McGuinness: I’ve no regrets on terror past
Ex-IRA commander quits politics
FORMER IRA commander Martin McGuinness boasted he had ‘no regrets’ about his terrorist past last night as he announced his retirement from front-line politics.
The Irish Republican, who eventually became a key figure in the Northern Ireland peace process, said he was suffering a ‘serious illness’ and would not seek re-election as deputy first minister.
But in an incendiary parting shot he said he had no regrets about his leading role in the IRA – the terrorist organisation that killed hundreds of people and brought decades of misery to Northern Ireland.
Mr McGuinness admits being a senior figure in the IRA but has refused to say whether he personally murdered British soldiers. Asked whether he regretted his role during the Troubles, when more than 3,500 people were killed, he told the BBC: ‘People have to consider the circumstances in this city when I did join the IRA.
‘We had a city where people were being murdered by the RUC [Royal Ulster Constabulary], where they were being murdered wholesale, as they were on Bloody Sunday, by the Parachute Regiment.
‘And the fact that many young people like myself, supported by many thousands of people – I’m not saying it was a majority – decided to fight back, I don’t regret any of that.’
Despite his lack of remorse, he said he still hoped to go on to become an ‘ambassador for peace, unity and reconciliation’. His comments drew a furious response from victims of IRA violence last night.
Former Tory chairman Lord Tebbit, whose wife Margaret was left permanently paralysed by the 1984 IRA attack on the Tory conference in Brighton, said: ‘I hope that he will still have no regrets when he finds himself in that section of hell reserved for people like him. The world will be a cleaner and sweeter place without him.’
Former Tory MP Patrick Mercer, who was wounded in an IRA attack in 1989 during a tour of duty in Northern Ireland, said Mr McGuinness’s lack of remorse would sicken those affected by terrorist violence. Mr Mercer, a former Army colonel, said: ‘This is an unrepentant terrorist who does not regret the misery he has caused. I understand the realpolitik that has forced governments to deal with him, but it does not make it any more palatable to myself or the families of my dead soldiers to hear this sort of thing being said.’
Mr McGuinness, a former butcher, has admitted to being the IRA’s second-in-command during Bloody Sunday in 1972 when 14 unarmed civilians were shot dead by British soldiers in Londonderry.
The Saville Inquiry into Bloody Sunday found that Mr McGuinness was ‘probably’ armed with a sub-machine gun, although there was ‘insufficient evidence’ to prove he fired it. The Sinn Fein politician plunged Northern Ireland politics into crisis this month when he quit as deputy first minister, effectively collapsing the power-sharing deal with the Democratic Unionist Party that has helped keep the peace for a decade.
His resignation was officially in protest at the DUP’s handling of a disastrous renewable energy scheme which is set to cost taxpayers £1billion.
But last night he confirmed he has been forced to quit politics to focus on his failing health. The 66-year-old is reported to be suffering from an incurable genetic disease which has left him looking pale and tired in recent months.
He is said to be suffering from amyloidosis, a rare condition caused by deposits of protein in the body’s organs.