SAOIRSE32

Guardian

Owen Bowcott, Ireland correspondent
Thursday November 30, 2006
The Guardian

Police and soldiers in Northern Ireland helped to coordinate a wave of loyalist bombings and gun attacks on both sides of the border in the 1970s, according to an Irish parliamentary report released yesterday.

The conclusions are likely to fuel fresh demands for investigations into what is alleged to have been a pattern of collusion between British security forces and the Ulster Volunteer Force.

The study, by the Irish parliament’s committee on justice, equality, defence and women’s rights, focuses on what has become known as the Glennane gang, a loyalist paramilitary group operating from a farm near Glennane, County Armagh, in the mid-70s.

Earlier this month a panel of international lawyers concluded there was credible evidence that Royal Ulster Constabulary officers and Ulster Defence Regiment soldiers had cooperated with the gang.

Yesterday’s report assessed the bombings at Dublin airport and Dundalk in 1975 and Castleblayney, Co Monaghan in 1976, as well as a series of atrocities in Northern Ireland including the Miami Showband massacre in 1975.

In its conclusions, the committee said it was “left in no doubt that collusion between the British security forces and terrorists was behind many if not all of the atrocities considered in this report.”

The report urged the British government to cooperate with any further investigations. “We are horrified that persons who were employed by the British administration to preserve peace and to protect people were engaged in the creation of violence and the butchering of innocent victims.

“Given that we are dealing with acts of international terrorism that were colluded in by the British security forces, the British government cannot legitimately refuse to cooperate with investigations and attempts to get to the truth.”

Contemporary reports by the Irish government that four members of the RUC in the Portadown area were also members of the UVF were never fully investigated, the committee said.

“Our experience has been that the British authorities have reacted to the issues that arise from the atrocities in a closed and defensive manner.”

BN.ie

30/11/2006 - 16:27:08

A father of 10 accused of IRA membership denied under oath having any items in his house worth destroying when gardaí conducted a search of the house, the Special Criminal Court heard today.

Art Sherwin (aged 55), of Ballinagappa Road, Clane, Co Kildare, told prosecuting counsel Mr Remy Farrell BL that he felt intimidated when his house was raided as part of a Garda investigation and denied wanting to leave to destroy evidence.

“There was no chance of any evidence being destroyed as I had nothing of that kind there,” he said.

Mr Sherwin denies membership of an illegal organisation styling itself the Irish Republican Army, otherwise Óglaigh na hÉireann, otherwise the IRA, on March 14, 2005.

The trial at the three-judge court continues tomorrow.

BN.ie

30/11/2006 - 17:15:31

The judge in the Omagh bomb trial today launched a blistering attack on two police officers over what he branded misleading and false evidence.

He called their actions “reprehensible” and added: “The credibility of the two witnesses had been brought into serious question”.

It was revealed today the Northern Police Ombudsman has been called in by Chief Constable Huge Orde after the judge earlier called for an immediate investigation of the officers’ actions.

Mr Justice Weir issued his damning indictment of Detective Sergeant Fiona Cooper and Detective Sergeant Philip Marshall, since promoted to detective chief inspector, when ruling on a defence application to have two of the 58 charges against the alleged Omagh bomber thrown out.

Yesterday the defence team for 37-year-old south Armagh man Sean Hoey made an application to have two charges, unrelated to the Omagh bombing itself, dismissed.

Orlando Pownall, QC, claimed the officers had been involved in “a unity of purpose, otherwise known as a conspiracy to bury” evidence.

The charges surrounded a murder conspiracy and a mortar bomb find at Altmore Forest at Dungannon, Co Tyrone, in April 2001, nearly three years after the Omagh bomb, which claimed 29 lives and injured hundreds more.

Hoey, an electrician, denies all charges against him.

After considering the application overnight the judge told Mr Pownall he was turning it down.

However, he described the actions of the two police officers as “reprehensible”.

He said: “The defence has exposed the nature of false and misleading evidence of these two witnesses”.

He went on: “The credibility of the two witnesses has been brought into serious question.”

Explaining his refusal to drop the charges he said: “I do not, however, accept in the course of the present case that the conduct of the police witnesses is so grave as to threaten or undermine the rule of law itself.

“Any prejudice can be dealt with within the trial process.”

Mr Justice Weir said he considered there was no infringement of Hoey’s human rights in continuing the trial on the two counts.

The accusations against the two police witnesses centred on written statements that they made and that the court heard had replaced earlier statements, which had since disappeared.

Mr Pownall alleged the statements had been doctored to beef up the case against Hoey to appear stronger.

Last week the judge called for an immediate investigation into why the statements were altered.

The Police Service of Northern Ireland confirmed today that Orde had referred the matter to the police ombudsman for investigation.