On April 7, 2025, the world commemorated the 31st anniversary of the 1994 Genocide against the Tutsi in Rwanda. On this day, 31 years ago, the genocide erupted, and in just 100 days, about a million people had been massacred.
The scale and brutality of the mass killings were so shocking that the world was galvanised into action. By November 1994, the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) had established the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR), through its Resolution 955, to try the persons responsible for the genocide and other humanitarian law violations. According to the International Justice Resource Centre (IJRC), the ICTR’s jurisdiction was limited to acts of genocide, war crimes, and crimes against humanity committed in Rwanda or by Rwandan nationals in neighbouring states between January 1, 1994, and December 31, 1994.
The spanking pace continued, with the tribunal starting operations from its seat in Arusha, Tanzania, in 1995 and its first trial beginning in 1997. By international justice standards, that was relatively fast. The IJRC states that by the time the ICTR closed down and handed its responsibilities to the UNSC-appointed United Nations International Residual Mechanism for Criminal Tribunals (IRMCT) after 20 years of operation, it had indicted 93 individuals, resulting in 61 convictions and 14 acquittals.
Prosper Mugiraneza, Protais Zigiranyirazo, François-Xavier Nzuwonemeye, André Ntagerura, Anatole Nsengiyumva, Tharcisse Muvunyi, Alphonse Nteziryayo, and Innocent Sagahutu were among the indictees who went through the ICTR process during those 20 years.
Mugiraneza was convicted of crimes of genocide and sentenced to serve 30 years in prison. However, he was acquitted on appeal in 2013.
In 2008, Zigiranyirazo was convicted of crimes of genocide and sentenced to 20 years’ imprisonment, but he was acquitted on appeal in 2009.
Nzuwonemeye was charged with conspiracy to commit genocide, complicity in genocide, crimes against humanity, and violations of the Geneva Convention. He was acquitted in 2014.
Ntagerura was charged with crimes of genocide and was acquitted on appeal in 2004 after the court said the prosecution had not proved the case beyond a reasonable doubt.
Nsengiyumva was charged with crimes of genocide and was sentenced to life imprisonment. In 2008, the ICTR reduced his sentence to 15 years, but in 2011, he was released after receiving credit for time served.
Muvunyi was convicted of direct and public incitement to commit genocide and was sentenced to 15 years’ imprisonment in 2010. He was granted an early release in 2012.
Nteziryayo was charged with crimes of genocide. He was sentenced to 30 years’ imprisonment, reduced to 25 years after an appeal. He was granted an early release in 2016.
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In 2011, Sagahutu was convicted of ordering the killing of former Rwandan prime minister Agathe Uwilingiyimana and the murder of 10 Belgian UN peacekeepers in Kigali, Rwanda, in April 1994. He was sentenced to 20 years in jail, but the Appeals Chamber reduced it to 15 years, confirming only his criminal responsibility in aiding and abetting the murder of at least two Belgian peacekeepers. He was acquitted of the murder of Uwilingiyimana. Three months later, in May 2014, he was set free after the IMRCT President, Theodor Meron, approved his request for early release.
However, their tribulations did not end despite their new-found freedom. They found themselves in a difficult situation, with nowhere to go. They were afraid to return to their own country, Rwanda, because they feared that their United Nations court process would not be respected and they would still be considered “génocidaires” and even retried. Some have family members in Europe, where the law guarantees a right to family life, but they cannot travel abroad because those countries have not allowed them in.
For years, they resided in a “safe house” in Arusha, where the Tanzanian authorities tolerated their presence. They live in a regime of semi-liberty, with no residency permits or passports and no ability to work or move freely.
In 2021, the Registrar of the IRMCT, the successor institution to the ICTR and the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY), reached a relocation agreement with the government of Niger to host the Rwandans and give them identity papers.
