The International Residual Mechanism for Criminal Tribunals sitting in Arusha, Tanzania has issued the Prosecution submission concerning Felicien Kabuga’s provisional release to Rwanda.
Before the trial chamber led by the Presiding Judge Iain Bonomy together with Justices Mustapha El Baaj and Margaret M. de Guzman and Registrar Abubacarr M. Tambadou, the submission titled Prosecutor versus Felicien Kabuga, decided whether Kabuga should be repatriated to Kigali.
In presence of senior trial attorneys, Rupert Elderkin and Rashid S. Rashid and the Counsel for Félicien Kabuga Mr. Emmanuel Altit
In the interests of justice, the Trial Chamber should decide whether to provisionally release Félicien Kabuga to Rwanda, his country of citizenship and the only State that has expressed willingness to accept him.
Based on the experience of the past two years, if Kabuga is ever to be released from detention, it will only be to Rwanda.
In August 2023, the Appeals Chamber instructed the Trial Chamber to expeditiously address the issue of his detention, as well as consider appropriate modalities and conditions for his release.
It stated that while “identifying a State that will accept Kabuga on its territory
may present obstacles, such a consideration may not be the basis for Kabuga’s continuous detention on remand”.
Yet, two years later, Kabuga remains in limbo, while complaining that his continuing detention violates his most fundamental rights.
His preferred European states have proved unwilling to accept him and the Host State is unequivocal that Kabuga “cannot be released onto its territory.”
The Trial Chamber has sufficient information to make its decision on release to Rwanda.
It has received the advice of the Independent Expert on aeromedical transfers explaining how Kabuga could be flown from the Netherlands to Rwanda while mitigating the risks associated with such a journey.
Rwanda has expressed its willingness to provide assistance to the Mechanism; to cooperate with the Mechanism in respect of the logistics necessary for Kabuga’s transfer to Rwanda; and to ensure that his “rights and freedoms are protected. Those rights include medical care and support.”
The parties have both provided opportunity, and every avenue of assistance available to it, to identify a state of release where he would like to go.
To date, all three of his preferred options, which are located in Europe, have refused. The only state willing – and obliged – to accept him is his native country Rwanda.
Numerous submissions concerning the question of provisional release to Rwanda, pursuant to a confidential order for submissions issued by the Trial Chamber on 14 October 2024.9
The Prosecution therefore requests that the Trial Chamber decide on Kabuga’s provisional release.
Should the Trial Chamber solicit any further submissions from the Netherlands and Rwanda pursuant to Rule 68(B), those submissions should not be delayed on the basis of any refusal to share Kabuga’s medical records, as there is sufficient information about his general state of health that has been made public.