400 sentenced to death in Rwanda genocide trials

KIGALI, Rwanda (Reuters) -- Courts in Rwanda have sentenced around 400 people to death since genocide trials began in the country four years ago, human rights sources said Wednesday.

In the latest hearing Tuesday, a former local administrator in Taba commune was sentenced to death by a court in the central town of Gitarama, court sources told Reuters.

Six others were sentenced to life in prison and four people were sentenced to 12-year jail terms, the sources said.

Around 800,000 ethnic Tutsis and moderate Hutus were slaughtered by Hutu extremists in Rwanda during the country's 1994 genocide.

The Kigali-based rights group LIPRODHOR said around 3,000 suspects have been tried since genocide trials began in late 1996.

It said 400 people have been sentenced to death while 500 others have been acquitted.

Twenty-two people have been publicly executed.

Around 125,000 genocide suspects are currently being held in overcrowded prisons in Rwanda, 18,000 of whom are detained without files against them, according to LIPRODHOR.

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