‘Bwindi tourists killed over RPF war’
Dec 05, 2005
THE eight foreign tourists murdered in Bwindi Impenetrable Forest in March 1999 were killed because their countries helped the Rwanda Patriotic Front to oust the government of Juvenal Habyarimana, according to a confession by Jean Paul Bizimana.
By Maurice Okore
THE eight foreign tourists murdered in Bwindi Impenetrable Forest in March 1999 were killed because their countries helped the Rwanda Patriotic Front to oust the government of Juvenal Habyarimana, according to a confession by Jean Paul Bizimana.
Bizimana, 31, a suspected Interahamwe now on trial for allegedly masterminding the murder of the tourists, confessed that the French tourists were freed because their country was not among those that supported the RPF of Paul Kagame in the Rwanda war of 1994, in which over 937,000 Tutsis and politically-moderate Hutus were killed.
Former Buganda Road Court chief magistrate Deo Nizeyimana read out the statement yesterday before High Court Judge John Bosco Katutsi, in which Bizimana confessed to being part of the group of the Hutu militia that killed the tourists.
“Our commanders told us that there were tourists and Ugandan soldiers in the forest. Our mission was to attack the soldiers and get guns from them. I had a gun but I stayed to guard against enemies. I heard gunshots and after a few minutes my colleagues returned with people dressed nicely,†Bizimana confessed.
THE eight foreign tourists murdered in Bwindi Impenetrable Forest in March 1999 were killed because their countries helped the Rwanda Patriotic Front to oust the government of Juvenal Habyarimana, according to a confession by Jean Paul Bizimana.
Bizimana, 31, a suspected Interahamwe now on trial for allegedly masterminding the murder of the tourists, confessed that the French tourists were freed because their country was not among those that supported the RPF of Paul Kagame in the Rwanda war of 1994, in which over 937,000 Tutsis and politically-moderate Hutus were killed.
Former Buganda Road Court chief magistrate Deo Nizeyimana read out the statement yesterday before High Court Judge John Bosco Katutsi, in which Bizimana confessed to being part of the group of the Hutu militia that killed the tourists.
“Our commanders told us that there were tourists and Ugandan soldiers in the forest. Our mission was to attack the soldiers and get guns from them. I had a gun but I stayed to guard against enemies. I heard gunshots and after a few minutes my colleagues returned with people dressed nicely,†Bizimana confessed.