Charles Onana, a French-Cameroonian author, was found guilty by a French court of downplaying the genocide in Rwanda.
In addition to the €8,400 ($8,900; £7,000) fine, the 60-year-old author’s publishing director from Éditions du Toucan, Damien Serieyx, was sentenced to pay €5,000. Additionally, they must compensate the human rights organizations that brought the lawsuit with €11,000.
The Paris court declared that France will “no longer be a haven for denialists” after ruling that Onana’s writings were in violation of French rules that forbid inciting hatred and denying genocide.
About 800,000 individuals were killed by ethnic Hutu extremists in Rwanda in just 100 days in 1994.
Regardless of their ethnic background, they were going for members of the minority Tutsi group as well as their political rivals.
