Bagilishema says he could not counter genocide

Meanwhile, defence counsel for Ignace Bagilishema, who has pleaded not guilty to charges of genocide, complicity in genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes, claimed at the ICTR on Monday that he did not have the means to counter the genocidal violence that spread to Kibuye prefecture between April and July 1994. Bagilishema, former mayor of Mabanza - not Mabanda, as mistakenly stated by IRIN on Monday - had witnesses testify that the attacks were conducted by ‘Abagika’ northerners from other communes, and that he had asked for military reinforcements which did not arrive.

“The war [against Tutsi rebels of the Rwandan Patriotic Front] and the introduction of multiparty politics brought disorder, which then spread ... I do not see how the mayor could have held out against numerous bands of armed men, against large-scale violence. He did not have the means to do that,” the independent Hirondelle news agency quoted French sociologist Francois Clement as saying. Psychiatrist Al Housseynou Dia maintained for the defence that Bagilishema was “a man of good morals” unlikely to have encouraged Hutus to kill Tutsis, Hirondelle reported.