By Joseph Mudingu
Philippe Hategekimana, alias Biguma, a Genocide fugitive who has been living in Yaoundé, Cameroon has been arrested on the basis of an international arrest warrant issued by French authorities, it has emerged.
The Rwandan has been living under the name Philippe Manier after he naturalized as a French citizen, according to media reports.
He has been under investigation since September 2015 after pressure groups filed a complaint in Paris regarding his role in the Nyamure Hill in south of Rwanda massacre during the 1994 Genocide against the Tutsi.
He is believed to have been involved in several massacres in the 1994 genocide in Rwanda.
A former chief warrant officer in the current Nyanza District Southern Province, Hategekimana is believed to have organised and participated in several massacres in April 1994, such as the assassination of the area’s bourgmestre (mayor) and several large-scale massacres committed in the former Butare prefecture.
After the Genocide, Philippe Hategekimana fled and domiciled in the French northwestern city of Rennes but sources in France suggest he later went into hiding in Cameroon where he was arrested.
The development comes just two days before the start of the 24th commemoration of the Genocide, which claimed more than a million lives in a space of 100 days.