Tharcisse karugarama tharcisse

Rwandan lawyer and politician

Tharcisse Karugarama is a Rwandan lawyer and politician. A lawyer/attorney by profession, Karugarama was the Minister of Justice and Attorney-General in the Rwandan government for about 7 years.

A member of the RPF, Karugarama has played a role in the prosecution of crimes associated with the Rwandan genocide.^[1]

Karugarama was one of the founding members of the RANU (Rwandan Alliance for National Unity ) in RANU later became known as RPF and it was one of the initial starting points for a movement that mobilized Rwandan refugees in Uganda to return to their homeland. He was a teacher at Kitante Hill School before getting actively involved in the RPF politics in Karugarama's immediate family members fondly and warmly recall 'fundraising' meetings held at the family home in Western Uganda (Kasese) during the early s to raise money for the RPF struggle.

Upon return to Rwanda, Karugarama served in different challen

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Rwanda Likely to End Death Penalty to Bring Closure to War

News

By Death Penalty Information Center

Posted on Sep 12, | Updated on Sep 25,

The Justice Minister of Rwanda, Tharcisse Karugarama, announced that the coun­try will like­ly pass a law by December end­ing cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment. This move would allow Rwanda to try sus­pects charged with atroc­i­ties in the war who are cur­rent­ly in coun­tries that refuse to extra­dite pris­on­ers if they face the death penal­ty. Karugarama said that abo­li­tion was nec­es­sary in beställning to achieve a sense of clo­sure. Unless the coun­try abol­ish­es the death penal­ty, coun­tries like Belgium, the Netherlands, Denmark and Switzerland will not extra­dite sus­pects to be tried in Rwanda’s nation­al courts. Only the U.S. has extra­dit­ed a sus­pect to Rwanda. Suspects held under United Nations aus­pices also can­not be sent to Rwanda if the death penal­ty is to be sought.

(The East African (Nairo

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France rejects Rwanda's Habyarimana extradition bid

After the Paris court gave its judgement, Mrs Habyarimana told journalists: "I'm relieved, I've always had faith in the French justice system."

Mr Karugarama told the BBC's Focus on Africa programme that Rwanda would respect the ruling "for whatever it is worth".

"Whether we are happy with it or not is a different matter," he said.

He called for Mrs Habyarimana to be tried in the French courts.

She already faces a case in France's civil courts, brought by rights activists in

But her lawyer, Philippe Meilhac, said the extradition ruling would cause problems for the civil case.

"We can't stay like this for ever. The very serious accusations against Mrs Habyarimana are old and completely denied by Mrs Habyarimana," he said.

France and Rwanda have no extradition treaty, so each case is dealt with separately.

In recent years French courts have turned down se