THE POLITICS OF BRITAIN'S
LEGAL, JUDICIAL AND SECURITY SYSTEM
IN "NORTHERN IRELAND"
D. O'Cearnaigh
Sinn Fein
International Publicity and Information Committee
CONTENTS
INTRODUCTION P. 3
CHAPTER ONE - THE HISTORICAL ROOTS OF THE SYSTEM P. 7
CHAPTER TWO - DYNAMICS OF EMERGENCY LEGISLATION P. 13
CHAPTER THREE - THE ROLE OF ARREST AND
INTERROGATION P. 21
CHAPTER FOUR - NEUTRALISING RESISTANCE:
THE COURTS AND DETENTION P. 32
CHAPTER FIVE - NEUTRALISING RESISTANCE:
SHOOTING TO KILL P. 46
CONCLUSION P. 56
FOOTNOTES P. 59
BIBLIOGRAPHY P. 62
APPENDIX: CHRONOLOGY P. 64
INTRODUCTION
This study investigates the development and operation of the
legal, judicial and security system in the occupied Six Counties
of the North of Ireland within the context of Britain's denial of
the Irish people's right to national self-determination.
It is a system which has spawned incalculable hardship
and misery. Imprisonment, perjury, torture, injury and death are
but the outward features of its use. Untold mental anguish and
social disruption are the less visible results.
In conjunction with concomitant economic and political
structures comparable only with the apartheid regime in South
Africa, the "Northern Ireland" state constitutes the most
repressive state in Western Europe. Its very existence breaches
all internationally recognised conventions on democratic and
national rights. it contravenes the United Nations Declaration
on the Granting of Independence to Colonial Countries and
Peoples; Article 6 of which states:
"Any attempt aimed at the partial of total disruption of
the national unity and the territorial integrity of a country is
incompatible with the purposes and principles of the Charter of
the U. N."
Moreover, Britain's occupation derogates the Irish
people's right to sovereignty, independence and unity as
enshrined in the International Convention on Civil and Political
Rights and directly perpetuates popular resistance by the
nationalist community.
A considerable range of elements bolster Britain's
capacity to preserve its interests in Ireland and to exact the
repression arising from its occupation. Central to the methods
employed is the legal, judicial, and security apparatus.
The roots of the present system stem back to the
establishment of the "Northern Ireland" state 68 years ago.
However, emergency legislation has been in existence throughout
Ireland for considerably longer. In fact since 1870, over 60
pieces of emergency law have been enacted in Ireland.
Since 1969, the rule of law in the "Northern Ireland" has
become totally subordinate to the demands of the theory and
practice of counter-insurgency enunciated by the British general,
Frank Kitson.
With the onset of the latest phase of resistance to
British occupation, the British government has unashamedly
dissolved any pretence towards the "normal" administration of
justice in "Northern Ireland". The law has been comprehensively
geared towards a harmonisation with broader political and
military strategies designed to stabilise British rule. Kitson
advocated in 1971 that : "The law should be used as just another
weapon in the government's arsenal..."and that, for this to be :
"The activities of the legal services have to be tied into the
war effort" (1). The following study will provide
incontrovertible evidence that this objective has been achieved.
Currently in "Northern Ireland" Britain retains two legal
systems, one of which implements the common law as applied within
the greater British legal jurisdiction, and a second which
fundamentally alters crucial aspects of the common law in respect
to arrest, interrogation and court proceedings. Consequently,
rights extended to those arrested under common law can be
simultaneously denied to individuals detained under emergency
legislation.
The existence of much of this legislation and the
operation of the legal and security system has been successively
found to be in breach of international law. Furthermore, the
design of the legislation itself has implicitly and explicitly
provided the security agencies with vast powers resulting in
horrific consequences.
The political nature of the legal and security system is
evidenced by the history of collusion between the various legal
and security agencies. On occasions when abuses under emergency
legislation have been so acute that the state has been impelled
to account for its agents' excesses under the judicial system,
the judiciary and other state agencies have closed ranks and
deflected the outcry.
The following chapters explore in detail the political
construction of the legal system and examine its application by
the state agencies.
The first chapter places the basis for the present system
into its historical context, demonstrating that the initiation of
a particular form of legal, judicial, and security system was
integral to the consolidation of the intended one-party state.
The second chapter analyses the core of this system by
focusing upon the Emergency Provisions Act and the Prevention of
Terrorism Act.
The third section deals with arrest and interrogation
procedures provided for by emergency legislation and
administration by the security agencies.
The subject of courts and detention is addressed in the
fourth chapter, whilst the execution of the shoot-to-kill strategy
by the state will be analysed in the next. The final chapter
summarises the effects of the operation of this dimension of
British rule and develops the conclusion that these apparatuses
and others presently used are inherent to the negation of Irish
national self-determination.
CHAPTER ONE
THE HISTORICAL ROOTS OF THE SYSTEM
The Partition of Ireland in 1921 by the British government
resulted in the annexation of the six north-eastern counties -
Antrim, Down, Armagh, Tyrone, Fermanagh and Derry, and the
establishment of the six-county state of "Northern Ireland"
Direct governmental administration for this colony was
devolved by the British to the Ulster Unionist Party and, for a
further 51 years, British economic and political dominance
throughout Ireland was mediated by a one party state in the 6
counties under unionist control.
The exercise of unionist government was to be as anti-
democratic as was the original manufacture of the state.
Britian's decision to partition Ireland was in direct
contravention of the results of two successive all-Ireland
elections in 1918 and 1920, when the overwhelming majority of the
Irish electorate voted in favour of national independence.
However, within the national electorate, a minority voted in
favour of continued union with Britain. This minority was
principally concentrated in Counties Antrim, Down and Armagh.
It was a feature of hundreds of years of systematic
colonisation that this national minority which favoured unionism
was of the Protestant religion.
In spite of the democratic wishes of the Irish people the
British government reneged on its own constitutional framework
and determined to construct a new "Northern Ireland" state under
the Government of Ireland Act 1920.
The decision to include the nationalist counties of
Tyrone and Fermanagh in the new state was critical to guarantee
its economic viability, yet this decision simultaneously created
a serious political and structural contradiction for the unionist
government.
Sizable nationalist populations existed in areas of
Counties Antrim, Down, Armagh and Derry, most notably in Derry
city. But the inclusion of Counties Tyrone and Fermanagh within
the new state increased the overall nationalist population and,
therefore, although unionism and Protestantism became the
dominant forces, a large nationalist minority also existed.
Aware that its establishment was at variance with the
democratic mandate of the Irish people and that Britain had been
physically removed from the southern 26 counties by the
prosecution of the Irish Republican Army's campaign, the unionist
government perceived itself to be under permanent threat. It
concluded that the immediate source or any threat to the well-
being of the state resided with the nationalist minority and,
consequently, nationalists were regarded with a deep political
suspicion, fed by an ideology of Protestant supremacy.
On this basis, the unionist party commenced the
installation of a complex of apparatuses designed to consolidate
unionist/Protestant hegemony and to stem any challenge to the
unionist party's control from within the nationalist community.
The ethos of the Six-County state was summed up by Prime
Minister Craigavon in April 1934 when he declared:
"All I boast is that we have a Protestant Parliament and a
Protestant state." (1)
A permanent state of siege was presided over by the
unionist party. From the outset, a system of economic and
political apartheid consigned the nationalist minority to a
position of permanent political and economic powerlessness and
social inferiority.
Nationalists were denied access to employment and
adequate housing under a comprehensive apparatus of sectarian
discrimination. This was reinforce with devastating effect by the
Local Government Act 1923 which abolished the proportional
representation method of voting. Later, a local government
boundaries commission gerrymandered local government to the
extent that even local nationalist majorities became controlled
by unionist dominated councils.
The apartheid-like economic and political structures of
the new state, necessary to secure unionist rule and preserve
British interests, were coupled with the installation of a system
of emergency legislation and state security apparatuses.
The central component of this system was the Civil
Authorities (Special Powers) Act 1922 (SPA)
This legislation empowered the Minister of Home Affairs
of the unionist government to have power in respect of all
persons, matters, and things, to take all steps to preserve peace
and maintain order in "Northern Ireland".
It expressly provided for the introduction of the death
penalty for firearms and explosives offences, and flogging as
well as imprisonment for others, for the prohibition of inquests
and for arrest without warrants. It also empowered the Minister
to make further regulations, each with the force of a new law,
without consulting parliament, and to delegate his powers to any
Royal Ulster Constabulary officer.
The most alarming section of the SPA prescribed that:
"If any person does any act of such a nature as to be
calculated to be prejudicial to the preservation of the peace or
maintenance of order in Northern Ireland and not specifically
provided for in the regulations, he shall be deemed to be guilty
of an offence against the regulations."(2)
Later, the SPA acquired more far-reaching powers
including the power to impose indefinite internment, ban
publications, outlaw organisations, serve exclusion orders on
named persons, and to examine and seize bank accounts.
All of these powers were exercised, in particular the
power to intern which led to the indefinite detention without
trial of nationalists by the unionist government from 1922-45,
1956-61, and again in 1971-75.
The extent of the power of the SPA was so comprehensive
and unrivalled that it prompted Mr. Vorster, South African
Minister for Justice, to say April 1963 that he "would be willing
to exchange all the legislation of that sort for one clause of
the Northern Ireland Special Powers Act." (30
Setting the SPA into its historical context and purpose,
Boyle et al have describe the legislation thus:
"The powers of arrest and detention under the SPA as it
was generally known, were not formally directed against Roman
Catholics and republicans, but it was common knowledged that it
was against them and them alone that it was directed and used...
in this way the unionists made use of the legal system to secure
themselves both against peaceful political challenge and against
internal and external attack."(4)
The SPA was renewed annually until 1928 when it received
a five-year extension. In 1933, it was rendered permanent and
remained in existence until its repeal in March 1972.
