The family of Dafroza Mukarumongi Gauthier announced that flowers are not required; instead, those who wish to contribute may do so, and the funds will be given to vulnerable survivors of the 1994 Genocide against the Tutsi.
Dafroza Mukarumongi Gauthier, aged 72, passed away on October 3, 2026, due to illness, according to her family; she died in France, where she resided. Her family announced that the day for her final send-off is October 12, 2026. According to the statement released by the family, the funeral proceedings include a service celebrating her life at Saint-André Church (3 Parvis Chanoine Warnier, Reims) at 10:30 AM.
There will also be a cremation ceremony attended only by close family members at the Reims Crematorium (40 Avenue Maurice Plongeron, Reims) at 1:00 PM (French time). At 2:00 PM, guests arriving to pay their final respects to the late Dafroza Mukarumongi Gauthier will be received for a time of conversation and fellowship; the venue for this gathering will be announced shortly. The announcement stated, “No flowers or floral wreaths. Should you wish to make a contribution, the funds will be given to survivors of the Genocide against the Tutsi, as they are in greater need than anyone else.”
Dafroza Mukarumongi Gauthier was a Rwandan national who also held French citizenship through her marriage to the Frenchman Alain Gauthier. Following the Genocide against the Tutsi, the couple founded the *Collectif des Parties Civiles pour le Rwanda* (CPCR), an organization based in France that advocates for identifying, prosecuting, and bringing to trial those who participated in the Genocide and fled to Europe.
In recognition of the organization’s significant role in the pursuit of justice, President Paul Kagame awarded the *Umurinzi w’Igihango* (Protector of the Covenant) medal to both Dafroza Mukarumongi Gauthier and Alain Gauthier in 2017, honoring the deep friendship they shared with Rwanda.
Dafroza Gauthier was born on 4 August 1954 – 3 October 2026) was a Franco-Rwandan chemical engineer and activist, known for tracking down suspected perpetrators of the genocide against the tutsi who had taken refuge in France and bringing them before the French courts. She is from Huye district. She lost her father in the anti-Tutsi massacres of 1963 and fled Rwanda after the 1973 coup. She married Alain Gauthier and settled with him in Reims. Her mother and some 80 members of her maternal family were killed during the 1994 genocide.
In 2001, she and her husband founded the “ Collectif des Parties civiles pour le Rwanda” CPCR), which was behind almost all of the complaints lodged in France against Rwandan genocide suspects and contributed to the first genocide trials held in France from 2014 onwards. Often described as “the Klarsfelds of Rwanda”, the couple was awarded Rwanda’s National Order of Exceptional Friendship in 2017. She also spoke widely in schools and universities against forgetting and denial of the genocide. She died of cancer in Reims in 2026.
In 1996, Dafroza traveled to Rwanda with her husband Alain. She met up with a cousin who had survived the genocide, and whose husband and two children had lost their lives. During her stay, she listened in horror to the accounts of the survivors, deciding to pass on the victims’ testimonies to a Parisian lawyer.
Remembrance and recognition
Gauthier was a regular speaker at secondary schools and universitiesin order to help prevent people from forgetting and to pass on the memory of the genocide.
Through her actions, she also intended to actively combat revisionism. We are witnesses to this memory; we are heirs to this history. In Rwanda, from 1959 to 1994, the Tutsis were killed without this being questioned. But justice helps to rehabilitate the victims, and is a weapon against forgetting and denial. Have you heard the suffering of the victims’ right here? It will no longer be possible to say that it didn’t happen.
In November 2017, the couple was awarded the National Order of Exceptional Friendship by Rwandan President Paul Kagame in Kigali to honor their service to the Rwandan nation. She was regularly accused of being an agent of the Rwanda Patriotic Front. In 2023, a documentary film and a comic book, Rwanda, à la poursuite des génocidaires, retraced the Gauthier couple’s struggleas the sixth Rwanda genocide trial opened in Paris on November 13 of that year. In 2024, she took part in the commemoration of the thirtieth anniversary of the Tutsi genocide.
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