Photo: Rakiya Omaar, Jean De Dieu Mucyo and Gerald Gahima

 

  The Norwegian  Royal Attorney/Prosecutor  Marit Formo has dismissed a criminal case leveled by the Rwandan Government against a former Rwandan high ranking military officer, Major Emmanuel Munyaruguru. In the October 10, 2010 letter notifying the Prosecutor’s decision to Norwegian authorities, a copy of which AfroAmerica Network has received, the Royal Prosecutor judged that all the charges of crimes committed in Rwanda contained in the case 891050 opened against Major Emmanuel Munyaruguru following the charges filed by the Rwandan Government have been dismissed on the grounds that no crime has been proven [NDLR: Statement by Royal Attorney Marit Formo for those who understand the Norwegian language: “ Kripos Underretter med dette om at forholdet i straffesak 8910580 (mistanke om straffbare forhold i Rwanda i 1994) for deres vedkommende er henlagt på grunnlag av at intent straffbart forhold anses bevist.”]

BAD BLOOD GOING A LONG WAY

    According to sources  close to the case, both in Rwanda and in Norway, the bad blood between the Rwandan Patriotic Army leaders and Major Emmanuel Munyaruguru started when the latter  refused to be recruited into the Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF) in 1993. He was part of the team sent by the Rwandan Government as a military expert during the Arusha Peace negotiations. The delegates of Rwandan Patriotic Army (RPA),  which was still an armed rebellion,  tried to recruit him into joining the RPA but he rejected their advances. Some officers who were part of the negotiation team, namely Colonel Balthazar Ndengeyinka and Major Augustin Cyiza, subsequently joined the RPA. Colonel Balthazar Ndengeyinka fled the RPF regime in March 2003, whereas Major Augustin Cyiza disappeared in April 2003 and is believed to have been assassinated by the Rwandan Directory of Military Intelligence ( See ou articles on the subject: Kigali: Habyalimana flees; Cyiza, Munyakazi and Nyamwasa may follow of March 31, 2003 . and Kigali: Cyiza disappears; Munyakazi in Kagame's sight of April 26, 2006. in our African Great Lakes Events ROundup 2003 and in

Inzira Ndende No 26  of April 26, 2006  AfroAmerica Network Great Lakes Pages - Rwanda Magazines here 

     After the Rwandan Ex-FAR were defeated by the RPA, Major Emmanuel Munyaruguru  fled with other Rwandan refugees to the Democratic Republic of the Congo, DRC then known as Zaire and then to South Africa. In South Africa, he escaped two assassination attempts by the Rwandan Intelligence Services operatives, one leaving him with severe injuries. Following the assassination attempts, the United Nations High Commission for Refugees (UNHCR) contacted the government of Norway for an expedited resettlement.  What was not known is that the Norway Refugee Services were infiltrated by a Rwandan Felix Muhigana associated with Rwandan Intelligence Services.  Felix Muhigana took over the harassment and intimidation campaign against, not only  Major Emmanuel Munyaruguru, but also against all Hutu refugees in Norway (see AfroAmerica Network article of May 2, 2003 tiled: Norway: Rwandan Refugees in Norway accuse Felix Muhigana of terrorizing them” in our African Great Lakes pages: African Great Lakes News Roundup: 2003). The refugees in Norway who accused Felix Muhigana, then President of  Urukundo,  allegedly a RPF front organization, included both Hutu and Tutsis. 

   

INCESSANT HARASSMENT

    Among the Tutsis refugees in Norway were students who had refused to take lessons in French at the Rwandan National University in Butare and Rwandan Patriotic Army (RPA) former military officers who had defected and fled to Kampala, Uganda. The Rwandan Government later accused them of fomenting a rebellion and seeking to overthrow the Government with the help of the Ugandan Government. These students and military officers were later resettled to Norway. Also, one of the people who accused Felix Muhigana of harassment was Abdul Joshua Ruzibiza, a former Rwandan Patriotic Army officer, who fled to Uganda and was subsequently resettled in Norway. He testified against President Kagame in the French and Spanish courts. The courts indicted President Kagame’s closest aids of terrorism, shooting down the plane of and assassinating  his predecessor , assassination of Spanish missionaries, and genocide and crimes against humanity committed on Rwandan and Congolese Hutu.  Abdul Ruzibiza died recently in exile.

