Bloody Sunday soldiers should be prosecuted, says civil rights leader
ONE of the founders of Northern Ireland’s civil rights movement has backed calls to prosecute former soldiers over the Bloody Sunday killings.
Former MP Ivan Cooper, 75, still regards the fatal shooting of 13 people in Londonderry on January 30 1972 following a civil rights march with disbelief.
Thirteen died, with 15 others shot and injured by soldiers from support company of the 1st Battalion Parachute Regiment.
All 13 victims were declared innocent in 2010 following a 10-year public inquiry conducted by Lord Saville. Then-prime minister David Cameron issued a public apology to the families on behalf of the state following the report.
An investigation by the Police Service of Northern Ireland followed the £195m inquiry and files were submitted to the region’s Public Prosecution Service (PPS) in 2016 and 2017 for consideration.
On Thursday the PPS is set to announce whether it will pursue prosecutions against some or any of 20 suspects, including 18 soldiers, one of whom has since died, and two Official IRA suspects.
John Kelly, whose 17-yearold brother Michael was among those shot dead, said it was a day the families had been waiting for with great expectation after 47 years.
Mr Cooper, one of the civil rights leaders on the march, called for prosecutions. “In my church the commandment says ‘thou shalt do no murder’, and I believe that commandment,” he said.
“They have to face justice, if Theresa May has any justice in her heart – and she is the daughter of a vicar, so she knows the same principles that I know.”
But Lord Ramsbotham, who was military assistant to the chief of the general staff at the time of Bloody Sunday, said it would set a “very dangerous” precedent.