UGANDA: Irish aid to continue despite concern at executions

NAIROBI, 2 April 2002 (IRIN) - The Irish government has expressed concern about the killing of an Irish priest in Uganda on 21 March and the subsequent execution of two soldiers summarily convicted of killing him, but said its aid programme will continue to help the poor of Uganda. The two Uganda People's Defence Force (UPDF) soldiers were found guilty by a field court martial of shooting dead Fr O'Toole, his driver and a passenger as they travelled along the Kotido-Moroto road, northeastern Uganda, four days before they were convicted and executed. Liz O'Donnell, Minister of State for Overseas Development Assistance and Human Rights at the Department of Foreign Affairs, has expressed concern at the speed of the judicial process and summary nature of carrying out the sentence. She also protested the absence of the right to appeal against the sentence, which, she said, gave rise to the suspicion that all the facts had not been revealed. Neither did Ireland support the use of death penalty, she added. There was a measure of pressure in Ireland to reconsider the level or scope of Irish assistance to Uganda as a result of the media stir O'Toole's killing and the soldiers' executions caused but O'Donnell stated in a Department Foreign Affairs press release that "the aid programme [to Uganda] will continue as it is meant to help the poor people." Uganda is one of six priority countries for Ireland Aid, with development assistance expected to reach some 35.5 million euros (over US $31 million) this year, according to projections made in October last. [see http://www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=12582] O'Donnell said the Irish government's concerns about the case had been conveyed to the Ugandan authorities, and the Irish Ambassador in Uganda, Mairtin O'Fainin, had sought a meeting with President of Uganda Yoweri Museveni to address the matter. "As part and parcel of Ireland Aid's programme for Uganda, frank dialogue should take place on all issues relating to governance and human rights," she added. The executions prompted the Irish nongovernmental organisation GOAL, which itself works in Uganda, to call on the Irish government to withdraw its diplomatic representation, The Irish Times newspaper reported on 27 March. "The fact that these men were taken out, put up against a tree and shot dead stinks," it quoted John O'Shea, GOAL's chief executive, as saying. The Mill Hill Missionaries order in Uganda, of which the late Father Declan O'Toole was a member, also said it felt "extreme unease" at the manner in which the sentence of death was carried out, which could cause suspicion "that a full investigation was not carried out and that the hasty executions were meant to terminate the case". Father Joseph Jones, a colleague of the late Fr O'Toole, told the BBC on Tuesday 26 March that UPDF officers had assaulted O'Toole a fortnight ago, after he asked the army to be less aggressive in their campaign to disarm residents in his Panyangela parish, near Kotido in the Karamoja subregion of northeastern Uganda. Ugandan Defence Minister Amama Mbabazi defended the court martial and execution of the soldiers in a statement to the Ugandan parliament on 27 March, dismissing any suggestions of "a cover-up", the government-owned New Vision newspaper reported on Thursday. The two soldiers had been tried by a field court martial because Karamoja was "a special operational area" for purposes of the disarmament exercise, the trial was speedy as demanded by the constitution and there was "convincing evidence for the court to convict them", Mbabazi added. The UPDF was thought to be keen to proceed quickly with the trial and sentencing of the two soldiers as it was concerned about undermining public confidence in a government-sponsored initiative to remove some 40,000 illegal weapons from circulation in Karamoja, the BBC reported last week. A two-month period of voluntary disarmament expired on 15 February, after which the UPDF began a campaign to forcibly confiscate over 30,000 guns remaining in circulation at that time.