A court in France has sentenced a Rwandan former doctor to 27 years in jail for crimes relating to the 1994 genocide in his country.
Eugene Rwamucyo was found guilty of complicity in genocide, complicity in crimes against humanity, and of conspiring to prepare for those crimes.
Rwamucyo – who was acquitted of charges of genocide and crimes against humanity – has denied any wrongdoing. Local media reported his lawyers said they intend to appeal.
His trial was the eighth in France relating to the genocide in 1994, when an estimated 800,000 people – mostly ethnic Tutsis – were killed by the Hutu majority.
Prosecuting lawyer Nicolas Peron said there was no evidence to show Rwamucyo personally carried out summary executions or acts of torture.
But he said the 65-year-old should not “escape his responsibilities” as one can “kill with words”.
Prosecutors accused Rwamucyo, born to a Hutu family, of spreading anti-Tutsi propaganda.
They also quoted witness statements, which accused him of helping bury victims in mass graves “in a final effort to destroy evidence of genocide”.
The prosecution had requested he be jailed for 30 years, while representatives for survivors had called on him to be imprisoned for life.
Angélique Uwamahoro, who was 13 during the genocide, said she saw Rwamucyo at a road block in the town of Butare and heard him encouraging militiamen to kill Tutsi people, according to the Associated Press.
“He wanted to incite them to kill us so we don’t get out alive,” she said.
But Rwamucyo told the court: “I assure you that I did not order the killing of the survivors nor did I allow them to be killed.”
His lawyers argued his involvement in burials in mass graves was because he wanted to avoid a “health crisis” that would have occurred if they had not been buried.
They said he was being prosecuted for disagreeing with the current government in Rwanda.
Rwamucyo was arrested in Sannois, north of Paris, in 2010 after attending the funeral of a former Rwandan official convicted for war crimes during the genocide.
In December, former doctor Sosthene Munyemana was jailed for 24 years by a French court for crimes including genocide and crimes against humanity. He was accused of organising torture and killings in the genocide.
