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RWANDA (NAI)

Brussels court jails Rwandan ex-major for 20 years over deaths of peacekeepers

BRUSSELS, Belgium (AP)

A former Rwandan army major was sentenced to 20 years in prison by a Belgian court Thursday for his involvement in the 1994 deaths of 10 Belgian peacekeepers killed at the start of the Rwandan genocide.

Bernard Ntuyahaga was found guilty of manslaughter by a jury Wednesday following the killings of the 10 Belgian paratroopers, who were on U.N. duty in the country.

Prosecutors in the case had pleaded for the court to sentence the 55-year-old to life for his role in ensuring the 10 peacekeepers were disarmed and later killed by a mob of local soldiers in Kigali.

Ntuyahaga's defense lawyer, Luc De Temmerman, said the deaths of the ten Belgians was the fault of a civil war in Rwanda that had started in 1990. He said his client did not receive "a just legal process" to make his case and added Ntuyahaga was likely to appeal against the verdict.

The ex-major was not convicted of manslaughter in the killing of then Prime Minister Agatha Uwilingiyimana, who the Belgian peacekeepers were responsible for protecting.

Ntuyahaga was accused by prosecutors of spreading rumors that the Belgians were responsible for shooting down a plane, killing President Juvenal Habyarimana the evening before April 7, 1994, when the peacekeepers and premier were killed.

Thursday's sentencing came at the end of an almost three-month trial, which heard over 150 witnesses and went over 70,000 pages of evidence.

The death of the 10 peacekeepers led to the withdrawal of the 450 Belgian troops in Rwanda and eventually, troops from other nations in the U.N. mission too. It opened the way for the genocide.

The 10 peacekeepers were given orders to protect Uwilingiyimana and take her to a radio station to make an appeal for calm the day after the plane crash in which the president died _ a crash which remains unexplained.

When they arrived there, soldiers of the Hutu army opened fire with rifles and grenades. After about two hours, the prime minister fled. She was caught and murdered.

Ntuyahaga handed himself over to Belgian diplomats in the Tanzanian capital Dar es Salaam in 2004 after a court there released him from custody and rejected an extradition request from Rwanda.