Nairac '˜remains did not go into mincer'

Independent Commission for the Location of Victims Remains (ICLVR) Chief Investigator Geoff Knupfer told the News Letter: “We have been absolutely assured by senior republicans that this didn’t happen. The reason it was put up was that the people who were involved at the time were trying to get the security forces off their backs.”

Lies were often told about ‘the disappeared’ to convince relatives they had run away, the commission has found.

Nairac was always in the Grenadier Guards, he said, but had an “intelligence liaison role” between police and army when he was killed.

SAS members killed on duty have their names listed on the regiment’s Clock Tower at Hereford, he said, but he has looked himself and Nairac’s name is not on it. The officer worked for the ‘Northern Ireland Training and Tactics Team’, a pseudonym for another intelligence gathering organisation, he added.

Nairac was not under the control of the SAS or the Intelligence Corps, but senior officers in Northern Ireland are not fully aware of this fact.

Myths accelerated when allegations were made that he had been an SAS soldier guilty of a string of murders. “These were then picked up by Ken Livingston and others and he made a speech in the house of commons.”

But Mr Knupfer has done a “cold case review” and says the allegations of wrongdoing “do not hold water”.

Senior republicans tell him: “Sorry, our authority doesn’t extend to Ravensdale.” They say his body was buried by a clique of republicans in Co Louth who are now dissidents.

• Anyone with information on the Disappeared can contact the ICLVR in complete confidence on 00800 555 85500, by writing to ICLVR, PO Box 10827, Dublin 2. or via the website www.iclvr.ie

• Read more views on Capt Nairac in Monday’s paper