Netflix’s most recent true crime documentary World’s Most Wanted tells the story of five affirmed offenders who were free in the start of the year: Sinaloa Cartel head Ismael “El Mayo” Zambada Garcia, charged genocide financier Félicien Kabuga, Samantha Lewthwaite a terrorism suspect, Russian gang leader Semion Mogilevich and Casa Nostra leader Matteo Messian Denaro.
However, after the series was aired, Félicien Kabuga was found and arrested during an early morning raid in Paris. He had been on the run for almost 26 years, however, the serious caught the attention of authorities and lead to Kabuga’s arrest.
ScreenBinge dug deeper into the matter and found out that he is suspected to finance the killing of 800,000 Tutsi group in Rwanda and members of the Hutu group in 1994. The International Criminal Tribunal had admitted Kabuga on seven counts in 1997, including mass murder and inhumane crimes.
In May Kabuga was captured from the suburb of Asnières-sur-Seine, where he had been living under a false identity. According to the sources he has used 28 fake names and identity over the years to avoid capture.
In June the French Government approved of extraditing him to a United Nations tribunal in The Hague, in the Netherlands. His lawyers, however, have requested to study the decision causing a delay in his extradition to the U.N.’s International Residual Mechanism for Criminal Tribunals (IRMCT).
Kabuga told the French courts, “All of this is lies. I have not killed any Tutsis. I was working with them.”
On the other hand, the Chief prosecutor for the IRMCT told the BBC, “We knew already a year ago that he was very likely to be in the UK, France or in Belgium and we concluded only two months ago that he was in France.”
The Covid-19 pandemic helped in the capture of Kabuga as authorities spied on his children and finally found him on a third-floor apartment in the suburbs.
Kabuga had a $5 Million award on his head for information aiding in his capture by the United States. It is believed that he had been living across East Africa having multiple businesses and political support. His capture has resulted in some powerful politicians being behind preventing his arrest all these years.
