Mr Moreno-Ocampo replied that Mr Bemba had been the man "most responsible" for the crimes committed.
After two-and-a-half years in custody, Mr Bemba at last has his day in court.
Former allies claim most of Mr Bemba's fortune comes from gifts from African leaders such as Libya's Muammar Gaddafi.
The Rwandans had already spurned Mr Bemba when he asked them for support.
Uganda supplied troops, equipment and training when Mr Bemba launched his rebel group, the Movement for the Liberation of Congo (MLC).
If Mr Bemba were pushed into exile, as seems likely, that would effectively decapitate what little opposition still exists in Congo.
Congo's general prosecutor has indicted Mr Bemba for treason and inciting rebellion.
As the Congolese government battled Rwanda-backed rebel groups in the east, Mr Museveni helped Mr Bemba open up a new front in 1998.
Mr Kabila, Mr Bemba and the peacekeepers have all beefed up their security in a city packed with armed men and their vehicles.
But many fear that more fighting is to come, even if Messrs Kabila and Bemba do agree to try to keep their rivalry peaceful.
Late last year, to Rwanda's consternation, the Ugandans aligned themselves with Jean-Pierre Bemba, a Congolese businessman who launched his own rebellion in northern Congo.
The chief prosecutor, Luis Moreno-Ocampo, outlined the case against Mr Bemba.
As a rebel leader, Mr Bemba became one of four vice-presidents.
There was a theatrical air to the opening of the trial of Jean-Pierre Bemba, the former vice-president of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), in The Hague.
From the outset of this trial, the prosecutors are trying to show that Mr Bemba's "command responsibility" was paramount and that he used rape as a weapon of war.
With a nod of his head, Mr Bemba acknowledged the judge's welcome to him, and through his lawyer, he proceeded to plead not guilty to all five charges against him.
But the appointment as minister of the economy and industry of Mr Bemba, a rich businessman and pillar of the Mobutu era, shows what a turntable the region has become.
At the rainforest-shrouded Chishimba Falls on the Luombe River in the Kasama District, three successive falls tumble into one another at a site that is revered as sacred by the Bemba people.
As the lawyers and their assistants leafed through their papers and readied themselves, Mr Bemba sat behind his defence counsel, with his arms folded and a look of defiance flickering across his face.
After his forces intervened in CAR, Mr Bemba became a vice-president in DR Congo as part of a 2003 power-sharing deal between the government and various rebel groups to end years of conflict.
But the leader of the Congolese rebel group, the Movement for the Liberation of Congo's (MLC) Jean-Pierre Bemba, denied the allegations in an interview with the BBC's Network Africa programme, saying his troops were more than 20 kilometres outside Bangui.
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