The broad remit of the SPA was augmented by two further
pieces of legislation in 1951 and 1954 with the Public Order Act
(POA) and the Flags and Emblems Act respectively. Each extended
and enhance unionist government proceeded to amend and strengthen
the POA.
Inherent to the administration of the state's unbridled
legal system was a unionist judiciary whose world view merged
totally with that of the ruling party. Indeed, many of the
judiciary were former leading unionist politicians.
Judge Curran typified this judiciary and personified the
unionist view that to preserve unionist and British interests the
state had to be placed on a sectarian offensive. Advising the
removal of all forms of power from nationalists, he said:
"The best way to prevent the overthrow of the government
by people who have no stake in the country and have not the
welfare of the people of Ulster at heart is to disenfranchise
them."(5)
Together with the institution of the all-encompassing
power of government contained in the SPA, the unionist state
formed apparatuses to execute and enforce these draconian laws.
This responsibility was devolved to two state security agencies:
The Royal Ulster Constabulary (RUC) which was ostensibly intended
to perform regular policing functions but in reality was a
heavily-armed paramilitary force recruited almost exclusively
from the unionist population; and the "B" Specials force which
was exclusively unionist in formation. It performed a support
role to the RUC and was also heavily armed.
Both the RUC and "B" Specials were perceived by the
nationalist community to be overly partisan forces, synonymous
with the extreme repressiveness of the state and as military
appendages of the unionist party. The sectarian history of each
has been extensively documented since their formation.(6)
The atmosphere of the state was captured in a 1936
National Council for Civil Liberties investigation into the SPA.
This report concluded that a permanent machine of dictatorship
had been developed by the unionist state which compared to the
fascist regimes then current in Europe. It was an apt comparison.
Rule of law for the next 51 years under the unionist party was
substitued by a frightening battery of legal measures employed
vigorously by specially created state agencies against the
nationalist minority in order to enforce its quiescence.
CHAPTER TWO
DYNAMICS OF EMERGENCY LEGISLATION
The resurgence of the struggle for national self-determination in
the aftermath of the unionist backlash to the campaign for
internal reform by the Civil Rights movement, in conjunction
with the international furor against the re-introduction of
internment without trial in 1971, subsequent torture of internees
and the events of Bloody Sunday in 1972, forced the British
government to prorogue the unionist government that same year.
With the resultant re-establishment of direct British rule, a
process commenced of reviewing the legal, judicial and security
system.
Internment and its torturous manner of application by the
unionists had become a serious international embarrassment to
the British. Consequently, the first step taken with the
reversion to direct rule in 1972 was to re-align the internment
policy with a system of judicial hearings. Thus was cultivated
the semblance of conviction for an offence to obtain a person's
indefinite detention.
Moreover, the existing judicial precess even combined
SPA did not have the desired effect. Overriding common law rules
on the admissibility of statements of admission prevented the
conviction of many detainees from whom such statements had been
extracted under intensive interrogation.
Accordingly, a security review was launched to construct
enhanced methods for obtaining an increased conviction rate of
republican activists in in 1972 by examining amendments to the
law. This review took the shape of the Diplock commission.
The commission recommended that, in respect to
"terrorist" offences, jury trial be abolished. It also proposed
the introduction of amended rules governing the admissibility or
statements or admission and concerning the onus of proof in
firearms cases. Furthermore, it advocated wider powers of arrest
for the security agencies.
These measures were accepted and incorporated into the NI
(Emergency Provisional) Act (EPA) 1973. It was slightly amended in
1975 and re-enacted in a consolidated form in 1978.
The EPA specifically provides for abolition of jury
trials: reversals in common law provisions relating to the
admissibility of statements of admission; exceptions to bail
applications; the shift of the burden of proof onto the accused
in cases involving possession of munitions; and, with respect to
special powers for searching premises and members of the public,
general arrest and detention powers for security agencies have
been expended. Notably, the power to intern remains on the
statute books. The EPA also provides for confiscation of property
and land and the closure of public highways.
The EPA 1973 was introduced to replace the SPA, which was
repealed in 1972. However, it is widely observed to be even more
repressive than the SPA. Comparing the EPA to its legislative
predecessor, Walsh comments:
"It was a repeal in name only, however, as the 1973 Act
also conferred wide powers of arrest on the RUC.. in fact, in many
ways the 1973 Act represented a retrograde step as far as the
rights of the citizen are concerned. It put the authorities in
the position where they could represent themselves as using the
"normal" judicial procedures when, in fact, the procedures they
were using consisted of special powers of arrest, non jury
"Diplock" courts and special rules of evidence." (1)
In April 1983, the British government appointed Sir
George Baker to review the operation of the EPA. Yet, apart from
a few minor concessions to the Act's critics, Baker's report in
1984 endorsed all the major derogations from normal legal
standards which had been in existence form 1973. (2) Thus, the
new EPA was passed in 1987 with only minor alterations to what
went before.
Supplementary to the EPA was the Prevention of Terrorism
(Temporary Provisions) Act 1974 (PTA). Contrary to common
perception, this legislation was not a response from the
authorities to the Birmingham bombings of 1974. The measures
contained in the Act had been formulated some time previously,
were drawn extensively form its legislative precedent, the
Prevention of Violence Act 1939 (then introduced to combat a
campaign of IRA operations in Britain) and were intended to
synthesise with the EPA.
Unlike the EPA, the remit of the PTA extended throughout
British and "Northern Ireland". Moreover, its infringements upon
basic human rights are even more far-reaching, so much so that
Roy Jenkins, the then British Home Secretary, when introducing
the PTA in 1974, was forced to concede that: "These powers are
draconian." (3)
The PTA was enacted in 1974, modified and re-enacted in
1976, and again in 1984 after a review by Lord Jellicoe. Since
1984, it has had a finite life of five years with annual reports
compiled and presented to the British parliament before each
renewal debate.
The PTA provides for the power to ban organisations in
Britain. Significantly, only Irish republican organisations are
named - membership of loyalist death squads is legal in England,
Scotland and Wales! Displaying or encouraging support for Irish
republicans organisations is an indictable offence. The PTA
further places onto the statute book as an offence, contributing
to political violence, and failure to disclose knowledge about
"terrorist" activities. Sections 3 to 9 of the Act provide for
exclusion of persons form Britain and "Northern Ireland" under a
system of political exile, which allows no appeal and requires no
justification from the authorities. Three-hundred-and eighty-two
persons have been served with such exclusion orders between 1974
and 1988.
Extensive arrest and detention powers have been prescribe
under the PTA. Hail reports that they extend far beyond those
provided for under current common law (4). The legislation allow
for detention incommunicado for up to 48 hours and ongoing
detention for interrogation for seven days. Each of the
provisions has been successfully challenged under European Law.
In MCVEIGH, O'NEILL and EVANS v the UNITED KINGDOM, the European
Commission found that where a wife or husband of a detained
person was not contacted for 45 hours following the arrest, this
delay was in breach of Article 8 of the European Convention on
Human Rights. In a more recent judgement, which is examined in
the next chapter, Britain has been indicted by the European Court
of Human Rights for human rights abuses arising from the PTA
detention orders.
The PTA is due to lapse in 1989. However, far from being
renewed on this occasion, the British government has determined
it shall be rendered permanent. The new act will be extended to
include the confiscation of funds of individuals and groups and
shall include a cut in the rate of remission afforded to
prisoners from one-half to one-third. Exclusion orders are to be
retained and more expansive search measures introduced.
This decision to make permanent the new Prevention of
Terrorism Bill (PTB) must be seen in the wider political context
of an escalation of state repression in "Northern Ireland" since
summer 1988. A programme of widespread and systematic searches of
thousands of nationalist homes and private property has
paralleled the announcement by the authorities on the October
19th 1988 of the removal of the long enshrined right to silence
from detainees. Additionally, the RUC have been given alarming
new powers to forcibly obtain mouth swab samples from detainees
to allow DNA forensic testing (forensic fingerprinting) to be
undertaken. More restrictions in the exercise of the electoral
process directed specifically at Sinn Fein candidates have been
introduced in the Elected Authorities Bill (NI). This
legislation will deny recently-released prisoners the right to
stand for election and demands that all candidates should sign an
anti-violence declaration.
That such an enhancement of power in the provision of
"emergency" legislation should coincide with generalised and
accelerated repression against nationalists comes as no surprise.
The enactment of the EPA formally heralded the commencement of a
British counter-insurgency strategy to be enforced at all levels.
This strategy had as its objectives the criminalisation,
normalisation and Ulsterisation of the struggle for national
self-determination.
In essense, this strategy necessitated the installation
of a legal and judicial apparatus which would process political
offences through ostensibly "normal" courts, thus encouraging the
thesis that the conflict was but a criminal conspiracy.
Normalisation demanded the manufacture of social and economic
conditions to bolster the pretence that "Northern Ireland" was a
thriving society, no different from Britain. Ulsterisation
involved the reduction of the British army's role by placing the
locally recruited Protestant militia, the Ulster Defence Regiment
(UDR) into the frontline along with increased RUC "policing"
responsibilities. All of these objectives were of course mutually
reinforcing.
However, central to this British government thinking in
1971-72 was the analysis that the basis of any such
counter-insurgency strategy would be the alteration of the entire
legal process. Apart from the benefits such changes would reap in
terms of increased convictions, the British proposed to
internationally de-legitimise the struggle for national self-
determination by portraying it as a localised sectarian and
criminal feud. This was to occur against a backdrop of the new
judicial Diplock system, the phasing out of internment, as
recommended by the Gardiner Report 1975, its replacement with the
RUC in security.
