The houses along the quiet tree-lined street look just like the normal homes found all across the Rwandan capital.
But behind the walls of the three adjoining villas in Kigali are the headquarters of a global operation involving investigators and prosecutors who are working to track down the very worst killers of Rwanda’s 1994 genocide.
“The mandate was to investigate and compile case files for the fugitives who were still at large,” said Faustin Nkusi, spokesman for the National Public Prosecution Authority, which oversees the unit.Some were arrested and taken to the UN-backed International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda , based in Tanzania. That court closed in 2015 after several dozen convictions.
Between 2005 and 2012, these courts put nearly two million people on trial, with some two-thirds of cases resulting in a conviction.A quarter of a century after the genocide, Rwanda is as determined as ever to make sure the key suspects are arrested and put on trial over the killings.The GFTU has issued 1,012 international arrest warrants for suspects in 32 countries.
Key suspects on the run include Felicien Kabuga, once one of Rwanda’s richest men who is accused of financing the genocide, who was reportedly spotted in Kenya.The team is having an impact: 19 people who were allegedly involved in plotting the genocide have been arrested and returned to Rwanda for trial, while 22 others have been tried abroad.When the gacaca process closed in 2012, the courts handed the GFTU a list of nearly 72,000 fugitives who had been sentenced in absentia.
Other nations, however, argue that they do not have extradition treaties with Rwanda while also demonstrating a reluctance to try suspects themselves.
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