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PARIS. – A former doctor in Rwanda has been jailed for 24 years by a French court for his involvement in the 1994 genocide in the east African country.

Sosthene Munyemana was found guilty of crimes including genocide and crimes against humanity.

He was accused of organising torture and killings in the genocide, in which 800,000 people were killed between April and June 1994.

It took French prosecutors 28 years to bring the case to trial.

In 1994, Munyemena was a gynaecologist in Butare, southern Rwanda, and was accused of helping set up roadblocks to round people up, and keeping them in inhumane conditions in local government offices before they were killed.

He was also accused of drafting a widely-distributed letter encouraging the massacre of Tutsis, which prosecutors said was used as justification for future attacks.

During the trial, Munyemana, who moved to France in 1994, repeatedly disputed the accusations against him, claiming he had been a moderate Hutu trying to save Tutsis by offering them refuge in government offices. – BBC.com