The Spice Girl and the ‘war criminal’: Mel B to spend Christmas with Rwandan president suspected of masterminding bloody coup

• Paul Kagame, 56, is said to have armed murderous M23 rebels in Congo
• Was warned by the United Nations last year he could face war crimes trial
• Scary Spice says she’s been invited for Christmas by Kagame’s children
• Singer is friends with Ivan and Ange whom she knows from New York
• Mother of three says she will spend Christmas at leader’s Rwandan palace

It is hardly a winter wonderland and certainly not renowned for peace and goodwill to all men.

But that won’t stop former Spice Girl Melanie Brown spending Christmas in a trouble-torn African nation – as guest of a dictator suspected of war crimes and accused of aiding genocide.

The former Scary Spice revealed yesterday that she has accepted an invitation from Rwandan president Paul Kagame to spend Christmas at his palace with her family

Holiday: Mel B, 38, will spend Christmas with East African dictator Paul Kagame, 56, at his Rwandan palace

Yorkshire-born Miss Brown, 38 – who lives in the US with husband Stephen Belafonte and children Phoenix, 14, Angel, six, and Madison, two – says she was invited by Kagame’s grown-up children Ivan and Ange, who are friends from New York.

Mel B: Yorkshire-born Miss Brown, 38 – who lives in the US with husband Stephen Belafonte and children Phoenix, 14, Angel, six, and Madison, two – says she was invited by Kagame¿s grown-up children Ivan and Ange, who are friends from New York

Miss Brown, now a judge on America’s Got Talent, told the Daily Mirror: ‘Christmas is different every year. Last year we were in Australia and it was lovely, but this year we have decided to go to Rwanda.

‘We’ve got this amazing trip planned and we’re staying with the president, Paul Kagame. I know his son and daughter because they live in New York and they’re adorable people. They invited us out there.

‘We will probably have our own Christmas in LA with stockings, presents and a big roast dinner, then we shall go off to spend time with the president.

‘I said to the kids, “Do you want to go to Africa and see lions, tigers and bears or stay at home and watch TV all day?” It was a no-brainer.’

A devastating United Nations report last year produced detailed evidence showing that Kagame, 56, had backed a notorious militia accused of widespread murder and rape in the neighbouring Democratic Republic of Congo. The militia is also accused of driving up to 800,000 people from their homes.

Kagame commanded the rebel army, the Rwandan Patriotic Front, that ended the 1994 Rwandan genocide. He was made president of Rwanda in 2000.

He has forged close personal ties with a number of Western leaders, including Tony Blair. Foreign aid accounts for more than 40 per cent of the Rwandan government’s income, and Britain is the Commonwealth country’s single biggest donor, giving £75million last year.

Kagame was re-elected in 2010 with 93 per cent of the vote, amid accusations he suppressed political opponents and journalists.

Paul Kagame: Kagame commanded the rebel army, the Rwandan Patriotic Front, that ended the 1994 Rwandan genocide

Fighting: Congolese government troops trading heavy weapons fire with M23 rebels in eastern Congo in July 2012

Bloody past: Kagame was praised for ending Rwanda’s genocide – but now may face war crimes charges of his own

In May 2012, the UN published a report accusing him of arming and training the M23 rebel militia – claims supported by a Human Rights Watch report earlier this year. A £16million UK aid payment was frozen following the UN report, but released six weeks later.

A further £21million was suspended last December, while other countries including Germany, Holland and the US have also frozen aid donations.

 

Evidence has previously emerged suggesting that Kagame ordered the systematic genocide of tens of thousands of rival Hutu civilians in revenge for the massacre of up to 800,000 of his Tutsi people in three months of bloodshed in Rwanda in 1994.

Witnesses claim there were ritual beheadings, while women and children were set alight, bludgeoned or shot. The UN has said that Kagame may face trial for war crimes.

