A former doctor goes on trial on Tuesday accused of genocide in Rwanda, three decades after the massacre of the African country's Tutsi population by the Hutu majority.
Eugene Rwamucyo, 65, is accused of aiding his country's authorities in disseminating anti-Tutsi propaganda and of participating in mass murder in an attempt to destroy evidence of genocide
The former doctor, who practised medicine in France and Belgium after leaving his country, has been charged with genocide, complicity in genocide, crimes against humanity, complicity in crimes against humanity and conspiring to prepare those crimes.
Rwamucyo's trial is the eighth in France relating to the genocide in 1994, when an estimated 800,000 people – mostly ethnic Tutsis – were slaughtered.
Following an international arrest warrant issued by Rwanda, Rwamucyo was detained in May 2010 by French police following a tip-off by his colleagues in the Maubeuge hospital where he was working at the time.
Angélique Uwamahoro was 13 at the time of the 1994 genocide in Rwanda. She said she had to walk through the bodies to survive.
Three decades later, she told her story on Tuesday at a Paris court where a former doctor is on trial for his alleged role in the mass killings of more than 800,000 minority Tutsis and moderate Hutus who tried to protect them.
The dead included some of Uwamahoro's family members. She said she came to court to “seek justice for my people, who died for who they were.”
If found guilty in the trial that started this month and is scheduled to end next week, Rwamucyo is facing life in prison.
Several witnesses traveled to Paris and gave graphic descriptions of the killings in the Butare region where Rwamucyo was at the time.
On Monday, another survivor, Immaculée Mukampunga, described attacks on Tutsi civilians who had gathered at a seminary. “They attacked us, using the same method: first the machete on top of the head, then the throat, then the ankles," she said.
She said she hid her children, aged 5 and 6, by covering them with bodies.
"I put blood on me, on the children too, so that they would believe we were dead,” she said.
Antoine Ndorimana was 9 when the genocide started. He told the court he had been hiding with his family in a church when they were found.
“Those with machetes and clubs started hitting people. Some slit their ankles, others their throat ... And then they stayed to see if anyone was still alive,” he said. He had been struck by a club but tried to stay still.
The next day, Ndorimana saw men putting bodies and wounded people in mass graves. He said he was almost buried alive in one but managed to escape.
Around 60 witnesses are expected to testify during the trial, which is scheduled to run until October 29.
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