    The case against Major Emmanuel Munyaruguru was officially handled by Rwandan Attorney General Gerald Gahima and Justice Minister Jean De Dieu  Mucyo. They used the Norwegian news media to put pressure on the Norwegian Government. Several articles published  in 2004 by the NRK journalist Hege  Moe Eriksen, currently based in Belgium and the Aftenposten  journalist Arild Jonassen, all close to Rwandan Attorney General Gerald Gahima, advocated hunting down Rwandan Hutu refugees in Norway.

CRIMINAL NETWORK OF OPERATIVES AND RAKIYA OMAAR INVOLVEMENT

In 2005, General James Kabarebe, then Rwandan Defense Forces Chief of Staff and currently Minister of Defense,  attacked Major Emmanuel Munyarurugu and his relatives living abroad in Rwandan media and during speeches in military ceremonies across the country. He also directly threatened Major Emmanuel Munyaruguru in various push through communications.  Threatening communications, some originating from infrastructures used by international organizations and  apparently sent by employees of these organizations who also work as Rwandan Intelligence Operatives,  continued over several years until the Norwegian Police got involved in the matter. They found that some of the communications came from the UN OCHA, Ndjamena- Chad where Felix Muhigana had relocated. According to the sources close to the UN OCHA,  a case to prosecute Felix Muhigana for criminal harassment is pending.

From 2007, the Rwandan Intelligence Services hired Rakiya Omaar, Director of African Rights, who was payed hundreds of thousands of dollars to write a series of reports  on the Rwandan opposition leaders in the diaspora. Among the opposition leaders specifically targeted  by Rakiya Omaar were Major Emmanuel Munyaruguru and his close relatives. In the process of writing the reports,  Rakiya Omaar,  accompanied with half a dozen of Rwandan Intelligence Officers, spent days interrogating Emmanuel Munyaruguru’s relatives including his more than 80 years old mother who was grilled for more than six hours standing in scorching sunlight, while Rakiya Omaar  and the operatives were comfortably sitting inside the air conditioned unmarked black SUVs used by Rwandan Department of Military Intelligence (DMI).

Rakiya Omaar’s reports, funded by Rwandan Intelligence Services were subsequently used as a preferred source by UN Experts and widely referred to by Rwandan Government officials in ceremonies and interrogations (see our article Tutsi Extremist in Diplomatic Row of April 13, 2010  in AfroAmerica Great Lakes).

From November 2007, the official investigations into Rwandan accusations against Major Emmanuel Munyaruguru began. Several investigators from the Norwegian Criminal Police known as KRIPOS  travelled to Rwanda and spent weeks interrogating relatives and neighbors and sipping through government and military documents and logs. According to Norwegian sources, the investigators could not find anything linking Emmanuel Munyaruguru or his relatives to crimes committed in Rwanda from 1990  to 2007. Instead they found that  Major Emmanuel Munyaruguru’s relatives were almost decimated during that period, mostly by the Rwandan Patriotic Army, which forms the current Rwandan Defense Forces. They also realized that the surviving relatives included Hutu, Tutsi and adopted  siblings who are from the often forgotten minority ethnic group Twa.

SURVIVING AMBUSHES AND KIDNAPPING

    In 2008, Major Emmanuel Munyaruguru travelled to the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC)  as the representative of Terram Pacis, an NGO founded by the late Bishop Ernest Kombo of Brazzaville to participate in a peace process, known as Kisangani Roadmap. The Kisangani Roadmap was initiated by the government of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) and the National Democratic Congress (NDC), a coalition between the mainly Hutu Rwandan armed rebellion, RUD-Urunana and the mainly Tutsi Armed rebellion, RPR. The Rome, Italy- based Sant’ Egidio Catholic Community , the Norway Agency-SIK,  and the Eglise du Christ in Congo (ECC),  respectively represented  by Mgr Matteo Zuppi,  Kåre Lode, and Mgr Dr. Kuye Ndondo,  mediated in the process.  The purpose of the peace process was to find durable solutions to the Rwandan Refugees crisis in Eastern DRC.  The Rwandan Government was opposed to the process which, if successful, could remove all its excuses used to invade the DRC and to loot  minerals and other natural resources. Hence, the Rwandan government sought to undermine the process by kidnapping the NDC leaders.