He has repeatedly denied arming M23 rebels, saying: ‘We are not supplying even one bullet.  We have not and we will not.’

Miss Brown, known as Scary Spice because of her outspoken behaviour, is not the only pop star with links to controversial leaders.

Beyonce, Mariah Carey, Lionel Richie and Nelly Furtado were all paid to perform for Libyan dictator Colonel Gaddafi or his family.

Sting accepted more than £1million to perform at a 2009 festival in Uzbekistan staged by the daughter of tyrannical president Islam Karimov, and Jennifer Lopez was reported to have received almost £1million to sing Happy Birthday at a party for Turkmenistan’s dictator Gurbanguly Berdymukhamedov.

THE RWANDAN PRESIDENT WHO MAY FACE WAR CRIMES CHARGES

Born in 1957 to a Tutsi family in southern Rwanda, Paul Kagame fled to Uganda at the age of just two when the Rwandan revolution ended Tutsi political dominance.

After growing up in Ugunda, Kagame joined the Ugandan army and then the Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF) which invaded Rwanda in 1990 in an attempt to defeat the Hutu-led government.

This began the Rwandan civil war, between the Hutu regime and the RPF.

When the head of the RPF died early on in the war, Kagame took over, and by 1993 the RPF controlled significant areas of Rwanda and a ceasefire was negotiated.  But in April 1994, the Hutu president Habyariman was assassinated when his plane was shot down, igniting ethnic tensions which began the Rwandan genocide.

Cameron and Kagame: The Rwandan president has made it his priority to befriend Western leaders

Paul Kagame was rumoured to have orchestrated the assassination, but he always denied having anything to do with it.

paul kagame

 

A 2006 report by French judges Jean-Louis Bruguiere concluded that Kagame was to blame and called for him to be prosecuted, but he was immune from prosecution thanks to his position as head of state.

A subsequent report, led by French judge Marc Trevidic, last year cleared Kagame and his regime of any involvement.

Whoever caused the plane to crash, it sparked a wave of mass killings and in little over three months, Rwandan Hutus killed between 500,000 and 1million ethnic Tutsis, roughly 20 per cent of the population.

In July 1994 Kagame ended the genocide with a military victory over the Hutus, and served as the country’s vice president and minister of defence until he took over as President in 2000.

Under his rule the country has prospered, and he has fostered links with the West, particularly Britain and the US, who believe he has spent aid money more sensibly than other African leaders.

With Clinton: Kagame is favoured by western leaders who believe he spends aid more wisely than others

Kagame positions himself as forward-thinking – he has his own Twitter account, website and Facebook page among others – but is quick to stamp out opposition

But despite the clean-cut image he is keen to project, Kagame is dogged by suggestions his regime has funded the M23 rebels fighting the government in neighbouring Congo.  M23 insurgents have driven hundreds of thousands of people from their homes as they seized territory in the east of the country.

A leaked United Nations report said Rwanda’s leaders – including Kagame – could face prosecution for ‘aiding and abetting’ groups responsible for atrocties committed there.

Stephen Rapp, from the US Office of Global Criminal Justice, said the evidence by the UN group of experts of Rwandan government support for M23 and other armed groups, including sending weapons and troops into the DRC, exposed Kagame and other senior officials to investigation for war crimes.

President since 2000, Kagame has been accused of funding rebel fighters in neighbouring Congo

The militia, led by alleged war criminal Bosco Ntaganda, is accused of widespread murder and rape and has driven 470,000 people from their homes last year.

The UN report said the Rwandan government gave ‘direct assistance in the creation of M23 through the transport of weapons and soldiers through Rwandan territory’, and recruited Rwandan youths, demobilised ex-combatants and Congolese refugees as M23 fighters.

Kagame, who was re-elected in 2010 with 93 per cent of the vote, has also been accused of suppressing political opponents and journalists in his own country.

But he has denied sending even ‘one bullet’ to Congolese rebel fighters.

 Source: Daily mail