Running for cover - RUC Chief under pressure
by Laura Friel
| |
The probe into the Finucane murder announced by the RUC Chief
this week, may be ``fresh'' and ``new'' but it is not independent. Indeed
the appointment of John Stevens, the British policemen whose inquiry
into collusion in the early 1990s gave the RUC a clean bill of
health, implies there is nothing very fresh or new about the probe
either.
|
A media offensive launched by RUC Chief Ronnie Flanagan last week
could not deflect the spotlight of international criticism currently
focused on the RUC. In a week that saw the future of the RUC becoming
increasingly embroiled in the deaths of civil rights lawyers Pat
Finucane and Rosemary Nelson, Ronnie Flanagan sought refuge in the
tabloid press.
``I've ordered Finucane probe'' ran the front page
banner headlines of the Sunday People. ``By RUC Chief Ronnie
Flanagan,'' highlighted in red and beneath the smiling uniformed
figure. Devoid of even the pretence of journalistic scrutiny, the
front page was simply given over to the RUC. Ronnie Flanagan sets out
his case, ``No Hiding Place for Terrorists'' in a lengthy essay beside
an editorial welcoming the ``new police probe''. It's clever PR. Ronnie
Flanagan is sympathetic, Rosemary Nelson's murder was ``brutal'' and
``cowardly''. He appears contrite, it is ``understandable'' that the
killing provoked ``shock and outrage...not only here but
internationally''. Flanagan acknowledges that ``many right-thinking
people have indicated concerns... about how the murder should be
investigated''. He is ``determined'' to fully address ``the concerns of
such people.'' But then there are the wrong-thinking people whose
concerns are not to be addressed by the Chief Constable. ``... One of
the saddest features... is the willingness - even eagerness - which
some exhibit in their preparedness to use the most tragic of events
to pursue their own agenda''. And to whose agenda is the RUC chief
referring? Republicans campaigning for the disbanding of the RUC,
Portadown nationalists who pointed the finger of collusion, or
perhaps the families of Pat Finucane and Rosemary Nelson, who are
calling for investigations independent of the RUC? Perhaps it is
Param Cumaraswamy, whose fiercely critical submission to the United
Nations Human Rights Commission was to be presented just hours after
Flanagan's article appeared in the press?
Understandably perhaps, the RUC Chief is unspecific in his criticism.
Besides, Flanagan assures us, he was ready and willing to step aside.
``I was totally open to the concept of an investigation completely
independent of the RUC''.
Unfortunately, he was persuaded to do the decent thing and remain in
control.
``All of the best investigative advice... accords with my own view,
that an investigation without the RUC would seriously reduce the
chance of a successful outcome''. And just what is a successful
outcome? The RUC Chief gives us a hint. ``We remain as determined to
bring to justice Pat Finucane's killers as we do those of Rosemary
Nelson.''
Nationalists fear the reverse is closer to the truth, that the RUC's
`determination to bring to justice the killers of Rosemary Nelson
will mirror the decade of foot-dragging we have experienced since the
death of Pat Finucane. The impetus for investigating the murder of
the Belfast solicitor, far from coming from within the RUC, has
depended wholly on those ``wrong-thinking'' people Ronnie Flanagan is
so determined to ignore. The probe into the Finucane murder announced
by the RUC Chief this week, may be ``fresh'' and ``new'' but it is not
independent. Indeed the appointment of John Stevens, the British
policemen whose inquiry into collusion in the early 1990s gave the
RUC a clean bill of health, implies there is nothing very fresh or
new about the probe either.
Last November, a 60-page document compiled by the British Irish Human
Rights Watch presented new and compelling evidence of collusion,
through their agent Brian Nelson, by British military Intelligence in
the killing of Pat Finucane. Although the findings of the Stevens
Inquiry have never been published, it is believed that evidence of
collusion by the British army's Force Research Unit was cited by
Stevens. Clearly, the RUC Chief is engaged in shifting the focus away
from the RUC towards a British army unit which was disbanded shortly
after the Nelson trial.
For northern nationalists, the murder of Rosemary Nelson was the most
recent reminder that crown force collusion is still up and running.
The tacit collusion of the British in the fudging tactics of the RUC
Chief offers no reassurance to nationalists, who had hoped a
government headed by Tony Blair would not follow the same old
security agenda of the Thatcher regime. Conceding what has already
been exposed is an exercise in damage limitation, it has nothing to
do with truth or justice.
![[An Phoblacht]](http://republican-news.org/graphics/title_gifs/aprn.gif)