Steven Edwards
National Post
Canada
02.21.00
In a secret move, the United Nations is investigating high-ranking members of the Rwandan government for war crimes, the National Post has learned.
As many as five of the 30 war crimes investigators based in Kigali, the Rwandan capital, are gathering information on atrocities blamed on the mainly Tutsi Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF), which overthrew the genocidal Hutu-led government in 1994.
Until now, prosecutors have targeted only leading Hutu suspects in the genocide, which killed at least 500,000 Tutsis. But there is also evidence suggesting RPF soldiers slaughtered thousands of Hutu civilians as they fought their way toward Kigali.
The highest government minister under suspicion is General Paul Kagame, who commanded the rebel force. He is now Rwanda's vice- president and minister of defence, but many consider him the country's de facto leader even though Hutu Pasteur Bizimungu is president. Other suspects hold many of the most senior government posts.
"The assignment is so sensitive that the investigators working on these files have had to be cordoned off from other people working in the prosecutor's office in Kigali", said a source attached to the court since its inception at the end of 1994. "That's because everyone knows that the office is infiltrated by the RPF. The truth is that these investigators are scared stiff."
The first indictments could be laid within six months, but persuading witnesses to testify will be difficult. "Even ones who are outside Rwanda have family inside the country who would be subject to intimidation", the source said.
"There are RPF people who disapproved of the killings. But the investigators will not, at this stage, contact them because they feel they may be double agents".
SOS Rwanda-Burundi, a Belgian-based non-governmental organization that has been calling for RPF prosecutions, says 101 former and current members of the rebel group are suspected of having committed war crimes.
But those at the top can rest easy for a while.
"The tribunal is not going for the big fish right away", said the court source.
"We will see the odd captain or lieutenant in the first batch. Arresting the accused will be the big problem. The senior members of the Rwandan government will give them up if they feel that the tribunal will be content with a few small fry and leave the rest of them alone".
This is the first time Tutsis, the victim ethnic group in the genocide, have come under UN scrutiny. Whether this can be maintained after the Rwandan government learns of the investigation is another matter.
"The tribunal must pursue them if it is not to be seen as dispensing one-sided justice", said Bernard Bizimana, a spokesman for the Rwandan Congress of Canada.
But the Rwandan government has already shown its willingness to pressure the UN into reversing decisions.
Indications of the world body's reaction may be seen as early as tomorrow in Arusha, Tanzania.
There, Carla Del Ponte, the UN's chief war crimes prosecutor, will try to convince appeals court judges at the war crimes tribunal to reinstate genocide charges against a Hutu they said should be freed because his human rights had been violated by a prosecutorial error.
She decided to appear after Rwanda protested the appeals court ruling by suspending its co-operation with the tribunal and temporarily denying her a Rwandan entry visa. The measures disrupted the work of the tribunal, which depends on Rwandan help to locate witnesses.
Since the UN created the war crimes tribunal in 1994, the Rwandan government has tried to deter it from indicting Tutsis, say tribunal officials.
One former prosecution investigator recalled a "thinly veiled threat" being issued to Louise Arbour, then the tribunal's chief war crimes prosecutor.
"If the tribunal investigates RPF atrocities, the Rwandan government will not guarantee the security of UN investigators inside Rwanda", he quoted Gerard Gahima, now Rwanda's attorney-general, as saying.
Frederik Harhoff, chief legal advisor to the tribunal's judges, said Tutsi soldiers raided the Kigali home of Oyvind Olsen, a Norwegian who is one of the UN's leading investigators.
"They simply entered his house where he and his wife were entertaining two friends, locked them all in a room at gunpoint, then took his television, his wife's jewellery, money and the family car", said Mr. Harhoff, who returned to his native Denmark in 1998.
"They apparently robbed him out of desperation because they are so poorly paid, but you can never feel safe in Kigali. It is understood that the tribunal should be careful".
He added that the tribunal has ample documentation indicating RPF atrocities, though much of it would need to be corroborated by eyewitness testimony.
"As the RPF advanced on Kigali, they were killing Hutus and burning off their houses", he said. "Much of this was documented in the form of pictures and testimony gathered by a number of humanitarian organizations, primarily Human Rights Watch, who had people stationed in the area".
In addition, evidence the RPF murdered up to 45,000 people in April to August of 1994 was uncovered by Robert Gersony, an envoy of the UN's Office of the High Commissioner for Refugees.
"Tacitly, but nowhere openly, the prosecutor's office decided to prepare the first indictments against Hutus and later to look into Tutsi crimes", Mr. Harhoff said.