Bloody Sunday, Human Rights Discourse and the Role of the Irish Government in Lobbying for a Second Inquiry
Résumés
Cet article se penche sur la campagne pour une nouvelle enquête sur le Bloody Sunday (30 janvier 1972), et sur la manière dont le discours des droits humains a permis d’obtenir le soutien de la République d’Irlande dans cette entreprise. L’enquête Widgery de 1972 avait déjà été critiquée à l’époque par des organisations de défense des droits humains, ainsi que par le gouvernement irlandais. Mais ce n’est qu’en 1989, aux débuts du processus de paix, qu’une campagne prend forme pour réclamer justice. Celle-ci se donne pour mission de redéfinir le Bloody Sunday comme relevant de la question des droits humains, et de l’éloigner de toute association avec la cause nationaliste ou républicaine irlandaise. À l’aide d’archives récemment déclassifiées, une attention particulière est portée à la manière dont cette stratégie a permis à la campagne de gagner le soutien du gouvernement irlandais, qui a ensuite joué un rôle essentiel en faisant pression sur le gouvernement britannique afin qu’il crée une nouvelle enquête en 1998.
Entrées d’index
Mots-clés :
Bloody Sunday, droits humains, gouvernement irlandais, gouvernement britannique, Irlande du Nord, enquête Saville, campagne pour la justiceKeywords:
Bloody Sunday, human rights, Irish government, UK government, Northern Ireland, Saville Inquiry, justice campaignPlan
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Introduction
- 1 “Saville Inquiry”, House of Commons Debates, vol. 511, 15 June 2010, col. 739.
1The 50th anniversary of Bloody Sunday was commemorated in Derry / Londonderry on 30 January 2022. Twelve years had passed since the much-publicised conclusions of the Saville Report were released on 15 June 2010, and David Cameron offered an apology on behalf of the British state. The Prime Minister accepted the conclusions of the report that none of the thirteen civilians killed or the sixteen injured had been a threat to the soldiers, and admitted that the army’s actions on Bloody Sunday had been “unjustified and unjustifiable”.1
2Many people, even outside Northern Ireland, will have heard of “Bloody Sunday”. Fewer, however, may know what the march of 30 January 1972 really was about: a protest against the policy of internment without trial, introduced in Northern Ireland in August 1971. The march had been banned by the government, but was maintained by the Northern Ireland Civil Rights Association. The government sent the British army to police the march and carry out an arrest operation, during which soldiers opened fire on the crowd. Two main narratives quickly emerged: the army claimed they had fired only in retaliation at gunmen and nail-bombers, while civilian eyewitnesses and reporters spoke of soldiers firing unprovoked into a crowd of unarmed and fleeing civilians.
- 2 Lord John Passmore Widgery, Bloody Sunday, 1972: Lord Widgery’s Report of Events in Londonderry, No (...)
3The United Kingdom Parliament’s reaction was swift: a public inquiry was immediately set up, to be chaired by Lord Chief Justice Widgery. Far from resolving the crisis of confidence created by Bloody Sunday, however, the Widgery Report, published on 18 April 1972, came under strong criticism. While it was accepted by the UK Parliament and government, it was rejected by the victims’ families and the nationalist community in Ireland, who denounced it as a “whitewash”. Nonetheless, it became the official version of Bloody Sunday and would remain so until 1998. The report’s conclusions placed the blame for the deaths on the organisers of the march, largely exonerated the soldiers from responsibility, and accepted the claim that they had come under fire first. Widgery did admit that there was no hard evidence that any of the victims had posed a threat to the soldiers at the time when they were shot, but still cast doubt on the innocence of some of them.2
- 3 PRONI: Public Record Office of Northern Ireland; NAI: National Archives of Ireland.
4Despite the shock and anger created by the Widgery Report, it was only in the late 1980s that a group of victims’ relatives and local activists began to get organised, leading to the establishment of the Bloody Sunday Justice Campaign (BSJC) in 1992. One of the key aspects of their strategy was to present Bloody Sunday as a human rights issue: this gradually allowed them to secure the support of the Irish government which, in turn, put pressure on the UK government to grant a second inquiry into Bloody Sunday, the Saville Inquiry (1998-2010). This article will attempt to assess the impact of both the use of human rights discourse, and of the Irish government’s decision to support the BSJC, by looking at Irish parliamentary debates, as well as PRONI and NAI archives released since 2018.3
Early reactions to Bloody Sunday: human rights groups, and the Irish government (1972-1989)
- 4 Martin McCleery, Operation Demetrius and Its Aftermath: A New History of the Use of Internment with (...)
- 5 Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms, Council of Europe Treaty Se (...)
