The genocide trial of four Rwandan former military officers resumes on Monday at the UN tribunal for Rwanda in the northern Tanzanian town of Arusha, the Hirondelle news agency reported Friday.
The hearings at the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) were suspended on September 26 to make way way for another trial of three other suspects accused of genocide in the southwest Rwandan region of Cyangugu.
US human rights expert Alison Des Forges is expected to be the first prosecution witness on the resumption of the case dubbed ”the military trial” before the ICTR, reported Hirondelle, an independent Swiss-based agency.
Former Rwandan defence ministry advisor Theoneste Bagosora is one of the four whose trial resumes Monday. He is regarded by prosecutors as the ”mastermind” of the 1994 genocide in the small central African country.
Des Forges started giving her testimony early in September, but the case was adjourned when the defence for one of the accused, General Gratien Kabiligi, objected to her being referred to as an expert.
The court, which was created by the United Nations late in 1994 to try key suspects in the genocide of April to July that year, has overruled the defence objections.
On trial with Kabiligi and Bagosora are Lieutenant Colonel Anatole Nsengiyumva and Major Aloys Ntabakuze.
Des Forges is senior advisor in the Africa Division of the US-based international watchdog Human Rights Watch. The prosecution plans to call about 250 witnesses to testify in the case.
Hirondelle said observers maintain that the ”military trial” is one of the most important cases currently before the ICTR, with the accused viewed as key figures responsible for the genocide that claimed close to one million lives in Rwanda.
The prosecution not only considers Bagosora to be a key planner in the genocide, but declares that on the death of president Juvenal Habyarimana, which triggered the massacres, he assumed de facto control of the political and military apparatus in Rwanda. – Sapa-AP