SPEAKERS CONTENTS INSERTS
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42–396 CC
1997
HUMAN RIGHTS IN NORTHERN IRELAND
HEARING
BEFORE THE
SUBCOMMITEE ON INTERNATIONAL OPERATIONS AND HUMAN RIGHTS
OF THE
COMMITTEE ON
INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
ONE HUNDRED FIFTH CONGRESS
FIRST SESSION
JUNE 24, 1997
Printed for the use of the Committee on International Relations
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COMMITTEE ON INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS
BENJAMIN A. GILMAN, New York, Chairman
WILLIAM GOODLING, Pennsylvania
JAMES A. LEACH, Iowa
HENRY J. HYDE, Illinois
DOUG BEREUTER, Nebraska
CHRISTOPHER SMITH, New Jersey
DAN BURTON, Indiana
ELTON GALLEGLY, California
ILEANA ROS-LEHTINEN, Florida
CASS BALLENGER, North Carolina
DANA ROHRABACHER, California
DONALD A. MANZULLO, Illinois
EDWARD R. ROYCE, California
PETER T. KING, New York
JAY KIM, California
STEVEN J. CHABOT, Ohio
MARSHALL ''MARK'' SANFORD, South Carolina
MATT SALMON, Arizona
AMO HOUGHTON, New York
TOM CAMPBELL, California
JON FOX, Pennsylvania
JOHN McHUGH, New York
LINDSEY GRAHAM, South Carolina
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ROY BLUNT, Missouri
JERRY MORAN, Kansas
KEVIN BRADY, Texas
LEE HAMILTON, Indiana
SAM GEJDENSON, Connecticut
TOM LANTOS, California
HOWARD BERMAN, California
GARY ACKERMAN, New York
ENI F.H. FALEOMAVAEGA, American Samoa
MATTHEW G. MARTINEZ, California
DONALD M. PAYNE, New Jersey
ROBERT ANDREWS, New Jersey
ROBERT MENENDEZ, New Jersey
SHERROD BROWN, Ohio
CYNTHIA A. McKINNEY, Georgia
ALCEE L. HASTINGS, Florida
PAT DANNER, Missouri
EARL HILLIARD, Alabama
WALTER CAPPS, California
BRAD SHERMAN, California
ROBERT WEXLER, Florida
STEVE ROTHMAN, New Jersey
BOB CLEMENT, Tennessee
BILL LUTHER, Minnesota
JIM DAVIS, Florida
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RICHARD J. GARON, Chief of Staff
MICHAEL H. VAN DUSEN, Democratic Chief of Staff
Subcommittee on International Operations and Human Rights
CHRISTOPHER H. SMITH, New Jersey, Chairman
WILLIAM F. GOODLING, Pennsylvania
HENRY J. HYDE, Illinois
DAN BURTON, Indiana
CASS BALLENGER, North Carolina
PETER T. KING, New York
MATT SALMON, Arizona
LINDSEY O. GRAHAM, South Carolina
ILEANA ROS-LEHTINEN, Florida
TOM LANTOS, California
CYNTHIA A. McKINNEY, Georgia
GARY L. ACKERMAN, New York
ENI F.H. FALEOMAVAEGA, American Samoa
DONALD M. PAYNE, New Jersey
EARL F. HILLIARD, Alabama
ROBERT WEXLER, Florida
GROVER JOSEPH REES, Subcommittee Staff Director and Chief Counsel
ROBERT R. KING, Democratic Professional Staff Member
DOUGLAS C. ANDERSON, Counsel
ELISE M. KENDERIAN, Staff Associate
C O N T E N T S
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WITNESSES
Mr. Martin O'Brien, Executive Director, Committee for the Administration of Justice
Mr. Michael Posner, Executive Director, Lawyers Committee for Human Rights
Ms. Julia A. Hall, Northern Ireland Researcher, Human Rights Watch
Mr. Stephen Livingstone, Co-Director, University of Nottingham Human Rights Centre
Ms. Maryam Elahi, Advocacy Director, Middle East and Europe, Amnesty International USA
Mr. Michael Finucane, eldest son of Patrick Finucane (deceased), Pat Finucane Center
Mr. Jim Kelly, father of Sean Kelly
Mrs. Brenda Downes, widow of John Downes (deceased), United Campaign Against Plastic Bullets
Mr. Edward Wallace, National President, Ancient Order of Hibernians
Mrs. Mary Paglione, National President, Ladies' Ancient Order of Hibernians
APPENDIX
Prepared statements:
Hon. Joseph P. Kennedy II
Mr. Martin O'Brien
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Mr. Michael Posner
Mr. Stephen Livingstone
Ms. Julia A. Hall
Ms. Maryam Elahi
Mr. Michael Finucane
Mr. Jim Kelly
Mrs. Brenda Downes
Mr. Edward Wallace
Mrs. Mary Paglione
Additional material submitted for the record:
Statement by Sen. George Mitchell, ''Peace Isn't Impossible,'' Newsweek, June 30, 1997
Statement by Rt. Rev. Monsignor Murray, ''Relatives for Justice,'' June 23, 1997
Amnesty International Report on the United Kingdom (1997)
Amnesty International, ''Cruel, Inhuman, or Degrading Treatment: Detention of Roisin McAliskey'' (April 1997)
Amnesty International, ''Special Security Units: Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment'' (March 1997)
Statement by the Reverend Brian Lennon, SJ re Firing of Plastic Bullets on Garvarghy Road, Portadown on July 11, 1996
United States Plastic Bullet/Kinetic Weapon Company Profiles submitted by the United Campaign Against Plastic Bullets
HUMAN RIGHTS IN NORTHERN IRELAND
TUESDAY, JUNE 24, 1997
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House of Representatives,
Subcommittee on International Operations
and Human Rights,
Committee on International Relations,
Washington, DC.
The Subcommittee met, pursuant to notice, at 10:06 a.m., in room 2200, Rayburn House Office Building, Washington, DC, Hon. Christopher H. Smith (chairman of the subcommittee) presiding.
Mr. SMITH. The Subcommittee will come to order. The purpose of this hearing is for the congressional committee with prime jurisdiction over human rights to conduct a fair and thorough examination of human rights abuses in the north of Ireland. This is but the first step in what I hope will be an exhaustive, ongoing examination of this vexing problem.
Recent events provide tragic evidence of the deterioration of respect for fundamental and God-given human rights. In May, RUC constable Greg Taylor was kicked to death by a Loyalist gang in Ballmoney. In June 16, an IRA gunman shot to death two policemen, John Graham and David Johnston. And just this weekend two men were injured by a car bomb in an apparent Loyalist retaliation for the recent murder of the two policemen.
These events should be a lesson to all of us that violence begets violence, that lawlessness begets more lawlessness. A system of law enforcement and dispute resolution grounded in the rule of law and in the respect for the rights of all human beings may sometimes be fragile. Such a system may even carry important risks, such as the risk that respect for procedural rights has the potential of allowing criminals to go free. But the events of the last month are further proof that a system of respect for law and for rights is far more stable and far less risky and obviously far more just, than any of the alternatives.
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So this hearing will be about respecting rights and the inherent worth, value, sacredness, and dignity of every human life.
I should add that when I speak of God-given rights, I do not use the term lightly. It is particularly tragic that some of those who resort to extrajudicial execution and other forms of violence in the north of Ireland pretend to be employing these tactics in the service of religion. Indeed, this fact has often been noted by the enemies of religion, who conveniently overlook the fact that the great butchers of our century—Hitler, Stalin, Mao Tse-Tung, Pol Pot and others—have all been atheists.
Nevertheless, if there is anything Catholics and Protestants should remember, it is that every human being is created in the likeness of God. We Christians, and our brothers and sisters of other faiths as well, believe that rights are given by God, not by governments or ideologies, and the most fundamental of these God-given rights is the right to life. Every murder is a crime not only against the victim and his or her family, but also against Catholicism, against Protestantism, and against Jesus Christ.
It is also important to point out that whatever the crimes perpetrated by the partisan paramilitary forces, or by the police for that matter, the central responsibility for protecting rights and maintaining the rule of law belongs to the government—which in this case, at this particular time, is the British Government. When governments resort to methods that are illegal, unjust, or inhumane, even when these methods are seemingly directed against the guilty or the dangerous, the effect is not to preserve law and order but to undermine it.
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It is particularly shocking that the British Government, America's trusted ally, is the object of serious and credible charges of disrespect for the rule of law in the north of Ireland. Just as the My Lai massacre was especially revolting because it was carried out not by the Viet Cong, but by Americans, freedom-loving people everywhere are outraged to learn that law enforcement officials of the United Kingdom tolerate and even perpetrate some of the gross abuses that have taken place in the north of Ireland.
The State Department's most recent Country Report on Human Rights Practices—which I believe tries to be an honest and comprehensive document—although I am disappointed that the Administration did not see fit to send Assistant Secretary Shattuck or any other representative to our hearing today, and they were invited—highlights important human rights abuses in Northern Ireland during 1996 and I commend it to all of my colleagues for their reading.
That report and numerous others by Amnesty International, the Lawyers Committee for Human Rights, Human Rights Watch, the Committee for the Administration of Justice, and others, all concur that one of the most basic problems in the north is that pervasive restrictions on due process of law remain in effect.
Under emergency legislation applicable only to Northern Ireland, police have expansive powers to arrest and detain suspects and to search premises without a warrant. In addition, the government can suspend the right to trial by jury—the much maligned Diplock Courts System—and the universally recognized right to be preserved from self-incrimination has been abridged.
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According to the Lawyers Committee on Human Rights, the so-called ''emergency'' statutes, that is, the Emergency Provision Act, or EPA, and the Prevention of Terrorism Act, the PTA, ''are designed to obtain convictions in cases involving those suspected of paramilitary activity, based on confessions obtained through detention and intense interrogation.'' The administration of justice in the north of Ireland is not only flawed, but its basic unfairness and lack of transparency exacerbate tensions and I believe that it breeds hate.
Amazingly, and regrettably, the British Government failed to repeal these sweeping policy State powers when it had a clear window of opportunity to do so—during the year-and-a-half cease-fire which began in the late summer and early fall of 1994.
It seems to me that the power to arbitrarily arrest, detain, intimidate; the power to deny timely and appropriate legal counsel; and the power to compel self-incrimination is an abuse of power normally associated with dictatorships and authoritarian regimes.
Human rights abuses committed by the members of the Royal Ulster Constabulary, the RUC, Northern Ireland's police force, is a pathetic reality. In addition to questions surrounding the deaths of Dermot McShane, who was run over by an armored personnel carrier, and Richard O'Brien, who was killed by police in 1994, credible accusations persist that security forces harass citizens and leak names of suspected Republicans to Loyalist paramilitary groups who then carry out the killings.
Michael Finucane, who as a teenager sat with his family at the dinner table when Loyalist thugs burst into the kitchen and shot his father, human rights lawyer Patrick Finucane, 14 times, will testify that, in his belief, collusion between security forces and Loyalist armed groups is at the root of his father's murder.
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According to the Lawyers Committee for Human Rights, ''at least 352 persons have been killed in Northern Ireland since 1969, by the use of lethal force by members of the security forces, many in disputed and controversial circumstances. In the same period, 32 agents of the State had been tried for offenses arising from or related to these deaths. Only six have resulted in successful prosecutions.''
The quotation continues, ''No soldier or police officer has ever been detained for 7 days in a holding center in connection with incidents which have occurred while they were on duty. Access to counsel of choice is never denied to agents of the State under investigation for scheduled offenses.''
Why, I ask, the double standards in the administration of justice? The time has come, I believe, for the British authorities to respect and guarantee the rule of law for all. This should apply in all cases, to all suspects regardless of religious denomination, regardless of place of residence. No more double standards in law enforcement.
And speaking of double standards, in contravention of internationally recognized standards, the British Government uses plastic bullets in one and only one place—in the north of Ireland. This has not escaped the notice of the U.N. Committee Against Torture which has been highly critical.
Brenda Downes, whose husband was killed by these so-called ''non-lethal means of crowd control,'' is representing the United Campaign Against Plastic Bullets and says in her testimony, ''the security forces in the north of Ireland have been guilty of, and continue to perpetuate, gross human rights abuses. No member of the security forces has been convicted of any incident in relation to the use of these lethal weapons. They have been granted impunity in respect of the murder of 17 men, women, and children and the injury of thousands of others.''
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And another witness, Martin O'Brien, executive director of the Committee on the Administration of Justice, will testify that in 1996 his organization received first-hand accounts of police behavior from more than 60 observers who were deployed at the various controversial marches in Northern Ireland. Mr. O'Brien will testify that ''these accounts describe the massive and indiscriminate use of plastic bullets, sometimes against completely innocent people coming out of restaurants and discos. In excess of 6,000 plastic bullets were fired by the security forces in the space of a week (normally the average is about 1,000 per year). This led to numerous injuries, many of a very serious nature,'' he says.
He also comments that there has not been an adequate explanation for the significant disparity in the targets of the plastic bullets, with some 5,340 being used against Catholic crowds.
The recent revelation about the use of defective bullets, their sectarian use, and the tragic consequences of death and permanent injury bring us to one conclusion: it is time to ban the bullets.
Today in the north of Ireland detention conditions are deplorable. The United Nations Committee against Torture and many human rights groups have raised concerns about mistreatment of detainees in Northern Ireland, where suspects arrested under emergency legislation are interrogated in special holding centers. The United Nations Human Rights Committee has termed conditions in certain facilities ''unacceptable'' and even the government-appointed Independent Commissioner for Holdings Centers has stated that some do not meet ''minimum standards.''
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And then, of course, there is the continuing terrorist violence by both Loyalist paramilitary groups and the Irish Republican Army, including the detonation of a massive bomb in the Docklands area of London by the IRA in February of last year, which injured hundreds and killed two innocent people, and a double bomb attack on British army headquarters in Northern Ireland last October.
While it may be a surprise to some, according to the Congressional Research Service, Loyalist paramilitary groups were responsible for more fatalities between 1992 and 1994 than the Republican groups. But let me say this very clearly, both sides commit atrocities and should be condemned by all who seek justice and peace in the north of Ireland.
Finally, Northern Ireland is caught in a cycle of retribution and violence that we all believe needs to be broken. To shed some light on the scope of the conflict and to suggest possible solutions we have invited many distinguished guests to testify before the Congress today.
In addition to international human rights experts, we are pleased to have with us human rights advocates not only from the United States but also from both the Protestant and Catholic communities in the north of Ireland, as well as some who have most acutely felt the human cost of the conflict—relatives of victims claimed by violence or by the miscarriage of justice.
I look forward to hearing their insights, to hearing their experiences, and I hope that they will offer suggestions about what the United States can do to restore respect for human rights and to encourage all those involved to more respect the rights of each other in the north of Ireland.
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I would like to at this time yield to my good friend and colleague, the distinguished gentleman from California, Mr. Tom Lantos.
Mr. LANTOS. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.
I want to commend you for calling this hearing. I have long since forgotten a number of hearings we have held on this subject, and it is a matter of deep anguish and anxiety and concern to me that conditions do not appear to be improving.
In this connection I would like to remind myself and all of us that the conflict in Northern Ireland is only one of many ethnic or religious conflicts in many parts of the world. And when we have the temptation to succumb to pessimism, it is always important to realize that occasionally these conflicts are in fact resolved.
It was just 3 weeks ago President Clinton asked me to take his personal letters to the Presidents of Romania and Hungary, who met at a historic meeting in Bucharest, to bring to a close an 1100-year-old conflict. And it was one of the most moving moments of my life to see the President of Hungary and the President of Romania joining hands and declaring that the blood bath, the fighting, the hatreds are over, and the two peoples will do their utmost under enlightened leadership on both sides to make a new beginning.
I wish we would be there with respect to Northern Ireland. Several of us were in Ireland not long ago, attempting to see again if there is anything the United States can do to alleviate the conflict. Let me state for the record, Mr. Chairman, that I have the utmost respect for the handling of this conflict by the President and our administration. President Clinton has done more than any President in history to bring this tragic and mindless conflict to an end. And I would like to pay personal tribute to the President's personal representative, Senator George Mitchell, for his indefatigable perseverance in trying to bring the two sides together. And I would like to place in the record a June 30 article by Senator Mitchell from Newsweek Magazine entitled ''Peace Isn't Impossible.''
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Mr. SMITH. Without objection, the article will be made part of the record.
Mr. LANTOS. Thank you very much.
[The article appears in the appendix.]
Mr. LANTOS. There are fundamentally two sets of issues we are dealing with. The first one, and here always the party in power is primarily responsible, we must insist on the termination of all subtle or not so subtle violations of human rights in Northern Ireland. We must insist on the rule of law in all its manifestations. There can be no compromise on this issue.
You gave a brief list of violations. I fully agree with your list, and I want to identify myself with most of your comments. Yet at the same time I cannot underscore strongly enough that terrorism is unacceptable, and let me repeat this. The assassination of two police officers in Northern Ireland a short while ago was an outrageous act which set back the cause of reconciliation and peace yet again. I have equal condemnation for the counter-violence and counter-terrorism that followed.
The responsibility is clearly on the shoulders of leadership on both sides. We, the Congress, and the Clinton administration, are prepared to do anything to bring normalcy to both the Protestant and Catholic communities in Northern Ireland, peace and normalcy and stability that all the people of this region so desperately need and so fully deserve. You have to visit Northern Ireland really to fully appreciate the high quality of the men, women and children in this long-suffering region of Europe.
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Terrorism must come to an end. The rule of law must be observed in all its ramifications. And human rights violations must stop. This Congress and the American Government will do its utmost to bring about peace at long last in Northern Ireland.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. SMITH. Thank you very much, Mr. Lantos.
I would like to yield to Mr. Gilman, the chairman of the full International Relations Committee.
Mr. GILMAN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and I want to thank you for arranging this historic opportunity to publicly explore the troubling human rights situation in Northern Ireland. It has made lasting peace and reconciliation in the north very difficult to achieve and has been neglected for far too long.
And I am pleased that we have with us several outstanding leaders from my area, Mr. Danny Withers, a member of the board of directors of Hibernian Civil Rights Coalition, and Dennis Lynch, general counsel of the Coalition. We welcome them here as observers today.
One of the most shocking abuses is displayed in the State Department's most recent human rights report. The report notes the use of plastic bullets—and, you know, they are not little, small 22 bullets—these are plastic bullets, it's a very deadly piece of plastic. Now one of the most shocking abuses is the note of these bullets being used in the north of Ireland, but not in the rest of Great Britain, as you have indicated, Mr. Chairman.
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These plastic bullets have been widely criticized by human rights monitors, by the U.N. Commission Against Torture, and by the European Parliament. There has been a call for a ban on these plastic bullets' use, issued by the European Parliament and most recently by the New York Times, and we hope someone is going to sit up and take notice.
