A MAN whose brother was gunned down by the IRA in the Kingsmills massacre hopes the Irish Taoiseach will not place him in a hierarchy of victims when they meet in an historic encounter in Dublin on Thursday.
Some 40 relatives of the 10 Protestant workmen murdered in 1976 will meet the Taoiseach to discuss the south Armagh murders.
It is thought to be the first time that an Irish premier has agreed to meet IRA victims from Northern Ireland about alleged Irish state collusion in the murder of their loved ones.
Colin Worton, whose brother Kenneth died in a hail of bullets at Kingsmills, said last night he was “apprehensive” about meeting Enda Kenny.
He added that, when it comes to victims of the Troubles, “one life is worth the same as another”.
“I don’t know what way it is going to go,” Mr Worton said.
“I would like to tell him that my brother was only 24 when he died and that my daughter just turned 24 last week.
“I don’t know what it must have been like for my parents to bury a son aged only 24.
“I could understand it if Kenneth had died in an accident. But what happened was that an IRA gang crept across the border and hid in a hedge waiting for them. Then they executed him and ran back across the border – and nobody said boo to them.
“But when the mad cow disease hit south Armagh the Irish government sealed the border immediately. So they must have accepted the Kingsmills murders and chose to do nothing about them.”
Mr Worton said he empathised with the Pat Finucane family as they press for a public inquiry into the murder of the Catholic lawyer. Mr Finucane, who often acted for IRA suspects, was murdered by loyalists in 1989. The British Government has accepted its security forces colluded with loyalists in the murder.
“My heart goes out to them but one life is worth the same as another,” Mr Worton said.
See full story in Thursday’s News Letter
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