Rwandan government critic Paul Rusesabagina, whose efforts to save people during the 1994 genocide were portrayed in hit Hollywood film Hotel Rwanda, has been freed from prison after more than 900 days behind bars.
Rusesabagina was released late on Friday and is to return to the US after the Kigali government commuted his 25-year sentence on terrorism charges.
His detention sparked criticism in the West and among rights groups, and highlighted Kigali’s record of crushing political dissent and free speech under Rwandan President Paul Kagame.
Photo: EPA-EFE
Rusesabagina was jailed after he was found to have backed an armed rebel group in a trial that his supporters denounced as a sham. The 68-year-old has been in failing health and his family said he was tortured during his 939 days in detention.
His sentence was “commuted by presidential order,” as were the prison terms of 19 codefendants convicted alongside him, government spokeswoman Yolande Makolo said.
Shortly before midnight on Friday, Rusesabagina arrived at the Qatari ambassador’s residence in Kigali, a US official said.
He would likely stay there for “a couple of days” before flying to Qatar, which helped broker his release, and then to the US, where he has permanent residency, another US official said.
Rwanda praised the role of the US and Qatar in resolving the case, after Kagame held talks in Doha earlier this month.
“This is the result of a shared desire to reset [the] US-Rwanda relationship,” presidential office Director General of Communications Stephanie Nyombayire on Friday wrote on Twitter, adding that the close relationship between Rwanda and Qatar was “key.”
US President Joe Biden welcomed Rusesabagina’s release, calling it a “happy outcome.”
“Paul’s family is eager to welcome him back to the United States, and I share their joy at today’s good news,” he said in a statement.
Rusesabagina, also a Belgian citizen, was accused of supporting the National Liberation Front (FLN), a rebel group blamed for attacks in Rwanda in 2018 and 2019 that killed nine people.
He denied any involvement in the attacks, but was a founder of the Rwandan Movement for Democratic Change, an opposition group of which the FLN is seen as the armed wing.
He was arrested after a plane en route to Burundi was diverted to Rwanda in August 2020 in an incident the UN has described as an “abduction.”
Rusesabagina had left Rwanda in 1996 and relocated to Belgium with his wife and children.
Nearly a decade later, he became an almost overnight celebrity with the release of the 2004 film Hotel Rwanda starring Don Cheadle.
The film was inspired by his experience as a hotel manager during the 1994 Rwandan genocide, when his family and hundreds of guests — mainly ethnic Tutsis like his wife — took refuge inside the Hotel des Mille Collines as machete-wielding mobs killed people outside the hotel gates.
Rusesabagina is credited with helping save almost 1,200 people.
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