Rwandan man set fire to a French cathedral and killed the priest who sheltered him

Rwandan man set fire to a French cathedral and killed the priest who sheltered him

Emmanuel Abayaisenga, a Rwandan migrant, applied for asylum in France in 2012. The authorities repeatedly denied him protection and issued deportation orders that were never carried out. Despite his irregular status, the priests of a cathedral entrusted him with the keys to the building so he could lock up and look after it.

At some later point — the exact date has not been established — Abayaisenga set fire to the cathedral. The blaze destroyed the 17th-century organ, which had survived the French Revolution and the Second World War, along with paintings, stained-glass windows containing 16th-century fragments and other priceless works. The cathedral's owners and prosecutor Thibaud Huc put the damage at "more than 40 million euros".

Despite the fire, the priest known as Father Maire took Abayaisenga into his home while he awaited trial. There, the Rwandan murdered the priest.

The case has peine the debate over the limits of humanitarian hospitality and the handling of asylum applications. Some commentators argue the system failed by not deporting in time a person convicted of a serious crime before the murder. Others point to the deeper problem: an immigration policy that creates situations of exclusion and vulnerability. What nobody disputes is that the trust placed in Abayaisenga had tragic consequences and that the chain of errors — from the rejected asylum claims to the handing over of the keys — deserves a thorough review.

Prosecutor Thibaud Huc has highlighted the scale of the heritage lost. The destroyed organ was a one-of-a-kind piece; the stained-glass windows, irreplaceable. The bill for the fire exceeds 40 million, but the human cost is incalculable.