The above re-evaluation of British government tactics and
strategies stemmed directly from the reintroduction of direct
rule and the dissolution of the unionist devolved Assembly.
International opprobrium had undermined the unionist government
as the optimum mechanism for preserving British interests in
Ireland. A new set of conditions now prevailed and a new method
for re-asserting British dominance was required. Consequently,
direct British dominance was required. Consequently, direct
British rule was reimposed and with it the comparatively crude
forms of unionist control were abandoned in favour of the
sophistication of criminalisation and its component parts.
The EPA and PTA since the 1970s have facilitated
Britains's criminalisation process and its overall war effort in
"Northern Ireland". They are unequivocally political in design
and intent. Without their existence, Britain's capacity to
repress political opposition to its' continued occupation of
Ireland would be considerably diminished.
In accomplishing its assigned role, "emergency"
legislation has been ruthless in the erosion of basic human
rights guaranteed under common law. Clever obfuscation of
statistics and data makes the results of the implimentation of
the legislation difficult to quantify but the impact has been
devastating. One source suggests that possibly as many as 1 to 2
million people have been stopped and questioned entering and
leaving Britain since 1974 under the relevant clauses of the PTA
alone! (5)
The target of the PTA is undoubtedly the Irish community
in Britain, although its operations have also deeply effected
nationalists in "Northern Ireland"; Sarah Spencer, General
Secretary of the NCCL, has observed tellingly:
"Such emergency legislation has also had a profound
effect upon the Irish community in Britain, many of whom fear
that if they say anything political or get involved in any sort
of Irish activities they will become suspect under the PTA or
liable to exclusion. It serves tp repress political debate and
knowledge about Ireland in Britain which can only hinder the
search for a political solution. I'm sure that this is one reason
why people in Britain have so little understanding about what on
earth is going on in Ireland." (6)
Criticism of both the operation of the EPA and PTA, and
opposition to their continuation is widespread. Many political
parties, including the Britian Labour Party (when in opposition*)
and the Social Democratic and Labour Party (SDLP), as well as
civil liberation groups like the NCCL have publicity expressed
these sentiments. However, genuine justice and democracy is
impossible whilst the governing legislation in "Northern Ireland"
remains a cornerstone in Britain's denial of national self-
determination to the Irish people.
* The EPA was enacted by a British Conservative government, the
PTA by a British Labour government.
CHAPTER THREE
THE ROLE OF ARREST AND INTERROGATION
The failure of the Civil Rights campaign to elicit fundamental
reform from the unionist government in the face of a violent
sectarian offensive, combined with the re-deployment of British
combat troops against the nationalist community, led to the re-
emergence of the IRA. Re-analysis and bitter experience of the
true nature of the "Northern Ireland" state now catalysed the
inevitable transition of the campaign for Civil Rights into a
popular struggle for national self-determination. Confronted
with this challenge to its very existence., the unionists
reintroduced the internment of nationalists in August 1971.
On the morning of August 9th 1971, British soldiers and
RUC personnel saturated nationalist areas throughout "Northern
Ireland" and arbitrarily arrested 342 males. They were interned
without trial or charge at Long Kesh concentration camp and were
joined at various stages over the following four years by
approximately 2,000 other nationalist men and women, the latter
being detained in Armagh prison. Thousands more were arrested and
then released after subjection to indepth interrogation.
However, the seriousness of the cumulative violations of
human rights against nationalists in this early period was soon
highlighted by reports of torture against 12 particular internees
by state agencies. Subsequent revelations uncovered the use of
the "Five Techniques" of interrogation - these methods constitued
the necessary ingredients of sensory deprivation.
Internment and its attendant torture generated such
outcry in Ireland and abroad that the Dublin government brought a
case against the British government to the European Court of
Human Rights in 1971. The same year an Amnesty International
inquiry corroborated the claims of systematic ill-treatment of
internees.
Unionism's utter failure to stabilise the accelerating
conflict impelled the Britain government in March 1972 to resume
direct administration control and to prorogue the unionist
parliament at Stormont.
The British immediately initiated a parallel system to
the internment method for incarcerating nationalists. It took the
form of an ostensible judicial process but failed to lead to
increased detentions due to continuing common law provision
interfering with the admissibility of statements of admission
obtained after oppressive interrogations.
The detail of the EPA's development has been examined in
an earlier chapter. It has been subject to minor alteration in
E.P.A. 1987 in respect to the repeal of Section 11 which allowed
for "72 hours" detention on suspicion of being a "terrorist".
However, Section 11 remains relevant as interpretations based
upon it continue to be applied today. Additionally, varying
arrest powers persist in Sections 13, 14, and 18. Moreover, the
PTA provides for a 7-day detention order contained in Section 12
(1) (6).
Even though clear stipulations controlled the application
of the primary arrest powers, Sections 11 and 14 of the EPA and
Section 12 of the PTA, Walsh points out:
"Together, these three sections gave the security forces
the power to arrest who they liked and when they liked with virtual
impunity, The crucial protections of the individual under the common
law were neatly swept away...RUC arrests were, therefore, largely
removed from the criminal justice system." (1)
All conventions enshrined in the common law to protect
democratic rights in the course of arrest and interrogations are
reversed under such "emergency" legislation. Indeed, these
reversals are accentuated by judicial rulings which neutralise of
"reasonable" as a prefix to suspicion in Sections 13 and 14 of
the EPA 1987 is withdrawn by an PARTE LYNCH which ruled that
general suspicion or an individual being involved in some form of
"terrorist" activity was sufficient grounds upon which to arrest
him/her under Section 12 of the PTA, as a means to merely start
RUC, investigations.
Another extreme ruling enhancing the scope for arbitrary
arrest resides in McKEE v the CHIEF CONSTABLE for Northern
Ireland, which held that the word of a senior RUC officer was
sufficent to create suspicion and impede legal redress by the
detainee.
"Through its interpretations of these provision, the
judiciary has given the RUC even greater scope. The net effect
of these judicial interpretations is to make it extremely
difficult to challenge the legality at the use of these powers in
any particular case. That is turn enables the RUC to use them as
instruments or arbitrary repression and control." (2)
The use of such arbitrary repression and control has
resuited in the arrest of one in four nationalist men between 16
and 44 years of age, since 1969. Once arrested under common law,
the detainee in police custody is protected by Judges Rules which
require a minimum level of proper treatment to ensure the subject
is not tricked or coerced into making inculpatory statements.
However, the very rationale of Diplock nullifies these rules. The
Diplock Report in 1972 stated quite openly that statements should
be admitted even when obtained.
"...as a result of building up a physcological atmosphere
in which the initial desire of the person being questioned to
remain silent is replace by an urge to confide in the
questioner, or statements preceded by promises of favours or
indications of the consequences which might follow if the person
persisted in refusing to answer." (3)
Breaches of Judges Rules in normal circumstances renders
a resulting confession void. Walsh has observed that the
implementation of Diplock's recommendation has had the
consequence of the admissibility of confessions under emergency
legislation being governed by a bewildering complexity of
statutory, common law, and administrative rules and regulations.
(4)
In essence, Section 8 of the EPA 1987 provides that any
confession is admissable before the courts unless it is
irrelevant or induced by torture. Yet, subsequent judicial
rulings such as R v HAILORAN have had the cumulative effect of
allowing the RUC to subject a prisoner to lengthy, repetitive and
debilitating interrogations, threats, bribes, trickery, verbal
abuse, and even a degree of physical ill-treatment in order to
obtain confessions without these being ruled inadmissable.
The ramifications of this circumstance are alarmingly far
reaching. Past monitoring of Diplock non jury courts revealed
that approximately 90% of defendents made confessions in
interrogation, while in 75% to 80% of cases the prosecution
evidence was based mainly on confessions - and judges rarely
contested their satisfactoriness. Moreover, about 10,000 persons
have been convicted mainly on confession evidence in such courts
since 1973.
Amazingly, where defendants have challenged the supplied
confessions by highlighting that they were induced by
maltreatment, judges have accepted that abuse had occurred but
have refused to reject the actual confessions. Examples of this
judicial complicity occur in R v TOHILL, R v McKEARNEY, and R v
CULBERT.
The announcement of the removal of a detainee's right to
silence under RUC interrogation in October 1988 has now created
an utterly incredulous judicial scenario within "Northern
Ireland". On the one hand, conditions exist to render admissible
any statement induced through oppressive interrogation, whether
authentic or not, in a non-jury court and, on the other, a judge
may now draw legal inference from a detainee's exercise of the
right to silence in interrogation. This represents an
unprecedented judicial situation which effectively emasculates
any prospect for a nationalist to secure a fair trial.
It is widely considered amongst legal academics, such as
Walsh, Boyle, Hadden, and Hillyard, that adequate provision
exists in common law to empower security agencies to perform
arrests and interrogations without recourse to emergency
legislation. This fact begs the question as to why it is
therefore used. Three broad explanations exist.
Firstly, arrest and interrogation powers are used
primarily to gather intelligence. This fact stems from the
requirements of Kitsonian counter-insurgency strategy. It is
evidence by the following illustrative figures between January
and October of 1980. Of 4,209 persons arrested for interrogation
under emergency legislation, only 11% were charged. By contrast,
under common law in Britain, in normal circumstances 90% of the
same number of detainees would have been charged. (5)
Secondly, the MODUS OPERANDI of arrest, which invariably
occurs in the early hours of the morning, and the removal of the
subject in a disorientated state to the oppressive environment of
the interrogation centre, where s/he is detained for up to seven
days, has the objective of intimidating the detainee.
