France detains two Rwandan genocide suspects

PARIS (Reuters) - Police said they had arrested two Rwandans living in exile in France who are wanted by an international court trying suspects in Rwanda's 1994 genocide.

Cleric Wenceslas Munyeshyaka was detained in Gisors, some 60 km (38 miles) northwest of Paris, where he has been living since 2001.

Munyeshyaka, formerly head of the Sainte-Famille parish in Kigali, was sentenced in absentia to life imprisonment last November by a military tribunal that found him guilty of complicity in genocide and rape.

The second Rwandan, Laurent Bucyibaruta, was detained in a village in the Champagne area near Troyes, 140 km (87 miles) southeast of Paris, where he has lived several years with his wife and children.

The two men, who were arrested on Friday, were expected to be transferred to Paris.

French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner, a long-time champion of human rights, welcomed news of the arrests in a statement issued late on Friday.

"After the detention of Mr. Kamali a few weeks ago, these arrests illustrate the firm desire of the French authorities to fully cooperate with the ICTR," he said, referring to the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda.

Isaac Kamali, who holds a French passport, was arrested in June on his arrival at Philadelphia airport and was immediately sent back to France by the U.S. authorities. His name is on a list of people suspected by the Kigali authorities of playing a role in the genocide.

Kamali, charged with genocide and crimes against humanity, is accused of planning massacres, pillage and the destruction of Tutsi property in southern Rwanda.

The current Tutsi-led administration in Kigali broke ties with Paris in November in protest at a French judge's call for President Paul Kagame to stand trial over the killing of a former leader, the event which unleashed the 100-day massacre, during which 800,00 Tutsis and moderate Hutus were killed.

Former rebel leader Kagame, and other critics, accuse Paris of covering up its role in training soldiers who carried out the massacre and propping up the Hutu leaders who unleashed them.

France denies that charge and says its forces helped protect people during a U.N.-sanctioned mission in Rwanda at the time of the genocide.