BBC News

11/16/07

A former Rwandan mayor has been sentenced to 11 years in prison for crimes committed during the genocide.

Some 800,000 Tutsi and moderate Hutus died in the 100-day slaughter in 1994. Juvenal Rugambarara pleaded guilty for failing to investigate and then punish those in his district of Bicumbi who were implicated in a massacre.

Since 1997 the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR), which sits in Tanzania, has convicted 29 genocide ringleaders and acquitted five people.

In 2003, Rugambarara was arrested in Uganda where he had been living since fleeing Rwanda after the genocide.

Earlier this year, the ICTR prosecutor agreed to withdraw eight of the original nine counts against the former mayor, which included genocide and crime against humanity.

Rugambarara told prosecutors he wished to serve his prison sentence in Europe, preferably France.

The ICTR is due to complete its work by 2010.

BBC News