Updated

A Rwandan opposition party leader says its lawyers have abandoned a case seeking to stop the government from scrapping presidential term limits because they fear for their lives.

Jean Claude Ntezimana of Rwanda's Democratic Green Party told the Associated Press Wednesday that lawyers are afraid their lives and careers are in danger for representing the party in the case before Rwanda's Supreme Court. The party had sought a court order to block a proposed constitutional change allowing President Paul Kagame to seek a third term in office.

Kagame, who has been credited for turning around Rwanda after the 1994 Genocide, has been criticized for crushing dissenting voices.