The family of a north Norfolk man who died in suspicious circumstances while working in Africa insist they won’t stop fighting for justice, despite repeated knock-backs from the authorities.
MP Duncan Baker recently wrote to the Foreign Office about the unresolved case of Dr Ding Col Dau Ding, who lived in Cromer.
The British national was killed at the age of 39 while practising medicine in South Sudan in October 2015. The authorities there initially said he had taken his own life, but his family quickly poked holes in that theory, and urged the UK government to investigate.
But since then, they say they have received little help, despite multiple attempts to get the government to intervene.
Mr Baker’s predecessor, Norman Lamb, first raised the matter with then-foreign secretary Boris Johnson, but that went nowhere, his family said.
Mr Baker asked a question about the matter in the House of Commons in 2021, before sending a further request for information to the government last month.
Dr Ding’s brother, Dr Dau Ding – who is also from Norfolk and works in the UK – has vowed that he “will not fail to get justice”, but added: “I feel very angry. I am very bitter about it all.
“The UK government have not taken this issue seriously at all. That is the main thing that has made me angry.
“They are not being straight with me. They have been evasive and opaque.
“At worst, that has been intentional because of some ill-conceived diplomacy within the Foreign Office; at best, it has been because of incompetence.”
The latest attempt by Mr Baker to raise the issue with the government has led to a reply from Andrew Mitchell, minster for Africa.
He said: “I recognise that this continues to be a distressing time for Dr Ding and I appreciate his frustration that we have not yet received a response from the South Sudanese minister of foreign affairs regarding his brother’s case.”
Dr Ding’s brother is convinced the murder has been covered up because of political connections his family has in the country.
“I now know who killed my brother and why they did it,” he said.
“But more importantly, I now know why there has been an extensive attempt to sweep my brother’s murder under the carpet by the South Sudanese government. It is political.”
Despite the official ruling that the death was a suicide, he says there is plenty of evidence pointing instead to murder.
He said there was no gun in his brother’s hand, he had been shot from behind, and there was no blood splatter at the scene.
Threats had been made against him previously, and CCTV recordings of the property appeared to have been removed.
Before Mr Baker’s most recent intervention, the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office said the responsibility for investigating deaths abroad belonged to the local authorities.
In a statement, a spokesman said: “We provided assistance to the family of a British man who died in South Sudan and were in contact with the local authorities.”
When asked what British nationals should do if they encountered resistance or a lack of co-operation from authorities overseas, the FCDO said it had no further comment.
Dr Ding Col Dau Ding attended Aylsham High School and Paston Sixth Form College before going to university at Bristol and Oxford, where he got a PhD in neuroscience, before returning to Bristol to train as a medical doctor.
Mr Baker’s office said that he would not comment publicly on the grounds that it was a constituency “casework inquiry”.
The South Sudanese embassy in London has been contacted for comment.
Adam Aiken
