Ed Moloney and Anthony McIntyre DID know police could seize tapes, Boston College insists

‘On RTÉ last Sunday, Anthony McIntyre was forced to concede that perhaps two out of the 26 people he interviewed were not anti-Sinn Féin’

ED MOLONEY AND ANTHONY McINTYRE did know that interviews with former republicans and loyalists in what have become known as the ‘Boston College Tapes’ could be seized by the US authorities and handed to the PSNI or British agencies, the overall director of the Boston College project has sensationally revealed.

This runs contrary to guaranteees given by Moloney and McIntyre that interviews would remain confidential and unpublished until after interviewees had died.

• Anthony McIntyre and Ed Moloney

Boston College have now insisted that the pair were aware that the Anglo-US Mutual Legal Assistance Treaty could be used by police to get access to people’s testimony – and it was.

Moloney and McIntyre have denied the academic institution’s assertion.

The tapes have been used as a basis for allegations that Sinn Féin leader Gerry Adams was involved in the 1972 IRA abduction and killing of suspected informer Jean McConville.

On Sunday, Gerry Adams was released without charge after four days being questioned by the PSNI on the allegations. The PSNI have now sent a file to the North’s Public Prosecution Service. It has been reported by the mainstream media that the PSNI had wanted to charge Gerry Adams with IRA membership but had insufficient evidence to stand any chance of a successful prosecution.

Now Boston College have further distanced themselves from what is becoming a rapidly discredited exercise under their academic cover. They have offered to return tapes to interviewees who have not already been compromised by what writer Danny Morrison has described as a “sham history project”.

Gerry Adams has welcomed the Boston College announcement, saying:

“Everyone has the right to record their history but not at the expense of the lives of others.”

He said that the Boston College Belfast Project “was flawed from the beginning”, having been conceived by Lord Paul Bew, a one-time member of the anti-republican Workers’ Party and later an adviser to David Trimble as leader of the Ulster Unionist Party.

He said that Lord Bew proposed Ed Moloney and Anthony McIntyre to front the project “despite the fact that both individuals were extremely hostile to myself, Sinn Féin, the Peace Process and the political process”, Gerry Adams said. (The identity of two anonymous ‘historians’ cited by Ed Moloney

“I was not and am not aware of any republican or member of Sinn Féin in support of the Peace Process who were approached by Anthony McIntyre to be interviewed. On the contrary, the individuals so far revealed as having participated are all hostile to Sinn Féin.

“On RTÉ last Sunday, Anthony McIntyre was forced to concede that perhaps two out of the 26 people he interviewed were not anti-Sinn Féin.

“This flawed project was exposed when Ed Moloney chose to capitalise on the death of Brendan Hughes and write a book called Voices from the Grave. No republicans, including myself, who were slandered in that book were offered the opportunity before publication to rebut the allegations made against them. Ed Moloney needs to explain that decision.

“He also needs to explain why, after the project officially closed, he returned to Ireland in 2011 and asked Dolours Price – whom he had described as mentally unwell and suffering from Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder – to be interviewed on DVD, a DVD which he then lodged in the archive.

“It is that interview, Anthony McIntyre’s interview with the late Brendan Hughes and his interview with Ivor Bell which formed the mainstay for my arrest last week.”

Gerry Adams concluded:

“I welcome the end of the Boston Belfast Project, indicated by the college’s offer to now return the interviews to the interviewees before the securocrats who cannot live with the peace seek to seize the rest of the archive and do mischief.

“Two standards are operating here. No British soldiers or former RUC officers involved in killings or conspiracies or collusion are subject to the same treatment as republicans. Once again, this emphasises why we need to deal holistically with our past and why we need a process such as those proposed by [US talks negotiators] Richard Haass and Meghan O’Sullivan.”