Barril was a gendarme until 1995 . He was the second officer of the GIGN Special Forces unit for 10 years , before being involved in the creation of the Counterterrorist Cell of the Élysée during François Mitterrand 's first mandate from 1981 to 1988 . Since then , he has led several private security companies . He has been in the centre of controversies for his role in Africa , particularly in Rwanda during the Rwandan genocide in 1994 during which extremist Hutus mass exterminated hundreds of thousands of ethnic Tutsis and moderate Hutus
Rwandan genocide
Rwandan genocide
Paul Barril