"Individuals and groups who have opposed the British
presence there [ in "Northern Ireland" ] by violent and non-
violent means have found it extremely difficult to secure
protection and redress in the courts against police excesses. A
remarkable feature about their lack of success is that the abuses
have been high in profile, substantial in volume and severity,
and sustained in frequency over the years." (6)
During the hunger-strike of 1981 for example, in one
night 60 key campaign activists were arrested under the PTA and
detained for the entire 7-day. More recently, arrest powers have
been employed extensively by security agencies to disrupt Sinn
Fein election campaigns.
A third obvious explanation for the reliance upon
emergency legislation to arrest and interrogate is their
contribution toward obtaining convictions - a fact amplified by
the excessive practices sanctioned for use by the security
agencies.
The publication of the Gardiner Report in 1975
recommended the ending of internment and formalised the
burgeoning strategy to criminalise the struggle for national
self-determination. From March 1976, all defendants were
processed through the Diplock non-jury court system, denied
special category status and were detained in the new cellular H-
Blocks prison. In conjunction with the new dominant role in
security delegated to the RUC, special interrogation centres were
constructed in Belfast and Armagh.
The decision of the British government to Ulsterise and
criminalise the struggle imposed an acute responsibility upon the
RUC to obtain the convictions of republican activists.
A conveyor belt system emerged to process those detained
by the security agencies, in place of the internment method with
its connotations of prisoners of war status. Persons were to be
arrested under emergency legislation, interrogated in the new
centres, charged with a scheduled ( i.e. "terrorist" ) offence,
brought to trial before a non-jury Diplock court, and ultimately
jailed in the cells of the newly-built H-Blocks.
However, the prerequisite to the success of this system
was the extraction by the RUC of confessions from the detainees.
Resultant pressure was brought to bear upon the RUC to accomplish
this.
The affliction of abuse upon detainees did not abate with
the new emphasis upon securing confessions - the reverse
occurred. With the opening of the interrogation centres and the
pressure to convict more republicans, abuse intensified.
"Irrefutable proof of inhuman and degrading treatment was
proved by the Association of Forensic Medical Officers in
representations to the Police Authority as early as April, 1977."
(7)
Throughout 1977, investigations were opened and dossiers
compiled on the extent of brutality meted out to nationalists by
civil libertarian activists such as Fr. Raymond Murray and
Amnesty International. Amnesty published a report in 1978 which
declared, "that maltreatment of suspected terrorists by the RUC
had taken place with sufficient frequency to warrant the
establishment of a public inquiry to investigate it." (8)
Such was the volume and evidence of allegations of
maltreatment that in 1979 two RUC doctors, both Protestants, felt
compelled to resign their positions as their professional code of
ethics no longer allowed them to continue working for the RUC.
The British government responded with a privacy inquiry
in 1978 headed by Judge Harry Bennett. Its remit was to examine
RUC interrogation practices and the procedure for dealing with
complaints arising and to make recommendations.
The recommendations of the Bennett Report were introduce
in 1979, yet several key proposals have not been enforced. For
instance, available research proves that the recommended number of
RUC personnel to perform interrogations has been exceeded. A high
ratio of complaints exist of detainees being denied access to
solicitors. Although instances of physical abuse have decreased
in the interests of tactical expediencey, the use of verbal abuse
in the form of insults, obscenities, etc., persists during
interrogations.
A much more sinister characteristic of current
interrogation practices is the escalating catalogue of attempts
by the RUC to entrap nationalists being held in custody into
becoming informers. This practice is operated in a deeply
disturbing and ruthless manner, targeting the most vulnerable
sections of the nationalist community, namely the unemployed and
individuals with domestic and medical problems. Between November
1985 and May 1987 almost 50 nationalists came to Sinn Fein and
revealed that the RUC had attempted to entrap them as informers.
Within this context of refined interrogation
malpractices, the removal of the right to silence by the British
government must be seen as central to the intensification of an
atmosphere which instills fear and stress in the detainee.
Moreover, the decision by the British to derogate from
the European Convention on Human Rights in December 1988 in order
to continue to use the 7-day detention order provided by Section
12 (1) (6) of the PTA may be regarded as official sanction of the
abuses of human rights occurring under arrest and interrogation
powers.
The above decision to derogate followed the announcement
in November by the European court that Britain was guilty of
human rights abuses against nationalists in "Northern Ireland"
through its continued use of Section 12. This is not the first
occasion Britain has been indicted internationally both formally
and informally for its abrogation of civil liberties and
democratic rights since 1969. The result of the case brought
against the British by the Dublin government in 1971 for
torturing internees was upheld. Successive Amnesty International
reports in 1971, 1978 and 1988 have exposed serious abuses of
human rights by the legal, judicial and security system.
The dissolution of human rights in respect of arrest and
interrogation is systematic and endemic.
Redress against the security agencies for abuses under
these draconian arrest and interrogation powers is impossible. No
mechanism exists to curtail or curb such malpractices. Fellow
members of the security agencies will not incriminate one another
in the event of an attempted prosecution and in any case the
panorama of judicial rulings is so expansive that these agencies
have effectively been elevated above accountability to the law.
(9) Moreover, the Director of Public Prosecutions, an ostensibly
independent prosecution authority established in 1972 and the
Attorney General, a member of the British government, have
singularly failed to prosecute any security personnel for
excessive behaviour or maltreatment.
That this is the case is not surprising. The frightening
array of powers legitimising the gross infringement of human
rights examined in the foregoing chapter has a clear political
imperative. They do not simply stem from the individual
sectarianism or vindictiveness of the RUC and judiciary, rather
they occur at the tactical behest of the British government. The
British occupation relies upon such measures and for their
execution by a legal, judicial and security system synthesised by
the common political aim of subjugating the nationalist
community.
CHAPTER FOUR
NEUTRALISING RESISTANCE: THE COURTS AND DETENTION
Ultimately the success of any counterinsurgency strategy will be
measured by its success in removing the source of resistance.
Over the last 20 years the British government has used various
tactics both singularly and collectively to realise this
objective. This chapter explores the range of methods employed by
the British to detain Irish nationalists at length since 1971
through either disregard for, or grotesque manipulation of, the
judicial process. The next chapter focuses on a separate measure
developed by the British - the shoot-to-kill policy - which,
although differing methodically from detention, has the same
explicit political objective of physically neutralising support
for national self determination.
The context in which the internment of nationalists was
reintroduced has been examined in preceding chapters.
It was acknowledged as a political failure within a year
of its implementation by the British government, but this
acceptance catalysed a cycle of review to identify the optimum
vehicle for detaining nationalists. This process was highly
sensitive to both political, military and international
considerations and led to the creation of a judicial type scheme
of detention which reflected a major strategy rethink by the
British in the 1970s.
O'DOWD ET AL have commented:
"By 1972, the "N. I. problem" had become "dangerously"
internationalised and the British policy of propping up the
Stormont regime was thoroughly discredited. At this moment, and
without the obstacle of a NI government, the British accelerated
the drive for reform and the reconstitution of the rule of law,
while at the same time drawing upon the latest repertoire of
counterinsurgency thinking... in so doing, it became increasingly
possible to divert international concern by representing the
conflict as a discreet problem of criminality." (1)
Internment was not automatically discarded with the
imposition of direct British rule although the arguments for its
total abandonment were being marshalled. Instead a system of
judicial hearings was introduced to side-track the focus of
continuing attention away from internment. This method proved to
be inadequate due to the rejection of confessions as inadmissible
on the basis of common law. Such difficulties were dissipated in
1973 with the enactment of the EPA as a result of the Diplock
Report. The Diplock Commission had been asked by the British
government to report on.
"What arrangements for the administration of justice in
Northern Ireland could be made in order to deal more effectively
with terrorist organisations by bringing to book, otherwise than
by internment by the Executive, individuals involved in terrorist
activities, particularly those who plan and direct, but do no
necessarily take part in, terrorist acts." (2)
Consequently, a series of alterations to the law ere
prescribed, central to which was the establishment of non jury
courts, later known as Diplock courts, to try "terrorist" or
scheduled offences. Once processed through the supposedly normal
Diplock system the accused was to be classified as a criminal and
imprisoned in the H-Block cells.
The recent legislative changes (PTA 1989) introduced by
the British government have augmented the terms of imprisonment
for detainees by reducing remission of sentence from one-half to
one-third.
Diplock courts have continued to operate since 1973 and
their success in obtaining convictions has hinged upon a number
of preconditions: the ability of the security agencies to arrest
persons at will; the extraction of statements of admission, on
which most Diplock "confessions" are based, after lengthy and
oppressive interrogation: third, relaxation of the laws
concerning the admissibility of statements of admission in a
court. The frightening significance of this factor has been
amplified earlier in Chapter 3 when it was shown that the burden
of proof is removed from the prosecution to the defendant for
disproving the statement of admission - in contravention of the
common law.
In addition, the conduct or trial proceedings compound
the likelihood of conviction. Several key characteristics
differentiate between a Diplock and a common law court, which
explodes the common law dictum, "innocent until proven guilty".
Walsh has revealed (3) that it is standard practice for
the RUC and DPP to prefer the most serious charges possible in a
politically related incident. Ultimately the accused will usually
be convicted on a lesser charge but this practice allows for the
maximum number of serious charges to be entered before the actual
trial commences, thus strengthening the prosecutions's hand in
later plea bargaining.
Moreover, in bail application the judge places greater
value on the RUC's opinion than upon the accused's evidence.
Consequently, a by-product of this tendency is to create an
effective form of internment through imposition of lengthy
periods of remand in custody before the actual trial.