I find it particularly ironic that these plastic bullets are not used by British authorities in serious race or youth riots in places like Leeds and elsewhere in England, yet it is all right to use them in Northern Ireland. Nothing better illustrates the second-class status the Nationalistic community faces in the north.
I am particularly pleased that we have witnesses today from the north who are fully familiar with the abuses by the security forces with regard to these plastic bullets, especially against the Nationalistic community. Seventeen deaths, eight of which are young children, deaths from these plastic bullets are intolerable for Europe or anywhere around the globe for that matter.
Finally, the suspension of rights and the lack of due process in the Diplock nonjury courts, and the adverse inference that can be drawn from mere silence in criminal cases, have long concerned many of us who have been observers of Northern Ireland.
Today, we will have the opportunity to hear from the Kelly family on the Casement Park case. Their son, Sean, has spent many unjustified years in prison serving two life sentences for merely being in the wrong place at the wrong time. He innocently observed two plain-clothes British army personnel who had wandered in an unmarked car into the middle of a Nationalist funeral, drew their weapons, a shot was fired, and were put upon by an angry crowd. This happened only days after a brutal attack on the Nationalist community when the anxiety level was very high, one of whom was being buried at the funeral.
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There is no credible evidence that young Sean, who had sought to try to find his father in the crowd, who he knew was participating in the funeral of a fellow cab driver, did anything other than observe the chaos. He did not aid or abet the killings which later took place elsewhere. He sits in prison for life under a novel and erroneous legal theory called ''common purpose,'' a very grave case of injustice which cries out for relief for both Sean and the other innocent Casement Park defendants. We will hear more about that today, and I was pleased to hear that one of these innocent young men was finally released just last week.
There are many cases of suspension of due process and fundamental fairness like the Casement Park matter on the Loyalist side as well, as we will hear today. I am pleased that some of these abuses are finally coming to light here in our own country. Maybe young Sean and others can finally get some long overdue justice in the north. It would certainly help start some of the healing and the reconciliation that is so badly needed there today.
So I look forward with my colleagues to today's testimony. It will put a human face on Northern Ireland, a place described recently before this committee by our good friend and very knowledgeable observer of the north, Father Sean McManus, who is here with us today, representing the Irish National Caucus, and his words were in describing Northern Ireland, ''a sectarian State in which anti-Catholic discrimination is systemic, endemic, and institutionalized.'' Those words will linger.
Maybe today's hearing can help bring much-needed change in the north. So, Mr. Chairman, we thank you and we thank our witnesses who came from Ireland and suffered so much over these many years in painful silence.
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Mr. Chairman, I ask unanimous consent that a recent report on human rights in Northern Ireland by Monsignor Raymond Murray, a well-known crusader for human rights, a leading scholar, and a historian on human rights in Northern Ireland, and former chaplain of Armagh Prison in Northern Ireland where I first met Chaplain Murray, be included at this point in the record.
Mr. SMITH. Without objection, it will be included in the record.
Mr. GILMAN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
[The report appears in the appendix.]
Mr. SMITH. Thank you very much, Mr. Gilman.
Mr. Payne, the gentleman from New Jersey.
Mr. PAYNE. Thank you very much. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, for calling this very important hearing on the plight of the people in Northern Ireland. I commend you for your continued push toward human rights around the world.
From the outset, let me just say that I cannot condone any form of violence, and I said that in my speech in Northern Ireland last summer, whether it is intended for Catholics in Mid Ulster, West Belfast, or Caven Monahan of Curie or Dublin or the innocent people beyond the island. I visited Northern Ireland last year, as I indicated, at the height of the marching season, and around Bloody Sunday. And what I witnessed was appalling. Human rights in general is a problem there. However, the attack by the British Army and the RUC during the summer of 1996, in my opinion, contributed to a serious breakdown in the rule of law.
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Since the RUC and the British army have begun to use plastic bullets as a weapon, as we have already heard, thousands have been injured, and we have already heard each of us mentioned it. Seventeen individuals have been killed by these bullets, including seven children.
This week's events, coupled with the tensions building toward the Orange marches in July, prompted me to introduce H.R. 1075, calling for an immediate ban on the use of plastic bullets. In 1986 convention of the Democratic Unionist Party criticized the blatant misuse of the plastic baton rounds in Portadown, and said this bullet, which I am holding in my hand as I collected while I was at Northern Ireland last year, was a killer weapon, designed to kill or to maim. This is not a 22 bullet. This is intended to kill and to maim, and at the velocity that it hits, even though they are supposed to use them at a distance, I have seen where they have been shot point-blank at people. I do not want to see a repeat of last year.
Let me conclude by saying that the question of decommissioning has not yet been removed as an obstacle in the negotiations. This remains the biggest stumbling block to the move forward. It is a very difficult question and I hope that there can be a resolution to that particular question. The marches through the Catholic neighborhoods by the Loyalists in the next few weeks could determine whether we move forward or backwards in the entire process.
George Mitchell says that he still has a lot of optimism. He says the time is now, it is very important, and hopefully we can move forward. But I think that the situation must be dealt with as it has been indicated, the situation of the hopelessness of the young people in the cities with despair and hopelessness and substance abuse and school dropout remind me of some of the same problems that we see in our inner cities here.
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I was also moved by a plaque at one of the community centers that was put at that center in honor of the late Ron Brown who had visited Northern Ireland to try to deal with employment for young people, for dropouts, for people who felt that the world had shut them out, and also the admiration that I found in Northern Ireland for Mr. Nelson Mandela, who is a symbol to all of us about courage, and Mr. Mandela's appreciation for the situation in Northern Ireland.
So once again, Mr. Chairman, I appreciate you calling this hearing and I look forward to hearing from our esteemed group of panelists. Thank you.
Mr. SMITH. I thank my friend from New Jersey.
I would like to yield to the gentleman from New York, Mr. King.
Mr. KING. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I want to join with all of the Subcommittee in commending you for scheduling this hearing, for holding it. I believe it is very timely, it is very vital, it is very necessary, and it is illustrative of the fact that you have a deep concern for human rights violations and exposing them and bringing them out to the public no matter where it occurs in the world. I really want to commend you for that.
I also want to join Mr. Lantos in a bipartisan note in commending President Clinton for the work that he has done on the issue of the north of Ireland. He has certainly put the prestige of his administration on the line, and I think he has to be commended by all of us for the dedication he has shown.
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Mr. Chairman, as I sit here today there is a certain tragic irony in this. I remember back in 1981 I was a member of an international tribunal which met in Belfast to examine the use of plastic bullets by the security forces. And one of the leading witnesses at that hearing at that time, in 1981, was a lawyer by the name of Pat Finucane. And he was extremely active in the civil rights movement in the north of Ireland. He gave especially compelling testimony at that tribunal, and ironically, to show how the cycle of violence continues through generations now, the suffering continues since that hearing in 1981. Pat Finucane was murdered, and that will be brought out in detail at this hearing, and his son who is testifying here today also is a lawyer. So it shows the intensity of the violence and it shows how the tragedy in the north of Ireland continues.
I just want to make several points clear on this. No. 1, I do not think we should be lured into the trap of saying this is a fight between Catholics and Protestants; that this is some sort of an ethnic or religious fight that is going on in the north of Ireland. The fact is historically and continuing through this moment the underlying cause of the violence in the north of Ireland is the British presence; it is the policies of the British Government.
The examples we are going to be talking about today on plastic bullets, on abuses by the police force, the Royal Ulster Constabulary, by the British army, by the courts, none of these are accidents. In any democratic society you are going to find certain accidents. You are going to find police who occasionally will carry out excesses. You will find judges who occasionally are biased. You will occasionally find a law which is Draconian and then subsequently repealed.
But the fact is violations of human rights, violations of basic human decency have been an integral part of British policy in the north of Ireland for the last 75 years. There have been no jury trials for political defendants in Northern Ireland since the State was created in 1922. This is not something that developed over the last 25 years. For the entire existence of Northern Ireland there have been no jury trials allowed for political defendants.
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The use of plastic bullets and rubber bullets has been going on for over 20 years, and these are not accidents where somebody happens to get killed in a riot situation. Again, back at the tribunal in 1981, we had a young girl, Carol Ann Kelly, walking by herself on the street, the top of her head blown off by the British army. We had another girl, Julie Livingstone, shot dead by the British army for no purpose at all other than to avenge other acts that were going on in Ireland at that same time. There were IRA attacks against the British army. The British army responded by shooting young girls in the streets of Belfast, and then putting out press releases somehow trying to tie this in with the IRA, somehow trying to tie this into riots or disturbances which were not going on. That showed the collusion, it showed the systemic corruption of the British forces in the north of Ireland.
On the issue of the courts, we had cases where you would have 30 to 35 to 40 defendants put on trial at one time based on the perjured testimony of one witness. These were, again, policies which were instituted by the British Government, carried out by the police and the army, and then fully implemented by the courts, which shows, again, the collusion, it shows how the systemic corruption is there at every level of the criminal justice system in the north of Ireland.
And Michael Finucane will testify today about the killing of his father. Yes, it was an absolute tragedy that his father was killed. It was terrible, he was shot in front of his family. He was shot by Loyalist paramilitaries, all of which is absolutely horrible.
What makes it more horrible, though, from a democratic point of view is the fact that he would not have been killed without the cooperation of the police force in the north of Ireland. The police force, the British army were active collaborators in the killing of his father.
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That continues today where people living in Nationalist Republican communities have their identities given by the police to Loyalist paramilitaries to killers, and that is what is not really brought out to the American people who somehow see this as being some sort of tribal war going on in the north of Ireland where the British are there as referees or as honest brokers. They are not. They are the cause of the problem, they sustain the problem, and we as members of an elected body and those of us who happen to be lawyers in particular have to speak out and denounce the way the criminal justice system is so debased.
I know as a law student I studied very proudly the common law of the British. I mean, it was basically our system, was transplanted here from the British system, and I always had tremendous admiration for the British system of law until I saw how it was so distorted and so perverted in the north of Ireland. And that, I think, Mr. Chairman, from looking at the witnesses you have here today, certainly is the focus of where we are going, and it also shows that it is not enough to call on people to stop violence, it is not enough to call on people to seek peace when the underlying institutions are corrupt, are inherently violent and biased toward one section of the community.
There will never be peace in the north of Ireland until the criminal justice system is corrected, until the inequalities are rooted out, and until the State-sponsored terrorism or the British security forces against the people of the north of Ireland is rooted out, ended once and for all. Until then we can talk all we want, we can say all we want about peace, we can say all we want about nonviolence. But until the systemic violence of the British security forces against the people in the north of Ireland ends we can never hope to see a realistic end to violence in that terribly shattered part of the world which has resulted from British policies over the years.
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So I commend you for these hearings. I look forward to the testimony of the witnesses today, and I would just ask all of the people here today and all of the members of this committee not to allow themselves to be lured into the trap of this being a Catholic versus Protestant fight. It is not. It is a battle between, it is a struggle, it is a human rights struggle between an oppressive force against innocent people, both the Protestant and the Catholic communities. They have all suffered. The one group who has not suffered is the British Government, and they should be brought to task for the terrible injustice they have brought about.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. SMITH. Thank you very much, Mr. King. I want to thank you for your leadership on this issue in the Congress.
I would now like to yield to another gentleman from New York, Mr. Ackerman.
Mr. ACKERMAN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. It is very difficult to add anything after the eloquent remarks of my colleague from New York, Peter King.
Let me also thank and commend you, Mr. Chairman, for your dedication to this issue and to all causes that have to do with protecting human rights around the world. You have truly been a leader and a champion in this area. And also, as Peter and Tom Lantos have mentioned, let me express the gratitude of all of us to the President of the United States who for the first time in my memory any chief executive is spending so much time and energy and effort trying to come to a just resolution of the troubles in Ireland.
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I had the opportunity to visit Ireland not too long ago, and my personal guide was the legendary Paul O'Dwyer. And you hear about these things related by other people who tell you stories second and third hand. You can see them on television, you can read about them, but there is nothing like being on the ground and talking to the real people in their neighborhoods and in the communities where they are affected.
I had the chance of being in the Ardoine and walking along the Falls Road and going into homes and talking to people and their families. And as a former school teacher, I have to tell you how deeply I was impressed by meeting with the young people who grew up and were growing up with constant depression, seeing their mothers harassed and intimidated on a daily basis by policemen, and the kind of a toll that takes, and hearing story after story of not only discrimination, when you say ''not only discrimination,'' there is a certain irony to that as well, but of the daily violence that is done to one's person and also one's psyche.
Peter is right. This is not only a battle between Catholics and Protestants. It is not only the story of discrimination. That is bad enough. But as Americans we should have a deeper understanding of what this problem is all about. It is really about the last vestiges of colonialism, and to remember that we too could not tolerate living under the occupation of foreign troops with other people being responsible for our own history.
The people of Ireland are entitled to their own self-determination as are peoples all over the world.
And with that, Mr. Chairman, I would really prefer to hear from our witnesses. Thank you very much.
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Mr. SMITH. Thank you very much, Mr. Ackerman.
Mr. Menendez, the gentleman from New Jersey.
Mr. MENENDEZ. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I want to thank you most particularly for calling this meeting. For those of us who have been pressing for some time to have a hearing on the question of human rights in Northern Ireland, we are particularly thankful to you for conducting the hearing. There has been a resistance in this Congress, not only this particular session but in the past, toward holding this hearing, this type of a hearing, and I appreciate your willingness to do so and those of us who petitioned you to do so.
You know, since Prime Minister Tony Blair took office we have seen more progress, I think, toward peace and reconciliation than maybe in the entire term of his predecessor. The Labour Government's actions have been promising, the possibility of opening the Bloody Sunday investigation, the transfer of prisoners closer to their families, tentative contacts with Sinn Fein speak volumes about the government's desire to see the peace talks succeeded. And I am hopeful that the new government will remain committed to that process.
The Blair Government has presented an unprecedented opportunity, I think, for peace in Northern Ireland. However, I want to say as a member who clearly is not of Irish dissent, maybe my closest connection is the Spanish Armada and its history, and who has consistently since he arrived here, and as a State senator in New Jersey where I presented the Free Joe Doherty Resolution in the legislature, who has consistently spoken out on the abuses of the rights of the people in Northern Ireland, I must say that the recent murders of the two police officers in Lurgan have frustrated, I think, a nation's opportunity for real and meaningful peace talks, and talks that would include what I have always argued for, along with other members, Sinn Fein.
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After years and years of intransigence and abuse, clearly the Catholic minority is rightfully angry and suspicious. But if there is to be peace in Northern Ireland, that time is now. And it is crucial that the more extremist elements of the opposition be reigned in. And so I have got to take this opportunity, since we are talking about human rights, that this is a moment for restraint. It is difficult after decades of frustration, but is a moment for restraint. And those of us who consistently argue on behalf of peace and justice in Northern Ireland also have to be able to speak out when we see abuses on the other side.
Now, the history of abusive human rights in Northern Ireland is long and treacherous from the more recent confinement of Roisin McAliskey during her pregnancy, which I think was an abomination, to the use of plastic bullets and the countless violations of rights stemming from British emergency legislation which governs the six northeast counties in Ireland, the populace of Northern Ireland has suffered myriad abuses of its civil and human rights. The emergency legislation has been responsible time and time again for illegal arrests, detentions and interrogations.
Amnesty International speaks about its powers to hold attainees for days before bringing them to a judge, to prevent access to lawyers, to deny lawyers access to their clients during interrogation, the use of special interrogation centers where detainees can be held virtually in communicado. The list goes on and on.
The U.N. Committee Against Torture, the U.N. Commission on Human Rights, Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International have all repeatedly urged the repeal of this repressive legislation.
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In my own trips to Belfast, the fact of the matter is I first became involved with a case called the Ballymurphy Seven, seven young boys who were arrested, rounded up for allegedly attacking British troops. The fact of the matter is there were no eye witnesses, no forensic evidence. They were rounded up in a way that was simply because of who they were and where they lived, spent—and I'm talking about boys, they were barely teenagers—spent years of their lives in jail waiting for trial.
And only because of the fine work of their solicitors who faced enormous pressures, Mr. Chairman, as I know that you have one of the witnesses who will testify who faced, in some cases attorneys who have been killed, in other cases who consistently face the threats of physical abuse and/or death, and who do so, as an attorney I admire their consistent courage in representing the rights of the Nationalist minority, who constantly are in need of that type of courageous representation, and yet they do so under a process by which their very lives are threatened.
And for those of us in the United States who practice law, I cannot fathom the possibility of having to go every day to court wondering whether on your travels to represent your clients you in fact might have your very life ended, and that is a reality for those courageous attorneys who represent individuals of the Nationalist minority.
So the Diplock Courts which derive their authority from the emergency legislation are a blot on English jurisprudence. Clearly, the convictions of people like Collen Duffy and Steven Larkin and most recently Damion Sullivan, all of whose convictions were overturned by working with their attorneys and also with organizations like Lawyers Alliance for Justice in Ireland, working with Voices of the Innocent and others, and Members of Congress, some of which I have solicited and others who have solicited me in the process of these individuals, their convictions have been overturned.
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But in the process their lives have been marred, and their families have been hurt, and the fact of the matter is that their basic human rights have been abused time and time again, and those are names of real individuals. But there are so many that we could recite through this process.
So I appreciate the opportunity for this hearing to send the message that it is intolerable for a Nation which has enjoyed a great history of democracy to stoop to tactics used by military regimes and dictatorships on the people of Northern Ireland.
I believe the new Prime Minister seeks to make amends in Northern Ireland, but it will only be done if there is action, only if there is action.
So, Mr. Chairman, human rights, whether they are perpetrated by friend or foe, need to be exposed to the harsh sunlight of public scrutiny. Only then can they be rooted out and justice flourish, and for that opportunity to speak about the human rights abuses of the people of Northern Ireland by those who we generally consider a friend and ally, I commend you for having this hearing.
Thank you.
Mr. SMITH. Thank you very much, Mr. Menendez. And I would agree with you that sunlight continues to be one of the best disinfectants, and hopefully this hearing, coupled with ongoing efforts by the Subcommittee, will bring some scrutiny and light to this terrible situation.
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Mr. GILMAN. Mr. Chairman.
Mr. SMITH. Yes, I will be happy to yield.
Mr. GILMAN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, for yielding.
Your earlier witness notice states that the Assistant Secretary of State for Human Rights was invited to participate in today's hearings, and I do not see any representative out there from the Administration to discuss their annual report on human rights as it relates to Northern Ireland. I see we have Amnesty International and a number of the other important organizations.
How come, Mr. Chairman, we have not heard from the Administration? Have you had any response?
