Callixte Nzabonimana (born 1953) is a former Rwandan politician who is accused of participating in the

Rwandan genocide The Rwandan genocide occurred between 7 April and 15 July 1994 during the Rwandan Civil War. During this period of around 100 days, members of the Tutsi minority ethnic group, as well as some moderate Hutu and Twa, were killed by armed H ...

Prior to 1994

An ethnic

Hutu The Hutu (), also known as the Abahutu, are a Bantu ethnic or social group which is native to the African Great Lakes region. They mainly live in Rwanda, Burundi and the eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo, where they form one of the p ...

from

Gitarama Muhanga (former Gitarama, renamed in 2006) is a city in Rwanda, in the Muhanga District, in Southern Province. The city is above sea level. Though officially part of the Southern Province, Muhanga is geographically in central Rwanda, approxi ...

prefecture, Nzabonimana held the position of Minister of Planning in the

MRND The National Revolutionary Movement for Development (french: Mouvement révolutionaire national pour le développement, MRND) was the ruling political party of Rwanda from 1975 to 1994 under President Juvénal Habyarimana. From 1978 to 1991, the M ...

government of

Juvénal Habyarimana Juvénal Habyarimana (, ; 8 March 19376 April 1994) was a Rwandan politician and military officer who served as the second president of Rwanda, from 1973 until 1994. He was nicknamed ''Kinani'', a Kinyarwanda word meaning "invincible". An ethn ...

from 15 January 1989 to 4 February 1991, in the successive "multi-party" government formed on 31 December 1991, and the second "multi-party" government formed on 16 April 1992.Indictment against Nzabonimana
from the ICTR As of 1994, he was also MRND president for Gitarama prefecture. The ICTR indictment against musician

Simon Bikindi Simon Bikindi (28 September 1954 – 15 December 2018) was a Rwandan singer-songwriter who was formerly very popular in Rwanda. His patriotic songs were playlist staples on the national radio station Radio Rwanda during the war from October 1990 ...

charges that Bikindi, an author of many racially charged anti-Tutsi songs, “consulted with President Juvénal Habyarimana, Minister of Youth and Sports Callixte Nzabonimana and MRND-aligned military authorities on song lyrics” before releasing them to be played on the Hutu Power radio station RTLM.Musician again pleads not guilty to genocide
''Hirondelle.org'', March 8, 2003

During the genocide

After the death of Habyarimana on April 6, 1994, Nzabonimana was appointed Minister of Youth and Sports (''Ministre du Sport et de la Jeunesse'') in the interim government. Between April 9 and 14 July, he is alleged to have met with fellow ministers at a number of Government meetings in which ministers received briefings on the genocide's progress, and requested weapons to distribute in their home provinces for use by the genocidaires. On 21 November 2001, the

International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda The International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR; french: Tribunal pénal international pour le Rwanda; rw, Urukiko Mpanabyaha Mpuzamahanga Rwashyiriweho u Rwanda) was an international court established in November 1994 by the United Nation ...

(ICTR) released an indictment charging Nzabonimana and others with

genocide Genocide is the intentional destruction of a people—usually defined as an ethnic, national, racial, or religious group—in whole or in part. Raphael Lemkin coined the term in 1944, combining the Greek word (, "race, people") with the Lat ...

, conspiracy to commit genocide,

complicity in genocide Complicity in genocide is illegal under international law both for individuals, as part of international criminal law, and state parties to the Genocide Convention. The latter was first held in the Bosnian genocide case (2007) in which the Internat ...

direct and public incitement to commit genocide Incitement to genocide is a crime under international law which prohibits inciting (encouraging) the commission of genocide. An extreme form of hate speech, incitement to genocide is considered an inchoate offense and is theoretically subject ...

, and crimes against humanity.

Apprehension

Nzabonimana was detained in Tanzania on February 18, 2008 and transferred to custody of the ICTR on February 19, 2008. According to African Rights, Nzabonimana is one of the "three key civilians" collaborating with the FLDR, operating out of the

Democratic Republic of the Congo The Democratic Republic of the Congo (french: République démocratique du Congo (RDC), colloquially "La RDC" ), informally Congo-Kinshasa, DR Congo, the DRC, the DROC, or the Congo, and formerly and also colloquially Zaire, is a country in ...

.African Rights seeks severe sanctions for FDLR
, ''Rwanda News Agency'', October 25, 2005

References

Footnotes

Sources

*http://www.hrw.org/reports/1999/rwanda/Geno4-7-04.htm *Kamanzi, Rwanda, ''Du Génocide à la Defaite'', p. 110; African Rights, Rwanda, Death, Despair, p. 361.

External links

{{DEFAULTSORT:Nzabonimana, Callixte Living people People indicted by the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda Planning ministers of Rwanda Sports ministers of Rwanda Youth ministers of Rwanda 1953 births