Hill to monitor Colombia Three trial

A west Belfast man, wrongly convicted of the Guildford pub bombing in 1974, is travelling to Colombia to monitor the trial of three IRA suspects accused of training guerrillas.

Paul Hill, who was released from prison in 1989 after spending 15 years in prison, is now a high-profile campaigner for humanitarian causes and will travel to meet James Monaghan, Martin McCauley and Niall Connolly in their Colombia prison cells.

Mr Hill is travelling on his own initiative as human rights campaign group Amnesty International, which he has worked for in the past, had no plans to attend the trial of the three Irishmen which begins next week.

The three men, who were travelling on false passports and arrested at Bogota airport in August 2001, are facing charges of training Marxist guerrillas of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (Farc), in explosives and urban terrorism.

So far they have refused to leave their cells to attend the preliminary proceedings of their trial.

Mr Hill expressed his concern over the men's safety, saying: "There was a gun battle in the prison they were in last year in which 13 people were killed and four prisoners have gone missing from the prison that they are currently in.

"It is clear the Colombian justice system is not entirely fair," he added.

Mr Hill said that his main concern was to see that justice was done and the men received a fair trial.

(MB)