By Michael Finucane, Sunday Business Post (23.6.02)
There have been renewed calls for a public inquiry into the murder of Belfast solicitor Pat Finucane, following last week's BBC TV Panorama documentary. Michael Finucane, eldest son of the murdered solicitor, explains why.
The documentary programme compiled by the Panorama team and aired last Wednesday was the result of about two years' hard work by some of the most tenacious and intelligent journalists I have ever had the privilege to know. I owe them a great deal, not just for putting themselves at risk to expose what they did, but for doing what it seems no one else in Britain is prepared to do.
Tony Blair says that he is determined to get to the truth of the matter. I'll believe him when I see the evidence of his convictions, which until now have been conspicuous by their absence. The material in the BBC Panorama documentary was very shocking and, in its own way, revelatory. It's not that I didn't know who Ken Barrett was. I have known for some time that he was a former loyalist paramilitary and was one of the men who murdered my father in front of me and my family 13 years ago, when I was just 17.
But it was quite another thing to sit in front of my television and listen to him describe, in clinical detail, the way in which the murder was planned and orchestrated by him, his associates and the RUC; how my father's name was continually raised with loyalists while they were in police custody; how an officer met Barrett and his associates to make sure they were killing this lawyer, who was ``a thorn in everyone's side''.
I watched and listened as the murder was meticulously planned with no detail left unaddressed, even to the extent of being sure that Pat Finucane was definitely at home when they came to kill him. ``If the car was there, he was there,'' said Barrett. ``The one thing we knew about Finucane was, he never went anywhere without the motor.'' This meant that they had first-rate intelligence about their target, information on which they could rely.
Just imagine how such information was collected. Pat Finucane must have been watched for weeks, perhaps months, followed everywhere he went, his house and family peered at from behind car windscreens as every detail was assessed and stored for future use. Who was doing this? Terrorists, RUC officers or the British Army? It is clear that all three were involved, but the line that was supposed to differentiate them is now completely invisible.
It is clear that the British state, in the guise of the British Army and the RUC, instigated and planned the murder of my father and facilitated its efficient execution. A photograph and an address were supplied, weapons were procured and roadblocks were removed at the last minute to ensure a clean getaway. These facts alone should demand a public tribunal of inquiry.
But no inquiry has been established. The British government has stubbornly resisted my family's campaign for an inquiry, backed by the Irish government, the United Nations, the United States Congress and so many thousands of others worldwide. But the RUC and agents on the ground are only the tip of the iceberg. The real question is, how far up the chain of command does the responsibility go?
I do not believe that this was the work of a few rogue policemen or soldiers. I do not support the claim that there is no evidence of ``institutionalised collusion'' or that there was no huge conspiracy. On the contrary, all the evidence points in the opposite direction: that there was a conspiracy, that collusion was not only institutionalised, but approved and encouraged.
The British government has not denied the facts of this case, as asserted over and over again for the many years that my family has been campaigning and as asserted again in the Panorama programme.
Just three weeks before my father was murdered, a British government minister, Douglas Hogg, stated in the House of Commons that: ``There are in Northern Ireland a number of solicitors who are unduly sympathetic to the cause of the IRA.'' Hogg was interrupted briefly as he said this and so he repeated it, lest there be any misunderstanding of what he meant.
Hogg was a member of the British government. His remarks were not accidental, nor were they impulsive. He had been briefed by senior members of the RUC not long before and had been primed with this information. Since no government minister ever says anything in public without clearance, it must have been intended to mean or do something and he must be questioned about the real meaning of that statement. Was it intended as the green light from government for the murder of Patrick Finucane?
On the 10th anniversary of my father's murder, my family presented a report to the British and Irish governments, including a dossier of intelligence documents. These papers appeared to be military documents describing how British Army Agent 6137 (Brian Nelson) was controlling and refining the murderous activities of loyalists.
One document, a so-called ``contact form'' (CF) read: ``Since 6137 took up his position as intelligence officer, the targeting has developed and is now more professional.'' Another CF reads: ``6137 initiates most of the targeting. Of late, 6137 has been more organised and he is currently running an operation against selected targets.'' This CF was dated February 6, 1989— six days before my father was murdered.
For me, one of the most significant aspects of last week's programme was the people who spoke about their experience on camera. These were the children of those murdered by the British government, the victims of this policy of assassination-by-proxy created and implanted by the British. They spoke with such feeling and dignity about what had happened to them and how it had affected their lives. Unlike me, many of them were doing this for the first time. Like me, however, they too lost parents to this murderous collusion machine.
They -- and I -- are the generation who will lead this island away from its violent past. Will the British government allow us to do this unencumbered by the past? Will we see our own children grow into adulthood, only to have the campaign for a public inquiry linger into future decades?
No one can be expected to have any confidence in the institutions of the state unless they are confident that the foundations are solid. In the case of Pat Finucane, the foundations are lies, cover-up and deceit. My family cannot stop the search for the truth until it is known, however difficult and painful that search might be.
The British government is aware that we are not going to stop, that we will persist in our campaign for a public inquiry until one is established. They are also aware that, until they deal with this issue in a fair, transparent and publicly accountable way, it will continue to eat away at the roots of the peace which so many have worked so hard to nurture.
Such an inquiry may prove shocking and controversial, but it is necessary if the truth is to be known. If the truth becomes known one day, I firmly believe that we will have something approaching the firm foundations of a lasting peace. Those foundations do not exist at present.
The British prime minister must realise that, until he establishes an inquiry that will find the truth and build confidence, all that has been built will be corroded beyond repair.
If I were to say anything right now to Tony Blair about this matter, I think it would be this: Only truth can heal, Mr Blair. Lies fester.
Michael Finucane is a Dublin-based solicitor