By Enyichukwu Enemanna
A writer who allegedly downplayed the 1994 genocide in Rwanda in which at least 800,000 Tutsis and moderate Hutus were killed within 100 days has been put on trial.
Charles Onana, a French-Cameroonian who is expected to appear in court in the French capital, Paris, had in a book published five years ago described the idea that the Hutu government had planned a genocide in Rwanda as “one of the biggest scams” of the last century.
In 2020, Onana now 60, along with his publishing director at Editions du Toucan, Damien Serieyx, were sued arising from the controversies stoked in the book.
The duo were sued by NGO Survie, and the International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH) for “publicly contesting a crime against humanity”.
Onana’s case will be the second case of denial of the Rwandan genocide to have been brought before a court in France.
His lawyer, Emmanuel Pire, insists that Onana does not question that genocide took place, or that Tutsis were particularly targeted.
The lawyer told AFP news agency that the book in question was “the work of a political scientist based on 10 years of research to understand the mechanisms of the genocide before, during and after”.
Under French law, it is an offence to deny or “minimise” the fact of any genocide that is officially recognised by France.
The campaign manager for NGO Survie, Camille Lesaffre says Onana’s trial will be “historic, since there is not yet any case law strictly speaking related to Rwanda” on questions of Holocaust denial.
“We will mainly base ourselves on case law related to the Holocaust”.
In 2021, French President Emmanuel Macron asked Rwandans to forgive France for its role in the Rwandan genocide.
He said France had not heeded warnings of impending carnage and had for too long “valued silence over examination of the truth”.
He however said his country had not been an accomplice in the killings.
Several fugitives have been arrested and tried in connection with the genocide in Rwanda.
One of them is, Fulgence Kayishema who allegedly orchestrated the killing of approximately 2,000 Tutsi refugees at Nyange Catholic Church during the 1994 Genocide against the Tutsi.
Kayishema arrested last year had been at large since 2001 and was among four remaining fugitives from the genocide,
UN said the arrest “sends a powerful message that those who are alleged to have committed such crimes cannot evade justice and will eventually be held accountable, even more than a quarter of a century later”.
