France’s intelligence chief signed an order to release top suspects in the 1994 Rwandan genocide, a previously classified diplomatic cable suggests, in apparently damning evidence of the country’s murky role in the massacres. Rwanda has long accused France of backing or at the very least turning a blind eye to Hutu forces behind most of the violence in which 800,000 Tutsis and moderate Hutus were slaughtered, many with machetes, over 100 days. Rwanda has also alleged that France facilitated the escape of some of the perpetrators – something Paris denies. However, the diplomatic cable unearthed by a lawyer researching France’s conduct in the genocide suggests that Paris knew suspects had sought refuge in a “humanitarian safe zone” controlled by French soldiers but deliberately let them go.