5The march of 30 January 1972 was a march against the policy of internment without trial, which already placed Bloody Sunday in the realm of human rights. The British government were clearly aware that internment constituted a breach of human rights under the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR), ratified by the United Kingdom in 1951: before introducing internment, they notified the Council of Europe of their intention to do so, justifying this departure from the rule of law by invoking the need to curb the rise of paramilitary activity.4 The other relevant human right in relation to Bloody Sunday was the “right to life”, protected by article 2 of the ECHR, which defined the circumstances in which the state could use force against its own citizens: it had to be “no more than absolutely necessary” and only for specific purposes, including quelling an insurrection or making a lawful arrest.5
- 6 Samuel Dash, Justice Denied: A Challenge to Lord Widgery’s Report on “Bloody Sunday”, New York, Def (...)
- 7 “Widgery Report on Bloody Sunday ‘Attacked’”, The Times, 8 June 1972, p. 2.
6Human rights organisations and lawyers were involved very early on in trying to challenge the official version of Bloody Sunday. The National Council for Civil Liberties (NCCL), a UK-based civil rights and human rights advocacy group, immediately called for an international tribunal to be established.6 After the Widgery Report was published, they contacted the International League for the Rights of Man, a human rights organisation with consultative status at the United Nations. Together, they asked eminent American law professor Samuel Dash to write his own assessment of the Widgery Report. Dash’s report was published in June 1972 and identified numerous failings with the Widgery Inquiry. Yet, there was virtually no response from the British state: the Ministry of Defence only gave a short statement to the press, which dismissed the document by arguing that it was “perfectly clear” that Dash’s report had only considered one side of the story and “[could not] be possibly regarded as impartial”7 – without, however, replying to any of the specific arguments given in the report.
- 8 NAI, Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA), 2002/19/535, 31 January 1972.
- 9 NAI, DFA, 2003/17/271, 31 January 1972.
- 10 Ibid.
- 11 NAI, Department of the Taoiseach, 2003/16/462, 1 February 1972.
- 12 NAI, DFA, 2003/17/271, 19 April 1972.
- 13 Dermot Walsh, Bloody Sunday and the Rule of Law in Northern Ireland, Basingstoke, Macmillan, 2000, (...)
- 14 “Vote 46: Foreign Affairs (Resumed)”, Dáil Éireann Debates, vol. 275, no. 7, 6 November 1974.
7The Irish government also reacted quickly to Bloody Sunday. On the day of the event, the Department of Foreign Affairs called the Irish representative at the United Nations in order to see whether any action could be taken through the Security Council8. The next day, Taoiseach Jack Lynch declared a day of national mourning and said: “The Government are satisfied that British soldiers recklessly fired on unarmed civilians in Derry yesterday”.9 He called for the withdrawal of British troops from Derry and other predominantly Catholic areas of the North, for an end to internment and for “a form of international enquiry”.10 Following these statements, an exchange between C. V. Whelan, working at the Embassy of Ireland to Great Britain, and Kelvin White of the UK’s Commonwealth and Foreign Office, shows a very tense conversation: White accused the Irish government of “prejudging” the issue of the Widgery inquiry, expressing outrage at the suggestion that the British army was “telling lies”, while Whelan maintained that there were good reasons to doubt the army’s version, as it was clearly at odds with many civilian testimonies.11 Upon the release of the Widgery Report, the Taoiseach issued a statement saying he “found it difficult to see how Lord Widgery reached the general conclusions he did even on the evidence set out in the report itself”, adding that this outcome only confirmed the necessity of an inquiry with an international dimension.12 Beyond these protests, however, the Irish government was not able to weigh on the UK government’s policy on Bloody Sunday. Indeed, until the 1985 Anglo-Irish Agreement, there were no institutions through which regular British-Irish cooperation could formally take place. The United Nations discussions did not lead anywhere, nor did the option of taking the case to the European Court of Human Rights: the case was turned down by the European Commission on the grounds that all domestic remedies had not been exhausted.13 Thus, the Irish government was out of options, as reflected in a bitter remark by independent TD Neil Blaney, who, speaking in the Dáil in 1974, accused them of “having forgotten the massacre on Bloody Sunday in Derry”.14
- 15 Lord Salmon, Royal Commission on Tribunals of Inquiry, 1966: Report of the Commission under the Cha (...)
- 16 Quoted by John Deering, “Success at Last for the Bloody Sunday Relatives”, The Irish Times, 20 Dece (...)
8For the next two decades, the debate on the official version of Bloody Sunday effectively remained closed, with the UK government always standing by the Widgery Report as the final and definitive version of the event – indeed, the established doctrine in the United Kingdom was that a public inquiry was the highest possible authority, and there could be no appeal from its conclusions.15 A small concession was made in 1974, when the government issued a statement agreeing to pay compensation to the victims’ families “in a spirit of goodwill and conciliation […] and on an ex-gratia basis”, and accepting that all the victims should be regarded as “not guilty” of engaging in violence – but still referring to the Widgery Report as a basis to refuse any liability for Bloody Sunday.16
The reframing of Bloody Sunday as a human rights issue (1989-1997)
- 17 Brian Conway, Commemoration and Bloody Sunday: Pathways of Memory, Basingstoke, Palgrave Macmillan, (...)
