This decision was made later on July 29, when the Paris Court of Cassation in France rejected his request for immunity from prosecution. Lt Col Kayumba is accused of being the one in charge of buying weapons during the 1994 Genocide against the Tutsis.

The prosecution says that he was at the forefront of all the activities of the Genocide against the Tutsis in 1994, and he was in a meeting that brought together senior military officers on the night of the 6th to the 7th of April 1994, after the prediction of the flight of Juvénal Habyarimana who led Rwanda, there was a very important meeting of the Ex-FAR leadership led by Col Théoneste Bagosora.

Prosecution continues to say that at that time Cyprien Kayumba did a lot to find weapons and continued to do so in Goma and Kishansa in the Democratic Republic of Congo, yet the United Nations had notified the Government of Rwanda to buy weapons from abroad.

This soldier admitted to the detectives that he bought weapons from abroad, but that he did not know that they were used in the Genocide, and that everything he did was based on the instruction he received from the Ministry of Defense. Only the French Prosecutor’s Office has shown that he cannot be trusted.

In January 2025, French judges decided to stop the investigation of Lt. Col. Kayumba, they show that there is not enough evidence to show that this soldier was involved in the Genocide against the Tutsis in 1994.

The lawyer of the Community of Rwandans living in France, Mr. Gisagara Richard, announced that the decision of the Court annuls the cases which irrevocably explains that Lt. Col. Kayumba will be on trial. Me Gisagara said: “Irrevocably, the file of the former Lieutenant Col in FAR, Cyprien Kayumba, was given to the Civil Court to specifically prosecute him for complicity in the Genocide.”

The French Public Prosecutor’s Office for Terrorist Crimes (PNAT) has appealed this decision, pointing out that some evidence was overlooked in the file. This lawyer pointed out that after 24 years, the Rwandan family living in France, Survie and FIDH filed a complaint against him, when it was time for him to be questioned for his role in the Genocide against the Tutsi in 1994.

WRITTEN BY CHARLES