Former FDLR official, Genocide suspect dies as France at 63

Mbarushimana died on October 4, according to sources cited by The New Times. His burial is expected to take place on Friday, October 9.

French authorities had been investigating allegations that Mbarushimana used his position at the UNDP during the Genocide to facilitate attacks against Tutsi.

He had lived in France for about 20 years after being granted political refugee status. In 2010, he was placed under judicial investigation over alleged crimes against humanity and complicity in such crimes.

A 2001 United Nations investigation linked Mbarushimana to the deaths of 32 people, including Tutsi colleagues at the UNDP office in Kigali. He had worked there as an IT specialist and later as a computer technician.

Among the cases connected to the investigation was the killing of a UNDP employee known as Florence, a cousin of President Paul Kagame. She was killed at her home in Kigali in May 1994.

President Kagame later spoke about her death during the 30th commemoration of the Genocide against the Tutsi in April 2024, recalling attempts to have her rescued.

The French case appeared to have reached an end in October 2024 after an investigating judge dismissed it. However, the Collective of Civil Parties for Rwanda (CPCR), which had filed a complaint that contributed to the investigation, challenged the decision.

The Paris Court of Appeal subsequently ordered the case to be reopened in May 2025, saying some evidence had not been fully examined.

Mbarushimana had also faced international prosecution over his alleged involvement in crimes committed by the FDLR in eastern DR Congo.

He was arrested in Paris in October 2010 and transferred to the International Criminal Court (ICC) in The Hague in January 2011.

The ICC, however, declined to confirm the charges against him in December 2011, ruling that prosecutors had not presented enough evidence showing his individual contribution to the alleged crimes. The Appeals Chamber upheld the decision in May 2012.

He returned to France and remained a free man until his death.

Mbarushimana was a former executive secretary of the FDLR, an armed group largely made up of remnants of forces responsible for the 1994 Genocide against the Tutsi.

By Prince Ruzigana