Priest forgives men who shot him

Father Creagh has worked with Aids patients for a decade

A Belfast missionary priest shot in South Africa has said he wants to meet and forgive the men who nearly killed him.

Father Kieran Creagh was shot twice by robbers at the hospice he founded to help Aids sufferers in Pretoria.

Surgeons had to remove one of the bullets from his lung following the shooting in February.

He is back in Belfast to visit his family and to recuperate over the next few months.

Speaking to the BBC about his attackers, he said: "I don't hold it against them - I forgive them.

"I would just like to meet them. I believe that two of them have been arrested, so hopefully they will get them all.

"Just so that they don't do it to anyone else.

"I would like to say that to them - you don't need to shoot people. Why did you rob?

"I think there is a big problem in South Africa at the moment. There is a lot of violent crime - it's dreadful."

'Trust God'

Fr Creagh said he had no immediate plans to go return to South Africa.

He said he would stay in Belfast and recuperate, before travelling around Ireland.

While he was apprehensive about returning to South Africa, he said he planned to build a clinic, church and pre-school.

"I am a priest - I have to trust God," he said.

The priest, who was the first person in Africa to be injected with a trial HIV vaccine, was made Irish International Personality of the Year in 2004.

He received the award after volunteering to try out the vaccine, despite being free from the virus himself.

He has worked with Aids patients in the country for a decade and opened the Leratong hospice in 2004.