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Rwanda’s president, Paul Kagame, prompt that solely an invasion of his nation may pressure him to launch Paul Rusesabagina, a rescuer within the 1994 Rwandan genocide whose launch the Biden administration has known as for.
“We’ve made it clear there isn’t anybody going to come back from anyplace to bully us into one thing to do with our lives,” Mr. Kagame stated in response to a query about Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken’s appeals for Mr. Rusesabagina’s freedom.
“Perhaps make an invasion and overrun the nation — you are able to do that,” he stated. Mr. Kagame spoke on the sidelines of the U.S.-Africa summit at an occasion hosted by the information group Semafor.
Requested whether or not he could be assembly one on one with President Biden throughout this week’s summit, Mr. Kagame stated he was “unsure but.”
Mr. Rusesabagina, 68, labored throughout the genocide because the supervisor of the Hôtel des Mille Collines in Kigali, the setting for the movie “Resort Rwanda.” The resort housed greater than 1,000 individuals liable to homicide; all survived. President George W. Bush awarded him the Presidential Medal of Freedom.
He’s a longtime critic of the Rwandan chief, who was himself as soon as hailed as a peacemaker — however has extra not too long ago been criticized broadly as a repressive strongman. In August of 2020, Mr. Kagame lured Mr. Rusesabagina to Rwanda underneath false pretenses from his residence in Texas, the place he was a everlasting resident.
Mr. Rusesabagina, a Belgian citizen, had vowed by no means to return to his native nation and believed he was flying to Burundi. He was arrested on his arrival to Kigali and ultimately convicted on fees of involvement in violent insurgent assaults inside Rwanda in 2018 and 2019.
The State Division decided in Might that Mr. Rusesabagina was being “wrongfully detained,” a standing that was additionally given to the basketball star Brittney Griner when she was held in Russia, and which makes Mr. Rusesabagina tantamount to a political prisoner.
Some human rights activists have criticized the attendance of Mr. Kagame on the summit. Writing for Time this week, Jeffrey Smith, an activist who promotes democracy in sub-Sarahan Africa, stated: “Rwanda’s president stands out as notably crafty and ruthless in his full-throttle consolidation of political energy again residence.”
Mr. Blinken raised Mr. Rusesabagina’s case throughout an August go to to Kigali, the place he met with Mr. Kagame. Mr. Blinken has additionally pressed the Rwandan chief on his nation’s assist for militias in japanese Congo and different human rights considerations within the nation.
“This drawback was not created by Rwanda and isn’t Rwanda’s drawback,” Mr. Kagame stated on Wednesday of the battle in neighboring Congo. “It’s Congo’s drawback. They’re those that should take care of it.”
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