NI parties split over move by UK Government to limit the number of Troubles’ cases
ULSTER Unionists have given a “cautious welcome” to the Government’s latest plan to tackle legacy cases while other Northern Ireland parties have hit out at the proposals.
Only Troubles killings with “compelling” new evidence and a realistic prospect of prosecution will receive a full police investigation, the Government said yesterday.
Most unsolved cases will be closed, in a “significant” change to plans previously agreed by ministers from Britain, Ireland and Stormont political leaders.
A new law would prevent those investigations into the decades of violence from being reopened, under proposed legislation announced by NI Secretary of State Brandon Lewis.
The move has angered some victims who have branded the plan — which appears to be an attempt to balance the demands of many families for justice amid pressure from Army veterans to prevent what they term unwarranted prosecutions of alleged security forces’ wrongdoing — an “insult”.
Separate prosecutions of Soldier F in relation to Bloody Sunday and veteran Dennis Hutchings for the shooting of a Co Armagh teenager in 1974 have raised concerns ex-soldiers are being targeted in a “witch hunt”.
UUP justice spokesperson Doug Beattie MLA said his party has “consistently highlighted major flaws” with the legacy arrangements outlined in the Stormont House Agreement (SHA), and said the new plans gave “some encouragement” to addressing those concerns.
“We also welcome the commitment that those who defended the rule of law deserve certainty that there will be an end to repeated questions about what happened during their service,” he said. “For too many people — most notably republicans, some self-appointed guardians of human rights ... the entire legacy process presented an opportunity to rewrite history and paint the state and its actors as the villains of the piece at the UK Government’s own expense.”
The DUP have yet to comment.
SDLP leader Colum Eastwood accused the Government of using the plan to “safeguard” former soldiers.
“This is about shutting down justice and shielding former soldiers from fulsome investigation indefinitely,” he said.
“The measures announced are designed to create a separate class of cases. Where one group receives special treatment because of the uniform they wore.”
His comments were echoed by Sinn Fein’s deputy leader Michelle O’Neill, who said these new proposals “break” the terms of the SHA.
“It is a unilateral move by the British Government to rewrite the SHA without consulting the political parties or the Irish Government. The legacy structures agreed cannot be cherry-picked,” she said.
Mrs O’Neill also insisted the new proposals were not “fully human rights compliant”. In the past families would have had recourse to law and the EU justice institutions to fight decisions made to not prosecute alleged perpetrators. It is understood the Government remains committed to elements of human rights law enacted domestically.