Mr Éamonn Meehan:

I will draw in my colleagues shortly but I will begin by responding on one or two points. In regard to Uganda, our fundamental principle is that each individual, by virtue of their birth and their humanity, is entitled to be treated with dignity and respect. On that basis, the recent legislation in Uganda is seriously flawed. It is not good legislation and it denies basic rights to a very vulnerable group. It is opening a situation where we can expect to see attacks on people and where people will be killed or forced to leave the country. Originally, there was a proposal that the death penalty would be part of this legislation, and that has been reduced to life imprisonment. On any analysis, it does not meet basic human rights standards.

I want to address Deputy Byrne's question around Islam and the relationships in countries where we work, in particular issues around Trócaire as a Catholic agency. First, what is happening in Nigeria and the murder of innocent people is appalling. I do not know a lot about the situation in Nigeria but it seems to me it is a very divided country. However, it also seems to me that governance and the institutions of the state are not capable of providing basic protection for all the people of that state, which is a serious problem. Everybody is entitled to the right to life, whether they are Christians or Muslims. It is an appalling situation.

For ourselves, I will give the example of Somalia. We have been working in Somalia since 1992, when the humanitarian catastrophe started and some 1 million people died of starvation. We have worked very effectively there over the last 20 plus years, mainly in health and education programmes, and we have supported communities there to set up their own health and education committees. We have a very strong and healthy relationship with those communities and it works very well. The fact that Trócaire is a Catholic agency and providing assistance and support to Muslim people is something that, in a sense, is not strange to Trócaire. Our support and assistance is given to communities on the basis of need, regardless of their race, religion or sex. In many of the countries where we work, there is a mixture of populations. The Deputy mentioned South Sudan, and Ethiopia and Kenya are other examples where there is a good mixture of communities.

With regard to Trócaire as a Catholic organisation, as such, we are bound by the church's teaching in regard to abortion and artificial birth control. Over many years, I have seen a situation where the best responses to the HIV and AIDS crisis in particular are ones that are deeply rooted in a community and where there are a number of responses to the problem. The first response is a recognition within the community that there is a serious problem. The second is that people are willing to sit down, as a community, and decide how they can respond to this. The next is that full education is provided and there is complete openness and transparency for everybody in those education programmes about how to protect themselves from the spread of HIV and AIDS. Trócaire as an organisation insists that every education programme for communities is completely open and transparent about all methods, mechanisms and approaches to protect oneself from disease and from potential death.

Sr. Miriam Duggan is a Medical Missionary of Mary sister. She is credited in Uganda with describing, outlining and designing some of the very best community-based approaches to HIV and AIDS, which succeeded in transforming the situation in Uganda. We now see, 30 years after the crisis, that there has been a dramatic reduction in Uganda of the incidence of HIV and AIDS. There are Government approaches and UN approaches, as well as the approaches of other organisations that have a somewhat different perspective to ours. I believe there is a place for everybody.

In my own experience, and for Trócaire, condoms on their own are not a solution. There are vast quantities of them available but there needs to be a response that goes beyond that.