Herbert Ssempogo
5 October 2008
Kampala — ANOTHER Ugandan Police officer has died in Sudan. Assistant Inspector John Okwir was on a UN peace-keeping mission in the troubled region of Darfur.
His death brings the toll among the Ugandan peace keepers to three since the year began.
Okwir, who left for Darfur early this year, died last Thursday, according to Police commissioner Benson Nyeko.
Nyeko said Okwir developed "stomach complications", which resulted into diarrhoea to which he succumbed in a Darfur clinic.
Attached to the Menawashi community policing centre, an ailing Okwir had been evacuated from Khor-Abeche.
"He died of natural causes. Death can occur regardless of where a person is," Nyeko said, adding that a postmortem check would be done. Arrangements to fly in the body are underway,
Inspector John Kennedy Oketcha was the first to die in May when he was ambushed and shot on the way back to his base at the airport in El Fasher.
A month later, Julius Osega, a lawyer by profession, suffered the same fate when his convoy was ambushed and sprayed with bullets by a militia.
He died alongside six other peace-keepers.
Last week, a South Africa soldier died after being stung by a scorpion.
In May, a Rwandan peace-keeper died of diabetes. There are about 70 Ugandan policemen in Sudan. Nyeko said measures had since been put in place to ensure the safety of the peace-keepers.
Law and order has collapsed in Darfur where UN officials say five years of conflict have killed up to 300,000 and driven 2.5 million from their homes.
Khartoum puts the death toll at 10,000 and accuses the Western media of exaggerating the conflict.
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