United Nations - For the first time in history, a woman has been charged with rape as a crime against humanity, a UN spokesman said yesterday. Ms Pauline Nyiramasuhuko, a former Rwandan minister, already faces a genocide charge before the UN war crimes tribunal for her alleged part in the slaughter of Tutsis and moderate Hutus in 1994.
The tribunal, in Arusha, Tanzania, has permitted the prosecutor to add the rape charge on the grounds that the accused knew her subordinates were raping Tutsi women and failed to take measures to prevent or punish them.