By Pierre Rocchicioli
Article from: Agence France-Presse


Rose Kabuye

A RWANDAN official held in France on charges of complicity in the murder that sparked the 1994 genocide has been allowed to fly home for Christmas.
President Paul Kagame's chief of protocol, Rose Kabuye, has been held in France since November over her suspected involvement in the 1994 plane crash that killed the then Hutu president Juvenal Habyarimana.

Authorised on Monday by French judges to return home for the holiday period, the 47-year-old is expected in Kigali this afternoon.

The late Rwandan president's widow, Agathe Habyarimana, who is a civil plaintiff in the case, issued a sharp protest, calling it "a U-turn made for diplomatic reasons".

"My client is staggered by this decision which goes against normal practice for this kind of investigation," said her lawyer Philippe Meilhac.

"The only person accused in this case is allowed to return to Rwanda where she will be fully able to confer with the other people targeted in the procedure.

"She wonders if this means Ms Kabuye's bail will be lifted pure and simple in three months time," Meilhac said, adding that his client "was coming to doubt the judiciary's determination to uncover the truth."

The Rwandan government's spokeswoman, Information Minister Louise Mushikiwabo, said Kigali was "happy" to see her come home.

"But this is only one step towards the justice she is owed," she said.

"We maintain that she is an innocent woman who was arrested in violation of international conventions," said the minister, repeating Kigali's calls for a "swift, just and equitable trial."

Kabuye was arrested in Germany in early November and transferred to France, where she was charged with "complicity in murder in relation to terrorism" and freed on bail, on condition she stay on French soil.

She denies the charges, according to her lawyer Leon-Lef Forster, who said she is bound to return to France by January 10.