ARUSHA — The alleged financier of the Rwandan genocide, Felicien Kabuga, is still in Kenya, notwithstanding government declarations to the contrary, US diplomat Stephen Rapp said Tuesday on a visit to Arusha.
“I’m going to Nairobi tomorrow to talk to the Kenyan authorities about the arrest of Kabuga, who is still in Kenya,” Rapp, US extraordinary ambassador on war crimes, told AFP during a visit to the Tanzanian city of Arusha.
“We have intelligence indicating Kabuga is in Kenya,” said Rapp, who made the same claim late last year.
Rapp on Tuesday discussed the same issue with officials of the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR), which is based in Arusha, including tribunal president Dennis Byron and prosecutor Hassan Bubacar Jallow.
Kabuga is the most wanted of 11 genocide suspects sought by the ICTR and still on the run. The United States has placed a five-million-dollar bounty on his head.
The wealthy businessman has been on the run for years since being indicted by the ICTR for his role in the 1994 Rwandan genocide that claimed 800,000 lives.
Kenya, where Kabuga allegedly found protection from senior officials in the previous government, denies he is in the country and has pledged to arrest him if discovered there.
ICTR officials say they remain unconvinced as long as the Kenyan authorities are unable to say when Kabuga left, through which border post and to which destination.
Born in 1935, the Rwandan businessman is said to be a frequent traveller to various African nations where he buys protection.
He was thrown out of Switzerland in 1994, and spent some time in the Democratic Republic of Congo before seeking refuge in Kenya, where he has escaped several attempts to arrest him.
Kabuga escaped arrest in Kenya in 1998, when an ICTR team raided a Nairobi house allegedly rented from a nephew of the former president and found a note indicating the fugitive had been tipped off by Kenyan police.
During his meetings in Nairobi, Rapp said he will also examine how far the Kenyan authorities have come with their project of setting up an independent tribunal to judge the perpetrators of the violence that rocked the country in early 2008, following disputed elections.
Source: AFP
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