A Dutch-Rwandan national has been handed a life sentence by a court in the Netherlands for his role in the 1994 genocide in Rwanda.
The 66-year-old man, identified only as Eugene N, was found guilty of genocide and war crimes after judges concluded that he had acted with genocidal intent.
Prosecutors accused him of participating in a massacre at a football stadium where large numbers of Tutsis had sought refuge.
The court heard that he directed Hutu attackers to prevent those inside from escaping.
The victims were reportedly attacked with stones, firearms and grenades, while those who survived the initial assault were later killed with machetes and clubs.
N was also found to have held a position of authority in Mbazi, southern Rwanda, where he exercised influence over roughly 1,000 residents during the period of the killings.
Judges said his standing as a local administrator meant he understood the power he possessed and the consequences of his actions.
They described his crimes as particularly grave.
Before the stadium attack, the court heard, N had witnessed the looting and burning of homes without intervening.
“Only a lifelong prison sentence does justice to the immense suffering” endured by victims and their relatives, the judges said.
Rwanda requested N’s extradition in 2014, but Dutch authorities opted to conduct their own investigation after he acquired Dutch citizenship.
The inquiry, launched in 2020, involved interviews with more than 30 witnesses. N was arrested four years later.
He rejected the allegations, claiming he was himself a victim of the violence and had lost relatives during the genocide.
His lawyers described him as a “broken man” whose past had been reopened by the proceedings.
The court cleared him of a separate allegation of inciting genocide.
His defence lawyers said they were “almost certain” to challenge the verdict on appeal.
An estimated 800,000 people, mainly Tutsis and moderate Hutus, were killed by Hutu extremists during approximately 100 days of violence in Rwanda in 1994.
By: Magdalene Agyeiwaa Sarpong