Despite new evidence that the massacre was the subject of disinformation
by the British state, families of fifteen people killed in a Belfast
bomb attack have begun a legal challenge against a decision not to order
an independent investigation.
The bombing at McGurk’s Bar in December 1971 was carried out by the
unionist paramilitary UVF. At the time the Crown Forces blamed the IRA
for reasons which remain unclear.
The families’ decision to begin judicial review proceedings comes after
they and campaigners presented new evidence, which drew no response from
the PSNI police. In a statement, the families said they are taking legal
action against outgoing PSNI chief George Hamilton over his failure to
order a fresh investigation, including the questioning of former senior
British Army officer Frank Kitson.
The former commander-in-chief of Britain’s Land Forces was the brigadier
in charge of the British military in Belfast at time of the bombing.
Important new evidence uncovered from official archives has confirmed
claims that Kitson, an expert on “counter-insurgency”, colluded with the
RUC to mount a cover-up within hours of the attack.
The families are demanding an immediate, independent investigation to
question Kitson.
Ciarán MacAirt, a grandson of two of the McGurk’s Bar victims,
personally discovered an entry in a high-level British military
Operations Log which stated that: “RUC have a line that the bomb in the
pub was a bomb designed to be used elsewhere, left in the pub to be
picked up by Provisional IRA. Bomb went off and was a mistake. RUC press
office have a line on it – NI should deal with them”.
The order is attributed to “Bde Comd” — an abbreviation for then
Brigade Commander Kitson.
Kitson is synonymous with the ‘Dirty War’ in the north of Ireland. He
was responsible for “in-depth interrogation” techniques, psychological
operations, pseudo-gangs and covert Special Force units such as the
Military Reaction Force which murdered civilians with impunity. He also
redeveloped the British Army’s information units which managed British
information policy, propaganda and disinformation across the Six
Counties.
Mr MacAirt said: “The police continue to cover up the McGurk’s Bar
Massacre and we now have a better understanding why. Secret British
military documents lead us to believe that General Sir Frank Kitson and
the RUC colluded to frame my grandmother and the other victims for the
atrocity. We have the evidence in black and white but Chief Constable
George Hamilton has failed to act upon it.”
“Successive Chief Constables up to this very day have denied and delayed
our basic human right to an independent investigation and a number of
our family members have gone to their graves without truth or justice.
Chief Constable George Hamilton might have his coat on to leave the
Police Service of Northern Ireland but we are calling him out before he
goes for the human right abuses our families suffer at the hands of
RUC/PSNI. That will be his legacy to our families and hundreds of others
like ours.”
Lawyer Niall Ó Murchú, who represents some of the victims, stated: “The
PSNI under the Chief Constable is perpetuating a police cover-up that
has spanned two generations. We now know why.
“This new evidence shows that Frank Kitson, the British Armed Forces’
most infamous commander, colluded with the RUC and ordered the
dissemination of the McGurk’s Bar lies.
“Like his predecessors, the Chief Constable is denying the McGurk’s Bar
families an independent, Article 2-compliant investigation which
examines the involvement of British Armed Forces and RUC in the
atrocity, so we have initiated Judicial Review proceedings to ensure the
families can access this basic right.”
As
the anniversary of Loughinisland is remembered, a look at an
extraordinary campaign for justice which continues to battle cover-up
and collusion. For the Down Recorder.
Twenty-five years on, the families of those killed and people injured in
the Loughinisland massacre by a loyalist gang say that time has gone by
in a flash.
Relatives and supporters will return to The Heights Bar, still run by
the O’Toole family, on Tuesday evening to pay their respects a quarter
of a century after their lives were irretrievably changed and a
community’s sense of peace shattered.
There won’t be the same craic as there was on the evening of June 18,
1994, when local people gathered to cheer on the Republic of Ireland
playing Italy in the World Cup.
That was before men with assault rifles burst into the bar and fired
indiscriminately, reportedly in retaliation for the killing of three UVF
members by the INLA a few days before.
Instead, there will be a silent, dignified candlelit prayer service for
the six men who died — Barney Green (87), Daniel McCreanor (59), Malcolm
Jenkinson (53), Eamon Byrne (39), Patrick O’Hare (35) and Adrian Rogan
(34) — the five men who were wounded and those who were left bereaved.
A Mass will be held at St Macartan’s Church for all those who lost their
lives while individual families will also mark the anniversary
privately.
