Rwanda's Tea Czar Pleads Guilty To Genocide

Michel Bagaragaza officially plead guilty to Genocide today at the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda.  He had reportedly entered a plea deal last year with the prosecution ahead of his trial this month.  Bagaragaza was head of OCIR-Tea which controlled the tea industry of Rwanda and used this position to facilitate Genocide against ethnic Tutsis in Rwanda:

He was initially charged by the UN International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) with ordering his subordinates and instigating others to kill hundreds of Tutsi civilians near a tea factory.

Mr. Bagaragaza helped establish, fund, train and arm the Hutu-dominated rebel Interahamwe militia to carry out attacks on Tutsi civilians and to have been the honorary president of a local Interahamwe unit. He also ordered tea factory employees to provide the Interahamwe with vehicle fuel, arms and ammunition from a stockpile at the factory and ordered them to help kill hundreds of Tutsis, the Tribunal said.

Bagaragaza fled to Kenya after the Genocide.  Bagaragaza turned himself in August of 2005 to the ICTR in Arusha, Tanzania as part of an undisclosed “amicable arrangment” with the prosecution.  He was later transferred to the International Criminal Tribunal for Yugoslavia at The Hague due to security concerns.  These concerns stem from Bagaragaza giving testimony in earlier cases against former colleagues including Habyarimana’s brother-in-law.  He requested and was denied referral to the national court system in Norway after it was determined that Norway had no provision to prosecute Genocide and in The Netherlands after doubts arose that their judicial system would be able to carry out the prosecution.  He was subsequently returned to the ICTR in Tanzania where he entered his plea today.