Gregoire Ndahimana is accused of taking part in the 1994 Rwandan genocide.

The Democratic Republic of Congo has transferred a chief suspect in the Rwandan genocide to the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) in Arusha, Tanzania.

Gregoire Ndahimana, who was the mayor of the Rwandan town of Kivumu in 1994, was arrested on August 11 during operations against Rwandan rebels in North Kivu in the eastern Congo. He is wanted for helping organize the 1994 Rwandan genocide.

According to his ICTR indictment, he is responsible for the deaths of at least 2,000 Tutsis, most of whom were killed when Hutus bulldozed a church where they had sought refuge.

"We have done humanity a service, because the crime of genocide is an attack upon the peace and security of humankind," Congolese Justice Minister Luzolo Bambi Lessa said after Ndahimana boarded a plane on his way to being surrendered to the court.

His wife and five children will be sent to Rwanda, according to a report released by the AFP news agency.

Most of the former Rwandan military and Interahamwe militia members responsible for the genocide fled to Rwanda's giant western neighbor, Congo, after Tutsi rebels came to power in July 1994 and ended the carnage. Their presence in the eastern Congo sparked a war and humanitarian catastrophe that has killed at least 5.4 million people over the past decade.

presstv