
French investigating judges have closed a long-running probe into Agathe Habyarimana, the widow of Rwanda’s late president Juvénal Habyarimana, ruling there is insufficient evidence to link her to the 1994 genocide that killed an estimated 800,000 Tutsis and moderate Hutus. The judges issued a non-lieu, the French legal term for dismissal, effectively ending potential prosecution after nearly three decades of inquiries and witness hearings. The case was opened in 1998 when survivors’ groups filed a complaint accusing Habyarimana, who has lived in France since the genocide, of complicity in crimes against humanity. While several former senior officials have been convicted in France for roles in the massacres, the judges said the evidence collected against the former first lady did not meet the threshold for trial. Prosecutors and civil parties can still appeal the decision to France’s Court of Cassation, but absent a reversal, the ruling marks the conclusion of one of the most high-profile Rwanda-related investigations in France.


NEW - French judges dismiss genocide case against Rwanda's former first lady, ruling insufficient evidence to link her to 1994 genocide that killed around 800,000 people, mainly ethnic Tutsis — France24
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