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The accused headed a prefecture in southern Rwanda at the time of the genocide against the Tutsis in 1994. The Court of Assizes of Paris (France) condemned, at the end of Tuesday afternoon, Laurent Bucyibaruta, former senior official of the administration from Gikongoro (South), to 20 years in prison for his role in the 1994 genocide in Rwanda. The defendant, who denied the charges, was accused of leading the massacre of Tutsis in Gikongoro sectors of Murambi, Cyanika, Kaduha, Kibeho, Gikongoro prison, Murambi technical school in southern Rwanda. The Court presided over by Judge Jean Marc Lavergne found him guilty of complicity in genocide and crimes against humanity. In particular, it considered that by virtue of his position and his authority, Bucyibaruta, who appeared free, committed crimes of complicity in the massacre of Tutsis at the Marie-Merci School in Kibeho. However, Laurent Bucyibaruta, 78, was cleared of all charges related to the Kibeho genocide, for which he was accused of being involved in the deaths of more than 28,000 people. Throughout the hearings, United Nations prosecutors accused him of being criminally responsible because of his duties as a commander. Indeed, as responsible for public order and law, he had the power to request the intervention of the army. The prosecution also accused him of complicity in crimes of genocide by virtue of his position which allowed him to have total control of the Interahamwe. The prosecution finally found him guilty of incitement to genocide, arguing that a few days after the death of President Juvénal Habyarimana, Bucyibaruta drove around the Gikongoro region in a car with a megaphone to galvanize the Hutus. Gikongoro was one of the regions hardest hit by the genocide which claimed at least 800,000 lives in Rwanda between April and July 1994, according to the UN.
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