Rwanda: UN court upholds 25-year jail terms on two convicted for genocide

The United Nations war crimes tribunal for Rwanda today upheld 25-year jail terms imposed on a former top military officer and a landowner for genocide in the massacres that killed some 800,000 Tutsis and moderate Hutus, often by machete or club, during a 100-day period in 1994.

The appeals chamber of the UN International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) dismissed the appeal by Lieutenant Colonel Ephrem Setako, who was also head of the defence ministry’s division of legal affairs, upholding his conviction for genocide for ordering the killings on 25 April 1994, of 30 to 40 Tutsis at Mukamira military camp and some 10 other Tutsis there on 11 May.

It also confirmed his convictions for extermination as a crime against humanity and for violence to life, health and physical or mental well-being of persons as a serious violation of the Geneva Conventions that govern the treatment of prisoners of war.

The chamber also upheld the 25-year jail term imposed on Yussuf Munyakazi, a former farmer and landowner, for genocide and extermination as a crime against humanity based on his role in the killings of Tutsi at Shangi and Mibilizi parishes on 29 and 30 April 1994, respectively.