Kenya freezes assets of Rwanda genocide suspect

NAIROBI (Reuters) - The Nairobi government froze the Kenyan assets of the most wanted suspect in Rwanda's genocide on Tuesday.

Felicien Kabuga, a wealthy Hutu businessman, is accused of bankrolling Rwandan militias who killed some 800,000 ethnic Tutsis and moderate Hutus in 100 days of bloodshed in 1994.

"There is enough evidence showing Kabuga is using his substantial wealth, including that generated in Kenya, to avoid capture and assist other fugitives at large to elude capture," said Keriako Tobiko, Kenya's director of public prosecutions.

The United States has put a $5 million bounty on his head.

Tobiko also told the High Court that Kabuga had used his money to "substantially interfere" with prosecution witnesses at the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) in Tanzania, which is trying the architects of the genocide.

He said the fugitive and his wife Josephine remained owners, shareholders and directors in several companies registered in Kenya, and that the proceeds were transferred from a local bank to an account in Belgium by the couple's daughter.

The ICTR has said Kabuga visited Kenya frequently in recent years. The east African nation has repeatedly denied allegations it had been remiss in failing to arrest him.

A Kenyan businessman who tried to lure Kabuga to his home in 2003 so that police could catch him was later found murdered.

The trial of a former Rwandan government minister, Callixte Kalimanzira, began at the ICTR on Tuesday.

"The accused is alleged to have coordinated efforts to commence the killing of Tutsis in Butare prefecture," the court said in a statement. Kalimanzira, who served as acting minister of the interior, has pleaded not guilty.

(Writing by Wangui Kanina; Editing by Robert Woodward)