Republican News · Thursday 8 May 2003

MI5 man accused of misleading Saville

The Bloody Sunday Inquiry

BY FERN LANE

MI5 intelligence officer, identified only as 'Julian', was accused on Tuesday of deliberate misleading the Saville Inquiry by not disclosing details of his "main agent" in Derry at the time.

In his statements to the inquiry, which reconvened in London on 6 May, Julian only made reference to another agent, now deceased, known as Observer B, whom he referred to as trustworthy, reliable and brave.

In his own statement to the inquiry, made before his death, B claims to have seen the IRA drilling in the days before 30 January 1972 and goes on to say that he was told by a local that that they were 'planning for Sunday' and an 'ambush' of the British Army during the forthcoming civil rights march.

The inquiry saw some of the communications between Julian, his immediate superior 'James', and the then Director of Intelligence, identified as 'David', in the days after Bloody Sunday. It showed the security services' desperation to find justification for the shootings. Julian and James are asked to check with a number of 'Observers' - that is, informants - on RUC Special Branch reports that IRA weapons were distributed to men positioned behind the Rossville flats and elsewhere on Bloody Sunday. "It has only taken about 24 hours for the usual Irish myth to be manufactured," he writes; "and it would clearly therefore be useful to get information from all available sources while memories are reasonably fresh". It emerged that these Special Branch reports actually emanated from Observer B.

Under cross-examination by Barry MacDonald, for some of the families, Julian admitted to the inquiry that Observer B, an Englishman, was "openly partisan" and "strongly anti-republican". He was, according to Army intelligence, "intensely loyal" to Britain. The inquiry also heard that B was originally handled by the Parachute Regiment and was "sympathetic" to them. He saw himself, said MacDonald, as "part of the British war effort" and had volunteered himself as an informer, rather than having been actively recruited.

Julian said that B was "a very reliable and a very energetic reporter" who was "intent on providing his services in order to counter extremism and violence from whichever direction it came". In his statement to the inquiry, B claimed to have not paid by the British security services, when in fact he received salary and bonuses for his work.

The inquiry also heard that B's claims to the inquiry to have seen the IRA drilling before Bloody Sunday did not appear in any intelligence reports at the time. MacDonald put it to Julian that "this material did not feature in any shape or form in int summs [intelligence summaries], it did not feature in any shape or form in any of your notes or source reports or anything of that kind".

MacDonald accused Julian of deliberately trying to mislead the inquiry by neglecting to mention that his "only agent of any consequence" in Derry at the time was not B, who was not actually based in the city, but another man, Observer C, who was highly placed and a member of the Londonderry Tenants' Association and other local groups. Despite C's obvious importance, Julian claimed to have simply overlooked his existence until repeatedly prompted by Counsel during questioning. He was also accused of tampering with security files and removing documents.

MacDonald suggested that the reason why Julian had "forgotten" about C and did not refer to him in his statements was because, "even though he was your main agent in Derry, and even though he was so good that his information was given to the Prime Minister, and even though he was the one who was well placed to report on these matters, he was tasked by the Security Service to find out what he could about Bloody Sunday and he could not find out anything which helped the Army case at all."