But on December 27, 2021, shortly after they arrived in the capital Niamey, Niger revoked the agreement, ordered their expulsion, and confiscated their documents, in violation of the country’s obligations under international law and the relocation agreement. Speaking at the time, Niger’s foreign minister, Hassoumi Massaoudou, claimed that Niger was unaware of the transfer of the eight individuals from a safehouse in Arusha to Niamey.
“The Arusha Tribunal’s Residual Mechanism didn’t tell us the truth before their arrival. We were told that Rwanda had agreed to the transfer, but a month later, when the agreement was published, that wasn’t the case. Until now, we’re waiting for them to find a place to stay, which isn’t easy. These people are responsible for the genocide,” said Massaoudou.
According to press reports, Niger’s actions were prompted by pressure from Rwanda and France. Rwanda accused the men of being responsible for the genocide as they held various high-profile political or military positions in the government: Nteziryayo was the prefect of Butare; Nsengiyumva was the commander of the military operational sector in Gisenyi; Muvunyi was the commander of the School of Non-Commissioned Officers of Butare; Nzuwonemeye and Sagahutu were the commander and deputy commander, respectively, of the Reconnaissance Battalion in the Rwandan army; Zigiranyirazo was a brother of Agathe Kanziga, the wife of former Rwandan President Juvénal Habyarimana, whose death when his plane was shot down in April 1994 sparked the genocide. Zigiranyirazo was the governor of Ruhengeri for more than 10 years; Ntagerura was the Transport Minister; and Mugiraneza was the Minister for the Civil Service.
An IRMCT judge ordered the Niger authorities to rescind the expulsion order and the government allowed the Rwandans to stay until the end of January 2022, in the hope that another country would welcome them.
Niamey asserted that “beyond diplomatic considerations, it had observed that the presence of the [eight] on Nigerien soil was ‘likely to disturb public order and national security.”
And the administration has not relented. The Rwandans live under police surveillance, are allowed to leave their houses only for medical emergencies, and are forced to rely on minimal resources to survive. The government has ignored or defied several orders from the IRMCT to release them from house detention and allow them to live a free life.
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For the past three years, the lives of the Rwandan nationals have been in limbo. Appeals by lawyers and human rights groups to governments to provide refuge to these men have fallen on deaf ears. Abbe Jolles and Jean Flamme, the counsel for Muvunyi and Sagahutu, respectively, wrote to UN Secretary-General António Guterres to find a new home for them to no avail. Even the IRMCT Appeals Chamber has acknowledged jurisdiction limitations in matters related to the relocation of acquitted individuals.
In 2023, the IRMCT dismissed a transfer request by three of the detainees, citing “a lack of a clear legal basis”. Nzuwonemeye, joined by Nteziryayo and Mugiraneza, had filed a request for a temporary transfer to the Netherlands.
“Nzuwonemeye fails to identify a legal basis upon which the Mechanism could order the transfer of the relocated persons to the Netherlands,” said the IRMCT President, Judge Graciela Gatti Santana.
Media reports emerging in September 2024 that the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) was ready to receive the six Rwandans did not materialise. The reports were criticised by Rwandan experts and activists against genocide, who accused DRC of “negative solidarity with genocidaires”. The government later disowned the alleged offer, terming it “fake”.
The detainees remain under house arrest in Niamey, with growing fears that they could be forced to return to Rwanda, thus exposing them to undue persecution or harm. The men are worried about the potential lack of fairness and security, given Rwanda’s stance towards individuals connected to the genocide, regardless of their legal status. They cannot be returned to Arusha, where the UN shipped them from. Tanzania maintains that its responsibilities under the UN agreement concluded with their transfer to Niger, ruling out any chance of their return.
This has taken a toll on them. Two of them have since died – Muvunyi in June 2023 and Nsengiyumva a year later in May 2024. Muvunyi had appealed, through his lawyer, for urgent medical assistance and requested to be flown to the United Kingdom for treatment. He died without receiving any response from the IRMCT.
Their fears reflect broader concerns about justice and reconciliation, especially by other ICTR convicts on their fate after serving their sentences in 12 host states.
