9 October 1997 Edition
Bloody Sunday: response from British soon?
By Martha McClelland
On Tuesday, Bloody Sunday relatives meet the Taoiseach. Sources indicate that an initial response from the British Government to the dossier on Bloody Sunday compiled by the previous Dublin Government last year will be outlined. Over the past year, fresh evidence and a growing world-wide lobby for a new independent inquiry has put the British Government under increasing press. With the collapse of the Tories, an international spotlight is now focused on the Labour government's response.
Anything less than an independent international inquiry will be rejected by relatives. Alternatives, such as a three person committee sitting to review current documents, are impotent and unable to deal with the mountain of eyewitness and other evidence which has been supressed. Some evidence suggests that Labour wants to deal with this open wound, but are afraid to because this requires them putting the Ministry of Defence and the Parachute Regiment in the dock.
Don Mullan, author of Eyewitness Bloody Sunday, referring to revelations throughout the year exposing glaring discrepancies in the ``evidence'' used by the British government in their case, said ``Bloody Sunday is an issue which is not going to go away. The findings of the Widgery Tribunal have been shown to be completely at odds with the evidence presented. We have gathered support from around the world and unless the Labour administration are prepared to set aside the findings of the Widgery Tribunal and launch a new independent inquiry they will come under even more pressure.''
In addition to recent revelations of a British Army helicopter film taken that day, but never presented in evidence, the Bloody Sunday Justice Campaign are upping their campaign to prove that shots were fired from the City Walls. The British Army version rules out the possibility of shots being fired from the Walls, but last year Thomas Dawe, an Englishman, came forward to reveal that bullets landed on the grassy bank underneath which he was sheltering. These could only have been fired from the Walls.
An archaeologist and a geophysicist have now been called in to search for bullets believed to be embedded in a grass verge under the Walls. John Kelly, whose brother was shot dead that day, spoke for the Justice Group and said ``If we can prove that shots were fired from the Walls, then the British Government will have a moral obligation to admit the errors in the Widgery Report and open a new and independent inquiry.''
On Tuesday, Bloody Sunday relatives meet the Taoiseach. Sources indicate that an initial response from the British Government to the dossier on Bloody Sunday compiled by the previous Dublin Government last year will be outlined. Over the past year, fresh evidence and a growing world-wide lobby for a new independent inquiry has put the British Government under increasing press. With the collapse of the Tories, an international spotlight is now focused on the Labour government's response.
Anything less than an independent international inquiry will be rejected by relatives. Alternatives, such as a three person committee sitting to review current documents, are impotent and unable to deal with the mountain of eyewitness and other evidence which has been supressed. Some evidence suggests that Labour wants to deal with this open wound, but are afraid to because this requires them putting the Ministry of Defence and the Parachute Regiment in the dock.
Don Mullan, author of Eyewitness Bloody Sunday, referring to revelations throughout the year exposing glaring discrepancies in the ``evidence'' used by the British government in their case, said ``Bloody Sunday is an issue which is not going to go away. The findings of the Widgery Tribunal have been shown to be completely at odds with the evidence presented. We have gathered support from around the world and unless the Labour administration are prepared to set aside the findings of the Widgery Tribunal and launch a new independent inquiry they will come under even more pressure.''
In addition to recent revelations of a British Army helicopter film taken that day, but never presented in evidence, the Bloody Sunday Justice Campaign are upping their campaign to prove that shots were fired from the City Walls. The British Army version rules out the possibility of shots being fired from the Walls, but last year Thomas Dawe, an Englishman, came forward to reveal that bullets landed on the grassy bank underneath which he was sheltering. These could only have been fired from the Walls.
An archaeologist and a geophysicist have now been called in to search for bullets believed to be embedded in a grass verge under the Walls. John Kelly, whose brother was shot dead that day, spoke for the Justice Group and said ``If we can prove that shots were fired from the Walls, then the British Government will have a moral obligation to admit the errors in the Widgery Report and open a new and independent inquiry.''