9Between 1975 and 1989, Sinn Féin filled the void left by the moribund civil rights movement and organised the commemorations of Bloody Sunday.17 They framed the event in a way that fitted the republican agenda, portraying it as evidence of the necessity of British withdrawal from the North of Ireland. From 1990, however, the commemorations were taken over by a new group of campaigners, led by Tony Doherty, son of Bloody Sunday victim Patrick Doherty, who set up the Bloody Sunday Initiative (BSI) in 1989. One of the main strategies of the BSI was to reclaim Bloody Sunday as a justice and human rights issue, rather than a republican issue, as outlined here by Jim Keys, who was involved in the committee in charge of planning the commemorations:
- 18 Interview with author, Derry / Londonderry, 22 July 2010.
One of the objectives of the Bloody Sunday Initiative was to promote it for what it was, a human rights issue giving a more universal image to the commemorations [and to the campaign] so as to counter the sectarianisation of it as “a nationalist issue”.18
The perception of Bloody Sunday as a nationalist / republican issue was identified by the campaigners as one of the main reasons why the Republic of Ireland proved unresponsive to their requests for support in the initial phase of the campaign, as explained by civil rights veteran Eamonn McCann, interviewed by author Julieann Campbell, herself a Bloody Sunday relative and campaigner:
- 19 Julieann Campbell, Setting the Truth Free: The Inside Story of the Bloody Sunday Justice Campaign, (...)
Eamonn McCann remembers the Dublin launch of the book [Eamonn McCann, Bloody Sunday in Derry: What Really Happened, 1992]: “We invited every TD and senator and we held the launch in a hotel directly across the road from Leinster House so they literally had only to cross the road. But of the dozens invited, only one turned up – Tony Gregory, independent TD for Dublin Central. Now, that tells you something. The thought was persisting that to be associated with the campaign was to be associated with something dangerous”.19
- 20 “Adjournment Debate – British Army Shootings in Derry, 1972”, Dáil Éireann Debates, vol. 415, no. 5 (...)
- 21 PRONI, CENT/1/24/22A, 23 December 1992.
Indeed, looking at parliamentary debates in Ireland, it appears that until 1994, the only TDs who raised the question of Bloody Sunday in the Dáil were independent TD Tony Gregory and Trevor Sargent of the Green Party.20 As for the Northern Ireland Office, an internal document shows how suspicious they were of the BSI’s possible links to Sinn Féin: “[…] it may be useful to ask […] for an up-to-date assessment of the ‘Bloody Sunday Initiative’ and the extent of their involvement with Sinn Féin”.21
- 22 Charlotte Barcat, “‘A Truth for the World’: From Widgery to Saville, the Campaign for Truth and Jus (...)
10It was undoubtedly true that members of Sinn Féin were involved in the campaign, like Tony Doherty, who had spent four years in jail for IRA membership after his father’s death and remained a member of Sinn Féin, although having renounced violence. Many republican organisations also participated in the commemoration marches, and commemoration events remained resolutely anti-imperialist in their discourse, although with an international perspective. Still, reducing the campaign to republicanism was a misrepresentation of both its objectives and its membership, which reached far beyond Sinn Féin and focused on a call for “truth and justice”, and transnational solidarity, rather than British withdrawal from the North of Ireland. The slogan chosen for the 20th anniversary in January 1992, “One World, One Struggle”, was particularly emblematic of this change.22
11In February 1992, the BSJC took over from the BSI and stepped up the campaigning, with three clearly stated aims: a declaration of innocence for all the victims, a clear repudiation of the Widgery Report, and prosecutions of the guilty. Doherty’s words outline the pragmatic aspect of the BSJC’s strategy, and why he, even though a republican himself, was convinced that the campaign needed both to be truly inclusive, and to be perceived as such:
- 23 Quoted in Julieann Campbell, Setting the Truth Free…, p. 64.
I think that at that point our campaign was generally viewed as some sort of republican-front organisation. But I was always genuine in the view that this shouldn’t be a republican campaign because, if it was, it wouldn’t get anywhere. There were also families who weren’t republicans and the campaign had to be representative of all. But that’s not how other people saw it, obviously.23
- 24 Ibid., p. 57.
- 25 Ibid., p. 74.
12The BSJC tried many times to meet Irish president Mary Robinson from September 1992, but were repeatedly turned down, both in Northern Ireland and in Dublin, which they felt was a “blatant snub”.24 Mary Robinson’s explanation was that the “constitutional parameters” of her office did not allow her to meet them, as they were a political campaign, while the Irish president is supposed to be above politics. This response left the campaigners “furious and frustrated that their case was still being viewed as a political rather than a human rights issue”.25
- 26 Dermot Walsh, Bloody Sunday and the Rule of Law…, p. 289.
