Rusesabagina’s PDR Ihumure among pro genocidaires opposed to Netherlands extraditing genocide suspects

Since the creation of PDR-Ihumure, a group founded by Paul Rusesabagina in 2006, it has been linked with the FDLR genocidal forces and other anti-Rwanda armed groups in the great lakes region, as well as genocide denier organisations. It is, therefore, not unexpected to see PDR-Ihumure amongst the pro-genocidaires who signed an open letter dated August 9, 2021 addressed to the Dutch Parliament asking “to end the handing over of political refugees” to Rwanda, as if genocide is an innocent, not criminal, policy.

The pro-genocidaires’ letter was in reaction to the extradition by The Dutch government, on July 26, of Dr. Venant Rutunga, 72, a Rwandan genocide suspect and former director at an agriculture research institute (ISAR-Rubona) near Butare town in southern Rwanda, following a 2018 request by Rwanda’s Prosecution Authority.

Rutunga became the third genocide suspect to be extradited to Rwanda from The Netherlands, after the extradition in November 2016 of Jean Claude Iyamuremye who was later convicted and sentenced to 25 years, and Jean Baptiste Mugimba whose trial is still ongoing.

Ibuka-Nederland, the Dutch-based umbrella association of survivors of the 1994 genocide against the Tutsi, in an open letter dated August 30, addressed to the Dutch Minister of Justice and Security, welcomed the extradition of the three genocide suspects to face justice in Rwanda, in addition to two other genocide perpetrators who were tried in The Netherlands, namely Yvonne Basebya, sentenced in 2013 to six years and eight months, and Joseph Mpambara, sentenced to life imprisonment in 2009.

While Ibuka-Nederland urged the Dutch government to bring to book the remaining fugitives still roaming in Dutch cities, it noted with appreciation that the work done in The Netherlands, so far, in regard to the quest for accountability for genocide, is consistent with the commitment made by the Dutch government in January 2020. The latter vowed that “The Netherlands cannot be a refuge for genocide perpetrators.”

Pro-genocidaires’ fight against accountability

The pro-genocidaires’ letter to the Dutch parliament is reminiscent of the story of a man who murdered both his parents, and then pleaded for mercy on the grounds that he was an orphan.

Arguments used by the propagandists behind the 1994 genocide to persuade ordinary citizens to partake in killings included the lie of the Hutu victimhood at the hands of the pro-RPF Tutsi.

Today, 27 years later, pro-genocidaires are striving to use the same propaganda on behalf of perpetrators by adopting the role of victims as a shield from accountability.

In the wake of the extradition of Rutunga, and also as the spectre of justice looms over the genocidaires living in France as a result of President Emmanuel Macron’s commitment to deal with genocide suspects – announced during his visit in Rwanda last May 2021 – Rusesabagina’s PDR-Ihumure and fellow pro-genocidaires who always try to shield perpetrators from responsibility by invoking moral equivalencies, wrote to the Dutch parliament shedding crocodile tears that they were “shocked and scandalized” by the extradition to Rwanda of the genocide suspects.

They illustrated their counter-argument against extraditions of genocidaires, whom they portray as “refugees and asylum seekers”, by citing the trial of Victoire Ingabire, as well as the disproven allegation of kidnapping “a European citizen Paul Rusesabagina,” to cynically suggest that genocide suspects are simply “critics or influential people who do not openly support the [Rwandan] government.” It is not the first time Rusesabagina is involved in pro-genocidaires’ attempts to shield genocide suspects from justice.

In the case of five genocide suspects living in the UK with impunity, in whose favour Rusesabagina testified, British journalist Linda Melvern underlined that British Judge Evans concluded that Rusesabagina is “a fantasist”, and declared his testimony “worthless”, after the Court determined that, “Rusesabagina was strongly allied to the extremist Hutu faction”. This fact was validated by Rusesabagina’s verified links with FDLR, “a group under the UN sanctions whose leaders and members include perpetrators of the 1994 genocide against the Tutsi in Rwanda”, according to the UN Security Council resolution 2150 (2014).

Reading Rusesabagina’s PDR-Ihumure and Co’s latest arguments in defense of genocidaires, it is as if the world should stop holding genocide perpetrators to account and, instead, focus on protecting genocide perpetrators and other criminals who have unrepentantly associated or collaborated with the FDLR.

It is ironical that in their letter, Rusesabagina’s PRD-Ihumure together with pro-genocidaires co-signatories including RNC of Kayumba Nyamwasa, RRM of Callixte Nsabimana, as well as the FDU-Inkingi founded by Ingabire Victoire which has long had ties with the FDLR have the audacity to urge the Dutch parliament to stop the extradition of genocidaires in order “to restore the Dutch dignity as a civilised nation that respects human rights and international law”. In their delusion, these pro-genocidaires think they are full of integrity, and believe they are the moral voices on genocide.

By referring to organisations and personalities allied to the genocidaires, like Human Right Watch, Freedom House and Filip Reyntjens whose Hutu Power support and divisive discourse is widely known, or Jambo Asbl, which is known for publishing articles in support of genocide perpetrators like Felicien Kabuga and others, or interviewing FDLR commanders to lend them credibility, the signatories of the letter couldn’t think of a more compelling argument, in order to persuade The Netherlands to stop extraditing genocidaires, than to threaten Rwanda with another genocide.

In their letter, they said that the Dutch government is “assisting in creating the very conditions that led to war and genocide in Rwanda”, as if impunity for genocidaires is the antidote to another genocide only them can foresee.

The Netherlands cannot waste its time on a nonexistent problem about an issue that was intensely scrutinized by, amongst other institutions, the British judge Anthony Evans who concluded that “guarantees were put in place for fair trials of the alleged authors of the genocide in their own country", Rwanda, in addition to the actual prevailing practice and standards on fair trial in Rwanda which have satisfied the ICTR to transfer its genocide cases to be tried in Rwanda since 2011.