‘Give Gaddafi’s millions to victims of IRA’
THE millions earned every year by the Government from Colonel Gaddafi’s frozen UK assets should be given to the victims of the IRA, the Democratic Unionist Party demands today.
A parliamentary report last week disclosed that the Treasury had taken £17million in tax over the past three years from £12billion in Libyan assets linked to the country’s late dictator. Nigel Dodds, the deputy leader of the DUP whose 10 MPs are supporting the minority Tory Government, says there is “a strong moral and legal case for this money to fund a compensation scheme for the victims of the IRA”.
Gaddafi supplied weapons, including Semtex explosives, to the IRA during the Troubles in the Eighties.
Writing in today’s Sunday Telegraph, Mr Dodds addresses Theresa May and says that “in the final days of her premiership, the Prime Minister should take decisive action and begin righting this terrible wrong”.
He writes: “If we wait until there is a political settlement with Libya, then I fear many of the victims who suffered as a result of Libyan Semtex and guns will never see a single penny. They will have died without justice and without any proper compensation.”
Mr Dodds adds: “The Government
has a clear moral duty to support our citizens, particularly those who have suffered so much.”
It is an “embarrassment for our Government” that other countries have forced Libya to pay out significant sums to their victims of Libyan-backed terrorism, he says, yet no such deal has been reached for British victims.
Mr Dodds says an ongoing review led by William Shawcross, the former chairman of the Charity Commission, should “establish how many victims could potentially qualify for such compensation, what levels of compensation should be requested and how the issue can be best progressed”.
He adds that: “Victims of terrorism from all parts of the United Kingdom deserve to be treated properly. Whether the terrorism happened in Belfast or Birmingham, the US or Germany, should not matter, the suffering was the same.”
Last week Simon Hoare, the Tory MP and chairman of the Northern Ireland committee, said the Government had to ask itself whether “it is content to continue profiting from frozen Libyan assets while victims receive nothing”, adding there was “a clear moral imperative” for the money to go to victims.
The Government said last week that it wanted to see “a just settlement for all victims of Gaddafi-sponsored IRA terrorism” but ministers have previously stressed that it was not their responsibility to secure compensation for victims of Libyan Semtex, and that individuals should pursue their cases with Tripoli.