Man last seen with ex-spy chief was Rwandan friend
Associated Press - 3 hrs ago
LAGOS, Nigeria (AP) — The man who was last seen with the Rwandan
ex-spymaster killed in a South African hotel was a Rwandan businessman
who befriended the victim in jail and whom he trusted "absolutely,"
said a former Rwandan general who has survived two assassination
attempts.
Police say former Col. Patrick Karegeya's body, apparently strangled,
was found Wednesday in Michelangelo Towers hotel in the Johannesburg
suburb of Sandton, along with a bloodied towel and rope.
Former Rwandan army chief-of-staff Lt. Gen. Kayumba Nyamwasa and
others accuse Rwandan President Paul Kagame of ordering Karegeya's
assassination and two 2010 attempts on Nyamwasa's life in
Johannesburg. Officials in Kigali, the Rwandan capital, have made no
comment since Karegeya's death but have previously vehemently denied
charges they target opponents of the government.
Nyamwasa said Karegeya, 53, was last seen by a family member at the
hotel with Apollo Ismael Kiririsi.
Nyamwasa said he had twice met Karegeya with Kiririsi. "I think he
(Karegeya) trusted him absolutely but they were together in the
(hotel) room and now one is killed the other has not been able to give
any account of himself." Nyamwasa spoke in a telephone interview from
his home in exile in Johannesburg, South Africa's commercial capital.
He said Karegeya's nephew, David Batenga, had been the last family
member to see the former spy chief. Batenga and Karegeya picked up
Kiririsi from the train station on Sunday. The three men spent several
hours together and dined on Tuesday before Batenga left the two men at
the hotel, Nyamwasa said.
The discovery of the body a day later means any killer or killers may
already have left the country. The Independent newspaper of South
Africa said police had to break into the room, which had a "Do Not
Disturb" sign on the door.
Police have not announced any arrests but have said they are searching
for a Rwandan man and are pursuing several leads. There has also been
no announcement about an ordered autopsy.
Theogene Rudasingwa, another Rwandan dissident and formerly secretary
general of Kagame's Rwandan Patriotic Front party, told The Associated
Press that Karegeya's body was found in a room rented by a man called
"Apollo." Police said Karegeya, who had a home in the town of
Roodepoort just outside of Johannesburg, had checked into the hotel.
Karegeya, Nyamwasa, Rudasingwa and some others were once allies of
Kagame, and are now critics. Karegeya headed the feared external
intelligence agency from 1994, when Kagame's rebel movement took power
and ended the Rwandan genocide, until 2004. Several Kagame opponents
were killed in that time, including former Interior Minister Seth
Sendashonga, who was gunned down in Nairobi, Kenya, in 1998.
The most recent killing that critics blamed on Kagame is the October
2012 death of Theogene Turatsinze, the former managing director of the
Rwandan Development Bank who was found tied up and floating in the sea
in Mozambique.
Nyamwasa said Karegeya had told him that Kiririsi had befriended him
while Karegeya was jailed in Rwanda in 2004, for alleged
insubordination and desertion. A military tribunal stripped Karegeya
of his rank in 2006 and he fled to South Africa in 2007, where he was
given refugee status and a South African security detail, according to
Nyamwasa.
But he said Karegeya asked the South Africans to stop protecting him
more than a year ago, apparently because the restrictions prevented
him from working and he needed money to pay school fees for three
children living abroad.
Nyamwasa, 55, said he hoped a South African court case into the
attempt on his life soon will be concluded. Three Rwandans and three
Tanzanians are accused in the 2010 shooting that has left a bullet
lodged in the base of his spine. Prosecutors have refused to say if
they believe the Rwandan government could be responsible.
The chief suspect is another Rwandan businessman, Pascal Kanyandekwe,
accused of bankrolling the plot, recruiting the gunmen and offering a
$1 million bribe to a police officer to free him, according to
prosecutors and witnesses in the court case.
http://news.yahoo.com/man-last-seen-ex-spy-chief-rwandan-friend-141034470.html
--
SIBOMANA Jean Bosco
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