Burundian authorities executed six people in Bujumbura's central prison on Thursday accused of playing a leading role in 1993 interethnic massacres, a government statement said.
The six, three Hutus, two Tutsis and one Twa, included the former headmaster of Kibimba school, Firmat Niyonkenguruka, accused of burning more than a dozen pupils alive in his schoolroom, according to a statement by the ministry of justice.More than 150,000 people - mainly civilians - have died in Burundi since October 1993, when the country's first freely elected Hutu president Melchior Ndadaye was murdered by Tutsi troops in an attempted coup.
The coup attempt was followed by a wave of reprisals by enraged Hutus, widely regarded as a "genocide" by Burundi's Tutsi minority and reprisals by the Tutsi-dominated army.
"They (executed people) were guilty of massacres committed after Ndadaye's death. They were hanged this morning," said a justice ministry official.
Burundi's military ruler Pierre Buyoya, who took power in a coup one year ago, has started a trial of those suspected of involvement in the October 1993 coup attempt and killings.
Burundi is at war between the ruling Tutsi-dominated army and Hutu rebels fighting for a greater political stake in the tiny tea and coffee-growing nation.