- 27 “Appendix 1: Confidential Downing Street Minutes, Dated 1 February 1972”, in Eyewitness Bloody Sund (...)
13To strengthen the credibility of their case, the BSJC sought out many legal and human rights experts: they worked with Seamus Treacy of the Madden & Finucane firm, who helped them renew their application to the European Commission on Human Rights – although unsuccessfully.26 Help also came from Jane Winter of British-Irish Rights Watch, who searched the UK’s National Archives in 1995: there, she unearthed many documents related to the Widgery Inquiry, including photographs and testimonies that had been excluded from the inquiry, as well as a damning government memo in which Prime Minister Edward Heath impressed upon Lord Widgery that the government were leading a “propaganda war” in Northern Ireland.27
- 28 PRONI, CENT/1/24/22A, 23 December 1992; PRONI, CENT/1/23/6A, 26 January 1994.
- 29 Julieann Campbell, Setting the Truth Free…, p. 84-86.
14The responses from John Major’s government were rather disheartening for the campaigners: although the Prime Minister conceded in a letter that all the victims should be regarded as innocent, his discourse did not stray far from the government’s 1974 statement. Until 1997, the government’s line would remain almost unchanged: it “would not be right” to re-open the case which had already been investigated by a public inquiry.28 Still, the political tensions relaxed considerably with the Downing Street Declaration of December 1993 – a joint declaration for peace in which UK Prime Minister John Major and Taoiseach Albert Reynolds both recognised the principles of self-determination and of democratic consent – and with the IRA ceasefire of August 1994. In the Republic of Ireland, the new Fine Gael Taoiseach, John Bruton, who took office in December 1994, showed much more interest than his predecessors in communicating with the BSJC. In January 1995, Tony Doherty was invited to speak at the Irish Forum for Peace and Reconciliation, and in February, BSJC members finally met Mary Robinson in Dublin, as part of a “Relatives for Justice” delegation.29
- 30 Dermot Walsh, The Bloody Sunday Tribunal of Inquiry: A Resounding Defeat for Truth, Justice and the (...)
- 31 Eyewitness Bloody Sunday…, p. 143-165.
- 32 John Kelly, foreword to Robert Breglio, Don Mullan, Raymond McClean, “Bloody Sunday”: The Breglio R (...)
15In the run-up to the 25th anniversary commemoration, many new books and reports were published to bolster the case for a new inquiry. The BSJC contacted law professor Dermot Walsh, from the University of Limerick, to get a legal expert’s assessment of the significance of the new documents.30 The most influential book, however, was probably that of human rights activist Don Mullan, who had been present on Bloody Sunday as a teenager. Mullan dug out over 700 statements by civilians given to the NCCL in 1972 and left aside by Widgery. These formed the basis of Eyewitness Bloody Sunday: The Truth, published for the 25th anniversary in January 1997. The book’s most sensational claim was that there might have been firing from soldiers stationed on the city walls.31 Mullan also enlisted the help of American ballistics expert Robert Breglio, who wrote a report confirming the credibility of this hypothesis. In the foreword, John Kelly, chairman of the BSJC, stated: “Today’s launch of the Breglio Report in the city of New York, is our first step in placing Bloody Sunday on the international Human Rights agenda”.32
16Dáil debates show intense pressure from Bertie Ahern and his Fianna Fáil party on Bruton’s government in the early months of 1997. On the eve of the 25th anniversary of Bloody Sunday, Ahern took Bruton to task, pressing him on the question of the new inquiry into Bloody Sunday. Bruton replied with a degree of defensiveness, trying to emphasise that the government was neither letting the UK government off the hook, nor treating the matter lightly:
- 33 “Order of Business”, Dáil Éireann Debates, vol. 474, no. 2, 30 January 1997.
I am very conscious of this issue. […] This is a human issue that needs to be resolved regardless of the political views of the community affected. This is a human rights issue, not one to be pursued in the context of one community seeking vindication at the expense of another. If the events had occurred in a different community in Northern Ireland, the same considerations would apply. In any comment we make on the matter in this House, it is important to approach it in that way, to see it as an issue of the rights of human beings to vindication, regardless of their political tradition, rather than to look at it in the context of seeking to pursue any other approach of a broader political kind. This is a human rights rather than a political question.33
- 34 “Adjournment Debate – Bloody Sunday Inquiry”, ibid.
- 35 Julieann Campbell, Setting the Truth Free…, p. 111-112.
