Kayihura briefs journalists on national security

Five foreign nationals have died in Uganda between February 5 and 19, according to the IGP Kale Kayihura.

"Police has made some progress in the investigation of the above case. Obviously in such investigations, it's the mission of police to investigate whether it was intentional or accidental death," he says while addressing journalists at the Police Headquarters.

IGP Kayihura says Alex Nordlarndar Sebastien Andreas, a Swedish national and Terasvouri Tuomas Juha Petteri, a Finish entrepreneur had drug toxicities in their bodies while Ritah Sharlotte's postmortem hasn't been done because the body is being taken to to Mulago Hospital for postmortem.

"It is alleged that Petteri, 42 came to Uganda on the invitation of the ISO boss Col Frank Bagyenda. However, we have discovered that the letter of invitation they had was a forgery," says Mr Kayihura.

"The focus is on the scientific evidence we have. We have made some arrests and we are still in the early stages of interrogating them. This is tragic and we shouldn’t read a lot through it. We should focus on the drugs and how the deceased got them," he added.

Addressing journalists at the same briefing, Police Director Medical Services, Dr Moses Byaruhanga says the Swedish national who died at Sheraton hotel had low oxygen content in his blood.

"So far we have handled three cases, One was the Swedish national who died at Sheraton hotel. In our check-up, we didn't find any physical injuries but he had features suggesting low oxygen content in his blood," says Dr Byaruhanga.

Kepher Kuchana Kateu, director government analytical laboratory says while carrying out a medical check up on the Swedish national, "we received samples from blood, stomach content and the kidney with a request to make a check-up of toxic analysis."

"In the case of the Finland national who died at Pearl of Africa Hotel, unknown substances, a combination of narcotics and also some pesticide like substances were found in his body," he says.