The UN tribunal based in The Hague said Félicien Kabuga, the alleged financier of the 1994 genocide in Rwanda, now in his eighties, was "unfit" to stand trial and that there would be no trial. The court "concluded that Félicien Kabuga is unable to participate meaningfully in her trial and that it is highly unlikely that she will regain eligibility in the future," the court said in a statement. The court said it was looking for an alternative "that resembles a trial as much as possible, but without the possibility of conviction."
UN judges had already announced the suspension of the trial in March, while deciding whether Kabuga was healthy enough to remain in the dock. Arrested in 2020 near Paris after 25 years on the run, Kabuga is accused in particular of having participated in the creation of the Hutu militia Interahamwe, the armed wing of the genocidal Hutu regime. When Kabuga's trial opened in September 2022, prosecutors accused him of playing a key role in the genocide, specifically delivering machetes en masse and running the notorious Radio Télévision Libre des Mille Collines (RTLM), which broadcast calls for the murder of Tutsis.
The businessman refused to appear in court or remotely at the start of the trial and participated by videoconference, in a wheelchair, from the UN detention centre in The Hague. He pleaded not guilty to charges that he was involved in the radical Hutu radio station that called for the killing of Tutsi "cockroaches" during the 1994 massacre, in which 800,<> people died. He also denied supplying machetes or otherwise supporting the Hutu Interahamwe militia.
