Joseph Nzirorera

Joseph Nzirorera (* 1950 in Mukingo ) is a former Rwandan politician with the MRND . He is considered one of the main initiators of the 1994 genocide . He is currently charged with genocide by the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda .

Joseph Nzirorera was born in Mukingo ( Ruhengeri Province ) in 1950 . He was general secretary of the MRND, the party of President Juvénal Habyarimana , who had ruled dictatorially for two decades and with whom he had a close relationship since he came to power. He was also known to Habyarimana's wife Agathe Habyarimana and her brother Protais Zigiranyirazo . He became Minister of Public Works. According to a testimony, from December 1991 he took part in the meeting of a commission to take measures to combat the rebel movement Rwanda Patriotic Front(RPF) should work out. These meetings are considered to be the main preparation for the 1994 genocide. He is said to have participated in an event in January 1992 at which the massacre of the Bagogwe was planned. He is also said to have been a member of the so-called Netzwerk Null , a communications association of the military and politicians that controlled death squads . In the following years he was involved in setting up and financing the Interahamwe as well as acquiring weapons for it. Its activities included in particular the area of ​​the Ruhengeri province. In December 1993, a Rwandan magazine accused Nzirorera of drawing up death lists to eliminate opponents of the MRND. Nzirorera disapproved of the Arusha agreement with the RPF.

After the President's death in a plane crash on April 6, 1994, he was involved in the creation of the transitional government as a key representative of the MRND. During the genocide of the Tutsi following the death of Habyarimana, Nzirorera, along with Mathieu Ngirumpatse and Édouard Karemera , exerted considerable influence on the MRND, whose militias participated in the genocide. For example, the then Prime Minister Jean Kambanda testified that Nzirorera had demanded the killing of all Tutsi who had fled to the mountains of Biserero in western Rwanda. So Nzirorera helped prepare the campaign in this area. In July 1994 he became President of the Rwandan Parliament. Due to the conquest of Rwanda by the RPF that same month, he fled abroad, where he was A. stayed in Cameroon with other initiators of the genocide .

On 5 June 1998 Nzirorera was in Benin arrested and the following month handed over to the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda, which it on 27 November 2003 along with three alleged accomplices due to the preparation and execution of the genocide in the so-called Government I trial accused. Due to procedural inconsistencies, a new trial was brought against him on September 19, 2005. Nzirorera pleaded "not guilty" in both trials.

literature

• Linda Melvern: Rwanda The genocide and the participation of the western world , Heinrich Hugendubel Verlag, Kreuzlingen / Munich 2004. ISBN 3-7205-2486-8 .

Web links

• Report on Trial Watch

Notes and individual references

1. ↑ Linda Melvern: Rwanda Genocide and the Involvement of the Western World , p. 267