Powerful testimony of terror victim illustrates the scandal of how right and wrong has been inverted in the handling of legacy in Northern Ireland

In powerful testimony reported in today’s News Letter, a former UDR soldier who lost his brother to the IRA has slammed UK government plans for an amnesty.

William Harron, whose sibling Tommy was one of four men blown up in 1983, called a statute of limitations “the final corruption of the criminal justice process”.

The use of the word final here is key, because there is a lot of muddled thinking about an amnesty, which has led to much of the media seeming to unite victims of terrorism with Sinn Fein against an amnesty, when in fact their rejection of the UK plan comes from utterly opposite perspectives.

There have already been multiple amnesties, all brought in to facilitate republican murderers.

There was the early release of prisoners, the amnesty around information that accompanied efforts to find the disappeared, or the decommissioning of weapons.

There was the amnesty of On The Run letters.

Above all there was the de facto amnesty for IRA leaders. While Martin McGuinness on his death had a former US president and dignitaries at his funeral, after his central role in decades of calculated terror, Dennis Hutchings died on trial, far from home, on charges relating to a single killing.

Thus, as Mr Harron’s words imply, the criminal justice system has been corrupted to facilitate the rehabilitation of by far the biggest culprit of the Troubles, Irish republican terrorists. This is where the UK deserves some recognition for its legacy plan, deeply flawed though it is.

The government knew that the whole process was turning against security forces. It is UDR soldiers who would have ended up being hounded on legacy, with the British army and the RUC. It would not have been terrorists, although there would have been token trials of them.

Why is this? Why did London never try to get to the bottom of this scandalous inversion of right and wrong? Why, outside the pages of the News Letter and beyond small bodies like the Malone House Group, was so little said about this moral outrage?

——— ———

A message from the Editor:

Thank you for reading this story on our website. While I have your attention, I also have an important request to make of you.

With the coronavirus lockdowns having had a major impact on many of our advertisers — and consequently the revenue we receive — we are more reliant than ever on you taking out a digital subscription.

Subscribe to newsletter.co.ukand enjoy unlimited access to the best Northern Ireland and UK news and information online and on our app. With a digital subscription, you can read more than 5 articles, see fewer ads, enjoy faster load times, and get access to exclusive newsletters and content.

Visit

https://www.newsletter.co.uk/subscriptions

to sign up

Our journalism costs money and we rely on advertising, print and digital revenues to help to support them. By supporting us, we are able to support you in providing trusted, fact-checked content for this website.

Ben Lowry, Editor