Kabuga was arrested in a dawn raid in a northern Paris suburb. AFP
France on Saturday arrested Felicien Kabuga, one of the last key fugitives wanted over 1994 Rwandan genocide, leaving him facing a likely trial at an international tribunal after a quarter of a century on the run.
Kabuga, once one of Rwanda’s richest men, was living under a false identity in the Paris suburbs, the public prosecutor’s office and police said in a joint statement.
Agents swooped on his home at dawn, finding an 84-year-old man “who has been sought by the judicial authorities for 25 years”, said the statement.
Around 800,000 people – Tutsis but also moderate Hutus – were slaughtered over 100 days by ethnic Hutu extremists during the 1994 genocide.
Kabuga was arrested at his home in Asnieres-sur-Seine north of Paris and had been hiding with the complicity of his children.
The police statement described him as “one of the world’s most wanted fugitives”.
Kabuga is accused of creating the notorious Interahamwe militia that carried out massacres in the 1994 genocide.
He also helped create the equally notorious Radio-Television Libre des Mille Collines that incited people to carry out murder in its broadcasts.
“Felicien Kabuga is known to have been the financier of the Rwandan genocide,” it said, adding that he had spent time in Germany, Belgium, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Kenya and Switzerland.
The head of France’s agency for fighting crimes against humanity, Eric Emeraux, told AFP that the chase had been renewed two months ago after new intelligence emerged.
Olivier Olsen, head of the association of homeowners in the building where he lived, described Kabuga as “someone very discreet … who murmured when you said hello”.
He said Kabuga had lived there for three-to-four years.
Kabuga is accused of using his wealth and influence during the genocide to funnel money to militia groups as chairman of the Fonds de Defense Nationale (FDN) fund.
The US State Department, which had offered a $5 million reward for information about him, said Kabuga through the FDN “is alleged to have provided funds to the interim Rwandan government for the purposes of executing the 1994 genocide”.
