Eleven sentenced to death for genocide

Eleven people were sentenced to death for involvement in Rwanda’s 1994 genocide by a court in Gikongoro, southwest Rwanda, the Hirondelle news agency reported. The group was part of a joint trial of 28 people from Kinyamakara commune who were charged with genocide and crimes against humanity. Four others were acquitted, seven were sentence to life imprisonment and six were given prison sentences of between six and 15 years. Of these, four pleaded guilty. Meanwhile, the court also ordered that the accused, Masabo Nyangezi, to be immediately released. He was sentenced to six years in jail but had already spent seven years in “preventive detention”. Masabo was the director-general at the Rwandan environment and tourism ministry in 1994 and is well known to the Rwandan public as a singer-songwriter, Hirondelle added. He fled Kigali during the genocide and took refuge in his home commune of Kinyamakara, where he stayed until his arrest in August 1994. The court found him guilty of participating in an attack against a local family.