Letter: Ireland has had multiple amnesties yet only a UK government in 2023 is obliged to act differently

In 1921 after the truce in the Irish war of independence, there was total immunity for the 112,650 volunteers in the 297 volunteer battalions, while in Northern Ireland from 1922 there was also de facto immunity.

In 1916 after the initial prosecutions, and 16 executions, and by 1917 the release of all convicted prisoners as well as all internees, there was again de facto immunity for crimes committed that week.

And Tony Blair’s OTR Letters of Comfort (only to IRA terrorists) were de facto another amnesty

Article 28.3.3 of Éamon de Valera’s July 1937 Constitution provides that nothing in it may be invoked to nullify (ie criminalise) any act done in time of war or armed rebellion in pursuit of laws for the purpose of securing the safety of the state.

The new Free State Govt in August 1923 – only three months after the end of the horrendous 11-month civil war – also decided to outlaw prosecutions for crimes committed by its army during it (which included three Kerry massacres by the Free State Army).

So why should a UK government in 2023 – 25 years after the 1998 Belfast Agreement, and 53 years after PIRA launched their long campaign of terror in 1970 – be uniquely obliged to act differently? The only records regarding NI mean only police or troops will be prosecuted at this point – never terrorists.

Tom Carew, Dublin