Mr. SMITH. Chairman Gilman, we did invite John Shattuck, who is the Assistant Secretary for Democracy and Human Rights, approximately a month ago, and told him we would be flexible in terms of the date, it could be any day this week, frankly, as we were working on the schedules. We had hoped if he could not make it, perhaps someone else might give the testimony on behalf of the Administration. So that may have to wait for another day, but it is regrettable because I believe it is opportunity lost. But we did issue an invitation, and Mr. Shattuck has been a frequent witness before our subcommittee, as you know so well, and is a very articulate and able guy. So it is disappointing he is not here.
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Mr. GILMAN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I hope this is not indicative of the kind of regard that they place on their report with regard to the troubles in Northern Ireland. But thank you for your response.
Mr. SMITH. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
I would like now to go to our first panel, and again I want to thank each of our panelists for being here, and I will introduce them in the order that I would ask them to testify:
Martin O'Brien is the executive director of the Committee on the Administration of Justice in Belfast. Mr. O'Brien, who earned his degrees in human rights law and sociology from Queens University at Belfast was a recipient of the Reebok Human Rights Award in 1992, and has been selected by Human Rights Watch as an international human rights monitor. In addition to his extensive writing and speaking, Mr. O'Brien is involved with the Kilcranny House, a rural education center which he helped establish in 1985.
Michael Posner has been the executive director of the Lawyers Committee of Human Rights since its inception in 1978. Mr. Posner, who served on the board for Amnesty International, America's Watch, and the International League for Human Rights, has been a visiting lecturer at both Yale Law School and Columbia University Law School, and in previous times has been before our subcommittee and provides enormous expertise and a wealth of information for our subcommittee.
Stephen Livingstone is currently co-director of the Human Rights Law Center at the University of Nottingham in England. Mr. Livingstone received his B.A. in law from Cambridge University and his L.L.M. from Harvard. He was previously the chairperson of the Committee on the Administration of Justice, and is the author of multiple books and articles on the situation in the north of Ireland.
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Julia Hall is the W. Bradford Wiley Fellow and Northern Ireland researcher in the Helsinki Division of Human Rights Watch. Ms. Hall earned her J.D. at the State University of New York at Buffalo School of Law, and holds a certificate of international law from The Hague Academy of International Law.
And, finally, Maryam Elahi is the advocacy director of the Middle East and Europe in Washington for the DC office of Amnesty International, and Amnesty too is frequently before us as is Maryam, and has provided enormous insights as to the true on-the-ground situation of human rights, not only in Northern Ireland but in many other parts of the world.
Mr. O'Brien, if you could proceed.
STATEMENT OF MARTIN O'BRIEN, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, COMMITTEE ON THE ADMINISTRATION OF JUSTICE
Mr. O'BRIEN. Mr. Chairman, thank you for the invitation to testify today. My comments today will be a summary of a longer written statement which I believe you have for the record.
I would like to begin by saying a little bit about the organization for which I work, which is the Committee on the Administration of Justice.
The Committee is an independent human rights organization which draws its membership from across the community in Northern Ireland, and it works on behalf of people from all sections of the community and takes no position on the constitutional status of Northern Ireland. We are opposed to the use of violence for political ends, and are profoundly disturbed by the breakdown in the IRA cease-fire and the return to violence.
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As a number of you have already mentioned this morning, recent weeks have seen a number of particularly horrific events, including the kicking to death by Loyalists of two young men, one a Catholic and the other a policeman; and the shooting dead in recent days of two policemen by the IRA.
Although it may be easier to promote human rights in times of peace, it is particularly during times of conflict that they are most at risk. It is precisely because of this that we are so appreciative of the opportunity to speak to you today. International—especially U.S.—involvement in developments in Northern Ireland has been extremely important in the past and is urgently needed at times like this.
We are particularly grateful to Chairman Smith, Chairman Gilman, Mr. Lantos, and the other members of the Subcommittee for their interest in human rights in Northern Ireland.
The CAJ believes that issues of justice and fairness are at the heart of the current conflict in Northern Ireland. Peace is only likely to flourish when everyone feels that their rights are respected and protected. We are therefore convinced that a lasting resolution of the conflict will require mechanisms to ensure that the rights of all are adequately protected.
We are concerned, however, that human rights were not integrated into the management of the peace process by the previous U.K. Government. This omission and the fact that further abuses occurred have contributed to the current impasse and the deterioration in the situation.
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There is an inclination to make human rights a second stage. We believe it should be a primary agenda item and progress on human rights can help in reaching a settlement of the political and constitutional issue involved.
At key stages of the Northern Irish peace process U.S. involvement has played a vital role. President Clinton's close personal interest and the impressive work done by Senator Mitchell have been particularly important. A more targeted U.S. focus on making human rights a prime element in the peace process would be particularly opportune.
The new Labour Government has given strong public expression to its commitment to human rights in its international relations, and with regard to Northern Ireland. These early signals provide important and encouraging signs of hope.
It is important, however, that the international community does whatever it can to build upon these first tentative signs of hope. Moving from conflict to lasting peace is both slow and painful. Certainly this has been so in Northern Ireland. There are no quick fixes or easy solutions, and there will be many setbacks. International concern to keep the process on track is vital.
Human rights abuses are at the heart of the conflict. Addressing them cannot await long-term political solutions, but must be part and parcel of any attempt to build a lasting peace.
Accordingly, together with our sister organizations in Britain and Ireland, we have developed a human rights agenda for action, an agenda that should be addressed at the outset when discussions take place.
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First, we call for effective mechanisms for the protection and promotion of human rights. Many human rights abuses in Northern Ireland occur because there is no written constitution, no codification of rights in the United Kingdom. The new Labour Government, however, says that it intends to incorporate the European Convention on Human Rights, and this is extremely welcome, but it is insufficient.
Northern Ireland needs its own bill of rights. Everyone in Northern Ireland, whether Nationalist or Unionist, shares an interest in, for instance, an accountable police service, freedom of expression, freedom from discrimination, freedom of religion, and other such fundamental liberties. All too often these shared interests are not effectively harnessed or prioritized. Indeed, we believe that a broad-based discussion of how best to protect everyone's rights would go a long way to facilitating discussion of other more controversial areas of political disagreement.
Second, CAJ calls for an end to emergency laws, and for a thorough review of the criminal justice system. The Lawyers Committee for Human Rights will speak to this issue in some detail. Suffice it to say that emergency legislation violates human rights, is unnecessary given the existence of other criminal justice legislation, and is counterproductive. The legislation has also led to many miscarriages of justice, affecting both Protestants and Catholics. You will hear more about these later.
The third key area requiring change is in the institutions which should protect human rights, but which all too often in Northern Ireland contribute to serious abuses. Human Rights Watch will speak in particular about the problems of policing which were encountered last summer and indeed more generally. These cannot, however, be seen in isolation. Particularly worrying are the continuing reports from detainees that police officers threaten and abuse lawyers via their clients.
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The European Committee for the Prevention of Torture has commented that persons arrested in Northern Ireland under the Prevention of Terrorism Act run a significant risk of psychological forms of ill treatment, and that on occasions resort may be had by detective officers to forms of physical ill treatment.
To address this problem CAJ calls upon the government to introduce audio and video recording of interviews with detainees. This would be in the interest of detainees and would protect the police from false accusations.
We also call for steps to end police harassment which is regularly experienced by working class Protestant and Catholic youth.
The fourth issue that CAJ raises in its human rights agenda is the need to deal with the legacy of the past. The consequences of the failure to address past abuses are graphically highlighted by the ongoing controversy around Bloody Sunday. This year marks the 25th anniversary of the killing by the British army of 13 unarmed civil rights demonstrators in Northern Ireland.
Recent evidence has emerged confirming that the original inquiry was fundamentally flawed. A new and independent inquiry with international input is vital to establish the truth and remedy the injustice done to the deceased and their families. Moreover, addressing longstanding abuses of human rights can contribute itself to building a lasting peace in Northern Ireland.
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Nor can the past be laid aside without addressing the issue of prisoners. It is ironic that the situation of Irish Republican prisoners held in Britain has actually deteriorated dramatically during the period of the cease-fire. Amnesty International will speak to the issue of prisoners in its presentation. The CAJ would urge that prompt steps be taken to secure the well being of prisoners.
Concrete action to improve the situation with respect to the areas I have described will contribute to the development of a strong culture of rights. The events of last summer where there was enormous communal tension emphasized the importance of developing a clear understanding that everyone is equal before the law, that human rights are inalienable, and that one must exercise one's rights with due respect for the rights of others.
There is a particular responsibility, however, on government to ensure that the rule of law applies. This will be vital in the coming marching season. Discriminatory behavior in all its forms must all be effectively outlawed, and I know this is an issue which has been of interest to people here in Congress. It has to be understood that as the Universal Declaration of Human Rights says, ''Recognition of the inherent dignity and the equal and inalienable rights of all members of the human family is the foundation of freedom, justice and peace.''
This brings us full circle to the argument which we made at the outset; namely, that having been at the heart of the conflict in Northern Ireland human rights must be at the heart of any peace process. Early signals from the new Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, Mo Mowlam, have been particularly positive. She however must not be deflected from prioritizing human rights concerns. It is also important that the new government in the Republic of Ireland show a clear understanding of the centrality of rights to building a lasting peace. It is particularly important at times when the political process encounters difficulties as it is bound to do, that the rights agenda provide tangible evidence of the benefits accruing from peaceful engagement with the democratic process.
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With the resumption of paramilitary violence and the coming to office of new governments in both the United Kingdom and Ireland, Committee members and the U.S. administration may well hesitate to become involved at this moment on human rights issues. However, as human rights activists in Northern Ireland, we would argue that it is precisely because the peace process is so precarious that primary attention to the human rights agenda is necessary. The peace process is only likely to succeed when everyone feels that their rights are protected and respected.
Equally, it is precisely because there is a new government and a new opportunity to leave behind the appalling human rights track record of its predecessor that emphasis on human rights from a friendly ally, such as the United States, is so necessary.
Thank you very much.
[The prepared statement of Mr. O'Brien appears in the appendix.]
Mr. SMITH. Mr. O'Brien, thank you very much for your very eloquent testimony. We have been joined on the panel by Mr. Matt Salmon, who is vice-chairman of the Subcommittee on International Operations and Human Rights, our subcommittee, and also by Mr. Kennedy, distinguished gentleman from Massachusetts. If they would like to just say a word or two.
Mr. Salmon. Mr. Kennedy.
Mr. KENNEDY. Just very briefly. I want to thank both you, Mr. Smith, as well as Chairman Gilman, for the leadership that you are showing on this issue. There can be no more important, I think, issue pertaining to human rights than making certain that the light of justice is shown upon people of human rights, and the courage that you are showing by continuing to keep this Congress involved in these issues is, I think, a tribute to you.
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But I also want to thank all of the witnesses that are coming before us today, and let you know that we very much appreciate the difficulties and troubles that many of you and your families have been through and the continuing courage that I think all of you show in making certain that these issues are dealt with in the way they ought to be.
I believe very strongly that even the current forward steps that have been taken with regard to the peace process in human rights come largely because of the involvement of President Clinton, which I think has occurred because of the leadership that people like Ben Gilman and Peter and others, Don and Bob and so many others in the Congress showed over a period of years prior to President Clinton's active involvement on these issues.
So I think that the Congress really has been in some ways a catalyst for getting the peace talks under way. Obviously, there have been setbacks recently. But I think continuing to show some of the injustices in Northern Ireland is a critical component to making certain that ultimately we find a peaceful solution to the troubles and difficulties in the north of Ireland.
So, again, I want to thank you very much, Chairman Smith, for your involvement and for hosting this hearing this morning.
Mr. SMITH. Thank you very much, Mr. Kennedy, and I hope you will stay. Mr. Kennedy is not a member of the Subcommittee or even the full International Relations Committee, but out of his interest in the issue has come by. So we appreciate you doing so.
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Mr. Posner.
STATEMENT OF MICHAEL POSNER, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, LAWYERS COMMITTEE FOR HUMAN RIGHTS
Mr. POSNER. Thank you very much.
First, Chairman Smith, I want to thank you for your leadership in convening these hearings and for your longstanding commitment to human rights issues in general. You have been a real friend of our community and we deeply appreciate everything you have done.
I also want to say a special thanks to Chairman Gilman. As the chairman of the Full Committee, you have also been somebody we have been able to turn to over the years, and I know your commitment on these issues is deep, and it is really heartfelt, and we greatly appreciate it.
This is an important time for this hearing. It is easy on one level to be quite distressed and despondent over the recent upsurge in violence which a number of you have mentioned. We would certainly associate ourselves with your unequivocal opposition to the use of violence for political means. It does represent a setback. And yet despite that there is a unique window of opportunity here for the human rights issues to be advanced forward as a part of the peace process, and as a catalyst to help reignite a more constructive process.
As several of you have said, there has been a tremendous commitment by Senator Mitchell in particular, who has played a very useful role as a mediator, and the Clinton administration more generally. The new U.K. Government, Prime Minister Blair's government, has also in its early days expressed a commitment to human rights generally and with respect to Northern Ireland in particular, and that is a welcome sign.
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This is a moment where we need to change the paradigm for looking at the peace process. What I want to emphasize this morning is that rather than saying that the larger political conflict has to be resolved before human rights can be respected, it is the other way around. Denial of basic human rights are at the heart of the conflict, and it is essential for the peace process to go forward successfully that these issues be addressed. Incrementally, if you will, but these issues must be addressed in a serious way as a part of a strategy to getting all sides to the table in a meaningful discussion about the issues that really matter.
And so I welcome this hearing as an opportunity to help advance that agenda. I would hope that this subcommittee will continue to press on these issues, and in particular, I hope that you will press Assistant Secretary Shattuck or some other member of the State Department to come and testify at a later date and present the Administration's views. I think you have an important role to play in that regard.
We are concerned that in the context of the peace process there has not been great enough attention paid to what we regard as fundamental issues relating to the rule of law and justice. I want to highlight briefly three things which are outlined in my written statement, which I would ask be made part of the record of these hearings.
We are deeply concerned and share Martin O'Brien's concern that the whole emergency law framework in Northern Ireland has been the foundation for a longstanding pattern of human rights violations. We have called in a report we released last year for an end to the emergency laws. This is a moment where there needs to be a serious discussion about powers of detention where a number of abuses occur. The whole criminal justice process also needs to be examined because it often undercuts a number of the basic due process rights which are found throughout the British system, as Congressman King described in some detail.
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We are also very concerned, and in the written testimony present added details about what we see as erosion of the judicial independence of the judiciary within Northern Ireland. In many cases confessions are obtained as a result of abusive police tactics. The absence of jury trials and lack of transparency in the appointment of judges are also part of a process which leads to an erosion in the rule of law. We believe these problems need to be corrected and addressed.
And the third area where we have devoted particular attention relates to the intimidation of defense lawyers. They play a critical role in any legal system in protecting the innocent. And in the case of Northern Ireland there has been a pattern, now longstanding, where clients or detainees are told that their solicitors—their lawyers—are sympathetic to one side or the other of the conflict, that they are not really lawyers, and that people are going to come after these lawyers. I am very pleased to see that Patrick Finucane's son, Michael, is here today and he will speak about that particularly awful and tragic case later on. It is striking to me that there has still been no independent inquiry into the murder of Patrick Finucane, now 8 years after he was killed at his home.
These are ongoing problems. Lawyers continue to receive threats. I was in Northern Ireland less than 2 months ago. We continue to receive reports that the people running the detention facilities regard the lawyers as their opponents and their enemies. They try to do what they can to intimidate them, and as a result they undermine the judicial process. This pattern of attacks has to be stopped. There has to be an investigation of it and the word has to come from on high that it is simply an unacceptable practice.
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We have made a number of specific recommendations in the written testimony relating to the restoration of jury trials and to specific changes that should be made to the emergency legislation, such as restoring the right to silence, and allowing suspects to be brought promptly before a judicial officer right after their arrest. These are steps in a process, and I don't want to dwell on any of them. This is a good moment to review this laundry list of things that can and should be focused on as part of a comprehensive approach that's central to, integral to, the peace process.
We would strongly urge, Congressman Smith, that you and others communicate directly with Senator Mitchell in terms of his role as the mediator, as the negotiator, and to try to encourage a greater attention to these issues on his agenda. We would also urge, as I said a moment ago, that you work to get the State Department to be more publicly outspoken on these issues, not only in its annual country report, but also to appear at a hearing like this.
Congressman Kennedy used the term ''catalyst,'' and I think you are in fact the essential catalyst to ensure that these human rights issues are integrated more centrally into the peace process, certainly from the U.S. Government's perspective. We all can help groups like the Committee on the Administration of Justice, advocates like Michael Finucane, by reenforcing what they are trying to do in their own society. This is the moment for us to be forthright, strong, and to push to see that these issues receive the prominence they deserve.
Thank you.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Posner appears in the appendix.]
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Mr. SMITH. Mr. Posner, thank you very much for your testimony and your full testimony, as well as that of all here, will be made a part of the record. And the Subcommittee will look very carefully at all of those recommendations and see how we can transmit that on to the British and other authorities, including Senator Mitchell.
Let me also point out that in the not too distant future I hope to put together a trip that will go to Northern Ireland. Many of us have tried to do this in the past, talk to the British Government, talk to others involved. But I think now with the change of government under Tony Blair there is a window of opportunity that ought to be seized to the greatest extent.
So, again, thank you for your very, very timely and very thoughtful recommendations.
Ms. Hall.
STATEMENT OF JULIA A. HALL, W. BRADFORD WILEY FELLOW, NORTHERN IRELAND RESEARCHER, HUMAN RIGHTS WATCH
Ms. HALL. Thank you, Chairman Smith, and Chairman Gilman, and members of the Subcommittee for this opportunity to speak with you about pressing human rights concerns in Northern Ireland.
We also feel that it is a particularly important moment for the Subcommittee to turn its attention to Northern Ireland. The protection of individual rights and the maintenance and the rule of law are essential to advancing the peace in Northern Ireland. Regrettably, attempts by State authorities to control the conflict there have created an environment within which human rights violations are routine. This erosion of civil liberties and human rights in the interest of security and public order has in many ways served to exacerbate the conflicts. Thus, any effort to build trust and confidence in the peace process must include immediate and careful attention to protection of human rights for all of Northern Ireland's citizens.
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We understand that recent events have had a negative impact on the peace process. The brutal murders of three police officers in the last month have shocked and saddened all those committed to peace. These senseless killings, coupled with serious tensions, with vast potential for violence, arising from the annual marching season signal an urgent need to resume efforts to create trust in all Northern Ireland's communities so that people have more of an investment in advancing the peace than they do in perpetrating or supporting acts of violence.