Emma Rogan, now a Sinn Féin MLA for South Down, has become a prominent
campaigner for the families’ justice group in the intervening years.
She was only eight years old when her father, Adrian, was murdered that
fateful night.
A Down GAA fan, he had called into the bar to collect a ticket for a
game the next day.
This October Emma will turn the same age her father was when he died and
says that this year could be the one that will really hit home.
“It’s a strange thing to think about and I know it will hit me then,”
she said. “I got married in January and it’s times like that you think
about all the things that you’ve missed out on and he’s missed out on.
“The other families are the same I’m sure. Sometimes it’s only now you
realise that those who died were really young men, even the ones in
their fifties, you realise how much life they had ahead of them.”
Emma still has a treasured doll, complete in its original box, sitting
on top of a wardrobe in her mother’s house. It’s the last thing that her
father bought her during a holiday to Spain with her dad, mother Clare
and older brother Tony.
“We came home on the Saturday morning from the holiday and he was shot
that night,” said Emma. “It was our first foreign holiday as a family
and we all have great memories of that. I got the doll before we came
home but after what happened, I never played with it as I wanted to keep
it good.
“He also taught us how to swim while we were away, so we are all so glad
to have had that last experience with him.”
The Loughinisland justice group was formed 10 years after the incident,
mostly as the bereaved wives and young mothers were so busy in rearing
children. For the wounded, much-needed time was needed to heal
physically and emotionally.
Like several other major atrocities during the Troubles no-one has yet
been arrested or brought before the courts for the attack.
Emma, along with the six to eight core members of the Loughinisland
Justice Group representing the affected families, has been through two
separate investigations by the Police Ombudsman.
The first in 2011 reported that while there were major police failings,
there was no police collision with the UVF. Then the 2016 report led by
Police Ombudsman Michael Maguire found that there had been police
collision and the initial investigation hampered by the need to protect
informers.
The controversial 2017 documentary film, No Stone Unturned, went even
further, naming the suspects, one of whom was a soldier and one who was
an informer.
The Loughinisland Justice group say that the heavy-handed arrests last
year of journalists Barry McCaffrey and Trevor Birney re-opened old
wounds, even though the High Court in Belfast last week threw out the
claims that the men had illegally obtained certain information.
There have been many times when the justice group, who have taken their
fight for justice and truth to America and Europe, have wearied of the
challenge.
“It just seems to be an uphill battle all the time, even as far as the
last few weeks when it was played out in court with the arrest of Barry
and Trevor Birney,” said Emma, who helped carry a banner when the group
took part in the weekend’s Time for Truth march in Belfast.
“The massacre had been on the front pages of newspapers for nearly three
weeks. That’s not easy for any of us to live with, particularly for the
more elderly relatives of the victims. It’s not easy for them to relive
that, as well as the likes of Aidan O’Toole who was injured that night
and witnessed it.
“When you hear things in court like the people who perpetrated this ‘had
the mere misfortunate to be terrorists’, you think of poor Barney Green
who had just come from Mass and was having a bottle of Guinness and a
half ‘un. What misfortune did he have that night when he was shot in the
back? It just beggars belief.
“There are times when we come out of court sometimes really deflated. I
have said that I’m not sure if I would ever advise anyone else to take
on what we have done.
“But then are are times when you think you absolutely have to keep going
as it’s the right thing to do.”
She added that the justice group were angry at learning from a recent
Policing Board meeting that £320,000 was spent in the arrest of the two
journalists.
“That is scandalous. I would be interested to know how much was spent
going after the perpetuators in the last 12 months?”
For Emma, it’s essential that the full truth of what happened leading up
to the attack and afterwards is known.
“The narrative now about the conflict is that the security forces were
the peacekeepers between the IRA and UVF. That’s not the case,” she
said.
“The people behind Loughinisland were helped to orchestrate and carry
this out. When I’m not here, I want that to be known on the public
record. Someone needs to be held accountable.”
She said that the justice group is even more resolute today to pursue
truth and justice.
“The mood is probably stronger now than it ever was due to the fact that
we have learnt so much,” added Emma.”When we look back to when we first
started, we think ‘if only we knew then what we knew now’. We never
would have known anything had we not set out to get the truth.”
Aidan O’Toole was taking a shift behind the bar in his family-owned bar
that night 25 years ago.
