- Jean Paul Akayesu
Jean-Paul Akayesu (born 1953) is a former
teacher , school inspector, andMouvement Démocratique Républicain politician fromRwanda . He served asmayor of Taba commune from April 1993 until June 1994.As mayor, Akayesu was responsible for performing executive functions and maintaining order in Taba, meaning he had command of the communal police and any gendarmes assigned to the commune. He was subject only to the
prefect . He was considered well-liked and intelligent.During the
Rwandan Genocide of mid-1994, over 800,000Tutsi s were killed in Akayesu's commune, and many others were subject to violence and other forms of hatred. Akayesu not only refrained from stopping the killings, but personally supervised the murder of various Tutsis.Fact|date=February 2007 He also gave a death list to otherHutu s, and ordered house-to-house searches to locate Tutsis.Fact|date=February 2007Trial
Akayesu was arrested in
Zambia in October 1995, making Zambia the first African nation to extradite criminals to theInternational Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) [http://69.94.11.53/ENGLISH/factsheets/detainee.htm]He stood trial for 15 counts of
genocide ,crimes against humanity , and violations of theGeneva Convention .Pierre-Richard Prosper was the lead prosecutor. Akayesu's defence team argued that Akayesu had no part in the killings, and that he had been powerless to stop them. In short, the defence argued, Akayesu was being made a scapegoat for the crimes of the people of Taba.Despite this defence, the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) found him guilty of 9 counts of genocide and crimes against humanity. This was notable in that it was the first time that the 1948
Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide was enforced. OnOctober 2 1998 , Akayesu was sentenced to life imprisonment.He was represented by
Montreal lawyerJohn Philpot , brother ofParti Québécois politician and authorRobin Philpot ; this connection later surfaced in the 2007 Quebec general election after statements from Robin Philpot's book "Rwanda 1994: Colonialism Dies Hard" appearing to deny the extent of the genocide were widely publicized. [http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20070308.wqueelection0308_1/BNStory/National/home]Here is the relevant section of the September, 1999
United Nations reportFourth Annual Report of theInternational Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda to the General Assembly (September, 1999), accessed at [http://69.94.11.53/ENGLISH/annualreports/a54/9925571e.htm] .] :"Report of the International Criminal Tribunal for the Prosecution of Persons Responsible for Genocide and Other Serious Violations of International Humanitarian Law Committed in the Territory of Rwanda and Rwandan Citizens Responsible for Genocide and Other Such Violations Committed in the Territory of Neighbouring States between 1 January and 31 December 1994":"
"The Prosecutor v.
Jean Paul Akayesu (ICTR-96-4-T)""14. On 2 September 1998, Trial Chamber I of the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda, composed of Judges Laïty Kama, Presiding, Lennart Aspegren and
Navanethem Pillay , found Jean Paul Akayesu guilty of 9 of the 15 counts proffered against him, includinggenocide , direct and public incitement to commit genocide andcrimes against humanity (extermination ,murder ,torture ,rape and other inhumane acts). Jean Paul Akayesu was found not guilty of the six remaining counts, including the count of complicity in genocide and the counts relating to violations of article 3 common to theGeneva Conventions and of Additional Protocol II thereto.""15. The Akayesu judgement includes the first interpretation and application by an international court of the 1948
Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide .""16. The Trial Chamber held that rape, which it defined as "a physical invasion of a sexual nature committed on a person under circumstances which are coercive", and sexual assault constitute acts of genocide insofar as they were committed with the intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a targeted group, as such. It found that sexual assault formed an integral part of the process of destroying the
Tutsi ethnic group and that the rape was systematic and had been perpetrated against Tutsi women only, manifesting the specific intent required for those acts to constitute genocide.""17. On 2 October 1998, Jean Paul Akayesu was sentenced to
life imprisonment for each of the nine counts, the sentences to run concurrently.""18. Both Jean Paul Akayesu and the Prosecutor have appealed against the judgement rendered by the Trial Chamber."
Akayesu is serving his sentence in a prison in
Mali .External links
* [http://65.18.216.88/ENGLISH/cases/Akayesu/index.htm ICTR case documents for Jean Paul Akayesu]
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