Rwanda's ex-finance minister loses genocide appeal

NAIROBI, Jan 16 (Reuters) The court prosecuting the architects of Rwanda's 1994 genocide rejected an appeal by the country's former finance minister today, ruling that he would remain in prison for the rest of his life.

A five-judge Appeals Chamber cleared Emmanuel Ndindabahizi of killing one person at a roadblock, but upheld his convictions for genocide and extermination for his role in the 100-day slaughter of some 800,000 people.

''Ndindabahizi's individual criminal responsibility has to be measured according to the entirety of his own contributions to this 'crime of crimes','' the Tanzania-based court said in a statement.

''Ndindabahizi's acquittal for the killing of a single victim at the Gaseke roadblock does not materially diminish the gravity of (his) criminal conduct seen in its entirety.'' His trial heard how the former minister urged ethnic Hutu gangs to kill minority Tutsis and politically moderate Hutus, and how he handed out weapons and supervised massacres.

He was arrested in Belgium in 2001 and sent to the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda in Arusha, which sentenced him to life in prison in July 2004.

The court said it had not been decided yet where he would serve the rest of his sentence.

REUTERS SP HT1609