| Police Report Confirms NI Security Force
Collusion
Reports by Frank Shouldice
Finucane Murder Should Have Been Prevented
Evidence of collusion between British Army officers, the police force,
and loyalist paramilitaries in targeting Irish republicans was starkly
revealed in the digest of a wide-ranging 3,000-page report published by
John Stevens, chief of London’s Metropolitan Police. Interim findings
of the Stevens Report, as it is known, unveil a shocking web of collusion
within the security forces in Northern Ireland. It reveals that intelligence
sources within the police and military ran illegal operations in conjunction
with known loyalist paramilitaries. It also finds that the 1987 murder
of Protestant teenager Adam Lambert – mistaken for a Catholic –
and the high-profile assassination of solicitor Pat Finucane in 1989 could
have been prevented. Those responsible for both murders could easily have
been caught, the report alleges.
In addition, Stevens accuses the Royal Ulster Constabulary (now called
the Police Service of Northern Ireland) and the British Army of willfully
obstructing and misleading his investigation. He alleges that key information
was withheld and that the fire, which occurred at his team’s operational
center near Belfast, was deliberately caused by arson.
John Stevens unveiled his potentially explosive report on April 17. The
four-year investigation is his third separate inquiry into security matters
in Northern Ireland. He first began his work in 1989 to investigate alleged
breaches of security by the RUC and British Army but told reporters that
the extent of collusion uncovered this time was “way beyond”
any irregularities uncovered by the two previous inspections. Collusion
took the form of “the willful failure to keep records, the absence
of accountability, the withholding of intelligence and evidence [and]
the extreme [case] of agents being involved in murder.”
Such a controversial report has re-ignited demands for a full inquiry
into Pat Finucane’s murder. In attempting to establish a timetable
of events, the Stevens report noted that Douglas Hogg, then junior minister
at the British Home Office, told the House of Commons that certain figures
in the legal profession in Northern Ireland were “unduly sympathetic
to the cause” of the Provisional IRA. Three weeks later the Catholic
solicitor was shot dead in front of his wife Geraldine and their three
children.
In an unrelated trial three years later, UDA intelligence officer Brian
Nelson was revealed as a British Army agent. Nelson was found to have
given the security forces a tip-off about loyalist plans to kill Finucane.
The tip-off was ignored. Facing court charges of his own, Nelson was jailed
for ten years on five counts of conspiracy to murder Catholics.
In June 1999, a former UDA quartermaster and RUC Special Branch agent,
William Stobie, was charged with killing the solicitor. At his trial two
years later, Stobie admitted to providing the gun for the assassination
but denied carrying out the shooting. The case against him collapsed when
a key witness refused to testify. Stobie walked free but was killed two
months later by loyalist gunmen.
Brian Nelson, 53, did not fare much better. He served his sentence and
was subsequently released from jail only to die in Canada from a brain
hemorrhage. Nelson’s death occurred just five days before the Stevens
Report was released.
Geraldine Finucane has long demanded a full judicial inquiry into events
surrounding her husband’s murder. Through the years she has been
supported by various human rights organizations, including Amnesty International,
and in 1998 the United Nations backed her call. The British government
refused to open such an inquiry but appointed John Stevens the following
year to carry out an internal police investigation. The Finucane family
will not be satisfied if the Stevens Report brings the matter to a close.
Although he makes 21 recommendations – and intends to return next
January to see if they have been implemented – the report falls far
short of their demand for a public, sworn inquiry. Canadian judge Peter
Cory is presently examining six controversial murders in Northern Ireland
to assess whether a full judicial inquiry is warranted.
Even if the Stevens Report does not satisfy the relatives of murder victims,
its confirmation of collusion fully validates suspicions long-held by
many within the nationalist community. “I believe the RUC investigation
of Pat Finucane’s murder should have resulted in the early arrest
and detention of his killers,” found Stevens. “I conclude there
was collusion in both murders [Lambert and Finucane] and the circumstances
surrounding them,” he said, adding that Douglas Hogg, for one, was
“compromised” after his remarks to the House of Commons.
Stevens’ findings have potentially opened a can of worms. The report
raises major questions on the chain of command and who-knew-what about
intelligence strategy involving army, police and loyalist gunmen.
SDLP (Social Democratic Labour Party) leader Mark Durkan felt it leaves
many questions unanswered. “It does not say how high the collusion
went,” he said. “What did our supposed great and good know about
this?” he asked, demanding to know whether former RUC chiefs Ronnie
Flanagan and Hugh Annesley, former Secretary of State for Northern Ireland
Tom King and former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher were in on
it. “What did they know when nationalists were being murdered with
state collusion?” posed Durkan.
However, the Stevens Report does not end with allegations and recommendations.
On the basis of three separate investigations over 14 years, he has sent
a total of 57 files to the Director of Public Prosecutions. More files
may follow.
The London police commissioner holds that the security forces in Northern
Ireland do not provide the same level for protection to Catholics as they
do for Protestants. He was particularly scathing about a lack of cooperation
from the RUC Special Branch but was also critical of sections of the British
Army, the RUC and the army’s Force Research Unit (FRU) which handles
counter-terrorist intelligence.
“Informants and agents were allowed to operate without effective
control and to participate in terrorist crimes,” he concluded. “Nationalists
were known to be targeted but were not properly warned or protected. Important
evidence was neither exploited nor preserved.”
Despite the shocking nature of his report, officials in Dublin and London
insist that current political negotiations between the Irish and British
governments would not be adversely affected by the revelations. Brian
Cowen, Minister for Foreign Affairs, said that Stevens’ conclusions
were of “the utmost gravity” but had to be seen “in total
isolation” from government attempts to revive the deadlocked peace
talks.
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