Human Rights Watch's research and advocacy in the past year has focused specifically on the reform of policing in Northern Ireland. This focus was a direct response to the final report of the International Body on Arms Decommissioning, chaired by former U.S. Senator George Mitchell, and tasked in 1995 with providing to the multiparty peace talks an acceptable plan for the decommissioning of paramilitary weapons.
However, the international body wisely recognized that success in the peace process could not be achieved solely by focusing on the decommissioning of weapons. To create trust in the peace process, confidence-building measures would also be necessary, including the normalization of policing, a review of the use of plastic bullets, a more balanced religious representation in the Royal Ulster Constabulary, the RUC, Northern Ireland's police force, which, as many of you know, is currently 90 percent Protestants, and the cessation of paramilitary punishment assaults.
Let me lay out for the Subcommittee some of our more specific concerns.
First, the policing of the upcoming marching season is a matter of urgent concern for Human Rights Watch. The marching phenomenon involves the ongoing dispute between Protestant fraternal orders supported by the Unionist community, and predominantly Catholic Nationalists organized to protest Protestant marches through Catholic neighborhoods.
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A detailed investigation by Human Rights Watch of last year's marching season strongly indicates that a series of police actions sanctioned by the government of the United Kingdom exacerbated the inter-communal conflict and contributed to an effective breakdown in the rule of law.
The failure of State authorities to maintain the rule of law occurred when police officials reversed an earlier decision to re-route a Protestant march, and allowed the march to proceed down the predominantly Catholic Garvarghy Road under threat of Unionist mob violence.
In the aftermath of this extraordinary reversal the RUC strategy for dealing with Nationalist protesters involved the use of brutal force in contravention of international standards. Of particular concern to Human Rights Watch was the excessive use of physical force directed at peaceful demonstrators, and the massive and indiscriminate use of potentially lethal plastic bullets. Testimony from residents on the Garvarghy Road indicated that many persons peacefully protesting were brutally assaulted by RUC officer in riot gear, many of whom used sectarian language throughout the course of the police operation.
Furthermore, the massive use of plastic bullets by the RUC, often in situations where there was no imminent threat to life, resulted in grievous injuries, including shattered jaw bones, broken palates, and internal injuries leading to comas.
It is imperative to note that plastic and rubber bullets have killed 17 people in Northern Ireland. The United Kingdom Ministry of Defense admission just this month that defective plastic bullets were used during last summer's marching season supports our own conclusion that the bullets are inherently unreliable, potentially fatal, and thus should be removed from use.
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Significantly, an internal police review of plastic bullet use during the summer of 1996 suggested that the presence of plastic bullet gunners can actually exacerbate tensions as opposed to defusing them.
For all of these reasons, Human Rights Watch continues its campaign to have plastic bullets banned. As well, we have called for a zero tolerance policy for the excessive use of force by police officers, and greater accountability for RUC operational decisions and conduct in order to avoid a repeat this summer of last summer's widespread police abuse.
Another immediate concern for Human Rights Watch is the daily violence of paramilitary punishment assaults and shootings in both Unionist and Nationalist communities. Throughout the troubles in Northern Ireland the police have concentrated their efforts primarily on the suppression of political violence. This anti-terrorism campaign has been waged to the exclusion of many traditional policing functions in some areas of Northern Ireland. In the absence of normal policing Loyalist and Republican paramilitaries have assumed quasi-policing rules in their respective communities by meting out punishments for perceived or actual offenses such as drug trafficking, wife abuse or burglary. These nonpolitical offenses, which would be addressed through routine policing by a traditional police force have instead been effectively delegated to irregular paramilitary law enforcement.
Paramilitary punishments in both communities take many forms. People have been brutally assaulted with baseball bats, irons bars and clubs driven through sharpened spikes. In some cases metal spikes have been driven through the legs and elbows of young men. Young women have been abducted, had their heads sheared, been tied to lamp posts, and had paint poured over them. Many people have been shot, some in the back of the knee which causes excessive bleeding and has led to the amputation of limbs.
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In 1995–1996, eight men were summarily executed for alleged drug offenses by vigilantes widely believed to be associated with Republican paramilitaries. In addition, paramilitary organizations issue expulsion orders to force alleged perpetrators to leave a particular city or all of Northern Ireland for a designated period of time under threat of being shot or beaten.
Testimony from residents in both the Unionist and Nationalist communities in Northern Ireland indicates that there is a profound lack of confidence in the RUC. Representatives from both communities appeared resigned to paramilitary policing because they felt that normal policing did not and would not occur in their neighborhoods.
Human Rights Watch has called for an immediate cessation of all forms of paramilitary intimidation. Punishment beatings and assaults are violations of humanitarian law and they cannot be tolerated. Furthermore, we have called the government of the United Kingdom to resume normal policing in many areas of Northern Ireland where these brutal alternative justice systems have become the only regular form of so-called justice that many residents know.
Finally, Human Rights Watch is deeply disturbed by persistent allegations of collusion between some members of the security forces and Loyalist paramilitary organizations. Members of the security forces are alleged to engage in collusion by conspiring directly with Loyalist paramilitaries to carry out acts of violence or by facilitating the commission of these acts. Actions that can constitute collusion include the leaking of security information such as photo montages and house floor plans, the diversion of law enforcement resources away from the scene of a Loyalist paramilitary assassination just prior to the crime, and the failure to adequately investigate Loyalist paramilitary killings by overlooking critical evidence, failing to interview key witnesses and generally failing to apprehend any suspects.
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Because the police are invested with primary responsibility for identifying, gathering and securing information on suspected paramilitaries and investigating acts of paramilitary violence, the bulk of the allegations of collusion are made against the RUC. This is particularly true in cases where legitimately collected official information finds its way into the hands of Loyalist paramilitaries. A common scenario in Northern Ireland involves the RUC warning a person—usually a Nationalist—that she or he is under paramilitary threat because his or her security files have ''gone missing,'' that is, been lost, and are in the possession of a Loyalist paramilitary organization. The frequency of these so-called warnings, coupled with the fact that a number of persons whose security information has been passed on have subsequently been assassinated by Loyalist paramilitaries, indicates an urgent need for the RUC to take affirmative steps to address allegations of collusion.
Human Rights Watch has made a series of recommendations to the United Kingdom for effectively addressing allegations of collusion, including the immediate and thorough vetting of the RUC for officers with illicit associations to Loyalist paramilitary organizations, a reassessment of procedures for the handling of classified identification information, and a strong commitment to the rigorous investigation of Loyalist paramilitary killings in conformity with international standards.
In some cases we call for more specific measures. For example, with respect to the Loyalist paramilitary murder of Catholic criminal defense lawyer, Patrick Finucane—who suffered harassment and death threats from RUC officers—Human Rights Watch urges that an independent, public inquiry be convened.
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Human Rights Watch has welcomed the initiatives of the new Labour Government with respect to the reform of policing and the protection of individual rights. Clearly, the Labour Government understands, as we all must, how persistent human rights violations create a climate of hostility and a lack of trust in State authorities. The time is now for a renewed commitment to building confidence in the peace process by guaranteeing the protection of rights.
Human Rights Watch urges the Congress to support the new Labour Government's initiatives and to express its own commitment in concrete terms to the protection of human rights in Northern Ireland.
Thank you.
[The prepared statement of Ms. Hall appears in the appendix.]
Mr. SMITH. Ms. Hall, thank you very much for your testimony and for your many very valuable and worthwhile recommendations.
You know, when you were talking about plastic bullets, and again I glanced over and looked at one, and all of us have seen those bullets before, but they are more like plastic mini-bombs. I mean, the size and scope are beyond what many people think. Americans, when they think of plastic bullets, they think of some toy that might do a minimum amount of damage. And then you look at this atrocity and you realize that that can kill and maim very easily. So I thank you for your strong statement.
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Mr. Livingstone.
STATEMENT OF STEPHEN LIVINGSTONE, DEPARTMENT OF LAW, UNIVERSITY OF NOTTINGHAM
Mr. LIVINGSTONE. Thank you very much, Chairman Smith, Chairman Gilman. I appreciate very much your invitation to come and testify before this committee today. I would like to thank the commitment to both this Congress and the Administration to the issues of human rights in Northern Ireland, which I think is of value to all communities in Northern Ireland.
I come before you in my personal capacity, as someone who as the Chairman said earlier, is from Northern Ireland, has taught in Northern Ireland, has worked as chair of the Committee on Administration of Justice and is a member of its board for a period. Although I now teach in England, I retain an interest in human rights in Northern Ireland, and particularly the issue of international human rights standards and their application to Northern Ireland.
And it is that topic that I wish to address in my speech today. I think it is important to note that international human rights standards, such as the European Convention, the United Nations and Human Rights Covenant, are standards that are agreed by States, including United Kingdom as one of the early movers in conventions such as the European Convention. They are acknowledged to be minimum standards. They are standards which are structured to acknowledge that the State may need to take steps to protect members of the public against acts which threaten their rights. And, moreover, international bodies reviewing the conformity of the Government in Northern Ireland with international human rights standards have acknowledged the severe difficulties faced by the government in dealing with paramilitary violence from both Loyalist and Republican groups in Northern Ireland, and violence which is responsible for over 90 percent of the deaths in the Northern Ireland conflict both with members of the security forces and with citizens who are not tied up in any way with the activities of the State.
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Nevertheless, those international human rights bodies have acknowledged that there are limitations which must be placed on any democratic State in dealing with conflicts or threats to the safety and security of its citizens no matter how aggrieved. And sadly, the United Kingdom has consistently failed to conform to those standards in many aspects of its dealing with the conflict in Northern Ireland.
For example, in the forum of the European Convention on Human Rights, in 1978, the United Kingdom was found to breach the guarantees against inhuman and degrading treatment in relation to its treatment of detainees in police stations and detention centers in Northern Ireland.
In 1995, in the McCann case, resulting from shooting of three people alleged to be planting a bomb in Gibraltar, the United Kingdom was found to have violated the protection against the right to life, one of the most fundamental guarantees in international human rights standards.
In 1989, in the Brogan case the European Convention of Human Rights found a violation of the right to liberty when detainees were detained for more than 7 days without judicial supervision for questioning, and similarly in the Fox, Campbell and Hartley case in 1990, a violation was found of the right to liberty when inadequate information was given to people arrested as to what they were suspected of.
Finally, in the Murray case in the European Convention context in 1996, the violation of the right to fair trial was found, particularly in the drawing of inferences from defendants refusal to testify and the failure to grant them immediate access to legal representations after their arrest.
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Both the United Nations Committee on Torture in 1991 and 1995 and the European Committee on the Prevention of Torture in 1995 have expressed strong concern that the circumstances for the interrogation of those suspected of terrorist offenses in Northern Ireland create a significant risk of the mistreatment of suspects. It is, of course, particularly disturbing that in 1995 we are finding the same concerns expressed about the interrogation of suspects which animated the 1978 European Court decision in the Ireland versus United Kingdom case. That problem has remained permanent in Northern Ireland.
Finally, in this international context it is worth mentioning that the United Nations Human Rights Committee in 1995 expressed concern that permitting courts to draw inferences from the silence of those charged with offenses in Northern Ireland, coupled with failure to give them immediate access to their lawyers, created a risk that their right to fair trial would not be protected.
As I said, these are significant findings in areas of basic human rights protections. Moreover, as I said, these are findings made by international tribunals and monitoring bodies that fully acknowledge the difficulties of the circumstances in Northern Ireland and the difficulties caused by political violence there.
If a common theme can be discerned in these cases, it is the failure of the State to provide adequate, effective and independent means for reviewing the conduct of law enforcement authorities, especially where they have been granted increased powers. The consistent theme of law enforcement policies in Northern Ireland in the current phase of the conflict has been that a combination of violence and intimidation, plus the need for quick results in serious cases, is thought to make law enforcement particularly difficult where law enforcement is based, as it normally is, on the cooperation of the citizenry.
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And State measures such as non-jury courts, lengthy periods of detention of questioning, and the drawing of inferences from silence, which reduce reliance on the cooperation of the public, give increased powers to police and prosecution.
But the constant danger with these measures is that they risk sections of the pubic increasingly seeing law enforcement as something that is done to them rather than for them; hence, fueling the lack of confidence in the law enforcement agencies and turning the lack of public support on which policies are predicated into a self-fulfilling prophecy. Such suspicions that increased law enforcement powers are merely a cover for arbitrary action are fueled when the mechanisms do not appear to exist to render law enforcement transparent and accountable.
The continuing controversy of the Bloody Sunday shootings in 1972 is perhaps the most significant example of why the lack of adequate scrutiny mechanisms can render public distrust and suspicion of law enforcement. Hence, from human rights perspective it seems to me there is need for changes which would render law enforcement more transparent and accountable, something which, in turn, should ensure compliance with international human rights standards.
A fully independent system for the investigation of complaints against the police, the introduction of video and audio taping of all police interrogations in Northern Ireland, judicial review of any extensions of detention of suspects, and indeed the lack of a need for detention for suspects beyond the period of say 48 hours, and qualified access of lawyers to their clients, and better procedures at inquests would all be high on the list of matters necessary to ensure the protection of human rights in Northern Ireland.
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All of these, it seems to me, can be achieved without rendering law enforcement authorities incapable of dealing with genuine examples of crime and politically motivated crime. The incorporation of the European Convention on Human Rights is likely to be initiated by the present government. It seems to me this is indeed a very welcome stand. But this must be supported by giving adequate powers to an independent human rights commission, whether a revamped Standing Advisory Commission of Human Rights or a new commission, to fully investigate the protection of human rights, and to initiate litigation where it feels these rights have not been given effect to.
I think it is true to say one must acknowledge that while human rights violations are at the core of Northern Ireland's problems, better protection of human rights alone would not solve Northern Ireland's problems. It is a deep political conflict that needs to be addressed by political steps. And it is also true to say that human rights may flourish better in time of peace.
Moreover, it seems to me that measures to enhance the protection of human rights, particularly to guarantee these core protections of human rights of life, liberty and a fair trial, seem to me essential to contribute to an atmosphere of public trust. They are things that are right in themselves. And by generating that better public trust confidence and the sense of public security they may help to contribute to an environment in which an overall settlement is more likely to be achieved.
Thank you very much.
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[The prepared statement of Mr. Livingstone appears in the appendix.]
Mr. SMITH. Thank you very much, Mr. Livingstone, for that very fine statement, and for your very valuable recommendations.
We have been joined on the panel by Congresswoman Ileana Ros-Lehtinen who is the chairwoman of the International Economic Policy and Trade Subcommittee.
Ileana, do you want to say a word or two?
And also by my good friend from New York, Eliot Engel.
Eliot, would you like to say a few words?
Mr. ENGEL. Well, I just want to say, first of all, it's good to be back in the Committee again, and I just want to commend you, Mr. Chairman, for conducting this hearing. As you know, I have, since the beginning of my tenure in Congress, been very concerned about the human rights abuses in the north of Ireland, and I look forward to listening to the testimony.
And, you, of course, as chairman, have been preeminent in this Congress about human rights abuses, not only in Ireland, but all over the world, and I really want to commend you and publicly compliment you for the work that you do. I think of all the work we do in Congress one of the best things that we can ensure is to let people all over the world know that Members of Congress and the United States are watching, and doing more than watching; that we will not tolerate or stand for the kinds of human rights abuses that we have seen in Ireland for so many years. I think it is very, very important for us to hold these kinds of hearings.
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So I again commend you for the work that you have done, and I look forward to listening to the testimony. Hopefully, we can highlight some of the problems, and encourage the Administration and Congress to take a more active position in concert to end these human rights abuses in the north of Ireland.
Thank you.
Mr. SMITH. Mr. Engel, thank you. And thank you for coming. As you pointed out, you are not a member of the Committee but because of your deep and abiding interest made time in your schedule to join us at this hearing. So I do thank you for that.
I would like to ask our final witness if she would present her testimony, Maryam Elahi from Amnesty International.
STATEMENT OF MARYAM ELAHI, ADVOCACY DIRECTOR, MIDDLE EAST AND EUROPE, AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL
Ms. ELAHI. Congressman Smith, I would like to take the opportunity like my colleagues before me to thank you for holding these hearings, and to thank Chairman Gilman and other members of this panel, and Congressman Engel, for the support you have had in the leadership on this issue, and on other human rights issues.
We welcome this opportunity to testify before this subcommittee on the human rights situation in Northern Ireland and in other parts of the United Kingdom.
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Mr. Chairman, I request that my written testimony be submitted into the record, together with two Amnesty circulars on the case of Roisin McAliskey and the special security units, and the 1997 Amnesty International Annual Report entry on the United Kingdom.
Mr. SMITH. Without objection all of that material will be made a part of the record.
Ms. ELAHI. Thank you very much.
Mr. Chairman, in its work on Northern Ireland over many years Amnesty International has identified laws, procedures and practices of law enforcement officials which have led to violations of the internationally recognized right to life, to freedom from torture or cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment, to fair trials, and to freedom of expression and assembly. In particular, Amnesty International has been seriously concerned about the British Government's failure to investigate independently and fully serious allegations of human rights violations, to make public the results of internal investigations, and to bring the perpetrators of human rights violations to justice.
Given the large number of human rights violations perpetrated in Northern Ireland, there is a particular need for the new government, the new British Government, that is, to review a number of issues, including policing and emergency legislation provisions, with a view to increasing the protection of human rights in Northern Ireland. The protection of human rights and the creation of a human rights culture are without a doubt central to lasting peace.
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Mr. Chairman, we believe that the new government has an opportunity to make significant moves for the protection of human rights throughout the United Kingdom, and we welcome the commitments expressed in initial government statements to emphasize issues of fairness and justice in Northern Ireland.
In my written testimony submitted for the record I have focused on Amnesty International's wide range of concerns about human rights violations in the United Kingdom and Northern Ireland. In the short time available to me today, I would like to touch upon our concerns in three particular areas.
First, unfair trials in Diplock Courts, and focus on the Casement Park case; second, to address special security units in the United Kingdom and the treatment of Category A prisoners; in that particular case to focus on Roisin McAliskey's treatment; and, third, alleged extrajudicial killings as illustrated by the case of Diarmuid O'Neill.
Before I begin, Mr. Chairman, I would like to note for the record that we too are baffled by the absence of a representative from the State Department. This year's State Department report on the human rights situation in the United Kingdom was even-handed and strong in its language, and it is unfortunate that Assistant Secretary Shattuck is not here to discuss what steps the Administration is prepared to take to raise these issues of mutual concern with the British Government. We do hope that his absence merely reflects a scheduling conflict and not a determination by the Administration to evade public criticism of one of its closest allies when they do wrong.
