Rwandan has found a 75-year-old man guilty of being an accomplice to genocide during the 1994 killings, sentencing him to 20 years in prison, state-backed media reported Thursday.
Venant Rutunga was extradited from the Netherlands to Rwanda in 2021, where he stood trial over allegations he directed massacres over a quarter century ago.
The prosecution said witnesses linked Rutunga with bringing police officers to ISAR, the agricultural research institute where he served as regional director, to have Tutsi employees and those seeking refuge there murdered.
The High Court Chamber of International Crimes sentenced "Venant Rutung to 20 years in prison for his involvement in the 1994 Genocide against the Tutsi," according to state-backed media outlet New Times.
"The court found Rutunga guilty of being an accomplice to genocide," it reported.
The accused initially faced three charges: genocide, complicity in genocide, and complicity in extermination as a crime against humanity.
However, the three-judge panel ruled there was insufficient evidence to show that Rutunga had personally participated in the murders or provided weapons.
Prosecutors had sought a life sentence.
Rutunga, who had pleaded not guilty, had argued he had called the officers to provide security for the facility, a decision he said had been approved by ISAR's board of directors.
He showed no visible emotion in court as the sentence was read out, but whispered to his lawyers.
His lawyer Sophonie Sebaziga told local media she would visit her client in prison to "discuss next steps" regarding a possible appeal.
Rutunga was detained by the Dutch authorities in 2019 after the Great Lakes nation issued an arrest warrant.
Some 800,000 mainly Tutsi people were beaten, hacked or shot to death in the genocide, a roughly 100-day killing spree carried out mostly by Hutu forces.