GOAL aid worker Sharon Commins spoke Irish during phone conversations with Garda and defence force personnel so her abductors wouldn't be able to understand what she was saying.

Commins used the 'cupla focail' in the phone conversations that took place while she was being held hostage, to "allow her say a few things without her captors knowing", a source confirmed to the Sunday Tribune this weekend.

"Most Irish people have spoken as Gaeilge while abroad [to allow them communicate with each other without being understood]. This is obviously a more extreme example of that," the source added.

Meanwhile, the chief executive of Goal, John O'Shea, said yesterday that Goal "didn't pay a penny to anybody" to secure the release of Commins and her Ugandan colleague Hilda Kawuki.

Responding to an Irish Times report yesterday that an Arab tribal leader in Darfur claimed that the kidnappers were paid a ransom by the Sudanese authorities, he said Goal knew nothing about this. Nobody in Goal had ever met this individual and it "would never countenance paying a ransom".