I would like to first address our concerns about extrajudicial killings. We have called on the British Government to carry out an independent inquiry into all alleged extrajudicial killings. Such an inquiry should examine the legislation governing the use of lethal force, the procedures used to investigate such killings, the lack of accountability of the security forces and the police, and the severely restricted nature of the inquest procedure which is prevented through legislation from carrying out the proper and public inquiry into the full circumstances of a disputed killing. We ask that the result of such an inquiry be made available to the public.
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Our concerns about such killings are highlighted by a recent case in September of last year in which lethal force was applied by armed police carrying out a planned raid on a house in London in the early morning, resulting in the death of Diarmuid O'Neill and the arrest of two others.
Diarmuid O'Neill was apparently shot six times by two officers from Scotland Yard. Initial statements by the police tried to justify the death of Mr. O'Neill by stating that he was killed during a shootout between the police and the arrested suspects. However, subsequent reports have confirmed that Diarmuid O'Neill and the other suspects were unarmed. The British Government needs to account for the initial misleading statement and its justification for killing an unarmed man.
We also believe that there should be an investigation into the treatment received by Diarmuid O'Neill in the wake of the shooting. The photos of smeared blood on the front steps of the house would seem to indicate that Diarmuid O'Neill was dragged seriously wounded down the steps to the pavement rather than being treated where he lay or removed on a stretcher.
Another aspect of this case which needs clarification is the reported use of CS gas during the operation. British officers should be asked why CS gas was used and what effect that amount of CS gas used would have had on Mr. O'Neill's reasoning.
I should mention that a police investigation was indeed carried out into this incident by senior officers of the Metropolitan Police Service, the very same police force that was involved in the incident. And the results of this investigation, if indeed it is now finished, have yet to be made public.
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The second concern that I would like to touch upon in this hearing is that of special security units or SSUs. Amnesty International has urged that the British Government carry out a review of the security measures which have been implemented within the British prison regime in order to ensure that such measures do not amount to cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment of prisoners. We believe that the special security units in which the exceptional escape risk Category A prisoners are held does constitute cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment. It denies remand prisoners a right to a fair trial in violation of the United Kingdom's obligations under international treaties.
The conditions that prisoners face in the SSUs are as follows: Small group isolation; the lack of adequate exercise, educational and work facilities; the lack of natural daylight and long distance vision; the lack of adequate medical treatment; and strip searching and other security measures, including the closed visits.
Many aspects of the SSU regime violate international standards. The conditions have led to serious physical and psychological disorders in prisoners.
Mr. Chairman, our concern about the SSUs is part of a wider concern about the conditions in which Category A prisoners are held. Category A prisoners are often denied their very basic rights which are recognized under international standards on an arbitrary basis. The denial of basic rights is greatly exacerbated in these SSUs. Basically, the SSU is a prison within a prison.
Mr. Menendez mentioned the case of Roisin McAliskey. The case of Roisin McAliskey is illustrative of our concerns relating to Category A prisoners. Ms. McAliskey, who was arrested in November 1996, 4 months pregnant, on an extradition warrant, was detained in total isolation in an all-male prison for 6 days before being transferred to a women's detention facility, Holloway Prison. She was detained as a Category A high-risk prisoner in Holloway, a prison which does not have facilities for Category A prisoners. She was subjected to very frequent strip searches, closed visits, and severe restrictions throughout her pregnancy on her rights to associate with other prisoners and to receive Irish press and to exercise.
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Amnesty International believes that she was detained in conditions which constituted cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment. It was only through international protest that some of the restrictions were eased toward the end of her pregnancy, and I would like to thank members of this subcommittee for being very active on this case, and she did give birth on the 26th of May in a civilian hospital. She is now currently on bail in a mother and baby unit in a secure hospital in London.
Let me now address our concerns about unfair trials in Diplock Courts. Diplock Courts were established under emergency legislation in 1973, to deal with serious offenses linked to alleged terrorist activities. There are a number of people who have been convicted in these courts who are victims of miscarriage of justice. Amnesty International has urged the government to review the functioning of the Diplock Courts to ensure that the specific troubling provisions of this system are brought into conformity with international standards for fair trials.
One case that brings home many of the concerns related to fair trial issues is the Casement Park trials. On March 30, 1990, Patrick Kane, Sean Kelly and Michael Timmons were all convicted after a trial in a Diplock Court of the murders of two British army corporals. Each of them was sentenced to serve two life sentences. Their trial was in violation of internationally recognized fair trial standards. Once arrested, they were not promptly brought before a judicial authority. They were denied access to their counsel during interrogation, and the defense had unequal access to evidence and experts.
In the case of Patrick Kane, the prosecution's case rested on voluntary statements that he made out of fear and confusion during interrogation, even though they were in conflict with evidence which was presented by the prosecution itself. Mr. Kane, 29 years old at the time, had an intelligence equivalence to an 11-year-old. He suffered from a serious hearing disability, was unable to read and could only write his name. It is absolutely outrageous that he was detained and questioned in the absence of a lawyer or other appropriate adult, as is required by the pertinent legislation.
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Recently, the Northern Ireland Secretary of State referred the case of Patrick Kane to the Court of Appeal. His conviction was quashed by the Court of Appeal in June 1997 because new evidence showed that his confessions might have been inadmissible and unreliable. We are happy to report that Patrick Kane was released on June 20th, this last Friday.
Amnesty International is concerned that the convictions of his two co-defendants, Sean Kelly and Michael Timmons, have still not been reviewed and we request that this committee recommend to the British Government that they be similarly reviewed as soon as possible.
I know that Mr. Kelly is here and will give more details on the current status of Sean Kelly.
In conclusion, allow me to state that Amnesty International believes that central to the functioning of any democracy is respect for basic civil liberties and political rights. The continued aberration of these basic rights has played a central role in the conflict in Northern Ireland. Any attempt to address the conflict must be coupled with a recognition that in order for peaceful lasting solution to occur human rights must be respected and be made central to the peace process.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
[The prepared statement of Ms. Elahi and circulars appear in the appendix.]
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Mr. SMITH. Thank you very much for your very fine testimony and for all of your insights and recommendations. And I am sure that many of the questions that my colleagues and I have, have really been answered preemptively by what you have said, because it was very thorough. But I do have a couple of remaining questions.
Obviously, this is another time of opportunity, with Tony Blair's new government, and it seems to me that we frequently review and press for human rights recognition and respect in some of the emerging democracies, particularly those that are in transition from communism to democracy. And usually the last part of the puzzle to fall into place is the judiciary.
But when you are talking about the United Kingdom, we are not talking about an emerging democracy. We are talking about a very mature democracy that has had a judiciary that has been imitated around the world. That is what is so disappointing and troubling when, by design, the emergency laws are crafted and implemented with such vehemence that people's fundamental, universally recognized rights are cavalierly abridged and desecrated.
I would like to ask all of you whether you believe that the emergency powers, the EPA and the PTA, are likely to be repealed by the new government, or at least overhauled and changed; whether you feel that, as we have seen in other parts of the world like El Salvador, a truth commission might be helpful. It could get a whole new set of eyes and ears looking at the old cases that still demand justice. As some of you have said today, until those are looked at there will continue to be a sense of violence. We see this with South Africa where old wrongs need to be righted, information has to be divulged, and complete transparency needs to be the order of the day rather than continued concealment. So I'm interested in whether you think that a truth commission might be something useful, or perhaps you think it's already happening.
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Again, I'm also interested in the prospects for repeal of the emergency legislation and whether you think Tony Blair will seize this opportunity to take a fresh look at this and begin to work through it.
Mr. Posner, you look like you want to jump first.
Mr. POSNER. Sure. Let me take a start at that, and others I am sure will have thoughts as well.
As an incrementalist approach one would hope that the Blair administration, the Blair Government would begin to look at the emergency legislation, or probably look at some pieces of it where there is the possibility of providing some immediate relief. Access to counsel or the right to see a judicial official immediately after arrests, those are areas that could be immediately addressed in a way that—as Stephen Livingstone said—would give confidence to both sides. All parts of the community would see that there is some shift afoot and that the authorities are beginning to look at these issues in a serious way.
I am not persuaded that the Blair administration is going to do this without a collective effort on all of our parts to push them in that direction. That is to say, there is no indication thus far that they are about to take those steps. From our perspective, we are operating on the assumption that this is a moment where in the context of the peace talks these are appropriate issues to put on the table, to have a discussion with all the parties there, to say these are the kinds of confidence building measures that are going to advance the larger peace process objectives.
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With respect to the truth commission, several people in our panel have referred to particular cases, the Patrick Finucane murder, the Bloody Sunday killings which occurred 25 years ago. In these and other key cases, there has been and continue to be calls for independent inquiries undertaken by the government. Perhaps this is the first step. There may be a broader effort to look at a whole range of cases, but, again, as an incremental step that would give people a sense of confidence. If the government were willing to go forward right now and say that they will pick a few very celebrated egregious cases and designate independent inquiries, I think that would go a long way toward setting a new tone for the situation.
Mr. SMITH. Mr. O'Brien.
Mr. O'BRIEN. I would like to endorse what Mike Posner from the Lawyers Committee has said. When the Labour party was in opposition for very many years they voted against emergency legislation. We were particularly disappointed to see that as the prospect of office loomed, their opposition weakened. It is by no means certain that the Labour Government will repeal emergency legislation.
One of the concrete things which we think they should do is to act to comply with one of the most recent rulings of the European Court of Human Rights in relation to the Murray case. That was one which found a violation of fair trial provisions of the European Convention. That was over a year ago, and as yet there has been no firm indication as to what will happen.
I think, given Labour's decision to incorporate the European Convention into domestic law, they will almost certainly have to make changes to emergency law. The extent of those changes remains to be seen. We feel very much that emergency legislation has been part of the problem in Northern Ireland rather than part of the solution, that it has led to human rights violations, that it is entirely counterproductive, that it feeds and fuels the conflict, and that it leads to alienation from the legal system. We would like to see the government acting quickly to repeal emergency law.
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In relation to the point about truth commissions, certainly that is something of which there has been some discussion in Northern Ireland. The U.N. Human Rights Committee has called on the British Government to deal with outstanding cases of concern. Obviously, this is something which is relevant to victims on all sides of the conflict who have unresolved questions about what actually happened to their relatives.
There is an argument, however, that there has been virtual impunity in relation to human rights violations by the State, and that some mechanism in particular is needed to deal with those. One very concrete thing which the government could do would be to establish an independent inquiry into Bloody Sunday, and that is something which we would hope might take place in the not too distant future. We would very much welcome assistance from Congress, both in pressing for repeal of emergency law and for the tackling of these outstanding violations of human rights.
Ms. HALL. I would also like to add that it is important to remember that many of the abusive powers the police have derive from the emergency legislation. The geography of this is also tied to the emergency legislation insofar as the holding centers are specifically established to deal with persons who are picked up for political crimes under the emergency legislation.
So the language that the Labour Government has been using recently in terms of police reform necessarily indicates that the abusive powers in the emergency legislation would have to be reviewed if they are serious and committed to a reform of policing.
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Mr. LIVINGSTONE. On the question of emergency provisions, I think it has been true for some time that it can be said that the emergency powers are not necessary; that there are quite sufficient, adequate powers in the ordinary criminal law in Northern Ireland to deal with the offenses committed, the violence, including political violence, in Northern Ireland.
Unfortunately, however, I think it is not clear by any means that the government will repeal these measures. I think it is disturbing, for example, that they have not taken action to repeal provisions on exclusion orders even though it does not seem that exclusion orders are being used very much; the orders that are given to people traveling between Northern Ireland and Great Britain, or Great Britain and Northern Ireland. I think the use of these has decreased significantly. They could have been repealed but the government has not taken even that kind of step. So I think it is disturbing that they have kept those things.
With regards to the issue of a truth commission, I think that it is certainly my position that the government is already under an obligation to have independent and effective mechanisms of dealing with allegations of human rights violations, and those have not been put in place.
A broader truth commission from that may be, I think, of value to the conflict. But since that would need to address not only activities by the State but also activities by armed opposition groups and many unsolved killings or injuries undertaken by them, that may be something that has to wait until a more general political settlement, I suspect.
Ms. ELAHI. Congressman Smith, your question touches on the two important steps that the government needs to take in terms of confidence-building measures and addressing the peace process in a serious way in Northern Ireland.
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Obviously, with respect to the truth commission, we believe that accountability is central to moving forward, and whatever the structure may be in terms of addressing past abuses such as an independent inquiry into Bloody Sunday, it is absolutely crucial that steps be taken in this direction.
And with respect to the emergency legislation, there are a number of structures that need to be looked at under that rubric, whether it is the Diplock Court system or the emergency legislation and other legislation that is being currently used that leads to human rights violations—all of that needs to be looked at and serious changes need to be made.
I would also like to mention that Amnesty International is this Friday releasing a document addressing an agenda on human rights for the new British Government, and we will be seeking meetings with a number of the Secretaries of State in Britain.
Mr. SMITH. Let me ask one additional question before you leave, Mr. King. In your testimony today, several of you noted—I think one of you actually said it—that there is a profound lack of confidence in the RUC, and I was wondering what your recommendation would be in terms of replacing especially egregious offenders of human rights in Northern Ireland.
One of the experiences we have had on this committee—and all of you as human rights activists know this as well—is that there are very often some people, particularly higher-ups in any given apparatus, with whom there is a problem, who are notable offenders.
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What is being done to try to finger those individuals, particularly those who are collaborating with killings by the paramilitaries, but also those who commit the other kinds of crimes and are responsible for these human rights abuses when people are in detention?
And if you could, while you are answering that, tell us what the status is of the shoot-to-kill policy. What is the status of that in Northern Ireland?
Mr. POSNER. I will take the first part anyway.
One recommendation that has recently been made by a prominent former government official, Maurice Hayes, is to establish an independent ombudsman to investigate complaints against the police. And this follows an investigation that he undertook, through a process where he was asked by the government to look at the existing procedures.
It is clear that there needs to be some independent and effective process where people whose rights have been violated by the police feel they have a recourse and an effective remedy. I think his recommendations are very much in the right direction. We need to follow up on what he has proposed and to see that his suggestions are acted upon.
Mr. O'BRIEN. I think your question goes to the core of the problem in relation to accountability and this issue of impunity. For example, despite the fact that large amounts of compensation have been paid to people who were detained and abused during detention, no police officer has ever been disciplined as a result of physical ill treatment during detention under emergency legislation. And what we have in a sense is a system which is designed to ensure that there is no accountability—a system where lawyers are denied access to interviews. There is no independent record by way of audio and video recording, and these are all things which could and should be done to try to ensure greater accountability in that area.
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The point which you made in relation to the judiciary is also particularly relevant if you reform the police and make a lot of changes to legislation. But if judges are still not prepared to believe that police officers can tell lies, then you have a very serious problem. We have particular problems which have to be addressed in relation to our judiciary. For example, not least, is the fact that there are no women judges in Northern Ireland, so there are big issues about representativeness in terms of the judiciary.
On the shoot-to-kill issue, the whole question of extrajudicial killings, that I think is one area where there has been some improvement. The incidence of these kinds of events has considerably decreased, and that I think is in no small measure due to the interest and attention of people around the world.
There have, however, been some recent disturbing developments in Northern Ireland in relation to the use of undercover soldiers and police officers, and where there have been shooting incidents, which could have led to fatalities in Northern Ireland and very fortunately did not. And so that is something which continues to require scrutiny, but is undoubtedly something where some progress was made in terms of actively limiting the number of incidents of this kind.
Ms. HALL. I would turn the Subcommittee members' attention to a recent report by Human Rights Watch specifically on the issue of policing, which contains five pages of concrete recommendations to the government of the United Kingdom and to the upper management of the RUC, the police force in Northern Ireland.
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Of particular concern to us, of course, is the composition of the RUC in that it is 90 percent Protestant, 99 percent male, and 100 percent white. We realize that the demographics of Northern Ireland themselves speak to some of that, but certainly not to the religious composition.
One of the major issues for us is the collusion issue. While the complaints system may be effectively addressed through an ombudsman, we do not feel that an ombudsman is the appropriate mechanism for dealing with complaints of collusion. There is a classic blue wall of silence around this issue. Collusion may occur at the lower levels, but it certainly is implicitly endorsed at the higher levels. We feel very strongly that this is an issue that the government of the United Kingdom must take out of police hands in terms of an independent inquiry into both specific cases, like Patrick Finucane, and the overall culture of policing in Northern Ireland, which is heavily security-dependent and heavily dependent on silence between officers to ensure that any collusive activities that do take place at whatever level are never brought to light. There is no mechanism for transparency and understanding how collusion occurs. We direct most of those recommendations to the government of the United Kingdom specifically.
Mr. SMITH. If you could, Ms. Hall, provide us with a copy of those recommendations, we would make it part of our record.
Ms. HALL. Packets of the report were FedEx'd to all members of the Subcommittee last week. They are in your boxes.
Mr. SMITH. OK, thank you.
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Mr. Livingstone, did you want to respond?
Mr. LIVINGSTONE. Yes, I think just on the policing question. I think, as I have already said, it points out again the need for adequate and effective scrutiny of the police. The government has made a number of attempts to revamp and change police complaints procedures, but none of these have established purely an independent side of the investigation. These investigations are still done by the police, even if they are overseen by members of the police complaints authority. And I do not think any of those have established the confidence of the public in those investigations. As Martin O'Brien has already said, none of these resulted in disciplinary proceedings.
On the issue of shoot-to-kill policy, I think as Martin said already, there have not been as many incidents. But I think when John Stalker wrote his book on his experience in investigating that policy, he said it was not that one finds any particular directive or notice pinned on the board or anything like that. His concern was more that a culture developed, and cultures like that can develop and decline. And I think that makes it even more important that one looks again at what happened in that period, and it is distressing that the government has still not published the full report of Stalker and Samson's inquiry. That is something, again, that the government could do urgently.
Mr. SMITH. Let me before I yield to Mr. King just say that, you know, recent history is replete with a number of leaders who when they took the helm immediately took action to replace violators of human rights. President Arsu and Guatemala comes to mind. I mean, in his first few days and weeks in office he sacked in excess of 100 generals and colonels who had very poor records on human rights.
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So our hope would be that based on data, based on good facts, that there be some kind of urging of the elements of these abuses in the RUC and that it be done immediately by Prime Minister Blair.
Mr. King.
Mr. KING. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
First of all, I want to thank all the members of the panel for their testimony. I think it was very illuminating and very detailed.
I would like to follow up on what Chairman Smith was asking, I think going to the root of the problem, about the RUC itself and the entire criminal justice system, because, for instance, we have just asked about the shoot-to-kill policy, and, yes, the shoot-to-kill policy is not as bad as it was several years ago. But you can find that with almost every element.