Further grave reversals of common law practices arise in
Diplock committal proceedings. Under the Criminal Procedure Act
1968, which forms part of the Magistrates Court Order 1981, both
preliminary inquiry and preliminary investigation at the
committal stage has been withdrawn in favour of the inquiry
alone. This change restricts the defence's opportunity to
challenge the prosecution's case before the main trial and it can
increase the risk of inadmissible evidence, prejudicial to the
accused's interests, being provided to the judge. Analysing this
characteristic of the Diplock system, BOYLE ET AL, say,
"It is further indication of the desire on the part of
the authorities to streamline the judicial process by eliminating
any effective opportunity for the defence to put into practice
what is, in theory, an essential part of the adversarial system
of criminal justice, the right to challenge the prosecution case
at the committal stage." (4)
The above obvious derogations of civil liberties within
the application of the Diplock system construct absolute
injustices under the judicial apparatus. The most blatant
violation stems from the inherent inability of Diplock courts to
administer justice because the trial judge is designated as the
sole arbiter of both law and fact, whereas under common law a
jury of lay persons would arbitrate upon the assembled facts. It
is widely acknowledged belief that this routine leads to the case
hardening of judges, thus diminishing their capacity to arbitrate
upon fact.
This structural flaw combined with the political purpose
of the Diplock courts has almost certainly caused miscarriages of
justice. It is difficult to escape such a conclusion when the
operation of the courts apparatus is examined in conjunction
with the arrest and interrogation practices administered by the
security agencies, as provided for under emergency legislation
and supplementary judicial rulings.
Certainly there is abundant evidence of the bias
displayed in favour of the security agencies, by contrast with
the treatment meted out to nationalists by the judiciary.
Illustrations of this will follow in the next chapter.
It is now clear that the DPP is not willing to prefer
charges against British army or RUC personnel unless the evidence
is at least overwhelming and such charges will only be preferred
after authority has been sought and sanctioned from the Attorney
General.
At another level, injustice pervades the Diplock system
through scheduling (prescribing as "terrorist") even criminal
offences, as opposed to those of a political nature. The result
is that such law-breakers are also processed through the
conveyor-belt system for offences it was not originally designed
to address.
However, even with inherent and outward injustice
characterising the Diplock courts apparatus, it s warped
potential was not fully realised until 1982 when the British
government introduced its paid-perjurer strategy. To understand
why the British decided to further develop the judicial
apparatus, the intervening period must first be evaluated.
The cogency of the political thinking underlying the
British strategy review of the early 1970s did not fully blossom
until the publication of Lord Gardiner's report in 1975. This
report enunciated the totality of the criminalisation strategy
discussed earlier, and its logic then carried through to the
evolution of the twin "normalisation and Ulsterisation"
strategies.
Gardiner counselled that internment could no longer be
maintained as a long-term policy and that all detainees should in
future be treated as mere criminals with the onset of the Diplock
courts. The report further recommended that special category
status (SCS), equivalent to POW status, should be phased out.
Consequently, internment ended in 1975 and, as of March 1976, SCS
was denied to those convicted by Diplock. This engendered the
anomalous situation which currently persists of some prisoners
being recognised as SCS detainees (i.e. POWs) and others being
considered criminals simply because they were convicted after
1976.
Whilst this situation was self-contraditory and arguably
untenable, it was nonetheless a crucial step towards
criminalising the struggle for national self-determination.
Britain could not hope to convince the world that the conflict in
"Northern Ireland" was a continued eruption of criminality if all
convicted detainees possessed POW status.
The 1975-76 period witnessed a major strategic offensive
by the British government against the national community which
was waged on diverse fronts. However, from the melting pot of the
intensified repression and conflict, a refined Republican
Movement was to emerge with a clearer political definition of the
direction the struggle was assuming.
A realisation devolve upon the detained republican
activists in 1975 that the prisons would become the vital terrain
upon which the battle against criminalisation of the struggle
Would be waged. Republican prisoners demanded recognition as
POWs and refused to wear prison garb, hence the blanket protest
began. The prison conflict intensified and escalated until the
republican prisoners were force by the prison administration into
a no-wash protest and to live among their own excreta.
International pressure from human rights, religious, and
political activists failed to diminish the British government's
intransigence and the H-Block struggle culminated in two hunger
strikes in 1980 and 1981, the latter of which claimed the lives
of ten republican activists.
The consequence of the unprecedented international
attention upon the prison struggle was to thoroughly discredit
Britain's strategy to criminalise the nationalist community's
popular demand for national self-determination.
Moreover, the hunger-strikes regenerated the political
struggle against British occupation as events propelled an influx
of newly politicised nationalist youth into the Republican
Movement.
Internal development within the Movement accelerated and
the struggle for national self determination expressed new
tactical dimensions, not least of which was the launch of Sinn
Fein, for the first time in 20 years, as a vibrant electoral
organisation.
The combined effect of an upsurge in IRA military
operations and Sinn Fein's impressive electoral interventions,
fuelled by support from a rejuvenated nationalist community, set
the backdrop against which the British government's decision to
introduce the paid perjurer strategy must be analysed.
Prior to 1981, paid-perjurers or "supergrasses" were used
on only four occasions to convict detainees in "Northern
Ireland". However, between November 1981 and November 1983, at
least seven loyalist and 18 nationalist perjurers emerged to give
evidence against 600 people in return for financial gain and, or,
immunity from personal conviction. Fifteen eventually retracted
their testimonies but ten others proceeded to trial.
Amazingly, the British government has consistently denied
that paid-perjurers have ever amounted to a prosecution strategy,
yet the fact that so many appeared over a comparatively short
period belies that contention. A number of specific conditions
existing against the broad political panorama outlined above
corroborate the proposition of a government sponsored strategy.
The impetus for the appearance of paid-perjurers stemmed
from the appointment as overall co-ordinator of security in 1979
of Maurice Oldfield and the need to compensate for the increased
difficulty in extracting confessions due to the application of
the Bennett recommendations post 1979. Moreover:
"It seems inconceivable that the financial and man-power
resources which this has required were not authorised at the
executive level in advance rather than, as the authorities
maintain, agreed on a case to case basis as each "convicted
terrorist" came forward." (5)
The use of perjurers is not provided for under common
law. However, rules relating to the credibility of accomplice
evidence and the governance of corroboration do exist. These have
been the judicial basis for the execution of the paid-informer
strategy.
Within common law, accomplice evidence may be challenged
at the committal proceedings during the preliminary inquiry.
However, use of the perjurer strategy under Diplock has removed
even this safeguard due to the implementation of the Voluntary
Bill of Indictment. This resulted in automatic imprisonment of
the accused until the main trial. Consequently the paid perjurer
strategy came to be also known as detention by remand, because
whether a conviction was upheld or not, under perjurer evidence
the procedure guaranteed the lengthy detention in remand of the
accused. For example, one nationalist was detained on remand on
the testimonies of five consecutive perjurers before being
finally released.
While the accused are detained on remand, the perjurers
were schooled intensively by the RUC in the testimony they
required to be presented against the detainees. The perjurer
Kevin McGrady was reportedly schooled on 47 separate occasions.
The leading case on the corroboration of accomplice
evidence is R v BASKERVILLE which established that evidence in
corroboration must be implicatory evidence. A further case R v
McCORMICK, developed upon R v BASKERVILLE by establishing that
corraborative evidence may be inadequate for conviction if the
judge considers the credibility of the supplied accomplice
evidence to be such that a higher that usual quality of
corroboration is required.
Despite these judicial criteria, the paid-perjurer strategy
preceeded with mass convictions solely on the basis of
uncorraborated evidence. Additionally, the stipulation by Judge
Murray in the case involving Anthony O'Doherty that evidence
presented in such trials furnish "clear and compelling
corraboration" proved to be impotent between 1981 and 1984 when
nationalists were convicted on the testimony openly described by
Lord Chief Justice Lowry as "contradictory, bizarre, and in some
aspects incredible", as in the case of R v GIBNEY.
Further reported aspects of the trial proceedings in the
paid-perjurer strategy were the division of the court room
between two distinct environments, for the accused and
friends/observers, and alternately for the perjurer and his/her
minders. It was found that concurrent to the absence of
corroboration and with forensic evidence being rarely available,
the preferred charges were flimsy. Significantly, perjurer trials
were invariably mass trials (Christopher Black implicated 38
nationalists). Inevitably this caused the accused to be mutually
tainted by the collective nature of the individual charges
preferred against them all. Finally ample evidence permeates the
succession of trials to prove that the presiding judges greatly
endeavoured to accept the supplied evidence. (6)
The net effect of this judicial strategy has been
succinctly summed up by Gifford:
"... the use of supergrass can lead, and I believe has
led, to the telling of lies and to the conviction of the
innocent." (7)
The last of the perjurers retracted her testimony in
1986. Towards the end of the strategy, perjurers were employed
with much lesser degrees of success than at the outset. This is
explained later. However, as with internment, it could be re-
introduced in a more refined form at any time deemed politically
expedient by the British government. Significantly, Lord Chief
Justice Lowry's written judgement in the McGrady case elaborated
what could provide a legal precedent for a future paid perjurer
strategy. Additionally, Amnesty International has expressed
concern that such trials may recommence under the same terms at
any time. (8)
A further cause for alarm should be the sustained
attempts by the RUC to induce nationalists being held in custody
into becoming paid informers and perjurers against specified
individuals.
