RWANDA: Declan Walsh reports on the war crimes trial which was expected to help explain the 1994 massacres of 800,000
A Rwandan military leader accused of masterminding the 1994 genocide boycotted his own trial yesterday.
Col Theoneste Bagasora and three other senior officers have been charged with between 10 and 12 counts each of genocide, crimes against humanity and rape.
Their trial was expected to illuminate how Rwanda's ruling elite orchestrated the 100-day massacre of an estimated 800,000 Tutsis and moderate Hutus.
But on the first day of hearing the four officers refused to leave their cells in a United Nations compound in Arusha, northern Tanzania, claiming they would not receive a fair trial.
Lawyers for Col Bagasora and co-defendants Lieut Col Anatole Nsengiyumva, Maj Aloys Ntabakuze and Brig Gen Gratien Kabiligi protested that key documents had not been translated into French and new witness disclosure rules were unfair.
"The fundamental rights of the defence have been violated," defence lawyer Mr Jean Degli told the court. "They consider that the prosecution has ambushed them."
Presiding judge Lloyd George Williams refused to force the men to appear before him. Instead, he ordered the documents to be translated and referred the rules complaint to an appeals court.
However, he allowed chief prosecutor Ms Carla del Ponte - who is also involved in the prosecution of Mr Slobodan Milosevic in The Hague - to make her opening statement.
The four men were "among the principal perpetrators of the genocide", she said. The charges against them were "frightening" and "reveal the plan organised and implemented in cold blood".
Col Bagosora, the alleged chief planner and executor of the killings, is alleged to have told Hutu army officers: "We must kill all Tutsis at all costs. This is the right opportunity." The indictment alleges that Col Bagosora was so opposed to concessions made by his government to Tutsi rebels at 1993 peace talks in Tanzania that he left the negotiating table, saying he was returning to Rwanda to "prepare the apocalypse".
The slow start to the most high-profile contested case to come before the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda again highlights the difficulties that have dogged the court.
Established shortly after the International Criminal Tribunal for Yugoslavia in 1995, it has achieved just eight convictions and one acquittal.
The Rwandan government has frequently accused it of being ineffective; other critics say it is one-sided. The court's workings have become enmeshed in scandal.
In recent months a court investigator was discovered to have been a genocide suspect himself.
Defence lawyers were accused of splitting fees with their clients and one Scottish counsel has been removed.
Three judges sparked controversy when they burst out laughing during the cross-examination of a rape victim. Afterwards they said they had been laughing at a defence lawyer; critics said they had displayed insensitivity.
UN officials reject the charges of incompetence. They say the court is slowed down by having to work in four languages, but has established a slew of international legal principles and sent out the message that crimes against humanity will not be tolerated.
The court has also helped lay the ground for the International Criminal Court, due to be set up later this year. The ICC is being championed by European countries but is being resisted by the US, which fears having its soldiers tried for their actions overseas.
Over 30 detainees are currently awaiting trial in Arusha, including a popular singer, a Catholic priest and an Anglican bishop. Some of the worst atrocities of the genocide took place in churches.
The premiere of the first feature film about the massacres, 100 Days, was held recently amid emotional scenes in the Rwandan capital, Kigali.