Kenya at heart of search for genocide suspect Felicien Kabuga

Kenya has been targeted by the US government as a possible "hiding place" of suspected Rwandan genocide perpetrator, Felicien Kabuga, in a renewed effort to apprehend him.

Kabuga - indicted by the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) - is accused of genocide and crimes against humanity, including being "the main supporter and financier of the Interahamwe militia" responsible for the 1994 Rwandan genocide, and of making "massive purchases" of machetes, hoes, and other agricultural implements in the knowledge that they would be used as weapons of murder.

Speaking in the Kenyan capital, Nairobi, on Wednesday the US ambassador-at-large for war crimes issues, Pierre-Richard Prosper, told reporters that a new task force of three US personnel had been established in Kenya this week to begin working with the ICTR's tracking team. Radio spots, newspaper advertisements and fliers with Kabuga's photo would also be used to inform the public, he said, and the award of up to US $5 million for information supplied - part of the rewards for justice programme announced in January 2001 - continued to be on offer.

Kabuga - a wealthy businessman - is believed to have been "passing through" Kenya, Prosper said, adding that he believed there was "fresh information" regarding Kabuga's whereabouts. "Over the years, he has been able to move in and out of various countries, using vast resources to maintain a comfortable lifestyle, but we believe that lifestyle would also make him visible."

The Kenyan attorney-general, Amos Wako, said where information had been supplied to the Kenyan authorities regarding Kabuga's presence on Kenyan soil, investigations had taken place, but added that on at least three occasions he had either evaded arrest or the information given to the authorities had been false.

"Kenya is not a safe house for persons indicted of war crimes by the ICTR," said Wako. "Therefore he [Kabuga] may not set his foot on the soil of Kenya."

Wako added that the Kenyan government "takes its commitments seriously" and had given the ICTR "total cooperation". He said that to date 13 suspects had been handed over to the tribunal from Kenya to face various charges, including genocide, and that Kenya had been "mentioned by the ICTR as effectively cooperating with it".

On Thursday, a delegation - including Prosper, the registrar for the ICTR, Adama Dieng, the tribunal's director of investigations, Laurent Walpen, and the special assistant to the US president and senior director for African affairs, Jendayi Frazer - would visit the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), where at least eight other people indicted by the ICTR were believed to be hiding, Prosper said.

He said this group formed the leadership of the Armee de liberation du Rwanda - comprising the Hutu extremist Interahamwe, members of the former Rwandan Armed Forces and more recent recruits - and was fuelling the war in the DRC either through financial backing or in "commander roles". Prosper added that, in principle, an agreement had been reached to open an ICTR office in the DRC capital, Kinshasa, and that the US would support such a move.