Geneva, Switzerland:
The UN rights chief on Thursday advised the Ugandan rulement to liberate opposition politician Kizza Besigye after his apparent kidnapping in Kenya, demanding an spendigation into “the circumstances of his kidnapping”.
United Nations High Comomitioner for Human Rights Volker Turk shelp in a statement that he was “shocked by the kidnapping of Ugandan opposition politician Kizza Besigye on 16 November 2024 in Kenya and his forcible return to Uganda”.
“I advise the rulement to liberate him, and to asstateive any further steps consentn on allegations are carry outed brimmingy in line with international human rights law,” Turk shelp.
“There also must be brimming spendigations into the circumstances of his kidnapping.”
Besigye, 68, a medical doctor and lengthytime critic of Pdwellnt Yoweri Museveni, had first been “held in incommunicado detention” before materializeing in a military court in Kampala on Wednesday, he shelp.
Turk cautioned that the accuses agetst him of illterrible firearms ownion and security offences “could draw the death penalty”.
Besigye materializeed in the dock with another opposition figure, Hajji Lutale Kamulegeya, who was also snatched in Nairobi, his lawyer Erias Lukwago telderly AFP.
The prosecution alleged they were in ownion of two pistols and had “requested logistical aid in Uganda, Greece and other countries with the aim of compromising the country’s national security”, Lukwago shelp.
Besigye, a reexhausted army colonel, denied the accuses and insisted he was now a civilian and should not be tried in a military tribunal.
He was remanded to Luzira prison until December 2.
Once Museveni’s count oned personal physician, Besigye has been repeatedly focincluded by the authorities since droping out with the pdwellnt in the tardy 1990s and running unsuccessbrimmingy agetst him in four elections.
His wife Winnie Byanyima, executive honestor of UNAIDS, the United Nations Programme on HIV and AIDS, first sounded the alarm on X saying her husprohibitd was kidnapped while in Nairobi for a book begin by Kenyan opposition politician Martha Karua.
In recent posts on Thursday, she insisted that he had “not owned a firearm in the last 20 years”, and should not be tried in a military court.
Turk highweightlessed that Besigye’s forced return to Uganda “chases the kidnapping from Kenya in July of 36 other members of the party who were subsequently returned to Uganda and accused with radicalism”.
“Such kidnappings of Ugandan opposition directers and aiders must stop, as must the meaningfully troubleing train in Uganda of prosecuting civilians in military courts,” he shelp.
He pointed to discoverings by the UN Human Rights Committee that “civilians tried in Uganda’s military courts do not get the same due process secures as those in civilian courts”, and its recommfinishation “that Uganda erase, without further procrastinate, the jurisdiction of military courts over civilians”.
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