Brig. Gen. Ezechiel Gakwerere set for public military trial, Prosecutor confirms
Brig. Gen. Ezechiel Gakwerere, a senior figure in the FDLR militia is expected to be arraigned before a military court soon, according to the Military Prosecutor General Col. Charles Sumanyi. A year without FDLR threat on Rwandan border
Speaking on February 9, during a press conference held as part of the launch of Anti-Corruption Week, Col. Sumanyi said Gakwerere remains in custody as investigations continue.
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“He was a senior leader in the FDLR and possesses critical information about his activities and those of the group. Security organs are still questioning him. In a few days, he will be brought before military justice,” Sumanyi said, without giving a specific timeline for his arraignment.
Gakwerere, who once served as Secretary General and third-in-command of the FDLR, was captured by AFC/M23 fighters in Goma in January last year and handed over to the government of Rwanda on March 1, alongside 13 others.
His name appears several times in the indictment of Captain Ildephonse Nizeyimana, the former commandant of the Ecole des Sous-Officiers (ESO) in Butare, who was convicted of genocide, including ordering the killing of Queen Rosalie Gicanda.
During the 1994 Genocide against the Tutsi, Gakwerere, then a Second-Lieutenant and company commander at ESO, is accused of training members of the ex-FAR and Interahamwe militia involved in killings in Butare.
Queen Gicanda, the widow of King Mutara III Rudahigwa, was killed on April 20, 1994, in the former Butare Prefecture at the age of 66. She is buried at Mwima Mausoleum in Nyanza District.
