Ferdinand Nahimana
| Ferdinand Nahimana | |
|---|---|
 |
|
| Born | 15 June 1950 Gatonde commune, Ruhengeri prefecture, Rwanda |
| Nationality | Rwandan |
| Criminal charge | conspiracy to commit genocide, genocide, direct and public incitement to commit genocide, complicity in genocide, and crimes against humanity (ICTR-96-11-I on 15 November 1999) |
| Criminal penalty | Life imprisonment, reduced to a 30-year sentence (28 November 2007 by the ICTR Appeals Chamber) |
| Criminal status | Incarcerated in Mali |
Ferdinand Nahimana (born 15 June 1950 in Gatonde commune) is a Rwandan historian who was convicted of participating in the Rwandan Genocide.
Nahimana was co-founder of the radio station Radio Télévision Libre des Mille Collines (RTLM), which during the genocide broadcast information and propaganda that helped coordinate the killings and fuel the hatred against Tutsi and moderate Hutu victims.
Ferdinand Nahimana holds a Doctorate in History from the University Paris Diderot. Between 1979 and 2007 he wrote many books, articles, about Rwandan History. In 1993 Nahimana helped create the RTLM radio station.
In April 1994, as the violence erupted in Rwanda after President Juvénal Habyarimana's death in a plane crash, the French embassy took Ferdinand Nahimana in, thereby helping him escape to Burundi. He was later arrested in Cameroon on 27 March 1996.
Nahimana, founder of the Radio Télévision Libre des Mille collines (RTLM) was convicted for his responsibility as a senior ranking official on the radio starting 6 April 1994, date on which he no longer exerted any role, according to his French lawyer Jean-Marie Biju- Duval. "There is an extraordinary paradox", estimated the lawyer in an interview with the Hirondelle agency.
This conviction, according to him, "marks the end of a certain right of evidence before international justice". "There was the idea that there was a right of evidence inherited from Common law (legal system mainly used before international courts) the protection barriers have been removed one after another", said Biju Duval, main counsel of Nahimana since 1996.
The Rwandan historian was convicted for not having done anything in order to stop the inflammatory shows of the RTLM after 6 April 1994, as he had, according to the judgment, an authority on the personnel of the radio station. According to the lawyer, "Nahimana was convicted on the weakest point of the prosecutor's thesis. The hierarchical responsibility is not the power of influence", he reminded. According to him, "it must be established within the framework of a chain of command, it must fall under a hierarchy with an effective control".
...
Wikipedia