Paul Rusesabagina, the Hotel Rwanda film hero who is being held in a Kigali police cell after a clandestine arrest and transfer from Dubai, is facing up to 14 criminal charges lined up against him by the Rwandan government.

While the Rwanda Prosecution Authority is yet to release a charge sheet detailing the accusations, The EastAfrican has learnt that four of the charges he faces are related to terrorism, terror activities, arson, and inciting violence.

The alleged crimes are linked to his position as chair of the Mouvement Rwandaise pour le Changement Democratique (MRCD), a coalition of exiled armed opposition groups formed in July 2017 with a base in Minembwe in the Democratic Republic of Congo.

Mr Rusesabagina, 66, shot to international fame when he was depicted as a hero in the film Hotel Rwanda, for his role in saving more than a thousand Hutus from being killed during the 1994 Genocide against the Tutsis.

He has not been in Rwanda for two decades.

He was paraded in handcuffs before the media in Kigali on August 31, with investigators saying that he was taken into custody on the strength of an international arrest warrant issued in November 2018.