<p>A Brussels court found a former Rwandan official guilty of genocide on Thursday after hearing of his role in the 1994 massacres in his country.</p>.<p>Fabien Neretse, who protested his innocence, is the first person to be convicted in Belgium on such a charge and he now faces a possible life sentence.</p>.<p>The 71-year-old agricultural scientist was also convicted of "war crimes" for 11 killings in Rwanda, under Belgium's code of universal jurisdiction for the most serious offences.</p>.<p>Neretse remained passive in the dock during the sentencing. He and the families of his victims will learn of his fate after a separate sentencing hearing on Friday.</p>.<p>His defence hung on questioning the credibility of the multiple witnesses called against him - but the prosecutors managed to prove that the exile has been living a lie for a quarter of a century.</p>.<p>During the trial, Neretse was accused of having ordered the murder of 11 identified civilians in Kigali and two in a rural area north of the capital in April and July 1994.</p>.<p>After 48 hours of deliberation, the jury cleared him of two of the Kigali killings but found him guilty of 11 war crimes.</p>.<p>To demonstrate the more serious charge of genocide, the prosecutor cited Neretse's appearance at public rallies urging fellow members of the Hutu ethnic group to slaughter the minority Tutsi community.</p>.<p>The jury accepted this account, based on multiple witnesses.</p>.<p>Belgium has already held four trials and condemned eight perpetrators of killings in its former colony, but Neretse is the first defendant to be specifically convicted of the gravest charge - genocide.</p>.<p>Neretse was a farming expert who founded a college in his home district Mataba, in the north of Rwanda.</p>.<p>Between 1989 and 1992 he was the Director of the national coffee promoter, OCIR-Café, a key post in one of Rwanda's main export sectors.</p>.<p>He was seen as a local kingpin in Mataba, and a cadre in the former MRND ruling party of late president Juvenal Habyarimana.</p>.<p>But at trial, he insisted he was an inactive party member and a friend to Tutsis.</p>.<p>"I will never stop insisting that I neither planned nor took part in the genocide," he insisted on Tuesday before the jury retired to contemplate its verdict.</p>.<p>He was arrested in 2011 in France, where he had rebuilt a professional life as a refugee, and he has spent only a few months in protective pre-trial custody.</p>.<p>Under a 1993 law, Belgian courts enjoy universal jurisdiction to prosecute genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity wherever they took place.</p>.<p>If he has now finally been brought to book, it is large measure thanks to the determination of 70-year-old Belgian former EU civil servant Martine Beckers.</p>.<p>Beckers' sister, brother-in-law and 20-year-old niece were shot dead by a gang linked to Neretse.</p>.<p>Their killings took place three days after the assassination of the Hutu President Habyarimana, the start of a genocidal campaign that would leave 800,000 Tutsis and moderate Hutus dead.</p>.<p>Beckers made a formal complaint to the Belgian federal police in 1994, and in the years since - working with Rwandan witnesses and human rights groups - she believes she has traced the instigators.</p>.<p>Magistrates have been compiling evidence in the case for 15 years and the fact that it came to trial "owes a lot to her determination" her lawyer Eric Gillet said before the hearings.</p>.<p>Talking to AFP at her home in Ottignies-Louvain-la-Neuve, south of Brussels, Beckers described her struggle as a "joint combat" on behalf of all of the massacre victims.</p>.<p>"I was in an excellent position, being Belgian, with my family and my life here. It's very different for the refugees," she said.</p>.<p>"There needs to be justice," she said. "Those who planned, organised and executed this genocide must be punished. If not here, then where?"</p>.<p>Before the trial began in November, she showed AFP photos of the ice cream parlour her sister Claire ran in Kigali and of Claire's daughter Katia in a karate uniform, shortly before her murder.</p>
<p>A Brussels court found a former Rwandan official guilty of genocide on Thursday after hearing of his role in the 1994 massacres in his country.</p>.<p>Fabien Neretse, who protested his innocence, is the first person to be convicted in Belgium on such a charge and he now faces a possible life sentence.</p>.<p>The 71-year-old agricultural scientist was also convicted of "war crimes" for 11 killings in Rwanda, under Belgium's code of universal jurisdiction for the most serious offences.</p>.<p>Neretse remained passive in the dock during the sentencing. He and the families of his victims will learn of his fate after a separate sentencing hearing on Friday.</p>.<p>His defence hung on questioning the credibility of the multiple witnesses called against him - but the prosecutors managed to prove that the exile has been living a lie for a quarter of a century.</p>.<p>During the trial, Neretse was accused of having ordered the murder of 11 identified civilians in Kigali and two in a rural area north of the capital in April and July 1994.</p>.<p>After 48 hours of deliberation, the jury cleared him of two of the Kigali killings but found him guilty of 11 war crimes.</p>.<p>To demonstrate the more serious charge of genocide, the prosecutor cited Neretse's appearance at public rallies urging fellow members of the Hutu ethnic group to slaughter the minority Tutsi community.</p>.<p>The jury accepted this account, based on multiple witnesses.</p>.<p>Belgium has already held four trials and condemned eight perpetrators of killings in its former colony, but Neretse is the first defendant to be specifically convicted of the gravest charge - genocide.</p>.<p>Neretse was a farming expert who founded a college in his home district Mataba, in the north of Rwanda.</p>.<p>Between 1989 and 1992 he was the Director of the national coffee promoter, OCIR-Café, a key post in one of Rwanda's main export sectors.</p>.<p>He was seen as a local kingpin in Mataba, and a cadre in the former MRND ruling party of late president Juvenal Habyarimana.</p>.<p>But at trial, he insisted he was an inactive party member and a friend to Tutsis.</p>.<p>"I will never stop insisting that I neither planned nor took part in the genocide," he insisted on Tuesday before the jury retired to contemplate its verdict.</p>.<p>He was arrested in 2011 in France, where he had rebuilt a professional life as a refugee, and he has spent only a few months in protective pre-trial custody.</p>.<p>Under a 1993 law, Belgian courts enjoy universal jurisdiction to prosecute genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity wherever they took place.</p>.<p>If he has now finally been brought to book, it is large measure thanks to the determination of 70-year-old Belgian former EU civil servant Martine Beckers.</p>.<p>Beckers' sister, brother-in-law and 20-year-old niece were shot dead by a gang linked to Neretse.</p>.<p>Their killings took place three days after the assassination of the Hutu President Habyarimana, the start of a genocidal campaign that would leave 800,000 Tutsis and moderate Hutus dead.</p>.<p>Beckers made a formal complaint to the Belgian federal police in 1994, and in the years since - working with Rwandan witnesses and human rights groups - she believes she has traced the instigators.</p>.<p>Magistrates have been compiling evidence in the case for 15 years and the fact that it came to trial "owes a lot to her determination" her lawyer Eric Gillet said before the hearings.</p>.<p>Talking to AFP at her home in Ottignies-Louvain-la-Neuve, south of Brussels, Beckers described her struggle as a "joint combat" on behalf of all of the massacre victims.</p>.<p>"I was in an excellent position, being Belgian, with my family and my life here. It's very different for the refugees," she said.</p>.<p>"There needs to be justice," she said. "Those who planned, organised and executed this genocide must be punished. If not here, then where?"</p>.<p>Before the trial began in November, she showed AFP photos of the ice cream parlour her sister Claire ran in Kigali and of Claire's daughter Katia in a karate uniform, shortly before her murder.</p>