The emergence and subsequent collapse of the paid-
perjurer strategy is an instructive lesson in the contemporary
operation of the legal, judicial and security system, the levels
of collusion between respective agencies; and their diverging
approaches to effective counterinsurgency. The following lengthy
quotation provides such a valuable political analysis:
"Its initial success was underwritten by an uncritical
judiciary which subsequently realised its mistake and about
turned, destroying the phenomenon it had helped create. This was
achieved against the wishes of the executive authorities and,
apparently, largely in response to a broadly based anti-
supergrass campaign. Contrary to the official view, therefore,
Northern Ireland's judges were acting together in a deeply
political manner all along, but not in the crude sense alleged by
the conspiracy theory. The supergrass policy was a high cost
counterinsurgency strategy in manpower, financial and propaganda
terms and therefore required a high conviction rate and an
appreciable reduction in the level of violence to justify its
continued existence. The indispensable co-operation of the courts
was faithfully rendered in the Bennett, Black and McGrady trials
in 1983. But, following the McGrady case in November 1983, judges
trying supergrass cases clearly became much more critical of this
type of evidence... It is impossible to identify precisely the
factors which have produced this result. It could be argued that
Northern Ireland's judges, drawn largely from Unionist
backgrounds, recognised the dangers inherent in the
disenchantment of large sections of the loyalist community with
the courts and government policy which the supergrass system
inspired. The well organised campaign by the various relatives'
groups and others almost certainly had an impact ... Probably
Lord Gifford's unofficial inquiry from October to December 1983
was of considerable influence...
"All these factors seem to have prompted the judiciary to
reassess its original choice between uncritical loyality to
counterinsurgency policy as conceived by the executive and
loyalty to the ideology of rule of law. Opting for the latter was
ultimately deemed to be necessary in order to limit the damage to
the legal system and to reassert a much more compromised judicial
"independence". It is likely that this volte face on the part of
the courts, rather than cajoling the security forces to smooth
down its rougher edges, has wrecked the supergrass system." (9)
The motivation of a legal and judicial system which
oversees such horrifying contortions of normal justice in order
to detain opponents of British rule is the British government's
commitment to denying Ireland the right to national self-
determination.
However, the facilitators and admimistrators of this
process are the judiciary, the DPP and the Attorney General,
without whom the pretence of "normal" justice would evaporate.
Hillyard states:
"The rhetoric of the administration of justice may
emphasize the notion of equality before the law, but the reality
of law which is most observable in any Diplock trial are the
sectarian, class, and income divisions between those who
administer the law and those who are directly affected by it."
(10)
Although Catholics have been appointed to the Bench since
direct rule, the majority of judges in "Northern Ireland" remain
Protestant and of unionist party, British military and business
backgrounds. The Worker's Research Unit has concluded that the
inherent sectarian bias of the judiciary is most clearly
manisfest in their sentencing of the accused, i.e. nationalists
are treated immeasurably more harshly than others. (11)
As previous chapters have demonstrated, far from taking
steps to mitigate abuses the judiciary has in fact sanctioned
them. Moreover, the DPP and Attorney General have also totally
failed to exert control over such oppressive practices and they
have readily collaborated with the introduction of the Diplock
Courts and the pursuance of the paid-perjurer strategy.
This chapter has traced the operation of the courts and
detention methods in "Northern Ireland" since 1971. They and
their administrators have been shown to be integral components of
the entire British war effort. Although internment and paid-
perjurers have been temporarily exhausted and Diplock remains the
central tactic for removing individuals from political
resistance. It is not the optimum device. The British government
particularly as 1989 heralds the 20th year of the redeployment of
combat troops, requires a new method fro widespread indefinite
detention of nationalists. What design this may take and when the
British determine that conditions demand its introduction is
difficult to anticipate but it will inevitably draw upon the
lessons of the previous 20 years - a scenario which can only
exacerbate existing repression against the nationalist community.
CHAPTER FIVE
NEUTRALISING RESISTANCE: SHOOTING-TO-KILL
The shoot-to-kill policy has been executed by the
security agencies in "Northern Ireland" since 1969. The deaths of
more than 300 people have thus far resulted due to the use of
this deadly force. The great majority of this total have been
nationalists - members of the unionist community have also been
killed but their deaths appear to have occurred inadvertently due
to the particular scenario prevailing at the time.
The practice of the shoot-to-kill policy has been
characterised by two broad scenarios. The first is the habitual
and excessive use of force which has led to the death of
joyriders at roadblocks, participants at the scenes of robberies
and in other general circumstances. In such instances the deaths
of unionist people have occurred.
The second scenario has occurred in premeditated
situations under general orders, such as on Bloody Sunday in
1972, or with the deployment of specially assigned squads to
execute republican activists, such as at the Loughgall ambush in
1987.
The shoot-to-kill policy may be extension be applied to
the use of plastic bullets. This ostensible riot control weapon
and its predecessor, the rubber bullet, have caused the deaths of
16 people since 1969, one of whom was a Protestant unionist.
Shooting to kill by the security agencies has not been an
aberration in unionist and British government policy. Its use is
the logical outcome of their determination to thwart the Irish
people's right to national self determination.
It was argued in the last chapter that the success of the
state's counterinsurgency strategy is measured by its ability to
remove resistance. Shooting to kill therefore, has been a
consistent partner of attempts to imprison and detain
nationalists. Where one method slackens the other intervenes.
The use of shoot to kill is much more limited in its
capacity to physically remove resistance on a wide scale.
Therefore, within the framework of British counterinsurgency, its
primary objective should be understood as the striking of terror
and instilling of war weariness into the nationalist community.
A refinement of the shoot to kill policy and an
escalation in covert operations occurred with the introduction of
"Ulsterisation", as a regular British troops were designated a
lower operational profile. Initially, responsibility was devolved
exclusively to the British army for covert operations. However,
by the 1980's specially-formed RUC undercover units, trained by
the British Special Air Services Regiment (SAS), were also
deployed for such work.
Three important factors provided the background to this
development. Firstly, Roy Mason was appointed in 1976 by a Labour
government as British Secretary of State to "Northern Ireland".
Secondly, in combination to Mason's aggressive political role,
Major General Timothy Greasey was appointed Army Commanding
Officer. Greasey had had extensive experience with the use of SAS
in Oman.
"It was, however the success of Provisional Sinn Fein in
the October 1982 Assembly elections that led to the full
unleashing of shoot to kill operations against the nationalist
community...Between 1982 and 1985, 23 individuals were shot by
the security forces in covert operations." (1)
Of the 23 mentioned in the above period, all but one were
republican activists.
The prosecution of the shoot-to-kill policy took on a
sinister new dimension in March 1988 when three unarmed
republican activists were killed by the SAS in Gibraltar in
circumstance amounting to summary executions.
Since 1969 only two members of the security agencies have
been convicted of either manslaughter or murder charges - both
were members of the British army. They were imprisoned in 1981
and 1984 respectively and both are not at liberty.
A total of 17 prosecutions has been brought against
members of the British army and RUC for killings committed whilst
on duty and resulting form the use of firearms. The attendant
acquittal rate was 90.5% overall. By contrast, the average
acquittal rate to studies into the Diplock courts in the early
1980s, was approximately 34.0%.
The total absence of accountability for deaths due to
security operations demonstrates that the security agencies have
been granted the power to decide the guilt or innocence of
suspected republican activists without recourse to the courts.
Through their ability to use firearms with impunity, Jennings
contends they have become the final courts of justice. (2)
The security agencies could not and cannot operate this
policy with such manifest immunity without the sanction of the
British government and collusion from the judiciary and its legal
adjuncts.
Two particular events were important landmarks in
conveying official acceptance of and constructing the legal
precedent for legitimising shoot to kill. These were the failure
to prosecute any British soldiers after the massacre of 14
nationalists at an anti-internment rally in Derry in 1972, and
the ATTORNEY GENERAL'S REFERENCE CASE in 1975.
The ATTORNEY GENERAL'S REFERENCE CASE concerned the
killing of a nationalist, Pat McIlhone in 1975 by British
soldiers. At a later trial, the soldier responsible was
subsequently acquitted. This decision sparked much disquiet and
prompted a process of legal review and rulings which culminated
in the House of Lords casting ultimate judgement on the
circumstances so legitimising the use of force by the soldiers.
The result was to leave the law in this sphere in a deeply
disturbing state of confusion. Consequently, the law does not
provide guidance on the circumstances granting permission to
the security agencies to discharge their weapons.
British army soldiers in "Northern Ireland" are issued
with instructions which are contained in the "Yellow Card".
However,
"It has been pointed out that these instructions do not
define the legal rights and duties of soldiers, and some judges
have regarded breaches of the instructions as "irrelevant"." (3)
These "Yellow Card" rules neither possess the force of
law or establish legal restrictions, nor do they provide an
effective code of guidelines on the discharge of weapons.
Ultimately, the relevant law on the use of force by the
security agencies resides in British common law as elaborated in
the Criminal Law Act (NI) 1967, Section 3. However, the
International Lawyers Inquiry into the use of firearms by the
security agencies found that this legislation was inadequate to
ensure lethal force is only employed when absolutely necessary.
The inquiry concluded that:
"225 The law governing the use of deadly force by the
police and army in Northern Ireland is inadequate. We find that
judges in Northern Ireland and the British House of Lords have
interpreted the law in a manner which allows too much scope
for members of the security forces. The attitude of some judges
amounts virtually to endorsement of martial law.."
"231 We consider that the British government in Northern
Ireland has violated and continues to violate the international
and domestic legal principle that every person's right to life
must be protected by law." (3)
The most disquieting examples of judicial partisanship
towards the security agencies have emerged in two ways in the
course of shoot-to-kill related cases. Firstly, when remarks such
as the following, expressed by Judge Gibson during FARRELL v
MINISTRY OF DEFENCE, openly endorse the shoot to kill policy.
"... if your watch wild west films, the posse go ready to
shoot their men if need be. If they don't bring them back
peaceably they shoot them. And in the ultimate result if there
isn't any way open to a man it's reasonable to do it in the
circumstances. Shooting may be justified as a method of arrest."