Flamme, who represents Sagahutu, told Journalists For Justice (JFJ) that the remaining six Rwandans in Niamey are stateless, with no freedom of movement, family life, or a dignified existence post-release and remain in a de facto situation of life imprisonment.
He lamented that the individuals remain trapped in conditions that defy the principles of human rights and that efforts to address their plight have been met with silence and inaction.
“We are still nowhere. These people are still held in illegal and arbitrary detention by the UN in inhumane conditions. I tried to approach the new government in Niger but they did not reply. There have been questions about whether Niger is prepared to host these poor people. But the Registrar did not give a cause for this. It is simply not credible or acceptable that the UN, in more than 15 years, would not have found a solution,” the lawyer said.
He added that the continued detention, loss of lives, and the lack of accountability underscore the urgency for decisive action.
“My client Gratien Kabiligi, acquitted on all charges, spent 10 more years in the ‘safehouse’ in Arusha with deficient medical care. He was sent to Belgium and France only to die. Three others died in detention. It is perfectly possible to find a host state. The Registrar, who got an order from the single judge to find solutions and report about it, has done nothing,” said Flamme.
Kabiligi was a former general in the Rwandan Armed Forces and was indicted by the ICTR in 1997. Flamme represented him in a damages lawsuit against the UN.
The lawyer observed that the challenges the men in Niger face resemble those of another one of his clients, Martina Johnson, a former commander in Charles Taylor’s National Patriotic Front of Liberia (NPFL), who was accused of war crimes and crimes against humanity during Liberia’s first civil war. He complained that justice, delayed for years, risks becoming a shadow of its intended purpose, leaving lives altered and the accused in legal and emotional limbo.
“My client, after an investigation of almost 15 years, was called to pre-trial last November. I asked for an additional investigation, which was refused. I also raised the very serious problems with Civitas Maxima and Hassan Biliti, who are the originators of this case. This was ignored by the court. The case is suspended as I have been granted permission for the translation of the file into English to permit my client to understand what she is accused of. My client is very sick as a consequence of a poisoning. If sent to trial, I shall argue that the reasonable delay has been by far bypassed,” Flamme told JFJ.
The lawyer criticised the sluggish progress of investigations in Belgium, where Johnson is charged. Belgian authorities have yet to conclude their investigations, and Johnson remains under house arrest since her detention in 2014.
Kate Gibson, while representing Mugiraneza in 2021, called on states to take action. She stated: “A country needs to step forward to give my client a chance to live with dignity and his family. Supporting international justice also means supporting those cleared by these courts.”
Speaking to Le Monde, Marcel Kabanda, president of Ibuka France, a genocide survivor association, said the UN should facilitate the men’s reintegration in Rwanda.
“There’s no point in being acquitted or having served one’s sentence if one is then condemned to not having a place to settle. This return will be psychologically difficult because of the monstrous crimes they committed there, but it would be the only way for them to return to the Rwandan community, to be definitively reborn in history. If they were to make this clear, the UN, which failed at the time of the genocide, should facilitate their reintegration. Their situation is a call to return home, to come and participate in the reconstruction of the country they helped to destroy,” said Kabanda.
Soon after the death of Nsengiyumva in Niamey in 2024, his son, Antoine Mukiza, appealed to Niger to facilitate the acquitted men’s release, allow families access, and promote their integration into Nigerien society.
“It is not normal that these people, who are acquitted or who have served their sentence, can find themselves imprisoned. The appeal we would like to make to the authorities of Niger is to first release our parents so that they can truly regain their freedom and also have easy access to health care. Then they should give them identity documents so that they can properly integrate into Nigerien society. We are willing to meet with representatives of the Republic of Niger to present our grievances and discuss the situation of our parents. We would also like to request an exemption so that their families can visit them,” Mukiza told RFI.
In the end, justice delayed may be justice denied for the now elderly remaining six Rwandans, some in poor health, as their illegal incarceration in Niger drags on with no hope of freedom in sight.
