Jean de Dieu Kamuhanda

Who is Jean de Dieu Kamuhanda?

Jean de Dieu Kamuhanda is a Rwandan politician who was sentenced to life imprisonment by the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda for his role in the 1994 Rwandan Genocide.

Kamuhanda was born in Gikomero, Rwanda. On 25 May 1994, he became the Minister of Higher Education, Scientific Research and Culture in the interim government led by Jean Kambanda.

In early April 1994, shortly after the beginning of the Rwandan Genocide, Kamuhanda gave a speech in Gikomero where we pointed out that the killing of Tutsis in Gikomero had not yet commenced and that he was willing to provide the weapons that would be necessary to carry out the killings there. At the end of the speech he handed out firearms, grenades, and machetes to those in attendance, and said he would follow up with the residents of Gikomero to ensure that the killings had begun. On 12 April 1994, Kamuhanda gave the orders to the Interahamwe militias the police to commence the killing of Tutsis who had taken refuge in a Protestant church's school in Gikomero.

In late July, Kamuhanda fled to France. At the request of the prosecutor of the ICTR, he was arrested by French officials in Bourges on 26 November 1999. On 7 March 2000 he was sent to the detention facilities of the ICTR in Arusha, Tanzania.