WRITTEN QUESTION E-1622/01 by Salvador Garriga Polledo (PPE-DE) to the Council. Punishment of the authors of the Rwanda genocide.
Date: 2001-06-12
Institutions: European Parliament, Provisional data
Subjects: International Criminal Tribunal, Rwanda, common foreign and security policy, crime against humanity

C 40 E/64

Official Journal of the European Communities

EN

14.2.2002

(cid:129) conservation and safeguarding of cultural heritage of European significance;

(cid:129) non-commercial cultural exchanges;

(cid:129) artistic and literary creation, including in the audiovisual sector.

The single Community instrument in the cultural sector is the (cid:145)Culture 2000(cid:146) programme, which is
financed from the Community budget, and the Community is not competent to intervene to safeguard the
artistic heritage of Member States outside the framework of the existing programmes and initiatives.

Moreover, as regards the possibility of creating new forms of financing for programmes or initiatives, it
should be noted that the financing of the Community budget is based on a system of own resources
(Article 269 (ex Article 201) of the EC Treaty), the provisions of which are laid down by the Council,
acting unanimously on a proposal from the Commission and after consulting the European Parliament.
These provisions must be adopted by the Member States in accordance with their own constitutional
requirements. Pursuant to the principle of budgetary universality, these resources may not be earmarked
for specific expenditure but must be used towards the overall financing of the Community(cid:146)s total budget
costs.

(2002/C 40 E/062)

WRITTEN QUESTION E-1622/01

by Salvador Garriga Polledo (PPE-DE) to the Council

Subject: Punishment of the authors of the Rwanda genocide

(12 June 2001)

Those responsible for the extermination of 800 000 Tutsi in Rwanda in 1994 are still walking free, while
the international community remains indifferent to the massacres which raged over a hundred days in that
African country.

The Rwandan government is continuing to press for the arrest of the ringleaders of the massacre and of
the hundreds of criminals who concocted and implemented the plan to eliminate the Tutsi community
from the face of the earth.

Can the Council state what action the EU is currently taking to ensure that the authors of these brutal
crimes are arrested, put on trial and sentenced for the worst act of genocide suffered by humanity since the
Nazi era?

Reply

(8 October 2001)

The Council shares the opinion of the Honourable Parliamentarian that those responsible for the genocide
in Rwanda in 1994 should be brought to trial. Already in 1994 the Council adopted a Common Position
on the objectives and priorities of the EU vis-(cid:224)-vis Rwanda (1), where it stressed the importance of bringing
to justice those responsible for the grave violations of humanitarian law, including genocide. In this respect
the EU considered the establishment of an international tribunal as an essential element to stop a tradition
of impunity and to prevent future violations of human rights. This is still the opinion of the EU and even
fall within the
though the actual arresting,
competencies of the Council, the EU Member States and the Community have supported the International
Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda set up by the UN in November 1994.

those responsible does not

judging and sentencing of

(1) OJ L 283, 29.10.1994.