Lawyers for survivors of Rwanda's genocide on Friday urged France to reopen its investigation into claims that French troops were responsible for the deaths of hundreds of people they had promised to rescue.

Six survivors, backed by human rights groups and other plaintiffs, launched a legal case in 2005 accusing French soldiers of abandoning Tutsi civilians in Bisesero, western Rwanda, in June 1994.

But France's probe into that claim was shut down in July as no one had been charged during 13 years of investigation.

The survivors say French soldiers had promised to rescue terrified Tutsis hiding in the hills of Bisesero at the height of the killing on June 27, 1994.

The troops arrived only three days later -- after hundreds of people had been massacred by genocidal allies of the Hutu government which had been backed by Paris for years.