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| France rejects Rwanda's Habyarimana extradition bid | |
| (40 minutes later) | |
| A French court has rejected a Rwandan bid to extradite the widow of ex-President Juvenal Habyarimana, whose killing sparked the 1994 genocide. | A French court has rejected a Rwandan bid to extradite the widow of ex-President Juvenal Habyarimana, whose killing sparked the 1994 genocide. |
| Agathe Habyarimana, 69, is accused by the Rwandan authorities of helping to plan the genocide. She denies the accusations. | |
| French forces flew her out of Rwanda shortly after the violence began and she has lived in France for years. | French forces flew her out of Rwanda shortly after the violence began and she has lived in France for years. |
| More than 800,000 Tutsis and moderate Hutus died in the massacres. | More than 800,000 Tutsis and moderate Hutus died in the massacres. |
| Juvenal Habyarimana, a Hutu, was killed when his plane was shot down above Kigali airport on 6 April 1994. | |
| Within hours a campaign of violence, carried out mostly by Hutus against Tutsis, spread from the capital throughout the country. | |
| The Hutu militias blamed the Tutsis for downing the president's plane, although it was unclear who shot the plane down. | |
| It is widely believed that Hutu extremists and the government had long planned the genocide. | |
| After the Paris court gave its judgement, Mrs Habyarimana told journalists: "I'm relieved, I've always had faith in the French justice system." | |
| Mrs Habyarimana also faces a case in France's civil courts brought by rights activists. | |
| 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. |