Three Burned Alive After Witch Hunt

A lynch mob has stoned and burned to death three women they accused of being witches in a Ugandan refugee camp, police have said.

The victims were burned aliveThe police chief of Kitgum district Charles Oumo said the victims were attacked after the mysterious death of a motorcycle taxi driver.

Mr Oumo said: "His skin started swelling up and blistering, he had pains all over.

"He died in hospital after his condition worsened."

Mr Oumo said police did not know the cause of the man's death, but locals assumed he had been poisoned.

"They thought he was bewitched by someone who had sprinkled a potion on his boda-boda (motorcycle)," he said.

In a harrowing echo of Europe's witch-hunts in the late middle ages, camp elders conducted a "trial" in which they determined who they thought was the witch by secret ballot.

The police chief said: "They hunted down the top three and a mob descended on them.

"They beat them with stones, sticks and axes before setting them ablaze, still alive."

They must have weighed more than a duck.