Troubles victims' group says 'it is not enough for Dublin to sit back and proof what the Brits are doing - they need to act on terrorism too'

The Irish state has launched a legal bid to overturn the Tory-imposed amnesty for Troubles crimes, which became law in the UK in September, much to the disgust of everyone from the TUV to Sinn Fein to groups representing victims of the conflict.

However, unionists have been quick to point to what they see as deep failings in how Dublin conducted itself during the Troubles, and how it still conducts itself now.

According to the Conflict Archive on the Internet (CAIN), between 1969 and 2001, some 116 people were killed in the Republic of Ireland – almost as many as were killed on the UK mainland.

Of those 116 deaths, 50 were down to loyalists, and 55 to republicans, with security services accounting for almost all the rest.

Now Kenny Donaldson, SEFF director, has chimed in on the subject too, saying: “Confirmation by the Irish State that it is to mount an interstate case against the UK and its Legacy and Reconciliation Bill must now be the catalyst for an ending of that state’s policy of denial on legacy and signal its willingness to now come clean on its acts of commission and omission.

“The Irish State must cease its rank hypocrisy on legacy.

"It is not a sustainable position for that State to act as quality proofers for what ‘the Brits’ do or don’t do – they must come forward and deliver for the Omagh families, families impacted by cross-border terror and indeed their own citizens who they have also failed on these issues.

“SEFF’s position on these matters has been clear and consistent: we have never supported statutes of limitation, nor amnesties. We have always stood by the rule of law.

"Many of the loudest voices against the UK legacy and reconciliation bill were complicit with the part-murder of justice through the provisions laid out in the Belfast Agreement around prisoner released and a capped term of two years for those convicted of a pre-1998 offence/crime.

“Many of those voices were also prevalent around the decommissioning of weapons, which was a process that facilitated the permanent moving beyond use of weapons used by terrorists in committing their heinous crimes; justice was further murdered through this process.

“And then we have state-facilitated appeasement of terror groups in facilitating on-the-run pardon letters. Royal Prerogatives of Mercy were also thrown in for good measure. The loudest voices weren’t as loud over these acts which further murdered justice.”

He added that “we opposed the legacy and reconciliation bill on principle because it represented the final murder of justice, and because it fails to meet the needs of our constituency of victims and survivors (the largest constituency)”.

This was largely echoed by the TUV, whose leader Jim Allister said: “Whereas the Legacy Act is wrong, primarily in affording amnesty, the international legal action by the Republic is shameless hostile meddling in UK legislation from a state which sustained and gave sanctuary to IRA terrorists over decades and which continues to operate effective amnesty for murderers.

"The most important provision in the ECHR, under which ROI seeks to intervene, is Art 2, the right to life - yet the hands of the Republic drips in the blood of border Protestants murdered by those to which it afforded sanctuary.”