Familys' Statement, 13 June 2000.
The following joint press statement was released on 13th
June 2000 by Margaret
Urwin, Secretary of Justice for the
Forgotten, the group representing the majority of the relatives
of victims and survivors of the 1974 Dublin and Monaghan
Bombings.
The statement followed recent public statements from Taoiseach
Bertie Ahern, and others in the Dublin political establishment,
calling for public inquiries in the North for several glaring
cases of injustice and collusion between British state forces and
Loyalist murder gangs, while refusing to support these familys' calls for equal
openness south of the border.
The statement was issued on behalf of the families
of the victims of several murderous Loyalist attacks south of the
Irish border: the Dublin bombings of 1972 and 1973; the Dublin and
Monaghan bombing of 1974; the Dundalk bombing of 1975; and the
murder of Seamus Ludlow in 1976.
The families of the victims of pro-British murder
gangs south of the Irish border support all such calls by bereaved
relatives for public
inquiries, north and south, where there is grave public disquiet
about collusion and official cover-ups following such Loyalist
killings.
This statement appeared in the local Dundalk
Democrat newspaper on 17 June and the next day it featured as
Letter of the Week in the Dublin weekly Ireland on Sunday.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Statement.
As families of victims of unsolved murders in this
State related to the Northern conflict, we welcome the Taoiseach's
call for an independent public inquiry into the murder of Portadown
man, Robert Hamill. We also welcome his support for the Bloody
Sunday Inquiry and his call for inquiries into the murders of Human
Rights lawyers, Pat Finucane and Rosemary Nelson.
Additionally, we welcome the remarks of former Taoiseach, Albert
Reynolds, supporting Mr. Ahern's call for the public inquiry into
Robert Hamill's death. During an interview on 'Morning
Ireland' on RTE on Thursday, 8th June, he expressed concern that no
inquest was to be held. We welcome his support for a process of
public accountability that is open and transparent.
However, their calls for public inquiries into atrocities committed
outside this jurisdiction ring rather hollow when compared with
their continued reluctance to hold public inquiries in this
jurisdiction into the murders of our loved ones who died in equally
tragic and controversial circumstances.
Mr. Reynolds' expression of concern into the failure to hold an
inquest in the Robert Hamill case might carry more conviction if he
was to express equal concern at the failure of this State to
conclude inquests in the cases of the Dublin bombings of 1972, 1973
and 1974.
We ask that journalists, in future, would challenge the Taoiseach
and all politicians who express support for inquiries outside this
jurisdiction to account for the glaring anomaly of their failure to
address the demands of victims in this State.
Tim Grace & Michelle O'Brien,
Justice for the Forgotten
(Dublin & Monaghan Bombings 1974)
Paddy Duffy, Matthew Bradshaw & Margaret Hynes
(Families of victims of 1972/73 Dublin Bombings)
Maura McKeever & Margaret English
(Families of victims of 1975 Dundalk Bombing)
Kevin Ludlow & Jimmy Sharkey
(Family of Seamus Ludlow)
PO Box 6790,
Dublin 15,
Ireland.
To Top
|