IRA rejected secret hunger strike deal
File photo dated 26/04/07 of Cell Number Eight in the Prison Hospital at the Maze / Long Kesh site near Lisburn where IRA Hunger stiker Bobby Sands died in 1981. PRESS ASSOCIATION Photo
IRA leaders including Martin McGuinness rejected a secret British offer to end the hunger strikes in July 1981 before the final six deaths, it can be revealed.
Files released today under the 30-year rule show that Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher authorised secret negotiations with the IRA.
At the time, republicans portrayed Mrs Thatcher as unbending and their claim that she “murdered” the hunger strikers led to her becoming a hate figure to many nationalists.
But the revelation that she secretly made an offer – almost identical to that accepted by republicans months later – which could have saved six prisoners’ lives will heap fresh pressure on the leadership of Sinn Fein.
As recently as 2009, Brendan ‘Bik’ McFarland, the IRA leader in the prison, claimed that “there was never any deal” with the government.
Other files released today show that British officials were convinced that the IRA leadership outside the prison was controlling the prisoners, despite Sinn Fein claims that the prisoners’ decision to die was entirely their own.
But despite the revelations, several sections of the hunger strike files released in Belfast have been blacked out or removed.
In public, Mrs Thatcher insisted she would not bow to the demands of republican prisoners held in Northern Ireland’s Maze Prison for so-called “political status” after Bobby Sands started a hunger strike on March 1.
However, files released by the National Archives in Kew, west London, show how her government sent messages to the IRA leadership through a secret intermediary, promising concessions if the hunger strikes were called off.
Though supported by many unionists in Northern Ireland, the government’s perceived intransigence drew widespread international condemnation and by the beginning of July, the pressure on the prime minister was intense.
Four hunger strikers had died and, before his death, 27-year-old Sands had secured a propaganda coup, winning election as an MP after standing in the Fermanagh and South Tyrone by-election.
But, when the remaining hunger strikers issued a statement dropping their demand to be treated as “prisoners of war”, Mrs Thatcher authorised a message to be sent setting out the concessions the government would make if the strikes were ended.
The go-between who relayed the message to the leadership of the Provisional IRA is identified in the National Archives files only by the codename ‘Soon’.
He has, however, been named previously as Brendan Duddy, a Londonderry businessman who for more than 20 years acted as a secret intermediary between the government and the IRA through his contacts with MI6 officer Michael Oatley.
The files include a log of a series of frantic telephone calls between Soon and his MI6 contact in the days leading up to the government’s offer. In one call, Soon explained the IRA’s demands.
“Immediately following the ending of the hunger strike, concessions would be required on clothes, parcels and visits. This, he said, would provide the Provisionals with a face-saving way out,” the log noted.
Soon used his contacts to arrange for leading republican Danny Morrison to visit the prisoners in the Maze to explain what was happening – without referring to the secret back channel.
The negotiations – which also involved the now Deputy First Minister Martin McGuinness – were clearly fraught.
At one point, the IRA men told Soon the British were being “insincere”. Soon retorted that “unless that belief was totally dispelled, he was going on holiday”.
The log noted: “The strength of his reply had, he said, won the day.”
In the final call, timed at 1am on July 6, Soon spelt out the precise choreography that would be necessary to bring the strike to an end.
“When HMG produces such a draft proposal it is essential [last word underlined] that a copy be in the Provisionals’ hands before it is made public,” Soon told MI6.
“This is to enable the Provisionals either to approve it or to point out any difficulties before publication. If it were published without prior sight and agreement they would have to disapprove it.”
Soon added that the situation would be “irreparably damaged” if another hunger striker died and urged the government to “act with the utmost haste”.
In London, ministers and officials prepared their response, setting out the concessions the government was to offer “if, but only if, it would lead to the immediate end of the hunger strike”.
They included allowing the prisoners to wear their own clothes, rather than prison uniform, and to receive normal visits, parcels and letters as well as “further developments” on prison work and remission.
Mrs Thatcher clearly took a close interest in the process. The draft message in the files includes a series of detailed amendments, apparently in her handwriting.
The message ended: “If the reply we receive is unsatisfactory and there is subsequently any public reference to this exchange we shall deny that it took place. Silence will be taken as an unsatisfactory reply.”
Despite the careful build-up and the apparent concession to the key IRA demands, the approach was rebuffed. The following day, a fifth hunger striker, Joe McDonnell, died.
Northern Ireland Secretary of State Humphrey Atkins informed Mrs Thatcher: “Following the sending of the message which you approved last night, we have received, as you will know, an unsatisfactory response. That particular channel of activity is therefore now no longer active.”
Nevertheless, the government then made a second attempt to break the deadlock. Mr Atkins’ office told No 10 they had used Soon to repeat “what was in essence the message sent on July 7”.
“Although the channel was very free with his own advice, he had nothing acceptable to say about the attitude of the Provisionals and at about 1900 hours on July 20 the secretary of state gave us instructions that the channel should be closed,” the note said.
The hunger strikes were to carry on for another three months, during which five more prisoners died.
See Morning View, page 18
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