Theoneste Bagosora, architect of Rwanda genocide, dies aged 80
Theoneste Bagosora, a former Rwandan army colonel regarded as the architect of the 1994 genocide in which more than 800,000 ethnic Tutsi and Hutus who tried to protect them were killed, has died in a hospital in Mali.
Bagosora was serving a 35-year sentence after being found guilty of crimes against humanity by the then-International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda.
Bagosora, 80, had been sentenced to life in 2008 but on appeal his sentence was reduced to 35 years in prison.
Known as a hardliner within the National Republican Movement for Democracy and Development party of then Rwandan President Juvénal Habyarimana, Bagosora in 1993 was appointed cabinet director in the defence ministry and took control of military and political affairs in the country.
The position made him answerable only to the president.
When the president died in an April 1994 plane crash, Bagosora took over the affairs of state and ordered the massacre of Tutsi and moderate Hutu.
Roméo Dallaire, a Canadian general who was head of United Nations peacekeepers in Rwanda at the time, described Bagosora as the “kingpin” behind the genocide.
At: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/sep/27/theoneste-bagosora-architect-of-rwanda-genocide-dies-aged-80
Former Rwandan Col. Théoneste Bagosora, generally regarded as the architect of the 1994 Rwandan genocide.
Bagosora, a Hutu, was staunchly opposed to the 1993 Arusha peace accords with Tutsi guerillas - and worked closely with hate radio and other extremist elements to foster ethnic hostilities in the small African nation.
The still-unsolved 1994 assassination of President Juvénal Habyarimana, who signed the accords, triggered a massacre that in two months cost at least 800,000 lives - 1 in 8 Rwandans at the time.
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