(5)
Secondly, whilst the conviction of Private Ian Thain for
the killing of a nationalist in 1984 has been highlighted as a
significant example of judicial impartiality, on the same day as
Thains's conviction another British soldier was found innocent of
either the murder or manslaughter of an Armagh nationalist.
Moreover, Thain was released on licence from his life sentence in
1988 and allowed to rejoin his original regiment.
The above example sets into critical relief the degree of
collusion which exists amongst the various components of the
legal judicial and security system in "Northern Ireland". Then it
was the Stalker-Sampson inquiry and its outcome which removed the
remaining semblance of impartiality and independence from the
judicial and legal system both in the broad scheme of affairs
and, specifically, with regard to shoot-to-kill cases.
This notorious inquiry which lasted from 1985 to 1988 was
commissioned to investigate the killings of six nationalists in
County Armagh within one month in 1982 by members of an RUC
undercover unit. Two English police officers were recruited to
oversee the inquiry because the first, Stalker, was initially
suspended from duties at a critical stage of his investigations
on allegations later found to be without substance.
The conclusions arrived at by the inquiry found that
grounds existed for charging a number of RUC personnel, including
senior officers, with a range of serious offences stemming from
the Armagh killings. Moreover, evidence emerged of incredible
attempts to obstruct and impede the investigation from within the
highest ranks of the RUC.
The report was eventually submitted to the DPP for
consideration apparently containing recommendations to prosecute
RUC members. The DPP in turn consulted with the Attorney General
who announced in January 1988 that eight RUC officers involved in
a conspiracy to pervert the course of justice and responsible
for obstructing the Stalker inquiry would not be prosecuted in
the interests of "national security".
The Stalker-Sampson affair represents the most fantastic
exposure of the dynamics of complicity operating within the
legal, judicial and security system in "Northern Ireland". The
Attorney General's decision cannot be construed as anything short
of official acceptance in future instances of inspired perjury by
state agencies. As for the shoot-to-kill policy, it continued to
claim the lives of republican activists and nationalist civilians
throughout 1988.
Summing up the implications of the use of shoot to kill
by the security agencies, Jennings points out:
"The shoot-to-kill policy is more militarily discreet and
politically expedient than the practices of South American death
squads. Rather than openly executing opponents, the security
forces engage them in situations where they will be able to act
with virtual impunity, always being able to fail back on the
elastic concept of reasonable force. But the intent - and result
- are similar. If experience is anything to go by, most members
of the security forces responsible for killing civilians are
unlikely to be charged, those who conspire to pervert the course
of justice will probably be protected by the all-embracing
concept of national security, those charged are unlikely to be
convicted and those unlucky enough to be convicted will probably
serve only a fraction of their sentence and may be free to return
to serve in the security forces. The actions of the security
forces and the attitude of the judiciary only serve to compound
the nationalist community's belief that the security forces are
a law onto themselves." (6)
It was stated at the beginning of this chapter that the
aggressive use of plastic bullets by the security agencies should
be understood as an extension of the shoot-to-kill policy. Not
surprising the same features of governmental sanction and
judicial acceptance control the employment of this weapon. An
aptly entitled article BULLETS ABOVE THE LAW, notes that:
"... the deaths and injuries in Northern Ireland from
rubber and plastic bullets are not inevitable. They are, rather,
an example of bad policing, and... a reflection of the increasing
use of excessive force, in which weapons are used not as a last
but as a first resort, and of its acceptance by the security
forces and judiciary alike." (7)
Plastic bullets were introduced in 1973 to replace the
use of rubber bullets as a riot control device. Since then,
according to grossly under estimated official statistics, 54,234
plastic bullets have been discharged, in circumstances
contravening the very guidelines laid down to control their use.
For instance, the governing rules stipulate that they should not
be aimed above the lower part of the body. In spite of this, most
deaths have resulted from the impact of bullets fired at the
victim's head.
The history of the use of plastic bullets has been
characterised by indiscriminate application. The majority of
victims have been proved not to have been involved in riot
situations and moreover, several fatalities have been inflicted
in areas where no street disturbance was even current! The case
of mother-or-three Nora McCabe, killed by a plastic bullet in
1981, bears grim testimony to this fact. At the time of her
killing, the RUC claimed to be under sustained attack. However,
at Nora McCabes' inquest in 1983, the jury established that no
riot was in existence and that no legitimate target was available
to use the weapon against within the vicinity. Such was the
magnitude of disparity between the RUC's sworn evidence at the
inquest, and the jury's corroborated findings, that a public
outcry ensued. Nonetheless, the DPP announced that no prosecution
would be brought against the RUC personnel involved in the
killing, or for perjury. The Attorney General endorsed this
decision and ignored a petition form 80 British MPs to convene an
inquiry into the killing. Furthermore, the RUC confirmed no
disciplinary action would be pursued. In fact, the officer who
ordered the fatal shot to be fired was later promoted to
assistant chief constable of the RUC.
No member of the security agencies has ever been
convicted of murder or manslaughter arising from the use of
plastic bullets. Indeed, in the one case brought against an RUC
officer, Nigel Hegarty, for the killing of John Downes in 1984,
the circumstances left no alternative but to prosecute as the
incident attained world-wide media attention (8). Hegarty was
acquitted in 1985, even though it was established during the
trial that the fatal bullet was fired in breach of the relevant
operational guidelines.
The British government has consistantly refused to
acknowledge the danger associated with plastic bullets, it
asserts that they are both necessary and well-controlled. It is
currently considering the introduction of a new and even more
deadly plastic bullet gun.
The use of these bullets has been widely condemned
internationally and both the European parliament and United
Nations have called for their banning. In addition, the NCCL and
Irish human rights activists have supported this demand and
condemned the proposal to introduce the new weapon.
The shoot-to-kill policy has become a key element of
Britain's counterinsurgency strategy. Flowing from the overall
objective identified earlier of contributing towards the removal
of nationalist resistance, shooting to kill enables the British
government to execute republican activists and terrorise the
nationalist community.
Official state death squads, appropriately ambiguous
laws, a corrupt judiciary and legal system, and weapons such as
plastic bullets are inevitable for as long as Britain's
occupation of Ireland is perpetuated.
CONCLUSION
It would be a physical and intellectual impossibility to
enumerate with accuracy the cumulative devastation wrought upon
the nationalist community by the operation of Britain's legal,
judicial and security system in "Northern Ireland". Some
indication of the severity of repression exacted upon
nationalists over the last 20 years by the British government has
been provided by use of some of the available statistics in the
previous chapters.
Yet this study has been restrictive. It has not
investigated a range of other repressive apparatus employed
systematically against nationalists by the British state. Nor has
it investigated the documented collaboration between the British
army and RUC and loyalist death squads. The human rights abuses
arising from the legal, judicial and security system discussed in
this study are but the readily evident and detectable outgrowths
of British occupation. Sadly, the totality of human rights
violations visited upon nationalists are much more far reaching.
However, none of this repression is aberrant. The
existing panorama of official and unofficial measures comprises a
counterinsurgency strategy to prevent the realisation of Irish
national self determination. The resulting derogation of human
rights is therefore inherent to stabilising Britain's occupation
of Ireland.
Since the signing of the Hillsborough Agreement in
November 1985 between the London and Dublin governments,
repression has intensified. Hillsborough marked a new development
in counterinsurgency planning because it harmonised and
systematised cross-border collaboration. Inconjunction with a
package of ostensible economic reforms, the objective of
Hillsborough was to isolate the Republican Movement and repress
the popular demand for national self-determination.
At the time, the propaganda hyperbole surrounding the
Agreement suggested that both governments were equal partners and
that in return for the introduction of certain measures in the 26
Counties the British government would make reciprocal concessions
by alleviating the harsher aspects of law and security. Amongst
those suggested were the replacement of one-judge courts by
three-judge courts and more sensitive "policing" by the security
agencies towards nationalists.
Although the objectives was clear, the respective
influence and authority of the two governments was far from
equitable. Dublin was the subordinate partner and, whilst it
fulfilled its' commitments, the British outrightly refused to
alter any aspect of policy in "Northern Ireland". On the
contrary, once commitments by Dublin to cross-border extradition
and related security matters were secured, repression was
inevitably increased.
Three years later, although a better equipped and more
sophisticated system of repression had been constructed, the
struggle for national self-determination continues undiminished
and the national community remains unbeaten. The scale of IRA
operations and unreduced electoral support for Sinn Fein reflect
the failure of Hillsborough. However, these have simultaneously
propelled the British government into a new phase of repression
coinciding with the renewal of the Agreement in November 1988.
Hence, the flurry of announcements in Autumn introducing new
repressive legislation and concurrent military clampdowns in
nationalist districts.
The 20th year of resistance by the nationalist community
to British rule, if only in the interests of historical
authenticity, will refocus the attention of the world upon
"Northern Ireland". Britain cannot afford a further 20 years of
international embarrassment and declining credibility due to the
Irish conflict. The latest waves of oppression must therefore be
placed into their political context: they represent the
commencement of a phase of unrestrained subjugation by the
British government designed to totally extinguish the struggle
for national self-determination.
This onslaught will unleash the combined potential of all
state apparatuses against the nationalist community. It will
not, however, neutralise the freedom struggle, nor can it
undermine Ireland's right to national self-determination, but it
will perpetuate the conflict and inspire further suffering and
agony.
The operation of the legal, judicial, and security system
represents the antithesis of democracy and justice. Its violation
of human rights is absolute. Any analysis of it, as this study
has argued, must be conducted within the context of Britain's
ongoing opposition to Irish national self-determination. It
follow, therefore, that genuine concern for the protection of
civil liberties and the establishment of the rule of law can only
be expressed ultimately in support for the Irish people's right
to national self-determination, reunification, independence and
sovereignty.
