Genocide suspect lands in Rwanda
- 12 years ago
ROUGH CUT - NO REPORTER NARRATION
A Rwandan man charged with crimes against humanity has been deported from Canada and arrived in the central African country on Tuesday (January 24).
Leon Mugesera, who lost a 16-year battle to stay in Canada, will face charges of inciting murder, extermination and genocide.
Mugesera, who says he fears torture or death if returned to Rwanda, spent years fighting his deportation in various courts. He and his family lived in the predominantly French-speaking province of Quebec.
The Supreme Court of Canada ruled in 2005 that a speech Mugesera made in Rwanda in 1992 was a crime against humanity by inciting Hutus to kill Tutsis, whom he referred to as cockroaches that should be exterminated.
Rwanda says Mugesera, who was a member of the ruling Hutu party when he made the speech, is a war criminal who was complicit in the 1994 genocide, in which 800,000 Tutsis and moderate Hutus died.
Lawyers for Mugesera argued their client, who taught at a Quebec City college, was a man of integrity who had sheltered ethnic Tutsis.
The United Nations Committee Against Torture had requested Mugesera not be deported until a group of experts could review the case. Ottawa pressed ahead with the deportation.
A Rwandan man charged with crimes against humanity has been deported from Canada and arrived in the central African country on Tuesday (January 24).
Leon Mugesera, who lost a 16-year battle to stay in Canada, will face charges of inciting murder, extermination and genocide.
Mugesera, who says he fears torture or death if returned to Rwanda, spent years fighting his deportation in various courts. He and his family lived in the predominantly French-speaking province of Quebec.
The Supreme Court of Canada ruled in 2005 that a speech Mugesera made in Rwanda in 1992 was a crime against humanity by inciting Hutus to kill Tutsis, whom he referred to as cockroaches that should be exterminated.
Rwanda says Mugesera, who was a member of the ruling Hutu party when he made the speech, is a war criminal who was complicit in the 1994 genocide, in which 800,000 Tutsis and moderate Hutus died.
Lawyers for Mugesera argued their client, who taught at a Quebec City college, was a man of integrity who had sheltered ethnic Tutsis.
The United Nations Committee Against Torture had requested Mugesera not be deported until a group of experts could review the case. Ottawa pressed ahead with the deportation.