Rwanda Probes Kagame Critic Over Deadly Attack in Tourist Hub
Rwanda Probes Kagame Critic Over Deadly Attack in Tourist Hub
(Bloomberg) -- Rwandan authorities questioned opposition leader Victoire Ingabire over her possible involvement in a rare attack in the nation’s tourist region last week that left 14 people dead.
“I was summoned by the Rwanda Investigations Bureau to answer questions regarding my party’s involvement in the Musanze attack,” Ingabire, leader of the United Democratic Forces and a longstanding critic of President Paul Kagame, said Wednesday by phone.
The bureau’s spokesman, Modeste Mbabazi, confirmed the summoning.
The government is accusing Ingabire’s party of being a member of a rebel group that allegedly staged the attack, she said from the capital, Kigali. Ingabire denied any wrongdoing. “FDU doesn’t have an army group or support any rebel group. This country has suffered a lot of killings. I condemn these killings,” she said.
Gunmen on Oct. 4 killed 14 people in the region known for mountain-gorilla trekking, about 58 miles northwest of Kigali. Nineteen of the attackers were subsequently killed, according to the police.
The incident doesn’t bode well for Rwanda, whose economy, one of Africa’s fastest-growing, is partly driven by a tourism sector that Kagame helped build to boost development after the 1994 genocide.
To contact the reporter on this story: Saul Butera in Kigali at sbutera2@bloomberg.net
To contact the editors responsible for this story: David Malingha at dmalingha@bloomberg.net, Pauline Bax
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