In a landmark ruling, a Paris court jailed for life Wednesday, July 6 two former Rwandan mayors accused of orchestrating the massacre of hundreds of Tutsis during the country's 1994 genocide, AFP reports.

The court said Octavien Ngenzi, 58, and his predecessor Tito Barahira, 64, were guilty of "crimes against humanity", "massive and systematic summary executions" and "genocide" in their village of Kabarondo, where some 2,000 people seeking refuge in a church were bludgeoned and hacked to death.

Ngenzi and Barahira have consistently denied the charges. Both appeared impassive as the judge read out their sentences.

It was the stiffest genocide sentence ever handed out by a French court. In 2014, former Rwandan army captain Pascal Simbikangwa got 25 years in solitary confinement for genocide and crimes against humanity, AFP says.

The eight-week trial has heard chilling testimony depicting the two men as "supervisors" and "executioners" in the massacre at the height of the genocide in which 800,000 people, mostly ethnic Tutsis, were killed by Hutu extremists.

"Ngenzi was the leader," said prosecutor Philippe Courroye, who requested life sentences for the two men. Barahira was the "dreaded machete officer," he added.

Ngenzi and Barahira's lawyers had pointed to contradictory testimony delivered 22 years after the killings to argue that reasonable doubt exists over their role, portraying them as having been helpless to stop the chaos unfolding around them.

"I am extremely disappointed but not really surprised," said Philippe Meilhac, Barahira's lawyer, after the ruling adding that his client may appeal the verdict.