Kigali — The Rwandan government has rearrested 5,770 genocide suspects who had been provisionally released in early 2003, an official in the Ministry of Justice told IRIN on Wednesday.

They were rearrested after fresh allegations were made against them, Hannington Tayebwa, head of judicial services in the ministry, said. The allegations were made in two reports by IBUKA, an umbrella organisation that groups association of the 1994 genocide survivors, he said.

"We had to arrest them as we embark on investigations into these new accusations," he said.

He said some who had confessed to killing one person were now being accused of killing more than three. "We need time to verify these facts," he said.

The rearrests began in May with 787 of them being held soon after they left camps where they had undergone three months of reintegration and rehabilitation.

The suspects were taken from their homes back to prison, Tayebwa said. They were among 22,567 suspects who completed the training in the camps across the country. Most had spent between seven and eight years in prison awaiting trial for genocide-related crimes.

IBUKA listed some of the suspects, accusing them of "not being open and telling the truth" about the crimes they committed during the 1994 genocide.

In January, President Paul Kagame issued a decree provisionally releasing up to 25,000 suspects, mainly the elderly and the sick as well as those who were minors during the genocide.

Soon after the arrests of the initial 787 suspects, judicial officials claimed that those held had been implicated in new offences during their rehabilitation in the camps. Tayebwa said that some of them were accused of selling illicit drugs such as marijuana. He said that they had received reports that some of them had raped.

Genocide survivor groups had criticised the provisional release of the suspects, saying that those pardoned could intimidate survivors into silence - jeopardising the planned Gacaca communal courts, due to begin operating shortly.