The International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) has sentenced the former head of legal affairs at the Ministry of Defence to 25 years in prison. Lieut-Col Eprem Setako was found guilty of genocide and crimes against humanity.
He was convicted of ordering the killing of at least 30 people at a military camp in 1994.

French President Nicolas Sarkozy acknowledged that France made mistakes during the 1994 genocide, paid homage to the victims but stopped short of apologising during his landmark visit to Kigali on Thursday. “What happened here is unacceptable, but what happened here compels the international community, including France, to reflect on the mistakes that stopped it from preventing and halting this abominable crime,” he said.

Rwandan health authorities have embarked on a campaign to sensitize the country's prisoners - considered high risk for HIV – on how to protect themselves from contracting and transmitting the virus.

Eighteen-year-old David Kimenyi* is sure he infected his girlfriend with HIV. They had unprotected sex many times, even after he discovered he was HIV-positive. "I am afraid that I would have infected my girlfriend with HIV/AIDS," he said.

Rwanda will play global host to celebrations for the 2010 World Environment Day, observed annually on 5 June, the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) has announced.

The Rwandan government and its military have largely been suspected by a UN Panel of Experts, human rights organizations and independent journalists, of financially supporting a number of violent militias that have destabilized the eastern Congo region to illegally traffic millions-of-dollars worth of minerals such as coltan, gold, and cassiterite. These minerals are then brought from neighboring Congo into Rwanda for eventual sale on the international market.

Opposition party members are facing increasing threats, attacks, and harassment in advance of Rwanda's August 2010 presidential election, Human Rights Watch has said. Human Rights Watch urged the government to investigate all such incidents and to ensure that opposition activists are able to go about their legitimate activities without fear.

The International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) has sentenced to 15 years imprisonment Tharcisse Muvunyi, a former Lieutenant Colonel in the Rwandan army, for direct and public incitement to commit genocide in 1994. Presiding Judge Dennis C.M. Byron, assisted by judges Gberdao Gustave Kam and Vagn Joensen, Thursday also ordered 57-year-old Muvunyi to remain in the custody of the Tribunal pending his transfer to a country where he will serve the sentence.

Sixteen years after the Rwandan genocide, many women are struggling to come to terms with the violence they endured. According to the association of genocide widows NGO, Avega Agahozo, sexual violence was used to humiliate, degrade and abuse women during the 6 April to 16 July 1994 killings. In many cases, the violence was meted out before, during or after the women had witnessed the killing of a relative.

Colette Braeckman

Venance Konan

"The April 6, 1994 assassination of Rwandan President Habyarimana was the work of Hutu extremists who calculated that killing their own leader would torpedo a power-sharing agreement known as the Arusha Accords. The landmark deal would have ended years of conflict by creating a broad-based transitional government and an integrated Rwandan army.

An analysis of the cost-effectiveness of male circumcision for HIV prevention in Rwanda has concluded that circumcising newborn babies would be cheaper and prevent more infections than providing the operation to adolescents or adults.

Given Rwanda's history of the elite manipulation of the past for political
gain, Gerald Caplan's analysis of the Mutsinzi Report is dangerous and thoughtless, writes Susan Thomson.

The important judicial decisions of the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) have enriched the law on genocide, war crimes, and crimes against humanity, Human Rights Watch said as it released a comprehensive digest with the judgments of the tribunal presented by topic.

A Rwandan doctor wanted on charges of genocide and war crimes has been arrested in France, police say. Sosthene Munyemana, 45, who had been working in a hospital in Bordeaux for eight years, denies the charges.

Debate over who was behind the assassination of Rwandan President Juvenal Habyarimana has raged for nearly 16 years, writes Gerald Caplan. But a new report, prepared by an ‘Independent Committee of Experts’ appointed by the government of Rwanda, makes ‘a major contribution to settling the great question of who was responsible’ for Habyarimana’s death on 6 April 1994, two days before the genocide began.

A campaign by the Rwandan government aims to significantly increase the use of both male and female condoms in the country, where it is estimated that sexually active people use an average of just three condoms per year.

Malawian authorities have arrested Charles Bandora an ex- senior official of the former Rwandan ruling party, MRND, indicted by the Prosecution for Genocide. Bandora, a former businessman in Ngenda, Kigali, faces charges that include; Genocide, complicity in Genocide, conspiracy to commit Genocide, extermination, murder as a crime against humanity and organized crime.

Horizon Community Association (HOCA), an LGBTI organisation in Rwanda, in collaboration with the Coalition of African Lesbians (CAL) and the International Gay and Lesbian Human Rights Commission (IGLHRC) calls on all human rights defenders, organisations, governments, civil society, globally, to immediately take action against a proposed article in the draft Penal Code Act in Rwanda which would criminalise homosexuality. The lower house of the Rwandan Parliament will hold its final debate on this draft code Wednesday 16 December 2009. A vote on this draft code will occur before the end of this week.

Gerald Caplan reviews Linda Melvern's 'A People Betrayed: the Role of the West in Rwanda's Genocide', praising its success in dispelling Western governments' claims of ignorance of developments in Rwanda leading up to the genocide.