human rights abuses.

The government should also guarantee the safety in the period leading up to and during Gacaca trials of the released detainees, genocide victims and survivors, prosecution witnesses and judges, AI said.

The 1994 genocide in Rwanda claimed the lives of at least 800,000 people. According to AI, there were about 110,000 people in Rwanda's prisons prior to the provisional releases made between January and April.