Pat Finucane murder: US House Committee on Foreign Affairs hearing on Wednesday

» John Hedges

An Phoblacht Editor

‘In terms of allegations of British state ‘collusion’ with loyalist paramilitaries, this is the big one’ – Security advisor to British Prime Minister David Cameron

MICHAEL FINUCANE will give evidence on Wednesday to a US House Committee on Foreign Affairs sub-committee in Washington DC on his father's murder by a unionist death squad infiltrated if not controlled by British Intelligence.

The hearing, chaired by Representative Christopher H Smith (R-NJ) and titled Recent Developments in the Investigation of the Murder of Human Rights Attorney Patrick Finucane, will also take testimony from human rights attorney Brigadier General James P Cullen, USA (Retired).

Pat Finucane was shot dead at home, in front of his family, in February 1989 by the UDA/UFF. At least two of those involved in the murder of the troublesome civil liberties advocate were British Government agents.

Pat Finucane’s widow, Geraldine (pictured right), has petitioned the courts for several documents after Prime Minister David Cameron reneged in October 2011 on a British Government pledge to hold a full, independent inquiry into the 1989 assassination.

Cameron instead ordered a review of the evidence by senior QC Sir Desmond de Silva.

In meetings with the Finucane family and their legal representatives prior to the announcement of the de Silva review, Cameron lead them to believe he would honour the commitments of the Tony Blair Labour Government for an inquiry.

In his 2012 report, de Silva confirmed there was collusion in the Finucane killing but found “no overarching conspiracy”.

An angry Geraldine Finucane described the report as a “whitewash”.

The Belfast High Court earlier this year heard about a paper sent to Prime Minister Cameron in July 2011 by security advisor Ciaran Martin in which the security analyst says:

“In terms of allegations of British state ‘collusion’ with loyalist paramilitaries, this is the big one.

“Some of the evidence available only internally could be read to suggest that within Government at a high level this systematic problem with loyalist agents was known but nothing was done about it.”

❏  AN RTÉ Freedom of Information battle with the British authorities last December revealed a previously unpublished chapter of the 2003 inquiry by former Metropolitan Police Commissioner Sir John Stevens into the murder.

Stevens’s investigation revealed that the RUC deliberately destroyed vital evidence in the case. Exhibits and records ‘could not be found’ and fingerprints at the scene were not compared against suspects.

The Stevens Report also stated that one of two murder weapons, a Browning pistol, was recovered by police but then given back to the British Army, from where it had previously been stolen by loyalists.