Husband of Ingabire fears life imprisonment
In the Netherlands, the family of Rwandan politician Victoire Ingabire follows the trial of Victoire Ingabire closely. Husband Lin Muyzere stays at home, with his phone close to hand. The trial of Rwandan opposition figure Ingabire opened on Monday morning.
Is your wife ready for her trial ?
“Victoire is ready for court. She received 2500 pages of accusations. They had to be translated into English, since they were written in Kinyarwanda. She took her time to read everyting. Also she has been able to talk to her lawyers last week.”
How is she doing?
“She is managing. In June she was ill, in August she was hospitalised and treated in Kigali. I believe she’s managing. ”
“In the meantime, I am trying to stay calm. I stay at home in Zevenhuizen in the Netherlands. The children are at school. People in Kigali follow the trial closely and tell me what’s going on. I receive phone calls from Kigali. I’ll explain to the children whatever the court decides.”
Ingabire has been accused of severe crimes. Do you fear she’ll receive a lifelong imprisonment?
“Oh yes. The president of Rwanda, Paul Kagame, and the prosecutor, Martin Ngoga, said that Victoire will stay in prison for the rest of her life. It’s hard. I don’t know what the judges will decide. I expect life imprisonment.”
“But the lawyers are ready to defend her. I know that the international community is interested and will follow what happens. The only hope I have is that democratic countries with an embassy in Rwanda will intervene and tell the president he has to leave some political space to others. ”
The trial opened Monday of Rwandan opposition leader Victoire Ingabire, an outspoken critic of President Paul Kagame's regime who is charged with fomenting insecurity and ethnic divisions.
Charges were read out against the handcuffed Ingabire, dressed in a pink regulation prison outfit and with a shaved head, but after opening prosecutors then called for the trial to be delayed, an attempt quashed by the judge.
Rwandan prosecutors said they have evidence of her alleged "terrorist" activities, including proof of financial transfers to the Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Rwanda (FDLR), a Hutu rebel movement based in neighbouring Democratic Republic of Congo.
Delay
The prosecution called for more time to collect evidence from the Netherlands, where Ingabire lived in exile before returning to Rwanda in January 2010. However, Ingabire's British defence lawyer Iain Edwards resisted delay, arguing that a postponement "would not be in the interest of justice."
At one point Ingabire, who appeared to be in good spirits according to an AFP reporter in the court, made an impassioned plea to the judge for the case to continue.
Judge Alice Rulisa later dismissed the prosecution appeal, ruling it had "failed to give the court an adequate reason to further delay this case."
Terrorist
Ingabire, who has been in detention since her arrest in October last year, is charged alongside several co-accused with "giving financial support to a terrorist group, planning to cause state insecurity and divisionism".
The prosecution opened their case against Ingabire’s co-accused, former FDLR combatant Tharcisse Nditurende. Around 20 armed security officers surrounded the courthouse, with several also inside the crowded courtroom. But, with proceedings held in the local Kinyarwanda language, progress was slow due to translation difficulties for the foreign members of Ingabire's defence team, with no official interpreters appointed by the court.
"It is my preference that all of the prosecution's opening be translated into English, not just for my benefit but also for the benefit of others," Edwards said, noting the foreign journalists and diplomats in the courtroom. The judge later ruled a "competent interpreter" would be appointed and scheduled the trial to resume Wednesday.
Critic
Ingabire's Unified Democratic Forces, refused accreditation as a political party, accuses Rwandan authorities of fabricating evidence against its leader with the aim of blocking her from political life.
Ingabire arrived in Rwanda in January 2010 after 17 years in exile in the Netherlands. She has been an outspoken critic of Kagame who has ruled the small central African country ever since the 1994 genocide which saw an estimated 800,000 mostly ethnic Tutsis killed by Hutus in a roughly 100-day period.
Source : AFP
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I appreciate Radio Netherlands Worldwide Africa's coverage of this story, but, when you say that Victoire Ingabire is on trial for "divisionism," that means genocide ideology, which means disagreeing with the official history of the Rwanda Genocide. Here is a paragraph of my interview with Victoire Ingabire last year for Womens' International News Gathering Service, which I clipped to include in this Saturday KPFA News story about the opening of the trial: http://www.anngarrison.com/audio/ingabire-trial-opening-in-rwanda:
"VICTOIRE INGABIRE UMUHOZA: First you have to know that my Party and I have never denied the genocide, by the UN understanding, because the Resolution 955 from UN says that in Rwanda was genocide against the Rwanda people. And that was, like you say; there was genocide against Tutsis and moderate Hutus. We don't have to forget that. Yes, there was genocide and all people involved should be brought to the court. But, before, during and after the genocide, other Rwandese people were killed. Hutus and Tutsis were killed. Is this denying genocide? I don't feel so."
When you conclude your report with the statement that "She has been an outspoken critic of Kagame who has ruled the small central African country ever since the 1994 genocide which saw an estimated 800,000 mostly ethnic Tutsis killed by Hutus in a roughly 100-day period," you might as well be pronouncing her guilty of one by reporting the Rwandan government's official history of the genocide--Tutsi genocide ONLY--as though it were indisputable fact.
Once again, Victoire has NEVER denied the Tutsi genocide. Neither have I, nor has Professor Peter Erlinder, ICTR lawyer Christopher Black, or Professor Ed Herman and independent researcher David Peterson, though we are all accused of doing so, simply because we refuse to deny the Rwanda Genocide, which included Hutu genocide.
I appreciate Radio Netherlands Worldwide Africa's coverage of this story, but, when you say that Victoire Ingabire is on trial for "divisionism," that means genocide ideology, which means disagreeing with the official history of the Rwanda Genocide. Here is a paragraph of my interview with Victoire Ingabire last year for Womens' International News Gathering Service, which I clipped to include in this Saturday KPFA News story about the opening of the trial: http://www.anngarrison.com/audio/ingabire-trial-opening-in-rwanda:
"VICTOIRE INGABIRE UMUHOZA: First you have to know that my Party and I have never denied the genocide, by the UN understanding, because the Resolution 955 from UN says that in Rwanda was genocide against the Rwanda people. And that was, like you say; there was genocide against Tutsis and moderate Hutus. We don't have to forget that. Yes, there was genocide and all people involved should be brought to the court. But, before, during and after the genocide, other Rwandese people were killed. Hutus and Tutsis were killed. Is this denying genocide? I don't feel so."
When you conclude your report with the statement that "She has been an outspoken critic of Kagame who has ruled the small central African country ever since the 1994 genocide which saw an estimated 800,000 mostly ethnic Tutsis killed by Hutus in a roughly 100-day period," you might as well be pronouncing her guilty of one by reporting the Rwandan government's official history of the genocide--Tutsi genocide ONLY--as though it were indisputable fact.
Once again, Victoire has NEVER denied the Tutsi genocide. Neither have I, nor has Professor Peter Erlinder, ICTR lawyer Christopher Black, or Professor Ed Herman and independent researcher David Peterson, though we are all accused of doing so, simply because we refuse to deny the Rwanda Genocide, which included Hutu genocide.
"Oh yes. The president of Rwanda, Paul Kagame, and the prosecutor, Martin Ngoga, said that Victoire will stay in prison for the rest of her life."
When? Can he produce evidence of that? I have never heard of it. Sentencing, should she be convicted, is for the judiciary anyway.
Political space? For people (like Ingabire) with an ethnic agenda? That is illegal in Rwanda. We do not want to go back to 1994.
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