Bruton’s strong emphasis on the “human rights” dimension of Bloody Sunday suggests that the work of the BSJC had paid off. Besides, other statements in the Dáil indicate that this rhetoric was not confined to Fine Gael. David Andrews of Fianna Fáil declared on the same day: “It is incumbent on the British Government to reopen the investigation based on the new evidence and to consider the matter a human rights issue, as the Members of the Dáil do unanimously”.34 In reality, this was the first time that Bloody Sunday had been referred to in such fashion in the Dáil. In February 1997, the BSJC travelled to Dublin, where they met John Bruton and other members of the Fine Gael government, but also leaders of the Progressive Democrats and Fianna Fáil. Their impression was that they had moved from being shunned to being “treated like dignitaries”.35 NAI records show that Bruton’s public statements about how seriously he was taking the issue were, indeed, matched by his government’s actions behind the scenes: from the start of 1997, the government was raising the question of Bloody Sunday with representatives of the British government on a monthly basis.
Getting the inquiry: using the Irish government’s report as leverage (1997-1998)
- 36 PRONI, CENT/1/26/49A, 27 February 1997; NAI, Department of the Taoiseach, 2021/99/2, 31 January 199 (...)
- 37 NAI, Department of the Taoiseach, 2021/99/8, 15 February 1997.
17On the side of the UK government, there had been a slight but significant inflection: from “it would not be right to reopen an inquiry”, government discourse had moved on to assurances that “no options [had] been ruled out” and that the Prime Minister had “an open mind” about the new evidence.36 Hints at a possible apology were made, although the government’s attitude to the new evidence was rather dismissive, with Secretary of State Patrick Mayhew sending contradictory signals about the possibility of a new inquiry.37
- 38 On 30 January; 4, 5, 6 and 25 February; 11, 13, 19 and 25 March; and 30 April.
- 39 PRONI, CENT/1/26/49A, 28 March 1997.
- 40 NAI, Department of the Taoiseach, 2021/99/2, 31 January 1997.
- 41 “Questions. – Northern Ireland Peace Process”, Dáil Éireann Debates, vol. 475, no. 4, 25 February 1 (...)
18While trying to navigate the reluctance of the British government, Taoiseach John Bruton also remained under constant pressure from the opposition. While the issue had been raised only once or twice a year at best until then, during the three months that followed the 1997 anniversary, Fianna Fáil members brought up the issue of Bloody Sunday ten times in the Irish Parliament, with special emphasis on the need for a new inquiry.38 Notes of a meeting between delegations of both governments at the Anglo-Irish Secretariat on 20 March 1997 show that Bertie Ahern was seen by the UK government as a more difficult potential partner than John Bruton and his Tánaiste Dick Spring, as the UK representative was recorded as saying that “he was grateful for the restrained approach […] the Tánaiste was taking in public – at least compared to Mr. Ahern”. The Irish representative, in turn, felt compelled to point out that the Tánaiste had made a statement calling the Widgery Report “seriously flawed” – showing, once again, a wish to be seen as combative on the issue.39 While the British government’s posture was to remain sceptical of the claims that the new evidence unearthed by the BSJC could truly justify a new inquiry, the Bruton government took a step that would prove to be decisive: they decided to put together their own assessment of all the new evidence.40 This move was criticised by the Fianna Fáil opposition, who did not see the need for yet another report, and argued the case was already strong enough to warrant a new inquiry – implying that Bruton’s government may be too soft on the British who seemed to be “procrastinating”.41
19Yet, the report compiled by Bruton’s government, eventually submitted to the British in June 1997, turned out to be a scathing indictment of the Widgery Inquiry. It offered a very detailed assessment of all the new evidence: Mullan’s book, Walsh’s report, the Channel Four interviews with British soldiers, a Sunday Business Post article featuring the account of a soldier, radio recordings of army communications known as the “Porter Tapes”, as well as 101 statements collected by the Irish government itself at the time of Bloody Sunday. The report examined each source of evidence and assessed its novelty and potential to undermine the Widgery Report. It then proceeded to a paragraph-by-paragraph analysis of the Widgery Report, pointing out its shortcomings, inconsistencies, and how it compared to the new evidence. Even more importantly, the Irish report did not balk from questioning Widgery’s integrity and even clearly hinted at a politically motivated cover-up:
- 43 Ibid., p. 176.
The new material […] provided fresh grounds for the belief that members of 1 Para wilfully shot and killed unarmed civilians. It suggested that the approach and conduct of the Widgery Inquiry was informed by ulterior political motivation from its inception.43
The report was also clear in setting forward the Irish government’s preferred solution, which would be a new inquiry and report, as well as a clear repudiation of Widgery:
- 44 Ibid., p. 177-178.
The new material fatally undermines and discredits the Widgery Report. A debt of justice is owed to the victims and their relatives to set it unambiguously aside as the official version of events. […] The most convincing redress would be a new report, based on an independent inquiry.44
These were precisely the two concessions which the UK government was still trying to avoid giving.
