- The UN-backed tribunal has increased the sentence of a convicted Rwandan Catholic priest from 15 to life sentence.
Athanase Seromba was sentenced to serve 15 years in jail in December 2006 after he was proven guilty of being responsible for the deaths of 2,000 Tutsis who sought refuge in his church in Nyange, western Rwanda during the country's 1994 genocide. He was charged with aiding and abetting genocide.
He was not satisfied with the outcome of the trial, and decided to file an appeal. But the Tanzania-based International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda realised that Father Seromba deserved life sentence.
Seromba was the first Catholic priest to be tried for Rwandan genocide. He denied all the charges brought against.
But prosecutors argued that the priest did ordered not only ordered the bulldozing of the church, but he also invited the Hutu extremist militia to kill any survivors with matches and guns. During the operation, all those who sought refugee inside the building were killed.
Some 800,000 minority Tutsis and moderate Hutus were slaughtered during the 100-day genocide.
The UN tribunal has sentenced about 30 people and acquitted five others.
In 2006, a military tribunal in the Rwandan capital Kigali found another local Catholic priest guilty of rape and other genocide crimes. Wenceslas Munyeshayaka, who resides in France, was sentenced to life in prison in absentia.
Munyeshyaka was accused of delivering hundreds of Tutsis refugee adults and children at his Holy Father Cathedral in Kigali to the genocidal militias, which brutally slaughtered them.
He had been jointly tried with General Laurent Munyakazi, leader of the army in Kigali's Nyarugenge District, where the church is located.
"Munyeshyaka and Munyakazi worked with militias to deliver hundreds of innocent children, women and men to militias to be killed," Brigadier-General Karenzi Karake, a judge of the military tribunal, told a packed courtroom.
afrol News - It is called "financial inclusion", and it is a key government policy in Rwanda. The goal is that, by 2020, 90 percent of the population is to have and actively use bank accounts. And in only four years, financial inclusion has doubled in Rwanda.
afrol News - The UN's humanitarian agencies now warn about a devastating famine in Sudan and especially in South Sudan, where the situation is said to be "imploding". Relief officials are appealing to donors to urgently fund life-saving activities in the two countries.
afrol News - Fear is spreading all over West Africa after the health ministry in Guinea confirmed the first Ebola outbreak in this part of Africa. According to official numbers, at least 86 are infected and 59 are dead as a result of this very contagious disease.
afrol News - It is already a crime being homosexual in Ethiopia, but parliament is now making sure the anti-gay laws will be applied in practical life. No pardoning of gays will be allowed in future, but activist fear this only is a signal of further repression being prepared.
afrol News / Africa Renewal - Ethiopia's ambitious plan to build a US$ 4.2 billion dam in the Benishangul-Gumuz region, 40 km from its border with Sudan, is expected to provide 6,000 megawatts of electricity, enough for its population plus some excess it can sell to neighbouring countries.
front page
| news
| countries
| archive
| currencies
| news alerts login
| about afrol News
| contact
| advertise
| español