Bloody Sunday inquiry ‘to blame for troops' torment
Paras facing murder charges attack the £200m Saville probe
VETERAN paratroopers yesterday blamed the Bloody Sunday inquiry for moves to prosecute them.
Seventeen former soldiers will learn today whether they will be charged with offences ranging from murder to grievous bodily harm over the killing of 13 civilians in Londonderry in 1972.
Lord Saville, who chaired the £200million investigation into the incident, yesterday insisted its purpose was simply to find out what happened.
He said: ‘Some thought that those soldiers who were found responsible should be proseanyone. cuted, but overall the campaign for Bloody Sunday originally was for an inquiry to find out what happened and why, rather than a question of prosecutions.’
The inquiry, which concluded in 2010 after 12 years of work, found that those killed were innocent and posed no threat.
Veterans said the findings paved the way for prosecutions.
A former soldier, who served with the 1st Battalion, Parachute Regiment, at Bloody Sunday, said one criminal investigator even knocked on his door with a copy of the Saville report in his hands.
He added: ‘We were made to give evidence to the Saville inquiry. We weren’t hiding from But we were told statements given to the inquiry couldn’t be used in prosecutions.
‘The next thing we know, the Northern Ireland Public Prosecution Service are saying they are deciding on prosecutions.
‘At the time of the inquiry, families were saying they were not interested in prison sentences for soldiers. Now they are saying they want life sentences.’
Another veteran said: ‘ It doesn’t take the brains of an archbishop to realise that if there is an inquiry about something a decision is going to be made at the end, whether it’s a prosecution or not.’
There is bitterness among para-
troopers that the inquiry allowed Provisional Ira figures to ‘hide behind a code of honour’.
The soldiers claimed they fired in retaliation after coming under attack from Ira gunmen.
Lord saville’s report prompted then- prime minister David Cameron to apologise to the families of victims, describing the killings as ‘unjustified and unjustifiable’.
But there has been an outcry over the prospect of military veterans, now in their 60s and 70s, being jailed for their roles in violence almost 50 years ago.
Evidence given to the Bloody sunday inquiry is not admissible in any potential criminal prosecutions under terms agreed when it was launched in 1998. But soldiers say there would have been no prospect of prosecutions without it
Lord saville told the BBC: ‘i didn’t know what was likely to happen. We hoped the inquiry would help the situation in ireland and i think and hope it did to a degree.
‘The question as to whether it draws a line under events or whether there should be prosecutions is not one for me, it’s one for politicians and prosecuting authorities.
‘if people want more and feel that justice can only be served by prosecutions against those that they believe to be responsible, then that is a matter again on which i can’t really comment.’
Colonel Derek Wilford, commander of the paratroopers on Bloody sunday, told BBC News that charging the soldiers would be a mistake.
He said: ‘We were betrayed and bringing charges against the soldiers is part of that betrayal.’
Col Wilford, now 85 and with Parkinson’s disease, said he disagreed with Lord saville’s findings, adding: ‘i was there and we thought in fact we were under attack. We will remain convinced of that until the end of our days.’