Felicien Kabuga had been on trial for financing militias and using media to incite violence that left more than 800,000 Tutsis and moderate Hutus dead
Rwandan businessman Felicien Kabuga has died in custody while awaiting trial for his alleged role in the East African nation’s 1994 genocide, the International Residual Mechanism for Criminal Tribunals (IRMCT) announced on Saturday. He was 93.
The IRMCT said Kabuga passed away while hospitalized in The Hague, Netherlands, where he was being held at the United Nations Detention Unit (UNDU).
“The president of the Mechanism, Judge Graciela Gatti Santana, has ordered a full inquiry into the circumstances surrounding Mr. Kabuga’s death, assigning Judge Alphons Orie to conduct the inquiry,” the UN court said in a statement.
Kabuga, a wealthy Rwandan businessman, was accused of financing and supporting militias and of using his broadcaster, Radio Television Libre des Milles Collines (RTLM), to incite mass killings during the genocide, which left more than 800,000 Tutsis and moderate Hutus dead over roughly 100 days. He faced charges including genocide, conspiracy to commit genocide, incitement to genocide, and crimes against humanity.
An arrest warrant was issued by the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) in April 2013. Kabuga evaded capture before being arrested in France in May 2020 and transferred to The Hague branch of the IRMCT in 2020, where he entered a not-guilty plea in his first appearance in November 2020.
His trial officially began in September 2022. However, in September 2023, proceedings were indefinitely stayed after judges ruled Kabuga unfit to stand trial due to dementia. Prior to his death, he had been awaiting provisional release to a state willing to accept him.
“A man whom international judges had themselves recognized as unfit to stand trial died in prison, although his continued deprivation of liberty no longer served any judicial purpose,” Kabuga’s lawyer, Emmanuel Altit, said in a statement cited by AP.
Kabuga’s case was among the last high-profile prosecutions from the 1994 genocide to reach the international tribunal system, which has handled dozens of cases against government officials, militia leaders, and other key figures involved in the atrocities.
Other suspects have faced justice in France, a common destination for individuals who fled the landlocked African state after being implicated in the genocide. In October 2024, a French court sentenced former Rwandan doctor Eugène Rwamucyo to 27 years in prison for complicity in the massacre.
Prior to Rwamucyo’s sentencing, another former Rwandan doctor, Sosthene Munyemana, was handed a 24-year prison term by the Paris-based Assize Court. In June 2023, a jury sentenced 66-year-old former Rwandan military police officer Philippe Hategekimana to life imprisonment on the same charges.