For instance, the torture in the prisons is not as bad today as it was 20 years ago. But then the torture was replaced by the super grass trials. And then there were the plastic bullets. We still have the denial of jury trials. So it appears as though there is almost like a seamless garment here where at every stage of the line the criminal justice system is perverted and it is distorted.
I just wonder if it can be reformed, because generally, whether it is this country or any country, if there is a particular agency which has corruption in it you can root out those who are guilty of corruption. If there is a police force where there is brutality, you can try to effectively address that brutality. But it appears to me that the entire criminal justice system is just filled with these types of human rights violations.
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And I guess I could address this question to any of you, but maybe specifically to Mr. O'Brien first since he is actually on the ground. Does he see any way, do any of you see any way that the system can be reformed or in effect would you have to have a disbanding of the RUC and almost a total restructuring of the court system?
And also, if we are talking about a peace process and people in the communities having confidence, I mean, I have spent some time in West Belfast. I cannot imagine a family in the Twinbrook or Lenadoon or Andersonstown or Ballymurphy any time in the foreseeable future having any faith in the police department if there were just reforms made.
And the same with the court system, you know, obviously there must be some judges who are doing their job, and I am not trying to cast all of them the same. The fact is I think if you spoke to the average person in a working class area, either Nationalists or Loyalists, they would say they have no faith in the court system.
So I am just wondering, apart from the individual abuses that occur, if you are trying to talk about creating a system or a climate where people have confidence in the police, confidence in the courts, confidence in the prison officers; can that be done without almost a total disbanding and then restructuring of the police, the courts, and also I would add the prison officials?
I guess I will start with Mr. O'Brien.
Mr. O'BRIEN. I think the answer to that question lies in some of the comments which you were making earlier, Mr. King. Basically since the origins of Northern Ireland we have had a system of emergency law, and there has never been a time when there hasn't been emergency law, and the nature of emergency law is that it has a particularly corrosive effect, and that it seeps into the way in which the whole system operates.
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I think the picture which you paint is an accurate one in terms of the depth of distrust and the depth of the lack of confidence which many people have in the legal system in Northern Ireland.
Our approach in relation to the issue of policing, for example, has been to say that there are certain standards which a police force has to meet. Those are, for example, that it be representative, that it be accountable, that it be responsive to the needs of the community, and that it operate within internationally agreed human rights standards. The RUC currently, in our view, fails to meet those standards, and any police force which will command the confidence and the respect of people from across the community must meet those standards if it is to succeed. Historically, the rule of law has not applied in Northern Ireland, and we have at various points seen particularly graphic illustrations of that; for example, last summer. The challenge really is to put in place the rule of law, that means that no one is above the law and people are equal before the law, that the law is clear, fairly enforced. These are all principles which go right to the core of any legal system.
One of the concrete things which we are doing in relation to policing is looking at how other countries which have had similar problems, for example, El Salvador, South Africa and the Middle East, and countries like Canada and Spain and others that have had particular problems with aspects of their policing systems, have dealt with their problem. We will be publishing a major report in the autumn which seeks to learn from those experiences and give concrete examples of how you go about building a police service in which people can actually have confidence.
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Mr. KING. I think that goes to the question, and we can ask the others to answer it though, are we talking about reform or are we talking about a new police force?
Mr. O'BRIEN. As I say, I think what we are saying is that the police service as it exists now does not meet these standards, and it would have to be transformed in order to meet those standards. We have not taken a position in the sense that this argument has been presented, as to disband or reform. We would not take a position on that argument. We would simply say that any police service needs to meet certain standards. The RUC fails to do this and it would require a considerable process of transformation if it were to meet these standards.
Mr. POSNER. If I can just follow up on that. There is this sort of surreal quality in some ways about the discussion we are now having. We are getting into the details of a lot of things that I think are rarely even mentioned in the context of the actual peace process.
And so when Martin talks about a transformation or a process of transformation, I think you are hearing from him and from all of us that there are structural problems in the emergency legislation, there are problems in the composition of basic institutions of government, the police is over 90 percent from one side of the community. These disparities create problems, and there is a history of bad practices, and no, or very little official accountability.
Those are the issues that ought to be on the table when people are discussing the future of Northern Ireland. And it is a process by which those discussions will lead to some resolution that will answer your question. I do not think any of us here are going to have the answer. It is clear that right now there is a problem in all three areas.
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If I can just add one anecdotal reference. I know Michael Finucane is going to speak later. But when we went to look several years ago at the so-called investigation into the murder of Patrick Finucane it was quite startling to me. We went to the police, and they said there is an ongoing investigation, but we cannot talk about it. There were reports of army collusion. We went to talk to people who knew something about that, and they said, well, we cannot talk about it. There is somebody doing an inquiry about that. We went to talk to journalists and they said, well, you know, we know some things but we cannot say them because we may get in trouble with the authorities if we write about it.
There was a sense that the system was not working in holding violators accountable. It is clear that a violation occurred, and yet there has never been a serious investigation. That cycle of impunity has to be broken, and I think that is where I would start, at least in a few key cases, I would say let us make sure that somebody knows that the law is the law, and that it applies to officials as well as others.
Ms. HALL. I would also like to add just a short story about what happens when the police actually do their job and maintain the rule of law in conformity with international standards. One of the rare instances last summer where the police actually upheld the rule of law was in a small community, a Catholic community almost 100 percent, which gave Human Rights Watch testimony that they had confidence in the police that particular day with that particular incident.
So I think what Martin O'Brien says is really true; that when specific standards are maintained and the police pay careful attention to their obligations under the law, communities will take note.
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This question of reform or disbandment dichotomizes in a way that leaves out the possibility that with a lot of work toward maintaining international standards, training in such standards and non-discriminatory composition the police force can do its job. What you may call a disbandment I may call a transformation. The ultimate goal is to get communities to take note, like this community did in the north. They said to us, ''The police have never done anything for us before this day,'' but on that particular day the police did their job, they followed the law, and the community noticed.
Mr. KING. We are talking about anecdotal stories. I just asked Mr. O'Brien today on the issue of community confidence. If a home in Ballymurphy was burglarized, would the owner of the home call the RUC or the IRA?
Mr. O'BRIEN. I think it is extremely unlikely that they would call the police. If they were to, it might be simply for the purposes of making sure that they were able to claim insurance, for example. But generally speaking, I mean, the current situation is that in particular parts of Northern Ireland there is virtually no confidence in the police force to do its job, and that has led, as Julia Hall referred to, to some quite appalling examples of informal community policing. If you have a vacuum in terms of policing, one of the things which can happen is that quite appalling mechanisms are used to fill that vacuum. So all of these issues are inextricably linked, and in some areas normal policing for all intents and purposes disappeared.
Mr. KING. Mr. Chairman, if I could ask Mr. O'Brien one further question.
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One thing you touched on in your testimony that really struck me the most was the fact that during the cease-fire you are saying that the conditions of prisoners in Britain actually deteriorated.
Mr. O'BRIEN. Yes.
Mr. KING. Can you give any rationale for that because that was a time when confidence-building measures were being looked for? I mean, it would seem to me during the cease-fire—let me just back up for a second. All of you said, I think, that it is easier to have human rights respected in times of peace. Now, here you had a 17-month cease-fire, and yet during that time the British used the opportunity to treat prisoners even more badly than they had before.
Mr. O'BRIEN. Yes.
Mr. KING. Is there any political or any rationale you can give for why the British carried out that conduct during those 17 months?
Mr. O'BRIEN. That is a question which maybe should be directed at the British Government. More generally, I think, there was a tendency on the part of the government to treat human rights as bargaining chips. They were things to be given out as rewards for good behavior rather than as absolute rights. And the issue of prisoners was, I think, very much treated in the manner of something which gets traded on, rather than by complying with the internationally agreed standards.
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We think that that is particularly unfortunate, and that the lack of movement in relation to human rights issues and the examples where further abuses continued contributed to the deterioration in the peace process. We think that that is a very important lesson to learn for anyone attempting to rebuild a peace process, that you cannot keep testing the peace, you have to build the peace. Building the peace means making sure that human rights issues are addressed. Not least among that is the importance of addressing the situation of prisoners. The testimony which Maryam Elahi gave from Amnesty went to some of those concrete points about the deterioration in the situation of prisoners.
Mr. KING. And this really is my final question. Do any of you at the table, anyone on the panel, assuming the government wanted to do it, do you think the jury trials could be restored in the north of Ireland?
Mr. POSNER. Why not?
Mr. KING. Well, over the years——
Mr. POSNER. I mean, the argument has been for a long time that it would be dangerous for people to serve on the jury.
Mr. KING. Right.
Mr. POSNER. They would be intimidated and so forth. There is some truth to that. But it is also true that we face lots of cases in this society where people are involved in very politically sensitive cases, and we find a way to address concerns about the safety of jurors. And in the United Kingdom, which has a fine legal tradition, they also find a way. They have lots of sensitive cases where juries sit.
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It seemed to me in the context of a lot of other things that have to be done in terms of dismantling the emergency, that this would be an important signal that there is confidence that the system can be just and fair. I think it would send a very important positive signal.
Mr. KING. Mr. O'Brien.
Ms. ELAHI. If I can just follow up on that.
Mr. KING. I am sorry.
Ms. ELAHI. Not only is it important to look at the issue of reestablishing jury trials, but to change some of the key elements of the Diplock Court, such as the admissibility and the right-to-silence issue and equal access of defense. So those need to be emphasized in terms of changing the structure of the Diplock Courts and moving toward a fair trial standard.
Mr. KING. Well, the reason I asked about the jury trials is that the British officials have said for years that they could not impanel juries because they would be intimidated by members of the community. And for someone who is on the ground, how would you feel about that?
Mr. O'BRIEN. I think it is quite interesting because when one looks back to the time when jury trial was abolished, there was no statistical evidence to establish the fact of intimidation of jurors and the perverse verdicts. In a sense, jury trial was abandoned in a very cavalier fashion in Northern Ireland, and the case that intimidation exists has never been effectively made.
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Undoubtedly people would, I think, have fears in participating in jury trials, but one of the negative consequences of the abolition of jury trials is that you have a legal system which the public really is not involved in. If you want to build a society with a fair legal system and one in which people have confidence, then they need to feel that they have some kind of involvement in that.
Clearly, if jury trials were to be restored, and it is our position that they should be, particular measures would need to be taken in order to try to ensure the safety of jurors and representativeness in juries. One of the other reasons given for abolition was that jurors would enter perverse verdicts because they would look at the particular background of the person who is on trial, and then make their decision on that basis rather than on the merits. So those are all issues that would have to be looked at, but it has been our consistent position and remains our position that jury trials should be restored.
Mr. KING. Thank you very much.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. SMITH. Thank you very much, Mr. King.
Mr. Payne.
Mr. PAYNE. Thank you very much. I apologize for missing practically all of the testimony. I was really looking forward to it, but several conflicts that were unavoidable came up, and so it is difficult to question the witnesses by virtue of not having heard the testimony.
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I do have a question though, and I am not sure whether it has been asked, about the RUC in general. And as you know, the argument goes that Catholics do not join because they feel reprisals from the community. You know, the other side, of course, indicates that it is clear that Catholics are not really welcomed.
I just would like to ask a question, and it may have been asked before, but do you think that the RUC can be reformed or transformed, or do you think that there would just have to be a totally new police unit?
One of the difficulties with a lack of an adequate police system is that people take law into their own hands, say, for basic crimes that normally a police department would investigate if their main function is other than dealing with just crime in the community, then people tend to take the whole question of enforcing law by virtue of vigilante types.
And so I guess my question is basically, one, do you think the RUC can be reformed? Two, do you think it would just have to be abolished and a new kind of a police department come in because in the absence really of a police too then you find that the military are the police, and military men and women are the worst police. In many countries, in Third World countries, currently even in the Congo, there is no police and the military are the police. Demonstrations by the new leadership there have been banned by virtue of the fact that military people inherently cannot police. They are a fighting force, and they should not be used for police duties.
So I just wonder about this whole question of RUC, whether it is possible to reform it or whether it would just have to have a whole clean sweep to begin again.
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Mr. POSNER. We did discuss this a bit a moment ago. But to just put it in a different way, I think it is premature and it is probably not for us to answer the question you put to us. It is, it seems to me, part of a larger negotiation process by the political parties to figure out this structure or the transformation of the police.
What we are all clear about is that there is a serious problem there, and it is a structural problem. There are laws on the book which make it too easy for the police, for example, to have an opportunity to coerce confessions. That is a structural problem. It is part of the emergency legislation that has to be addressed.
There is a problem of the composition of the police. You are right in saying, and I think it is probably both things, that there is a lack of confidence in large parts of the community, particularly the Catholic community, in the police. Therefore it is hard to recruit people from those areas. And people who do join the police probably do feel threats. These problems have to be addressed as part of a comprehensive package.
And the third element is that there is a lack of accountability, and that is also a contributing factor to the problem. When the police abuse civilians there is no effective mechanism to make sure that they are disciplined or weeded out of the force.
I think you have to address this whole package. Each of these issues ought to be part of the negotiating process and a transformation will occur over time. Whether the police are organized in a new force or reformed force is, I think, a question for another day.
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Mr. LIVINGSTONE. Yes, I think one of the things that has to be said is that it is really getting this issue clearly established and getting the government to accept the need to review policing going on. There has not really been a review undertaken by the government of policing in Northern Ireland since 1972, despite the continuing problems with policing. And I think it is going to take that review to establish what principles are relevant to a police force, and then the outcome of that might be a new police force; it might be a reformed police force. But I think it is getting that process started is where we are at the moment. And rather than taking one position or the other at this stage, which I think forecloses the debate that needs to be undertaken, I think it is the development of that debate which I think is very important.
Ms. HALL. I would also like to add that this is not a phenomenon that is just related to the Nationalist community. I have noticed almost a presumption that it does just impact the Catholic Nationalist community. Much of the testimony in our recent report deals with working-class Unionist communities who likewise fail to have confidence in the RUC. When they call the police they do not come. If the police do come, the first thing they embark on is an effort to get either the perpetrator or the complainant to inform on potential terrorist suspects.
Mike Posner's suggestion that this become part of the debate is something that has great potential because it is not just one political party that actually sees it as a problem in their community.
We spoke with a number of the Unionist parties who also very clearly failed to have confidence in the police force. There is great potential at this particular point for this to become a subject of debate at the table.
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Mr. PAYNE. Just on the whole question of marches with the marching season coming, of course we remember what happened at Drum Creek last year, and I was in Derry the week before. The march is when the debate was taking place and the discussion about whether the march along the wall should occur. As you know, I am not sure it was just the apprentices, but when the marches come through in Derry they, as you know in some instances throw pennies down to the side of the wall, once again showing this tremendous amount of arrogance and sort of reliving history.
And I wonder if anyone has any thoughts on this marching season since it is the 25th anniversary of Bloody Sunday. Do you think that perhaps an inquiry to begin before the marching season begins would be a way of bringing out discussions and seeing that we are even talking about apologies in this country? I am not sure whether we are looking for apologies. You know, that is a debate that has come up for different past actions.
Does anyone have any thoughts on the question of the marches in this season being an anniversary, which would tend to heighten tension?
Mr. O'BRIEN. This is something which is of particular concern. In fact, some of the marches have already begun, and within a matter of weeks this will be upon us. I think the particular issue which we feel people can focus on and where something can be done to minimize the potential for conflict is to focus on the way in which the police police these kinds of confrontations. There is, it seems to us, a clear conflict of rights in this situation, and what is particularly important is that there is some kind of fair adjudication of that conflict of rights. Last summer we saw an appalling breakdown in the rule of law where the police effectively gave way to mob rule, leaving people feeling completely vulnerable. An internal police inquiry has itself been highly critical of the way in which the police policed last summer. It seems to us very important that there not be a repetition of the things we saw last summer, whereby peaceful protestors on the Garvarghy Road had plastic bullets fired at them, were physically assaulted and were verbally abused. Steps must be taken to ensure that there is no repetition of that kind of problem. It is very important to make sure that the massive use of plastic bullets, which we saw last summer, is not repeated this summer. The police in these situations have the potential either to aggravate or to bring some calm to the situation. Unfortunately, to date and very often their response has been to aggravate rather than to calm what is potentially a very explosive situation.
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Mr. PAYNE. Just a last comment. You know, I do not know if you saw the news today that I think one of the British royalty saw a movie and there is a tremendous amount of discussion going on in England about the boys being taken to see the movie.
Anybody have any comment? Have you heard this new conversation that started yesterday?
Mr. KING. The movie was ''The Devil's Own,'' and apparently Princess Di took her two kids to see it, and there is an uproar.
Mr. PAYNE. OK. Well, then, I just thought I would mention that. It certainly is going to be a matter of debate in the next few days there. It started yesterday, so you will probably hear more about it.
But thank you. I will yield back the balance of my time.
Mr. SMITH. Thank you, Mr. Payne.
Just let me note for the record—and if you would like to say something, please do—that Rick Lazio and John McHugh, both distinguished members from New York, have joined our panel.
Mr. MCHUGH. Mr. Chairman, if I might, as a member of the Full Committee, not a member of this subcommittee, I want to thank you for the opportunity to sit here and to hear these very distinguished panelists, and let me thank them for their very important work that they do. And I also want to thank you, Mr. Chairman, and the members of the Subcommittee for taking up this very important cause. The issue of human rights in Northern Ireland is a longstanding topic of concern for many members of this House. I think it is especially of concern to several of us who have been trying to work with you and other members who will be here today in trying to find a positive role for this House, for this Congress and for this country.
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I also want to commend you before the second panel beings on the obvious quality of the panelists. There is a gentleman who will be appearing before you who, among his many distinctions, lives in the 24th congressional district, which I have the privilege of representing. I am certainly looking forward to Mr. Wallace's testimony.
So I thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. SMITH. Thank you, John.
Let me ask you this on behalf of Chairman Gilman. He wonders if each of you could indicate with a yes or no whether or not you support the McBride principles.
Mr. O'Brien.
Mr. O'BRIEN. We have been particularly active in the whole field of religious discrimination. This is a very timely issue because the Standing Advisory Commission on Human Rights is later this week to publish a report on religious discrimination in Northern Ireland. We very much hope that that will lead to concrete improvements in the legislation. It is clear that the McBride campaign here in the United States has played a very important role in moving forward legislative provision in Northern Ireland. Religious discrimination remains a very serious problem, and it is important that people in the United States continue to focus on these kinds of issues.
Mr. POSNER. We also take a strong position in support of efforts to address religious discrimination. We have not taken a position on the McBride principles.
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Ms. HALL. Human Rights Watch endorses the McBride principles.
Mr. LIVINGSTONE. I think the McBride principle is a helpful contribution to the debate on firm employment action, and the review that will be published shortly is a very important one, and I think will lead the way for improvements in legislation on fair employment, which remains such a central question in Northern Ireland.