    An attempt by the Rwandan Government to kidnap the leaders of NDC and Major Emmanuel Munyaruguru failed. The ambush in Kiwandja in July 2008, of the leaders of NDC traveling with MONUC and  initiated by Rwanda Forces disguised in CNDP officers, was subsequently aborted when MONUC official, Philip Lancaster, who was riding in one of the MONUC vehicles carrying the leaders, had the reflex action of turning back and contacting MONUC headquarters. Subsequent attempts were thwarted when the Congolese Security Advisor to President Joseph Kabila, Professor Kaumba Lufunda  exposed the plan to the diplomates based in Kinshasa and to  the MONUC,  and  the Norway Government threatened to suspend aid to Rwanda if anything was to happen to the NDC leaders or to those involved in the process.

THE HIT LISTS

After the failed ambushes and kidnapping, Rwanda launched another action to target leaders in the diaspora (see The Rwanda Hit List - Conscious Being Alliance ).   In 2009 and 2010, Jean Sayinzoga, the Chairman of Rwanda Demobilisation and Reintegration Commission (RDRC), under an order titled Recruitment of International Sensitisation consultant No. 02/CS/RDRC/09 launched a   tender worth of more than a million dollars to target opposition leaders living in America. The terms of the contract singled out RUD-Urunana in North America as the enemy number one of the Rwandan Government, because of "the critically detrimental role played by the RUD-Urunana’s leaders abroad, particularly in Europe and North America, in sustaining the armed movements on the ground, in projecting a powerful image of the opposition abroad and in promoting their goals internationally... RUD-Urunana reflects a policy to seek alliances and support abroad from foreign governments, regional and international organizations, the media, the church and Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs), through misinformation and deception".

On December 30, 2009, the Rwandan opened another tender for hundreds of thousands of dollars. The tender  N°01/CS/RDRC/ 2010  titled "Request for expressions of interest for the consultant to support the Rwanda Demobilization and Reintegration Commission´s work with regard to Rwandese armed groups in foreign countries,"  was signed by Mr. Sayinzoga Jean on 30th December 2009 and published on January 18, 2010. With the tender, the Rwandan Government invited “expressions of interest for an international consultant who will help to address the gaps that allow campaigns of misinformation and disinformation of armed groups to go unchecked with far-reaching consequences.”

The failed ambush, the hit-lists, and the two tenders, all targeting the opposition leaders and NGOs involved in the Kisangani process may show how determined the Rwandan Government was and still is and how far it could go.

A CASE WITHOUT MERIT.

In November 2009, the Norwegian Police KRIPOS dismissed the Rwandan Government accusations against Major Emmanuel Munyaruguru, but  requested that the Norwegian Royal Attorney make a final judgment.  Then, the Rwandan Government adopted another strategy: to bring the case to the court of public opinion. They contacted the influential Norwegian  NRK  media group to run simultaneous media blitz and saturate the printed, televised, and online medias with reportages on the involvement of Major  Emmanuel Munyaruguru in the 1994 Rwandan tragedy.  NRK TV  broadcasted a reportage on January 30, 2010 including a lengthy ambush interview of Major Munyaruguru. The reportage was followed by articles in  print and online over February 2010.

Unfortunately for the Rwandan Government and luckily for Major Munyaruguru and the Rwandan refugees in Norway, the reportage appeared to produce unintended consequences: Major Emmanuel Munyaruguru appeared to the Norwegian public as the face of the Rwandan tragedy and the personification of the oppression of Rwandan refugees by the current Rwandan Patriotic Front regime.

Whether the NRK reportage has helped the Norwegian Royal  Attorney Merit Formo make up his mind or not, the court decision must be a welcome note to the Rwandan refugees in Norway and elsewhere in the West  persecuted by the Rwandan Government.

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