Read here the International Justice Tribune, No. 72

Table of content:

• ICTR - France: France reopens its Rwandan files
• Canada: Boredom and distraction in Canada’s first war crimes trial
• Argentina: Ten military officers on trial

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Pastor

Elizaphan Ntakirutimana is accused of genocide, complicity in genocide, conspiracy to commit genocide, crimes against humanity and serious violations of the Geneva Conventions and of Additional Protocol II.
© Réseau Intermedia.

Identity

• He had been president of the 7th Day Adventist Church at the Kibuye municipal council, and pastor of the Mugonero church in Gishyita.

Chamber

• Erik Mose, Navanethem Pillay, Andresia Vaz

Prosecutor

On 13th May, General Kabiligi's defence team requested that an investigation be opened into the acts of torture allegedly committed on the accused while he was under arrest by the Office of the Prosecutor. This is the first allegation of its kind made to the ICTR. Moreover, the case involves an investigator from the Office of the Prosecutor who has been in trouble with the law in his own country. The Prosecutor has branded the motion « frivolous » and « pointless ». « Acts of torture » These words alone fill the mind with fear.

The UN Rwandan Tribunal may soon be seeing the last of its convicted genocidaires now that Mali is ready to host them. At his first press conference on July 26, 2001, Tribunal Registrar Adama Dieng announced that the path had been cleared for President Navanethem Pillay to transfer the Tribunal's convicted genocidaires to Mali to serve their sentences.

Gratien Kabiligi's lawyer tried to gradually shift the debate with Alison Des Forges away from the RPF's responsibilities in the genocide. The military trial resumed in curious fashion on 18 November, with the remainder of the cross-examination of Alison Des Forges.

The Rwandan Gacaca courts, initially scheduled to close in June 2009, will now have to finish their work by the end of this year.

By Thijs Bouwknegt

The traditional courts were enlisted in 2001 to serve as a vehicle for truth, justice and reconciliation following the 1994 Rwandan genocide.

The Prosecutor's evidence against the Ntakirutimanas resembled a patchwork quilt of half-remembered truth and half-forgotten fiction. On November 2, the prosecution rested its case against Pastor Elizaphan Ntakirutimana and his son, Dr. Gerard Ntakirutimana, after a month-and-a-half (27 days of actual trial) and 19 witnesses - the fastest prosecution case in the history of the ICTR. Although the defense was scheduled to put on its case from January 14 to February 15, 2002, Dr.

Director of the Gisovu tea factory

Alfred Musema was found guilty of genocide and crimes against humanity. He was sentenced to life imprisonment.
© Réseau Intermedia.

Identity

• Alfred Musema was born on 22 August 1949 in Rutare commune, Byumba prefecture. At the time of the events referred in the indictment, Alfred Musema was the Director of the Gisovu tea factory in Kibuye prefecture.

Charges

The UN Security Council Wednesday reappointed the prosecutors working at the tribunals tasked with bringing to justice the perpetrators of crimes committed during the Balkans conflicts of the 1990s and the 1994 genocide in Rwanda.

Acting on two separate resolutions, the Security Council reappointed prosecutors Serge Brammertz of the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) and Hassan Bubacar Jallow of the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) for new terms, until 31 December 2014.

The International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) Tuesday sentenced to life imprisonment former Rwandan Director in the Ministry of Women and Family Affairs, Jean-Baptiste Gatete, for genocide, and extermination as a crime against humanity.