FOOTNOTES
INTRODUCTION
1. F. KITSON, "LOW INTENSITY OPERATIONS"; P. 69.
CHAPTER ONE
1. M. FARRELL, "NORTHERN IRELAND: THE ORANGE STATE"; P. 92
2. FARRELL, ibid; P. 93.
3. cited FARRELL, ibid; P. 94.
4. BOYLE et al, "LAW AND STATE"; P. 7.
5. cited WORKERS RESEARCH UNIT, "BELFAST BULLETIN
NO. 10"; P. 21.
6. see M. FARRELL, "NORTHERN IRELAND: THE ORANGE STATE",
and "ARMING THE PROTESTANTS".
CHAPTER TWO
1. D. WALSH, "THE USE AND ABUSE OF EMERGENCY
LEGISLATION"; P. 11.
2. S. GREER and A. WHITE, "A RETURN TO TRIAL BY JURY";
P. 47.
(contained in "JUSTICE UNDER FIRE" ed A. JENNINGS)
4. HALL, ibid; P. 171.
5. W. MIDLANDS P. T. A. RESEARCH AND WELFARE ASSOC.,
"BRIEFING FOR P. T. A. DEBATE"; P. 2.
6. M. COLLINS ed, "IRELAND AFTER BRITAIN"; P. 60.
CHAPTER THREE
1. D. WALSH, "ARREST AND INTERROGATION", P. 34.
(contained in "JUSTICE UNDER FIRE" ed A. JENNINGS)
2. ibid; P. 33.
3. INTERNATIONAL LAWYERS INQUIRY, "SHOOT TO KILL?";
P. 115.
4. D. WALSH, "THE USE AND ABUSE OF EMERGENCY
LEGISLATION"; P. 44
5. D. WALSH, "THE R. U. C.: A LAW ONTO THEMSELVES?";
P. 95.
6. WALSH, ibid; P. 93.
7. NATIONAL LAWYERS GUILD, "NORTHERN IRELAND"; P. 29.
8. cited. N. L. G., ibid; P. 29.
9. D. WALSH, "ARREST AND INTERROGATION"; P. 42-43.
(contained in "JUSTICE UNDER FIRE", ed A. JENNINGS)
CHAPTER FOUR
1. O'DOWD et al, "REFORMING REPRESSION"; P. 201.
(contained in "NORTHERN IRELAND: BEYOND CIVIL RIGHTS
AND CIVIL WAR", O'DOWD et al.)
2. INTERNATIONAL LAWYERS INQUIRY, op cit; P. 115.
3. D. WALSH. "THE USE AND ABUSE OF EMERGENCY
LEGISLATION"; P. 79 - 80.
4. BOYLE et al, "10 YEARS ON IN NORTHERN IRELAND"; P. 69.
5. S. GREER, "THE SUPERGRASS SYSTEM"; p. 85.
(contained in "JUSTICE UNDER FIRE", ed A. JENNINGS)
6. WORKERS RESEARCH UNIT, "BELFAST BULLETIN
NO. 11; P. 10.
7. T. GIFFORD, "SUPERGRASSES"; P. 34.
8. AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL, "N. I. KILLINGS BY SECURITY
FORCES AND "SUPERGRASS" TRIALS"; P. 61.
9. GREER, op cit; P. 93 94.
10. P. HILLYARD. "POLITICAL AND SOCIAL DIMENSIONS OF
EMERGENCY LAW IN N. I.; P. 201.
(contained in "JUSTICE UNDER FIRE", ed A. JENNINGS)
11. WORKERS RESEARCH UNIT, "BELFAST BULLETIN
NO. 10; P. 21.
CHAPTER FIVE.
1. A. JENNINGS, "SHOOT TO KILL: THE FINAL COURTS OF
JUSTICE"; P. 173.
(contained in "JUSTICE UNDER FIRE", ed A. JENNINGS)
2. JENNINGS, ibid; P. 105.
3. JENNINGS, ibid; P. 111
4. INTERNATIONAL LAWYERS INQUIRY, op cit; P. 125 - 126.
5. JENNINGS, op cit; P. 112.
6. JENNINGS, op cit; P. 124.
7. A. JENNINGS, "BULLETS ABOVE THE LAW"; P. 131.
(contained in "JUSTICE UNDER FIRE", ed A. JENNINGS)
8. JENNINGS, ibid; P. 138.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL.
"NORTHERN IRELAND: KILLINGS BY SECURITY FORCES AND
SUPERGRASS TRIALS"
BOYLE et al.
"LAW AND STATE: THE CASE OF NORTHERN IRELAND"
"10 YEARS ON IN N. I.: THE LEGAL CONTROL OF POLITICAL
VIOLENCE"
COLLINS, MARTIN. (ED)
"IRELAND AFTER BRITAIN"
CURTIZ, LIZ.
"NOTES ON EMERGENCY LEGISLATION"
FALIGOT, ROGER.
"BRITAIN'S MILITARY STRATEGY IN IRELAND. THE KITSON
EXPERIMENT."
FARRELL, MICHEAL.
"NORTHERN IRELAND: THE ORANGE STATE."
"ARMING THE PROTESTANTS."
GIFFORD, TONY.
"SUPERGRASSES: THE USE OF ACCOMPLICE EVIDENCE IN N. I."
INTERNATIONAL LAWYERS INQUIRY,
"SHOOT TO KILL"
JENNINGS, ANTHONY. (ED)
"JUSTICE UNDER FIRE: THE ABUSE OF CIVIL LIBERTIES IN N.I.
KITSON, FRANK.
"LOW INTENSITY OPERATIONS."
NATIONAL COUNCIL FOR CIVIL LIBERTIES.
BRIEFING PAPERS ON P. T. A. AND E. P. A.
NATIONAL LAWYERS GUILD.
"NORTHERN IRELAND"
O'DOWD et al.
"NORTHERN IRELAND: BETWEEN CIVIL RIGHTS AND CIVIL WAR."
SINN FEIN.
"IRELAND: INTERNATIONAL NEWS BRIEFING."
"HILLSBOROUGH A FAILURE: THE BALANCE SHEET."
TOMLINSON, et al.
"WHOSE LAW AND ORDER?"
WALSH, DERMOT.
"THE USE AND ABUSE OF EMERGENCY LEGISLATION IN N. I."
WORKERS RESEARCH UNIT.
"BELFAST BULLETIN."
CHRONOLOGY
1920 GOVERNMENT OF IRELAND ACT enacted, signalling
the partition of Ireland
1922 SPECIAL POWERS ACT enacted, R. U. C. and B.
Specials already in existence.
Internment introduced.
1923 LOCAL GOVERNMENT ACT enacted, abolishing the
P. R. system of voting. This commenced the process
of gerrymandering local councils.
1928 S. P. A. rendered permanent.
1936 National Council for Civil Liberties compares
the 6 counties to European fascist dictatorships.
1951 PUBLIC ORDER ACT enacted.
1954 FLAGS AND EMBLEM ACT enacted.
1969 Strengthening of the P. O. A. British army
redeployed.
1970-71 Replacement of the B. Specials by U. D. R. and
R. U. C. Reserves.
1971 Internment reintroduced. Amnesty International
exposes the torture of internees. Dublin government
takes case against the British to the European
Court of Human Rights.
1972 Bloody Sunday occurred. Abolition of the
unionist government and reimposition of
direct British rule.
DIPLOCK REPORT published. Genesis of the
criminalisation strategy.
1973 EMERGENCY PROVISIONS ACT enacted. Diplock
courts operating in concurrence with internment.
Plastic bullet introduced.
1974 PREVENTION OF TERRORISM ACT enacted.
1975 GARDINER REPORT published and formal
implementation of criminalisation
of the struggle.
ATTORNEY GENERAL REFERENCE CASE is established.
1976 Evolution of ulsterisation and normalisation
to complement the criminalisation strategy.
Opening of the H-Blocks and commencement of the
Blanket Protest.
Castlereagh and Gough interrogation centres are
opened.
Refinement and escalation of the shoot to kill policy.
1978 Amnesty International report into the torture
of detainees under interrogation published.
1979 Publication of the Bennett Report.
The no wash protest continues in H-Blocks.
1980-81 The two Hunger Strikes took place. Mass
solidarity campaigns organised.
Dramatic increase in the use of plastic bullets
and associated deaths.
1982 Emergence of the paid perjurer strategy.
Sinn Fein succeeded in the assembly elections.
Upsurge in shoot to kill incidents.
The six Armagh killings occur. Revelation
emerge of R. U. C. undercover units.
1983-84 Jellicoe review of P. T. A. Baker review
of E. P. A.
1985-87 Hillsborough Agreement is signed. The
Stalker-Sampson inquiry ensues. Catalogue
of reports of R. U. C. attempts to recuit
vulnerable nationalists as informers and
perjurers.
1988 Culmination of the Stalker-Sampson inquiry with
the Attorney General's decision not to prosecute
R. U. C. personnel involved. Private Ian Thain
released from prison and allowed to rejoin his
regiment.
Announcement of the intention to render
permanent the P. T. A.
Internationalising of the shoot to kill policy
at Gibraltar.
From Autumn an upsurge of search and seal
operations in nationalist areas is sustained.
Censorship laws against Sinn Fein are
introduced.
The right of detainee's right to silence is
removed.
New powers extended to the R. U. C. to perform
D. N. A. forensic testing.
Britain found guilty of human rights abuses by
the E. C. H. R. In December British government
announces its' decision to derogate from the
E. C. H. R. ruling.
1989 Permanent and expanded version of the P. T. A.
enacted. ELECTED AUTORITIES (N. I.) is enacted.
