The former Rwandan minister of family and women affairs has denied the allegation that she harbored an ideology of discrimination between Hutus and Tutsis during a trial at the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda.

Pauline Nyiramasuhuko, the only woman indicted for the Rwandan genocide and crimes against humanity in 1994, told the United Nations court that she had never exercised discrimination as her parents had come from these two ethnic groups.

The prosecution alleged that Nyiramasuhuko, appointed minister in 1992, had encouraged local pro-Hutu militia to kill Tutsis and rape Tutsi women and girls in Butare in southern Rwanda.

Nyiramasuhuko pleaded innocent to the charges, according to reports reaching here Saturday from the northern Tanzanian city of Arusha where the UN court is based.

The International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda, with its mission to expire in 2008, has so far convicted 22 people and acquitted three, with 25 suspects currently under trial and 16 currently in custody awaiting trial. Fourteen suspects are still on the run from the UN court.

The 1994 genocide in Rwanda killed some 800,000 people, mainly minority Tutsis and moderate Hutus.

Source: Xinhua