- 45 PRONI, CENT/1/26/59A, 21 May 1997; PRONI, CENT/1/26/59A, 16 June 1997.
- 46 PRONI, CENT/1/26/59A, 16 June 1997; PRONI, CENT/1/26/59A, 19 June 1997.
- 47 PRONI, CENT/1/26/59A, 7 October 1997.
20The new Labour government led by Tony Blair from 2 May 1997 was certainly more malleable than John Major’s government – in part because of the famously cordial relationship between Blair and Ahern, and in part because unlike Major, Blair’s government relied on a very comfortable parliamentary majority, making it far less reliant on unionist support in the House of Commons. Still, the PRONI records show they remained extremely reluctant to set up a new inquiry, mostly because of the fear that it might lead to prosecutions. Still, both Tony Beeton of the Northern Ireland Office and Northern Ireland Secretary of State Mo Mowlam herself repeatedly expressed worry at the idea that the Irish government might act before they did, which shows that the pressure was keenly felt.45 Mowlam did favour an inquiry, or at the very least a review, but had to face much resistance from Secretary of State for Defence George Robertson, who feared any inquiry and was keen to opt for an apology instead.46 The group of experts put in charge of expressing an opinion on the Irish government’s report was highly dismissive of its contents and of the new evidence: “[…] we have found nothing to substantiate the belief that the Widgery Inquiry Team was biased or behaved improperly”.47
21As the Blair government grew more and more aware of the need to make a statement, in the run-up to the 26th anniversary of Bloody Sunday, the Irish government played their trump card by warning them of their intention to make their own report public. On his blog, Eamonn McKee, who worked in the Anglo-Irish Division and was one of the civil servants tasked with drafting the Irish government’s report, explains:
- 48 Eamonn McKee, “Bloody Sunday: When and Why Apologies Work”, 31 December 2022, online: https://eamon (...)
The intention was to publish the Assessment eventually so that even if the British Government refused a new inquiry, the Irish Government would table in effect an alternative narrative. It was a great example of the collective talent and teamwork that the Irish system was able to bring to the peace process.48
- 49 PRONI, CENT/1/26/59A, 6 January 1998.
A draft letter by Mowlam to Blair and Robertson, dated from 6 January 1998, shows her rising impatience and worry, as she deplored the ruling out of an inquiry and urged the government to act: “[…] we can procrastinate no longer – a decision is needed urgently”. The draft also warned: “Leaving it much longer exposes us to the possibility that the Irish will publish their dossier (as the Taoiseach has already promised) first and we will seem to have been pressured into a response”.49 The transcript of a phone conversation between Prime Minister Tony Blair and Irish Taoiseach Bertie Ahern on 21 January 1998 shows that, while the exchanges remained very civil, the pressure on Blair was palpable and Ahern’s reminder that he was “holding back the publication of the document” was clearly meant to signify both goodwill and a determination not to release the pressure:
- 50 NAI, Department of the Taoiseach, NAI/TSCH/2021/100/1, 21 January 1998.
Prime Minister: […] Now Bertie, I just wanted to say to you on Bloody Sunday. I mean following your call, I have been going back and looking at this material very, very carefully indeed, because I mean, you know you couldn’t have made it clearer to me how….
Taoiseach: I appreciate that, it’s a big one for us.
Prime Minister: Now the trouble is I am not really in a position in the next couple of days to say something on the Inquiry. Although I mean. I hope to be in a position next week, because presumably it is important that something happens before the anniversary.
Taoiseach: Or there around, you know, I mean I have been holding back the publication of the document, because I don’t want to make things worse, you know I am not sure if it would or not, but I…
Prime Minister: Well it helps if we are not under too much pressure on this. I mean I am going back and actually studying the whole thing myself and I looked at it first over, on Saturday and Sunday and I will have another look at it this weekend now and really go back over it again.
[…]
Taoiseach: I am meeting the committee, I am meeting the relatives, but I meet them regularly, they come down here all of the time.
Prime Minister: But I think the less in a sense that, the less pressure there is at the minute. Anyway we will let you know well in advance what we are going to do and why. But I just wanted to explain why, I don’t think tomorrow I am in a position to be definitive.
Taoiseach: No, that’s okay Tony, I mean I just live in hope that it will go right, because it is a big one.
Prime Minister: Well I mean I…
Taoiseach: You understand that, I know that.
Prime Minister: I mean there are huge sort of ramifications of this around this place as well. But anyway I promise you I am looking at it as carefully as I possibly can and doing it personally.50
Ahern’s repeated phrase that Bloody Sunday was “a big one” and his mention of regular meetings with the Bloody Sunday relatives is yet another indication of how strong the Irish involvement had become at that stage. A week later, on the eve of the 26th anniversary, Tony Blair gave a statement to the House of Commons to announce a new inquiry. It was carefully worded to avoid any indictment of Lord Widgery:
- 51 “Bloody Sunday”, House of Commons Debates, vol. 305, 29 January 1998, col. 501.
