Rwanda enraged by UK arrest of spy chief
Rwanda said it was an “outrage” for Britain to arrest its intelligence chief at the request of Spain, report Reuter.
Spean wants him to answer charges on war crimes.
Karenzi Karake, 54, director general of Rwanda’s National Intelligence and Security Services, was arrested at London Heathrow Airport on Saturday, British police said.
He was remanded in custody to re-appear at the court on Thursday.
“Western solidarity in demeaning Africans is unacceptable. It is an outrage to arrest Rwandan official based on pro-genocidaires lunacy!” Foreign Minister, Louise Mushikiwabo, wrote on her social media account.
Mushikiwabo accused Spanish Non-Governmental Organisations (NGOs), which she said were behind the arrest warrant, of backing the FDLR.
“The U.N. in 2009 amply documented support of Spanish NGOs behind the preposterous ‘valid European arrest warrant’ to genocidal militia FDLR!” she wrote in another account.
Justice Minister, Johnston Busingye, said Rwanda was working with the British government on the case.
”We will contest in the courts. We have sought explanation from the UK on this matter as well,” he said in remarks in a report.
Rwanda’s ambassador in London, William Nkurunziza, told the BBC the charges against Karake were “politically motivated”.
Britain’s embassy in Kigali said the arrest `was a legal obligation, following the issue of a valid European arrest warrant.’
The embassy also said that it `greatly values the close relationship with Rwanda’ and was committed to it for the long term.
The case will likely further strain ties between Rwanda and aid-donor Britain after Kigali suspended a local BBC radio service in 2014.
A documentary by the British broadcaster questioned official accounts of the genocide.
Rwanda has long accused the West and others of doing too little to halt the genocide and then failing to do more to crush groups such as the FDLR “genocidaires”.
It is a Hutu militia implicated in Rwanda’s 1994 genocide. Rwanda has also blamed by the United Nations and human rights groups for atrocities in eastern Congo.
About 800,000 people were butchered in three months of ethnic killings in 1994, most of them from Rwanda’s Tutsi minority as well as moderates from the Hutu majority.
The massacre was halted by the Rwandan Patriotic Front, the then rebel force led by Paul Kagame, who is now president.