Ms. ELAHI. I do not have a position on it.
Mr. SMITH. I want to thank our very, very distinguished panelists for their expert testimony. There are many, many recommendations——
Mr. LAZIO. Mr. Chairman.
Mr. SMITH. Yes.
Mr. LAZIO. I wonder if I would just be permitted to ask a question. Thank you very much. I appreciate the courtesy and apologize for not getting here earlier. I was chairing my own hearing.
But I want to make just a brief comment if I could and ask one question. The comment simply has to do with, given my background in the law as a prosecutor, and Mr. King's background in the law as a prosecutor, I would suggest that both of us, if I could speak for him for a moment, are very highly offended by the pretrial detentions and the erosion in the confidence in the rule of law in the area. And that is compounded by the punishment beatings. Until those issues are forthrightly addressed, I cannot see how we can begin a good faith discussion of restoring a sense of justice into the area, and I do not know what we can do, but it seems as though we need to provide more leadership from here in order to put pressure to ensure that both things are changed.
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And if I can just ask one question, and that has to do with punishment beatings. Do you believe that because it happens ordinarily, evidently in the same community of the people, the paramilitary organizations that organize these horrific acts, have the paramilitary groups become so accustomed to this type of horrific activity and retribution that they cannot be brought on board with the peace process; that they are so accustomed now to a culture of violence that you cannot see that reconciliation process bringing them into a more democratic, humanitarian process?
Mr. POSNER. I think in any conflict where there is despair and there is a sense that the political process has broken down and where the rule of law has broken down, there are people on the extremes on all sides who are going to essentially take any action to achieve their ends.
The task for us, for those of us at this table, for those of you sitting up there, is to break that cycle of violence. And what we have talked about here, very usefully this morning is how we can advance a law-based agenda, a human rights agenda into a peace process which is now very much underway. Chairman Smith and all of you who are interested, and there is obviously a great deal of interest here, ought to be joining forces, to go see, and send a ''Dear Colleague'' letter to Senator Mitchell. You should say that this is the moment where these sorts of issues—pretrial detention, access to counsel, basic human rights protections—ought to be more on the agenda than they are in the peace process. This is the central message that I hope you take from this hearing because there are a range of issues that are not being discussed which are essential to going forward in a larger peace process.
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Once you succeed in that I think it isolates the extremes and it makes it possible to go forward.
Mr. LAZIO. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. SMITH. Thank you, Mr. Lazio.
I want to thank this very fine panel for their expert testimony. We look forward to working with you in the near future.
I would like to welcome our second panel, and ask our panelists to come to the witness table. And just as a matter of administration, I will probably have to leave for about 15 minutes, and Mr. King has agreed to take the Chair. The House, as you may know, is debating Most Favored Nation status for the People's Republic of China, an issue that I have been very active in, and I am the next to the last speaker before we go to a vote. So I will be called when my time comes up, and will be out of the room for that period of time. But thank you, Congressman King, for agreeing to do that.
Mr. KING. Sure. Mr. Chairman, at this stage could I ask unanimous consent to submit a statement for the record from Father Bryan Lennon on the firing of plastic bullets last year in Portadown?
Mr. SMITH. Without objection, so ordered.
[The prepared statement of Father Bryan Lennon appears in the appendix.]
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Mr. SMITH. I want to welcome our second panel beginning with Michael Finucane, who is the eldest son of Patrick Finucane, a Belfast solicitor who was murdered in front of his family, as we know, in 1989. In his work for the Pat Finucane Center, Michael has actively sought justice and a full disclosure of the facts behind that crime.
The second witness will be James Kelly, who is the father of Sean Kelly, who was convicted and sentenced to life imprisonment for his alleged involvement in the killing of two British army soldiers in West Belfast in 1988, even though there was evidence that he was not at the scene of the fatal shooting.
Brenda Downes, whose husband, John, was killed by a plastic bullet in 1994, obtained an Honor's Degree from Queens University in 1993. In addition to her work with the United Campaign Against Plastic Bullets, Mrs. Downes is a women's development worker in the Beachmount area of Northern Ireland.
Edward J. Wallace is the national president of the Ancient Order of Hibernians in America. In addition to his 42 years of service with the Hibernians, Mr. Wallace has been active in the Knights of Columbus and is a member of the Pastoral Council of the St. Mary's Church in Clayton, New York, and we also know he is John McHugh's constituent.
And, finally, Mary Paglione is the national president of the Ladies' Ancient Order of Hibernians in America. Mrs. Paglione has also served as the national treasurer and secretary and vice-president during her 49 years of service to that organization.
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And I would have to point out, John, that she is my constituent and very much welcome to the Subcommittee this morning.
Michael, we will begin your testimony at this point.
STATEMENT OF MICHAEL FINUCANE, PAT FINUCANE CENTER, SON OF PAT FINUCANE (DECEASED)
Mr. FINUCANE. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, I would like to preface my remarks this afternoon by extending on behalf of myself and my family very sincere gratitude for the invitation to testify here today. And I would also like to say that my remarks this afternoon will be a summary of a more lengthy document which I submitted to Congress sometime last week.
Mr. Chairman, members of the Subcommittee, my fellow speakers, ladies and gentlemen, my name is Michael Finucane. I am 25. I am the eldest son of Patrick Finucane, who was brutally murdered by a pro-British Loyalist death squad on the 12th of February, 1989. My father, who was a human rights lawyer practicing in Belfast, was shot to death in front of me; my younger sister, Katherine, who was 12; and my younger brother, John, who was 8; my mother, Geraldine, was also shot.
We were all sitting down to our Sunday evening meal when the assassins kicked in our front door and shot my father 14 times in front of all of us. The Loyalist gunman said nothing and fled immediately afterwards, leaving my father lying dead and bleeding on our kitchen floor. The Loyalist gunman who murdered my father issued a statement saying that he was a member of the IRA. They had to say that. Their statement was a coverup. It was a lie.
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My father was not a member of the IRA. He was not a political activist, nor was he a member of any political party. He was a solicitor who vigorously represented his clients within the law. He sought the protection of British justice for his clients. He represented anyone who needed his expertise from both sides of the community.
Shortly after my father's murder my mother said that such was his dedication and professionalism, he would have defended the very people who murdered him.
From an early age I was aware that my father was doing important work for both prisoners and people who were under arrest or injured as a result of the conflict in Ireland. He represented the families of those killed by the RUC and the British army, exposing the injustices of the British political and judicial system.
It was only after his murder that I gradually learned about the circumstances surrounding his death. His successful pioneering work in the area of civil rights was the true reason for his murder. The large number of people who came to our house and to my father's funeral was a testament to the work that he did. There were many people from outside Ireland who attended. Many of his friends from the United States attended. Lawyers who studied the Northern Ireland legal system and who had concerns about its repressive nature were there. Lawyers from South Africa who were familiar with civil rights abuses and State-sponsored political assassinations were there. They all talked about his work and were devastated by his death. It was a very difficult period for my family.
The suspicious and controversial circumstances surrounding my father's murder have already been investigated by many international human rights groups. The National Council for Civil Liberties carried out an investigation shortly after his murder in 1989. Helsinki Watch investigated his murder in 1991. The Lawyers Committee for Human Rights investigated his murder in 1992. All of these distinguished organizations called for a full independent judicial inquiry into my father's murder. They are joined in this call by Mr. Louis Joinet, former United Nations special rapporteur on the Independence of Judges and Lawyers; Dr. Claire Palley, the British expert nominee to the United Nations on the Protection of Minorities; Peter Burns, the rapporteur in the United Kingdom for the Committee Against Torture; the Northern Ireland Standing Advisory Commission on Human Rights, Viscount Colville of Culross QC; Amnesty International; the International Commission of Jurists; Fédération Internationale des Droits de l'Homme; Committee on the Administration of Justice; Liberty; British-Irish Rights Watch; the Haldane Society; the Law Society of England and Wales; and the Association of the Bar of the city of New York.
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The American State Department in its recent report to the Senate on human rights in the United Kingdom has also raised my father's murder for the second consecutive year.
My family and I are very concerned that the evidence available to us indicates a conspiracy at the very highest level of the British Government. Shortly before my father's murder, he was subjected to death threats from the Royal Ulster Constabulary, the political police force, which is 95 percent Unionist. It has been accused by many international observers of colluding with Loyalist death squads by providing information and support. The death threats against my father were recorded in his own handwriting when he took details from his clients who were held for interrogation in Castlereagh Interrogation Center. The Lawyers Committee for Human Rights were given these handwritten notes.
In January 1988, a complaint was recorded by Amnesty International that a man who was severely beaten in Castlereagh was told that Patrick Finucane should be shot dead by Loyalists. In the months that directly preceded his murder the death threats became more frequent. Three weeks before my father's murder, on the 17th of January, 1989, Douglas Hogg, the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for the Home office, as he then was, said in the British Parliament under privilege, and I quote, ''I have to state as a fact but with great regret that there are in Northern Ireland a number of solicitors who are unduly sympathetic to the cause of the IRA.'' He gave no reason or justification for his statement, but simply said, and again I quote, ''I state it on the basis of advice that I have received, guidance that I have been given by people who are dealing with these matters, and I shall not expand on it further.''
John Hume's Deputy, Seamus Mallon, who was in the British Parliament that day immediately realized the implications of such a statement. His warning to Hogg that he had placed solicitors' lives in danger was proved grimly prophetic.
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On the day after my father's murder many influential people called for Hogg's resignation. They could see a clear connection between my father's murder and Hogg's statement. Hogg refused to resign and was subsequently promoted. He became and remains the British Government Minister for Agriculture.
My father was murdered with a gun that was supplied by the British army, as discussed in the report of the Lawyers Committee for Human Rights. My father's murder was planned and executed by a British army agent, Brian Nelson, also in the report of the Lawyers Committee.
After my father's murder I worked in his law practice and I saw statements and talked to people who had been interrogated by the RUC in Castlereagh. I found out that members of the RUC gloated about my father's murder. They said things like, and I quote, ''Ah no, it's Madden and Finucane, minus Finucane. Finucane was a bastard and it was a good job well done and he deserved it.''
When another detainee asked for the firm, he was told, ''Sure, that cunt is dead. I will go and dig him up.'' To another, ''Who is your solicitor? Finucane? We'll arrange for you to meet him.'' And many other comments in language more offensive and derogatory were detailed in that 1991 Helsinki Watch Report, Human Rights in Northern Ireland.
I accuse the British Government of ordering and arranging the murder of my father. There is an obvious connection between the RUC death threats, Hogg's statement, the role of Brian Nelson, the origins of the murder weapon, my father's assassination, and the powerful motivation of the British Government to silence the embarrassing revelations of my father's successful human rights work. I am not the only one making this accusation.
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On behalf of my family, I would ask for the support of this committee in calling for the establishment of an independent international public inquiry acting with full judicial powers to investigate the murder of my father and the continuing intimidation of defense lawyers. My father's murder will never be forgotten. Those who ordered his murder should not rest easy.
In South Africa today the Truth and Reconciliation Commission hearings show that the truth cannot be hidden forever. Those in high places are just as accountable as other citizens for the wrongs that they do.
In order for my country to achieve peace and reconciliation the truth must prevail. Without it there will never be justice, and without justice there will never be peace.
I am not seeking revenge. I only seek the truth. The memory of my father and the courage he displayed in doing the work he did deserves nothing less. In order that my family and I can fully reclaim our shattered lives, we ask that the British Government conspiracy behind the murder of Patrick Finucane be investigated and exposed.
I would like to thank this honorable committee for its time.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Finucane appears in the appendix.]
Mr. SMITH. Mr. Finucane, thank you for that very moving testimony, and I can assure you that this subcommittee—and I believe we will have widespread support on both sides of the aisle throughout the Congress—will join you in asking for that international scrutiny, such as a commission to look into all the facts concerning your dad's murder. So thank you for that recommendation. We will follow up on that, I assure you.
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Mr. FINUCANE. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. SMITH. Mr. Kelly.
STATEMENT OF JAMES KELLY, FATHER OF SEAN KELLY
Mr. KELLY. Chairman Smith and members of the Committee. Could I begin by thanking the Committee for their kind invite and for taking the time to hear our plea? My wife, Bridge, and myself are here today as part of our continuing fight for justice for our son, Sean, and his co-accused, Michael Timmons. I am happy to inform the Committee that I had to change my original submission for on Friday, June the 22nd, the Criminal Court of Appeal overturned the conviction of Pat Kane, another co-accused.
Sean and Michael are still serving life in prison for their alleged involvement in the tragic death of the two British army soldiers. The incident happened in March 1988 when two soldiers armed but dressed as civilians drove their car into the funeral cortege of Kevin Brady. Mourners believed the funeral was coming under attack and reacted. The car was attacked, the occupants were overpowered and during that struggle a shot was fired. The soldiers were taken into Casement Park. After a few minutes the soldiers were taken away and they were shot dead by the IRA.
Representatives of the ward's media attended the funeral of Kevin Brady. Pictures of the frenzied attack on the soldiers' car were flashed all over television screens. To understand why the mourners reacted so forcefully, a series of related events must be taken in account. March 1988 was a particularly traumatic period for the people of West Belfast. Previously, a Loyalist had launched a grenade and gun attack on mourners who themselves attended a funeral of the Republicans from West Belfast. The three had died in controversial circumstances at the hands of undercover soldiers.
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The Loyalists' attack on the mourners in Miltown Cemetery resulted in another 3 dead and 68 injured. Kevin Brady was one of the dead and it was into his funeral the soldiers drove their car.
In view of the way Kevin met his death, it is little wonder the mourners reacted the way they did. We see the background and buildup of tension prior to the 19th of March is important. Yet, in the written judgment, the trial judge allotted just three links to the background. Sean and Michael were arrested almost 1 year after the event. They were charged and released on bail, and the trial took place almost 3 years after the incident.
Charged with aiding and abetting and procuring others in the murder, the men protested their innocence. After a 4-week trial the judge conceded the men could not be guilty of aiding and abetting the murder because they were not present at the scene of the shooting. After failing to prove any of the four elements of their charge, the judge found the three guilty by applying the principle of common purpose.
Sean and Michael are not guilty of murder. Neither of them attended the scene of the actual shooting; their alleged involvement ended at Casement Park. The two soldiers were taken from the park and driven to Penny Lane. There a struggle took place, ending with both soldiers shot dead. When the shots were fired, Sean was with me. I repeat, Sean was with me half a mile away from Penny Lane, and Michael Timmons was with the funeral procession to the Miltown Cemetery.
In another trial connected with this verdict, a different trial judge found a different defendant did not have the proper ground for murder. Yet that defendant was at the scene of Penny Lane fighting with one of the soldiers when the soldier was shot dead.
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Neither Sean nor Michael knew the final attackers were gunmen. They did not know the soldiers would be killed, they did not agree with the death of the soldiers. Neither they nor we can understand how they can be held responsible for the actions of men they did not know, for actions not approved of, and carried out at a scene they had no knowledge of and did not attend.
We believe the principle of common purpose should not apply in this case for both the essential ingredients needed as proof are missing. One, there was no premeditation; and, two, there was no meeting of minds.
Sean was walking past the funeral when the soldier's car went on the pavement beside him. Neither Sean nor Michael could have known what was going to happen. None of the men charged knew each other prior to arrest. All attended Kevin Brady's funeral for different reasons, and they came to the scene from different directions.
It is accepted by everyone none were members of any Parliament or political group, legal or illegal, they were caught up in an unforeseen and unexpected incident. Neither of them left home with any preplanned notion or criminal intent on their mind. We believe the net of common purpose was cast so wide the prosecution did not have to prove guilt. The prosecution simply had to suggest the death of the two soldiers at the hands of the IRA may or must have been one of a thought which passed through the defendants' minds.
It seems that Sean and Michael are serving a life's sentence for a thought they may or may not have had, by the actions of men they didn't know and over whom they had no control. This conviction should not be allowed to stand. The injustice must be addressed and we appeal for help to achieve that end.
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Thank you.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Kelly appears in the appendix.]
Mr. SMITH. Thank you very much, Mr. Kelly, and I can assure you that we will do everything we can to see that justice is served. That is why we wanted you here to make this appeal. I am a father of four and I can just imagine how I would feel if one of my sons or daughters were accused of doing something that they did not take part in. So I want to thank you for your testimony.
Mr. KELLY. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. SMITH. Mrs. Brenda Downes.
STATEMENT OF BRENDA DOWNES, CAMPAIGN TO BAN PLASTIC BULLETS, WIDOW OF JOHN DOWNES
Mrs. DOWNES. Mr. Chairman and members of the Subcommittee, I thank you for this opportunity to testify on the use of plastic bullets. I have traveled here today with Bronagh Groves, the daughter of Emma Groves, who was blinded in 1971 with rubber bullets. I am here representing the United Campaign Against Plastic Bullets. I will give a small summary of our written testimony that has been submitted for records.
I want to start off this delivery by thanking the people gathered here today who have shown an interest in these plastic bullets, not only in Ireland, but throughout the world.
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My name is Brenda Downes. When I was 21, my husband, John Downes, was shot dead by a plastic bullet in Belfast. This happened when Martin Galvin was attending a rally in commemoration of the introduction of internment. Internment was a device used by the British Government to detain people whom they suspected of being members of illegal organizations without trial or jury. It was an event which was commemorated by the Viseles community in the north of Ireland because they were the community which suffered most from the introduction of internment. They were protesting against what they saw as indiscriminate use of power to detain people without trial or jury.
My husband, John, was 22 years of age when he was shot dead by an RUC man. He was a young man. He had so much to live for, but his life was cut short by the indiscriminate use of plastic bullets by the RUC. When people talk about plastic bullets, they have a vision of a bullet which does not kill or maim. The fact of the matter, however, is that 17 people have been shot dead by plastic bullets. Seven of those victims have been young children, as young as 10 years of age.
When I speak here today, however, I speak in the capacity of a person who is totally committed to the banning of plastic bullets throughout the world. They are a lethal weapon, and the terminology of plastic bullets would suggest a weapon which does not maim or kill. The fact of the matter, however, is that they do kill and maim. I was 21 when my husband, John, was shot dead. We were a newly married couple. We had a daughter called Claire, and we both had so much to live for.
The unfortunate reality, however, is that the future which we could have had was cut short when my husband was shot dead by a plastic bullet.
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When John was shot dead, however, I was left in a situation where I had to care for my daughter, Claire, and initially did not cope with the situation. I was prescribed tranquilizers by a doctor, and remained on those for a number of months. I could not cope with life. But I realized then, as I do now——
[Pause.]
Mrs. DOWNES. Sorry.
[Pause.]
Mr. SMITH. There is no hurry, so please take your time.