The time scale within which Lord Widgery produced his report meant that he was not able to consider all the evidence which might have been available.51
Still, the result of the lobbying by the BSJC and the Irish government was clearly visible:
- 52 Ibid., col. 502.
I have been strongly advised […] that there are indeed grounds for such a further Inquiry. We believe that the weight of material now available is such that the events require re-examination. We believe that the only course that will lead to public confidence in the results of any further investigation is to set up a full-scale judicial inquiry into Bloody Sunday.52
22Thus, in spite of efforts by the Prime Minister to avoid framing it in such a way, the verdict of a public inquiry was overturned, for the first and only time in the history of the United Kingdom. The Saville Inquiry would not confirm all the hypotheses found in the Irish government’s assessment – according to the Saville Report, firing from the walls did not happen – but it led to conclusions that showed that the shortcomings of the Widgery inquiry and report had, indeed, been considerable.
Conclusion
23Efforts by the BSJC to impose a framing of Bloody Sunday as a human rights issue, rather than a political issue, seem to have been instrumental in securing the support of the Republic of Ireland. The NAI and PRONI archives confirm that, although they had previously been unsupportive, from around 1997, successive Irish governments consistently applied much pressure on the UK government to act on Bloody Sunday. Although Fine Gael may have appeared less combative in their rhetoric, they did raise the question repeatedly with British representatives, and were the ones to commission the report which highlighted the numerous failings of the Widgery Inquiry. The accession of Fianna Fáil’s Bertie Ahern to the position of Taoiseach in June 1997 led to even stronger pressure being put on the UK government. Numerous other factors were certainly at play: for example, the need to grant “confidence-building measures” in order to reach an agreement on Northern Ireland, pressure from Sinn Féin negotiators, the constant lobbying of John Hume, or the role of Irish Americans. Still, the records show that the pressure exerted by the Irish government, and especially the possibility of making their own report and conclusions on the flaws of the Widgery Inquiry public, did play a key role. In this regard, the records suggest that political action behind the scenes did match public discourse.
24Interestingly, although there are clear signs of the human rights rhetoric permeating political discourse in Ireland, there are very few references to human rights law in the intergovernmental discussions and even in the Irish government’s report. Neither government seemed to pay much heed to the possible impact of the upcoming integration of the ECHR into British law through the Human Rights Act, which was already in preparation, and would in fact have implications regarding the responsibility of the British state to carry out inquiries, in relation to its article 2 obligations. It must also be said that the Irish government’s report, which was so efficient as a means of pressure, did not fundamentally differ from previous reports commissioned by the campaign, in terms of methodology or content. Many eminent specialists in their fields, often with no connection to Northern Ireland, and sometimes with considerable expertise in the field of human rights, had already written challenges to the Widgery Report – as early as 1972 in the case of Samuel Dash. The difference probably lay in the fact that this new report came from a government, which took it upon itself to present the evidence to the UK government in the context of the wider peace process negotiations. Presenting the new inquiry as a human rights issue helped to turn Bloody Sunday into a question that could no longer be brushed aside, although archival evidence now shows that even the Blair government was extremely reluctant to set up an inquiry, only relenting a few days before the 26th anniversary of 30 January 1998.
Notes
1 “Saville Inquiry”, House of Commons Debates, vol. 511, 15 June 2010, col. 739.
2 Lord John Passmore Widgery, Bloody Sunday, 1972: Lord Widgery’s Report of Events in Londonderry, Northern Ireland, on 30 January 1972 [18 April 1972], London, Stationery Office, 2001, p. 97-99.
3 PRONI: Public Record Office of Northern Ireland; NAI: National Archives of Ireland.
4 Martin McCleery, Operation Demetrius and Its Aftermath: A New History of the Use of Internment without Trial in Northern Ireland, 1971-75 [2015], Manchester, Manchester University Press, 2020, p. 18.
5 Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms, Council of Europe Treaty Series, no. 005, 1950.
6 Samuel Dash, Justice Denied: A Challenge to Lord Widgery’s Report on “Bloody Sunday”, New York, Defence and Education Fund of the International League for the Rights of Man, 1972, p. 5.
7 “Widgery Report on Bloody Sunday ‘Attacked’”, The Times, 8 June 1972, p. 2.
8 NAI, Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA), 2002/19/535, 31 January 1972.
9 NAI, DFA, 2003/17/271, 31 January 1972.
10 Ibid.
11 NAI, Department of the Taoiseach, 2003/16/462, 1 February 1972.
12 NAI, DFA, 2003/17/271, 19 April 1972.
13 Dermot Walsh, Bloody Sunday and the Rule of Law in Northern Ireland, Basingstoke, Macmillan, 2000, p. 286-287.
14 “Vote 46: Foreign Affairs (Resumed)”, Dáil Éireann Debates, vol. 275, no. 7, 6 November 1974.
