Dafroza Gauthier, a prominent campaigner for justice for victims of the 1994 Genocide against the Tutsi in Rwanda, has died at the age of 72 following an illness.
Gauthier devoted much of her life to ensuring that people suspected of participating in the Genocide and later living in France were brought before courts and held accountable for their alleged crimes.
Together with her French husband, Alain Gauthier, she co-founded the Collectif des parties civiles pour le Rwanda (CPCR), an organisation that has gathered evidence and testimonies used in efforts to prosecute genocide suspects living in France.
The couple began their justice campaign in the aftermath of the Genocide, working to identify suspects who had settled in France and supporting efforts to bring cases against them.
Their work included tracing suspected genocide perpetrators in France, travelling to Rwanda to gather evidence from areas where crimes were committed, meeting survivors and prisoners, and preparing case files for submission to judicial authorities.
Gauthier also played an important role in making evidence accessible to French courts by helping translate Kinyarwanda documents used in genocide-related proceedings.
She viewed justice as an important way of restoring dignity to those killed during the Genocide and remained committed to ensuring that perpetrators could not live freely without facing accountability.
Beyond legal efforts, Gauthier and her husband visited schools and universities to educate young people about the history of the Genocide, contributing to efforts to preserve its memory and challenge genocide denial.
Gauthier was born in 1954 in what was then Butare Prefecture. She married Alain Gauthier, a French national who had been teaching in Rwanda. The couple later moved to France, where they were living when the Genocide against the Tutsi took place in 1994.
Although she was not in Rwanda during the Genocide, about 80 members of her extended family were killed.
In 2001, Gauthier and her husband formally established the CPCR, building on work they had started several years earlier to support the pursuit of justice for Genocide victims.
In recognition of her contribution to justice and the fight against impunity, President Paul Kagame awarded Gauthier the Igihango Medal on November 18, 2017.
Her death marks the loss of one of the prominent figures who spent decades supporting efforts to bring suspected Genocide perpetrators living abroad before justice.