He was 25 and had a 14 month-old baby and a seven-week baby. His father
was away in Romania, helping to build orphanages. The likelihood is high
that he too would have been killed or injured had he been there.
Aidan still carries a bullet in his kidney from the shooting and says
the memory is something that stays with him everyday.
“I’m still recovering and it never goes away from you,” he said. “You
just have to tear away. What else can you do? “We never thought we would
be still campaigning for the truth 25 years later. It all seems like
yesterday. The 25 years have flown in, it’s gone as a flash.”
“I just want the people who done it to be brought to justice and put
before the courts. I know they will only do two years in prison but
that’s immaterial. We accepted the Good Friday Agreement and to let
people out of jail in two years and we did that for peace.”
He agrees that the recent court hearing for the No Stone Unturned
journalists has opened old wounds.
“I felt really sorry for Barry and Trevor. I think it was a disgrace
that they were arrested and the way they were arrested with 40 officers
at their doors. They were just journalists doing their job. When they
started, they didn’t know what they would uncover and neither did we.
The police should be investigating the people who actually did the
shooting.
“If anything happened to me, my children would definitely carry the
campaign on. My wife Louise is very strong and she would push it on as
well.”
His message to the judicial system: “Just give us justice and go and
arrest the people who did it.”
As tensions rise over the case, it has been confirmed that the only British soldier to be charged with a crime in relation to Bloody Sunday will be summonsed to appear at Derry courthouse next month. Fourteen innocent civilians were killed and another fourteen were injured when British paratroopers opened fire on a civil rights protest in Derry in 1974. On March 14 this year, relatives of the victims were dismayed when it was announced that only one soldier out of the 18 investigated would face charges as a result of the massacre. A former member of the Parachute Regiment, known only as ‘Soldier F’ will be formally charged with two counts of murder in relation to two of the killings, those of James Wray and William McKinney. He will also face four counts of attempted murder in relation to the late Patrick O’Donnell and Michael Quinn, Joseph Friel and Joseph Mahon. ‘Soldier F’ gave evidence to the Saville Inquiry into Bloody Sunday in 2003 and admitted he had fired a total of 13 shots. His claims that those killed and wounded were “gunmen and bombers” were rejected in the report of the inquiry, which concluded that he had fired at least at father-of-six Paddy Doherty and that he had shot Bernard McGuigan as he went to Mr Doherty’s aid. The decision to hold the trial in Derry has been welcomed by lawyers representing the majority of relatives of those killed and wounded. The relatives had feared that pressure from military campaign groups and unionist and Tory politicians would result in the trial being held in Britain. The family of 26-year-old William McKinney said it was important that prosecutors did not allow bogus delays to hinder the trial as has happened with other legacy cases. “It has been a long time since evidence was first given to the Inquiry to get to this point. The important thing is that Soldier F is to be charged with the murder of our brother, Willie. I would urge the PPS not to deviate from the time scale it has set out,” said Michael McKinney. A loyalist campaign in support of the soldier has seen banners provocatively erected in more than a dozen locations across the North. A number of victims groups have called for the PSNI to take down the flags and banners, under hate crime legislation. However, the PSNI has actually been present when the banners have been raised and appear to have lent their tacit support to the campaign. Sinn Féin’s Caoimhe Archibald objected to one banner which reads ‘Coleraine supports Soldier F’. It was erected this week in the vicinity of the station in the County Derry town. “This is close to shopping centres, car parks and other amenities which are used by people from across the community and visitors to the north coast,” she said. “This banner will cause distress not only to the families of those killed on Bloody Sunday and those killed by the parachute regiment in Ballymurphy but also other victims of state violence. It should be removed immediately.” Philip McGuigan, Sinn Féin representative in north Antrim, described a scene in Ballymoney where a banner was raised today [Saturday] as “pathetic”. Three members of the PSNI took part in raising the banner
He said: “This banner is right outside the Jobs and Benefits Office on
John Street, which is used by all sections of the community.
“It is clearly intimidatory and offensive, particularly to those who
have lost loved ones as a result of state violence. Several police
officers stood by and watched while this banner was put up.”
Mickey Brady, the Sinn Féin MP for Newry and Armagh, also hit out at
PSNI for being on hand when a banner was erected in Armagh but did not
intervene.
“It is wrong that this banner has been erected in Armagh city centre in
the first instance but it is absolutely unacceptable that the PSNI stood
by at the bottom of the ladder and watched while a masked man put it
up,” he said.
