US lawyer says he fears for his life as he jets in

US lawyer says he fears for his life as he jets in


By David Ochami

The US defence lawyer accused of denying the Rwandan 1994 genocide arrived in Kenya last night after three weeks of captivity in Kigali.

And one of his Kenyan lawyers was denied entry to the US.

Prof Peter Erlinder on Sunday said he fears for his life even while in Kenya following Saturday’s attempted assassination of Rwandan military defector Kayumba Nyamwasa in South Africa, blamed on Rwanda’s intelligence.

Erlinder, who was arrested in Kigali when he went to represent a Rwandan opposition leader Victoire Ingabire, also accused of denying genocide, said he believes he is still alive because he is a white man from a powerful country.

"Imagine if I was not a mzungu. Imagine if I was not from the US. Imagine if I was not a law professor," he said.

Visa denied

Erlinder added it was time to revise the Rwanda genocide history from the one presented by President Paul Kagame and his Western backers.

The US State Department refused to grant Mr Kennedy Ogeto a visa to travel with the professor to the US. Another Kenyan lawyer, Gershom Otachi, will now travel with him following a visa grant in Kigali, the Rwandan capital. The two Kenyans represented Erlinder during his three-week torment in Rwanda’s jails.

The three are defence lawyers at the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda, formed in 1995 to try key suspects from the genocide and civil war that rocked Rwanda in the mid 1990s.

Erlinder accused his government of standing by as the Rwanda regime subjected him to degrading and life threatening treatment.

"My special request to Foreign Secretary Hillary Clinton is to let my lawyers to travel to the US to help me explain to the world what happened."