Berlin - Germany faced a diplomatic row with Rwanda Monday after arresting a senior Rwandan official, Rose Kabuye, at Frankfurt international airport on an arrest warrant from France.

She has been wanted for questioning since last November in connection with the April 6, 1994 killing of Rwandan president Juvenal Habyarimana. She is chief of protocol to Rwandan President Paul Kagame and a leader of the Rwandan Patriotic Front.

Rwanda broke off diplomatic relations with France after the warrant was issued by magistrate Jean-Louis Bruguiere.

Diplomatic sources in Berlin said Germany warned beforehand that it would arrest her if she travelled to Frankfurt.

Police acting on the warrant took her into custody on Sunday at the airport, the German Foreign Ministry said. Prosecutors in Frankfurt were responsible for the case.

Bruguiere last year issued warrants for the arrest of nine Kagame staff and suggested a UN Tribunal investigate Kagame himself.

Habyarimana was in a plane that was shot down as it was returning to Rwanda in 1994, the year of genocidal bloodletting in the African nation. (dpa)