15 Lord Salmon, Royal Commission on Tribunals of Inquiry, 1966: Report of the Commission under the Chairmanship of the Rt. Hon. Lord Justice Salmon, London, HMSO, 1966, p. 43.
16 Quoted by John Deering, “Success at Last for the Bloody Sunday Relatives”, The Irish Times, 20 December 1974, p. 8.
17 Brian Conway, Commemoration and Bloody Sunday: Pathways of Memory, Basingstoke, Palgrave Macmillan, 2010, p. 83-86.
18 Interview with author, Derry / Londonderry, 22 July 2010.
19 Julieann Campbell, Setting the Truth Free: The Inside Story of the Bloody Sunday Justice Campaign, Dublin, Liberties Press, 2012, p. 36.
20 “Adjournment Debate – British Army Shootings in Derry, 1972”, Dáil Éireann Debates, vol. 415, no. 5, 6 February 1992.
21 PRONI, CENT/1/24/22A, 23 December 1992.
22 Charlotte Barcat, “‘A Truth for the World’: From Widgery to Saville, the Campaign for Truth and Justice about Bloody Sunday”, in Ireland and Victims: Confronting the Past, Forging the Future, Lesley Lelourec, Grainne O’Keeffe-Vigneron (eds.), Oxford, P. Lang, 2012, p. 59-73.
23 Quoted in Julieann Campbell, Setting the Truth Free…, p. 64.
24 Ibid., p. 57.
25 Ibid., p. 74.
26 Dermot Walsh, Bloody Sunday and the Rule of Law…, p. 289.
27 “Appendix 1: Confidential Downing Street Minutes, Dated 1 February 1972”, in Eyewitness Bloody Sunday: The Truth, Don Mullan, John Scally (eds.), Dublin, Wolfhound Press, 1997, p. 270.
28 PRONI, CENT/1/24/22A, 23 December 1992; PRONI, CENT/1/23/6A, 26 January 1994.
29 Julieann Campbell, Setting the Truth Free…, p. 84-86.
30 Dermot Walsh, The Bloody Sunday Tribunal of Inquiry: A Resounding Defeat for Truth, Justice and the Rule of Law, Derry / Londonderry, Bloody Sunday Trust, 1997.
31 Eyewitness Bloody Sunday…, p. 143-165.
32 John Kelly, foreword to Robert Breglio, Don Mullan, Raymond McClean, “Bloody Sunday”: The Breglio Report, Derry / Londonderry, Bloody Sunday Justice Campaign, 1997, p. 5.
33 “Order of Business”, Dáil Éireann Debates, vol. 474, no. 2, 30 January 1997.
34 “Adjournment Debate – Bloody Sunday Inquiry”, ibid.
35 Julieann Campbell, Setting the Truth Free…, p. 111-112.
36 PRONI, CENT/1/26/49A, 27 February 1997; NAI, Department of the Taoiseach, 2021/99/2, 31 January 1997.
37 NAI, Department of the Taoiseach, 2021/99/8, 15 February 1997.
38 On 30 January; 4, 5, 6 and 25 February; 11, 13, 19 and 25 March; and 30 April.
39 PRONI, CENT/1/26/49A, 28 March 1997.
40 NAI, Department of the Taoiseach, 2021/99/2, 31 January 1997.
41 “Questions. – Northern Ireland Peace Process”, Dáil Éireann Debates, vol. 475, no. 4, 25 February 1997.
42 Irish Government, Bloody Sunday and the Report of the Widgery Tribunal: The Irish Government’s Assessment of the New Material; Presented to the British Government in June 1997, Dublin, Government Information Services, 1997, p. 169.
43 Ibid., p. 176.
44 Ibid., p. 177-178.
45 PRONI, CENT/1/26/59A, 21 May 1997; PRONI, CENT/1/26/59A, 16 June 1997.
46 PRONI, CENT/1/26/59A, 16 June 1997; PRONI, CENT/1/26/59A, 19 June 1997.
47 PRONI, CENT/1/26/59A, 7 October 1997.
48 Eamonn McKee, “Bloody Sunday: When and Why Apologies Work”, 31 December 2022, online: https://eamonncmckee.com/2022/12/31/bloody-sunday-when-and-why-apologies-work.
49 PRONI, CENT/1/26/59A, 6 January 1998.
50 NAI, Department of the Taoiseach, NAI/TSCH/2021/100/1, 21 January 1998.
51 “Bloody Sunday”, House of Commons Debates, vol. 305, 29 January 1998, col. 501.
52 Ibid., col. 502.
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