“Incidents like this do nothing to support efforts to build community
confidence in the PSNI.”
There has been a welcome in Ireland for the result of a survey of
Britain’s ruling Conservative Party which revealed that most of its members would be willing to
see Irish reunification if it meant that England could leave the
European Union. The poll puts the Tories completely at odds with their DUP
allies in the London government.
A survey of Conservative Party members found that 59% would prefer to
see Ireland united if it secured Brexit, while an even greater number,
63% or almost two in three, would be happy to see an independent
Scotland if it meant Brexit would go ahead.
The research comes as the future of Britain looks increasingly
uncertain, with another Brexit deadline on the horizon in October and
the Tories preoccupied with a leadership contest for at least another
month. Mainstream media commentators have taken to predicting ‘the end
of the Union’ on a weekly basis.
Of the two remaining candidates for leader of the Conservative Party and
British Prime Minister, Boris Johnson (left) and Jeremy Hunt (right), Johnson remains
the clear favourite. However, his support will have suffered following
shocking reports on Friday that police had to be called to a domestic
incident at the home he shares with his partner. That has suddenly
darkened the image of the popular but controversial former Mayor of
London.
His rival in the leadership vote is the unfamiliar Foreign Secretary
Jeremy Hunt, a relative moderate and former opponent of Brexit who is
described as “Theresa May in trousers”. He is best known for the
frequency his name is mispronounced by news readers.
The Conservative Party membership will be canvassed in the next four
weeks and the new leader should be announced by the last week of July.
While both candidates could be tempted to call for an ‘England First’
Brexit in the wake of the YouGov poll, one of the first tasks of the
future Conservative leader and Prime Minister will be to tackle the
hardline unionist DUP, who are keeping the party in government through a
confidence-and-supply arrangement.
The DUP’s Brexit stance is to remilitarise the border between the north
and south of Ireland by pulling the Six Counties out of the EU,
regardless of the damage to the economy or the wishes of the people in
the North, most of whom want to remain.
Only a new general election could allow a new parliament to end the
DUP’s blocking tactics, although the strategy of going to the people
backfired spectacularly for Theresa May two years ago, weakening her
position and delaying Brexit.
Tory MP Daniel Kawczynski, who is supporting Boris Johnson, told BBC
Radio that if Johnson becomes Prime Minister, he has an opportunity to
win a general election to ensure the British government is “not at the
beck and call of the DUP”.
“I have to be careful what I say about the DUP because hitherto if I’ve
been critical of them then noises are made back here at Westminster,” he
said.
“We have still not left the European Union, in part because the DUP
absolutely categorically refused to contemplate the Northern Ireland
backstop.”
Sinn Féin’s John O’Dowd welcomed signs that the Consdervative Party were
willing to rethink the partition of Ireland.
Mr O’Dowd said: “We have always said that the people of Britain are
perfectly entitled to pursue Brexit if that is what they wish to do and
we wish them the best.
“What they are not entitled to do is drag the rest of us out with them,
against our best interests and democratically expressed wishes.
“Clearly, it is now dawning on many Tory Party members that, if they are
to have the kind of hard Brexit they wish to have, then the obvious
solution to the impact of that on Ireland is Irish reunification.
“It is a conclusion that more and more people are coming to every day
which is why poll after poll is showing greater support for Irish
reunification, particularly in the context of Brexit.
“Theresa May herself said last year that she would expect an Irish unity
poll to be passed. And with such overwhelming support for reunification
within the self-declared conservative and unionist party, it is
obviously time to begin preparing for an Irish unity referendum.”
The UFA Executive Board would first and foremost like to thank our members who participated in the recent Lobby Days, especially those that took the time to visit and/or get in contact with their elected leaders.
Thank you to both the New York State Senate & Assembly for passing our Cancer “Look-Back” Bill this week. Special thanks to Brooklyn Senator Andrew Gounardes & Bronx Assembly Member Karines Reyes, who sponsored the bills in their respective houses.
Both houses passed our bill unanimously. The bill, along with our Widow’s Cola Bill, will be sent to Governor Andrew Cuomo to be signed into law.
While not all of our legislation was successful this session, we recognize the great turnout in both DC and Albany. The support of our membership is crucial, and your presence did not go unnoticed. We appreciate our members sacrificing their time to turn out for political action events, and are grateful for your continued efforts.
On behalf of the UFA Executive Board, we once again express our gratitude for your dedication and support.
