Witness pins down party chief on Rwandan genocide

A prosecution witness has told the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda that the former Rwandan ruling party chief had consented to the killing of Tutsis.

The witness, codenamed UB for safety reasons, told the United Nations court in Arusha of northern Tanzania that when he called Mathieu Ngirumpatse, former president of the ruling Mouvement republicain national pour la democratie et le developpement (MRND) to complain about the killings, he was told by the party head to let the militia do their work.

The phone call was made on April 11 of 1994, according to reports reaching here on Friday.

"I told him (Mathieu Ngirumpatse) the Interahamwe (militia) had decimated the Tutsi and he told me to leave the problem aside and let the Interahamwe do their work," said the witness.

Ngirumpatse is standing trial for genocide and crimes against humanity jointly with MRND vice-president Edward Karemera and MRND secretary-general Joseph Nzirorera.

The trio are accused of creating the Interahamwe militia (the youth wing of the MRND party) which spearheaded the genocide which claimed the lives of an estimated 800,000 Tutsis and moderate Hutus in Rwanda.

Their trial began in September last year at the UN court in Arusha.

Source: Xinhua