Mrs. DOWNES. May I just take a moment?
Mr. SMITH. Sure. Absolutely.
Let me just note for the record that Congress has not had hearings on the human rights situation for Northern Ireland before, as far as I know. The House has not done so before. But I was approached by friends from the Hibernian Civil Rights Coalition, Joe Barrett, Ms. Lynch, Ed Ahern, and from the Ancient Order of Hibernians, Joe Roach and Mary Paglione. They suggested a hearing and brought me volumes of information on how bad the situation is, and suggested that perhaps we were at a moment of change. At that time, they were talking about the upcoming elections and whether it would be appropriate and timely to do one immediately after the election, especially if a new government were to be elected.
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So I want to thank them for their concern about the human rights situation there. As all of the speakers have said, the key is human rights. If we are going to have confidence going forward, respect for the individual seems to be paramount, and we will ratchet up the pressure now. I can assure you that we will not let go, and I speak, I know, for members of our subcommittee. Friends do not let friends commit egregious human rights abuses. If we are such great allies with the British Government, then we need to speak loud and clear about the need for reform in the north of Ireland. The time has come. No more delays. This is a ripe opportunity. Hearing these very compelling stories of grieving family members puts a burden on each of us that is not easily relieved to try to help them secure justice, reconciliation, and hopefully peace and democracy in the north of Ireland.
Brenda, if you would like to continue.
Mrs. DOWNES. I joined the campaign for the ban of plastic bullets and for a number of years I have campaigned throughout the world in order to generate enough pressure to have these bullets banned. I do not come to the hearing looking for sympathy. I come to this hearing hoping that enough pressure is put on the British Government to ensure that plastic bullets are banned.
I think of my own situation, and the effect which these plastic bullets has had on my own life and that of my daughter, Claire. I also think of Julie Livingstone, Carol Ann Kelly, and I ask myself why. They were children. They offered no threat to anyone, but their lives were cut tragically short by a plastic bullet. I also think of Emma Groves who has been an inspiration to me and she was blinded in her own home by a rubber bullet.
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The use of plastic bullets is wrong, and I am of the opinion that this hearing should follow the example of the European Parliament and most European countries and demand that plastic bullets be banned. The campaign for the banning of plastic bullets is an apolitical organization. We stand for the right to life, and our campaign is geared toward ensuring that there are no more deaths or fatalities because of the use of this plastic bullet.
I realize that when I speak here today I do so in the capacity of a person who has witnessed first-hand the impact which a bullet can have on peoples' lives. Recently, a report has been published highlighting the fact that the RUC, British army, were using plastic bullets which were more lethal than what the British Government was prepared to admit.
Last summer more than 6,000 plastic bullets were fired in 1 week, the normal average for a year is 1,000. We need your help to ensure that these plastic bullets are not used this coming summer during the marching season. One and one-half million pounds, equal to three million dollars, has been paid in compensation to families and individuals who have been maimed or killed by the plastic bullets. Is this a situation that any democratic party or government can allow to continue?
I am of the opinion that if you believe in democracy, then you believe in the right to life. If you believe in the right to life, then you will demand that plastic bullets are banned not only in Ireland, but throughout the world.
Again, I would like to thank you all here for hearing this testimony. As has been the case in the north of Ireland, we have never been given justice. No prosecutions have ever taken place. No accountability. The police are a law unto themselves. They kill, maim children, men, women with this indiscriminate use of plastic bullets.
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Again, I would just like to take this opportunity to thank you.
[The prepared statement of Mrs. Downes appears in the appendix.]
Mr. SMITH. Thank you, Mrs. Downes.
Mr. King.
Mr. KING. Mr. Chairman, could Mrs. Groves' daughter identify herself? Thank you.
Mr. SMITH. Thank you, Mr. King.
Again, Mrs. Downes, thank you for your testimony, and we will do what we can, and I do agree with you.
Mr. Wallace.
STATEMENT OF ED WALLACE, NATIONAL PRESIDENT, ANCIENT ORDER OF HIBERNIANS
Mr. WALLACE. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I welcome all the Members of Congress. I welcome my Congressman, John McHugh, and bring greetings from northern New York, commonly known as God's country.
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For the record, the Ancient Order of Hibernians traces its roots back to the 1500s in Ireland when Irish people found it necessary to ban together to defend their faith and their fatherland. With the great wave of immigration in the early 1800s, it was found necessary to establish the Ancient Order of Hibernians in the United States, which was done in 1836. Again, to help the immigrants defend themselves against discrimination, their faith and their ancestry. We continue today on a daily basis to support human rights for our people here and in Ireland.
So, thank you, Chairman Smith, not only for the opportunity to share the views of our membership with you, but your leadership and that of the members of your committee in taking up this critical task.
In our view, America has a unique contribution to make to the resolution of the conflict and to the protection of human and civil rights for all in Ireland. The political landscape in England and Ireland has changed dramatically in recent weeks, and the United States is presented with a window of opportunity to express its concern and demonstrate its resolve in promoting the justice upon which peace can endure.
First, I must emphasize that Hibernians seek the use of nonviolent means to restore the unity to Ireland lost when Britain chose to unilaterally and undemocratically partition Ireland with a lot in 1919, for which not one Irish vote was cast.
The violence used by the British and their Loyalist allies fails to receive the attention acts of Nationalist paramilitaries are given. It would no doubt surprise you that nearly 900 innocent civilians, amongst one-third of the total casualties, have lost their lives to those who claim to be for law and order, democracy, and who have foresworn violence. The index of deaths, 1969 to 1994, by Malcolm Sutton, portrays the conflict quite a bit different from the one often seen in the U.S. media.
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The AOH abhors the use of violence. The AOH condemns the use of violence on both sides. Violence is a dead end, and only unconditioned dialog in the cause that brings us here today, the protection of human rights, will bring peace to Ireland.
First, a core problem which was created by the British to sustain the statelet is anti-Catholic discrimination. Most particularly, in employment. In the McBride Fair Employment Principles, named after the famed Irish nobel peace prize honoree, Dr. Sean MacBride, Americans have a way to ensure that their economic clout, whether by investment or purchase power, promotes fair employment in the north. The principles were supported in the 1996 platforms of both the Democratic and Republican parties.
Republicans supported private investment in the North, fully consistent with the MacBride Principles for Fair Employment in order to address the systematic discriminatory practices that still exist against Catholics in the work place. I applaud your followup, Mr. Chairman, to that commitment by inclusion of the Principles in the bill recently reported from Chairman Gilman's International Relations Committee, and which links the Principles to recipients of money from the International Fund for Ireland.
Second, I draw your attention to a resolution adopted by larger Irish-American organizations this past March 15, 1997. The use of plastic bullets in the North, although introduced as an alternative to regular bullets, has had deadly consequences. The RUC and British army have killed 17 people, 16 Catholics, and permanently maimed hundreds of others, including most recently, Kevin McCafferty, a 16-year-old from Derry who lost his eye to a plastic bullet at Union Hall Place last year.
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In this issue we find ourselves in rare agreement with the New York Times, which has called upon Prime Minister Blair to ban their use as a confidence-building measure. We appeal for this committee to join the European Parliament, the Irish Bishops Conference, the U.S. Conference of Bishops, and Physicians for Social Responsibility in opposing the use of these devices, which are banned from use throughout the rest of the United Kingdom.
Third, the true work of peace is to work for measures that will promote justice. Such measures come in many shapes and sizes. The corruption of law which wrongfully imprisoned the Birmingham Six and the Gilford Four, to achieve political ends is ongoing with cases like that of the Casement Three, and that of Danny McNamee, and the punitive detention of Roisin McAliskey. Your expression of concern might serve to expose these injustices to the light of truth.
During the period 1989–1992, nine Sinn Fein-elected officials and campaign workers were slain. Since 1992, five more campaign workers have been murdered and dozens more are regularly detained without charge during campaigns. No other party in a modern democracy has experienced such persecution, which usually begins with the RUC telling a person that his or her file has suddenly ''gone missing.'' The collusion of security forces in this campaign to derive Nationalists of their right to participate in the political process is apparent to all not too blind to see.
As elected representatives, you can campaign here free of such violent intimidation. Your further inquiry into this campaign to silence Sinn Fein could prove critical to restoring a true democracy to the political process in the north.
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Finally, I would appeal to you to specifically question on behalf of members of our organization who are imprisoned in the North. Suffice it to say we believe their term of imprisonment should be reduced by the time they spent in confinement in this country while we and most other Irish-American organizations supported their lengthy battle against deportation and extradition. This is a humanitarian plea on behalf of their families, and in the interest of promoting the healing so necessary for the reconciliation of the divided communities. I would ask that this committee or its members individually write to Dr. Mowlam, the Secretary for Northern Ireland, and that the time in America be credited to their original sentence.
Mr. Chairman, I thank you for your attention to my testimony and ask that it may be included in its entirety in the record of these proceedings.
Mr. SMITH. Without objection, Mr. Wallace, your full statement will be made a part of the record, as will all the others.
[The prepared statement of Mr. Wallace appears in the appendix.]
Mr. SMITH. Before going to Mary Paglione, let me thank the Hibernians again for the work that you are doing. I think that there is a much more energized effort underway to make Americans, particularly Americans of Irish descent, more knowledgeable about the ongoing human rights abuses in the north of Ireland, and about the fact that the only way to attain a just and sustainable peace is to address the human rights question, aggressively, honestly, and transparently. So I want to again thank the Hibernians for your leadership on this.
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Let me also acknowledge that Congressman Neal is here. If you have any comments, you are welcome to make them.
Mr. NEAL. I will wait.
Mr. SMITH. OK, thank you.
STATEMENT OF MARY E. PAGLIONE, NATIONAL PRESIDENT, LADIES ANCIENT ORDER OF HIBERNIANS IN AMERICA
Mrs. PAGLIONE. Mr. Chairman, thank you for this opportunity to address this committee. I am Mary Paglione, president of the Ladies Ancient Order of Hibernians in America.
The LAOH was established in 1894, and now has over 11,000 members from all over the United States. Like the AOH, we are committed to our Irish heritage and our Catholic faith, and support our brothers and sisters in all of Ireland.
Despite the circumstances that force many of our ancestors to these shores, we are proud of the Irish contribution to America, and even prouder now to have the opportunity to give something back to Ireland; hopefully, peace with justice.
The very real and systematic abuse of human rights that have taken place in the six counties of Northern Ireland are a matter of utmost concern to the members of the Ladies Ancient Order of Hibernians. In August, 1995, on a tour of Ireland with the officers and members of the LAOH and the AOH we participated in a mass at the cathedral in Armagh. A woman approached me and two other officers who were wearing officers' sashes that are orange, white and green, which is the color of the Irish flag. Her statement to us was, ''My, but you are brave to wear the tri-colors here.'' At that time we thought little of it. Yet it shows the fear that the residents of that area live under.
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I will not try to enumerate the specifics or try to point out to you the most horrific instances. That we are here today indicates that the problem is at last being addressed by the appropriate body, the U.S. Congress. You have already heard many distinguished panelists give their views today. I would like to offer mine from the perspective of an Irish-American woman, wife, and mother.
For each act of abuse, there is a shockwave of victims. Each victim of abuse is a son, a husband, a sister, a daughter. Their pain is not felt alone. It is no surprise that the loudest voices called for peace in Northern Ireland are those of women. Being a Catholic woman in Northern Ireland carries with it the double burden of discrimination, a system that ridicules your religion, allows church goers to be pelted and stoned on the way to mass, and then places women lower on the employment list than any other category. It is not only abusing basic human rights, it is an affront to human dignity.
The LAOH has always been concerned with human rights abuses in Northern Ireland. I recently appointed Eileen C. McNeill of Ohio, chairperson, National Office of Catholic Action, to serve with me on this committee. The LAOH is participating in a prisoners dependents' fund, St. Paul's Parish Church in Belfast, to assist with their building fund. Our record of donations to human rights funds is well documented. The LAOH has been constant in prayers for peace and justice throughout our history.
As a resident of Florence Township, Burlington County, New Jersey, I live within the 4th Congressional District represented by Congressman Christopher H. Smith. I thank you, Chairman Smith, and the members of this committee on behalf of the Ladies Ancient Order of Hibernians in America and all women of goodwill. I urge you to pursue with appropriate legislation and the moral authority of these United States an end to the abuse of basic human rights practiced in Northern Ireland with great dispatch.
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Thank you very much.
[The prepared statement of Mrs. Paglione appears in the appendix.]
Mr. SMITH. Mrs. Paglione, thank you very much for your testimony and for your leadership on this issue.
Let me ask one general question, and perhaps our witnesses from Ireland will take a stab at this first. Now that the baton has been passed to the Blair Government, do you believe that there is a heightened sense of expectancy and hope? There is also the fact that our own President is more energized on this—and the Congress, I believe, is now going to step up to the plate and do what it ought to do, and become more aggressive in our relationship with the United Kingdom. As a friend of the United Kingdom, we must demand that there be true justice and respect for human rights.
It is easy to criticize a developing country, a Third World country, which has little or no commerce or cultural contact or ties with us, and much harder when it is a good ally that was with us in the Persian Gulf. But I think it is all the more reason why we need to speak out loud and clear, with a lucid sense of what the problem is.
Is it your sense that there could be some changes in the offing?
Mr. FINUCANE. I remain optimistic that change will come from the point of view of President Clinton's involvement, and I think, and I am sure Jim will agree with me on this, you would really have had to have been present in Belfast the day he made his appearance with the First Lady. It was quite an undescribable feeling. The people were lifted immeasurably. There is really nothing I can compare it to that would do the occasion justice. And President Clinton's involvement is vital because through his influence on the mechanisms of the two governments, and when they come together it can make a very, very serious difference on the ground.
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The noticeable absence of RUC officers and army soldiers during the cease-fire in which America played no small part was commented on on a daily basis by the people of Northern Ireland.
But as far as that involvement is concerned it needs to be continuing, and Mr. Blair, it must be said, is in a different position from his predecessor in that he has a strong government majority and is not beholden to independent elected representatives who may hold the balance of power. I think that majority should be used and used to good effect.
And although from my own point of view I remain optimistic, the lessons of recent years have shown that optimism can be very short lived if action is not taken.
Mr. SMITH. Mr. Kelly. Thank you.
Mr. KELLY. Initially, when we received the invite to come and address this committee we were well pleased and remain well pleased, and the intention of coming here was we realize that your voice, the voice of your government here, your committee here, could have wide-ranging implications for persuading, as you put it, your friends in the British Government to address our issues, the issues that we are here representing all the person cases.
Our hope remains that that in fact will be the case, that we have been able to convince you of the right of our case, and that you will take that, button up and carry it forth on the thing. However, we get conflicting readings from the British Government. On one hand, we hope. He seems open to persuasion, open to change, and on the other hand, we get the like of the government who have not addressed and could have addressed a couple of other issues, and not specifically our own. And so we are getting conflicting messages across. Nobody knows where we are going, what the strength of the government will be.
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However, we cannot overemphasize your part in persuading your friends to adopt the right course of action here, and if that is of any help to you.
Mr. SMITH. Thank you for that insight. And Michael, thank you.
Mrs. Downes.
Mrs. DOWNES. Sorry. I did not hear what the question was.
Mr. SMITH. The question had to do with whether or not this was an opportune time for the Blair Government to take action, whether or not there was hope and some expectation that a new day may be dawning. Will he seize this opportunity?
I think you were out of the room when I said that I can assure you that our committee will begin earnestly ratcheting up as much pressure as we can muster in this regard because I do believe that the time has come for change. Enough is enough. We need to speak out in a bipartisan way, which I believe we have been doing, but we will do so even more earnestly now.
Mrs. DOWNES. Well, coming here today I have expectations. I have high expectations that you will put enough pressure onto the British Government to expose the injustice and to ban the plastic bullet. Members of our campaign met with the Labour Government when they were not in power. They gave reassurances that once they did get into power, that they would then ban the plastic bullet. Since they have taken up their position, there has been no forwarding suggestion that they are going to ban the plastic bullet. So I do feel that pressure from yourselves could enhance their knowledge and to ban the bullet.
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Mr. SMITH. One of the reasons why we thought you should be here is to amplify that message. I do believe that there is unanimity on the part of Members of Congress that the use of plastic bullets remains an abuse of rights, especially with 17 people dead, many of them children. It is an impermissible means of crown control. And so, again, that is why we wanted you at the witness table today, to try to amplify that message.
Mr. Wallace.
Mr. WALLACE. Like Senator Mitchell, our organization remains confident and optimistic that the peace process will get back on track. With the efforts of President Clinton, who I had the opportunity to thank personally for his efforts, he took risks that previous Presidents who also claimed to have Irish ancestry would not take the risks to bring the abuses in Northern Ireland to light.
But with some of the changes such as the election of Prime Minister Blair and a Nationalist mayor of Belfast, some of the key players and increased focus on Northern Ireland and also with hearing what Congress is doing here in the United States, we remain optimistic that things would get back on track, and that overwhelming pressure would make a difference. As you said earlier, if the Brits claim to be our allies, then why do they not make some changes? It is not going to take a bandaid approach. It is going to take major surgery to have some real reforms to the situation.
Mrs. PAGLIONE. All I can say at this time is that I will have to put my faith and trust in Congressman Smith and his committee as a constituent of Congressman Smith. I know that any task that he has taken, he has worked to the utmost to find a solution. So I therefore can only pray that this committee will follow through and see that there will be peace and justice in Ireland.
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Mr. SMITH. Let me ask one final question before yielding to Mr. Gilman who has to get back to the floor. I asked earlier about the repeal of the emergency powers legislation, the PTA and the EPA, and whether you think that is probable under the Blair Government. It seems to me—and our previous witnesses spoke very eloquently about this—that human rights have to be central to the peace process, not a tangential issue, but right at the core. The ultimate confidence builder would be a bold initiative, perhaps in the area of human rights.
Prime Minister Blair has a golden opportunity, if only he would seize it, and perhaps he will. This could help move the peace process along mightily.
Regarding the repeal of the emergency powers, do you have hopes on that, Michael?
Mr. FINUCANE. Yes, I do. I think that many, many aspects of the emergency legislation that is in existence in Northern Ireland runs contrary to the spirit of the common law——
Mr. KING. Would you speak up a bit, please?
Mr. FINUCANE. Sorry. I think it completely flies in the face of accepted international standards. It runs contrary to the common law as espoused by all other parts of Britain, and many, many aspects of the emergency provisions have been condemned by European courts and also other international courts.
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From my point of view, I can say that one of the circumstances which contributed very, very strongly to my father's death was a particular provision in the emergency legislation which excludes lawyers from interrogation rooms while persons are under arrest and being questioned by the RUC. And I think that one way of perhaps persuading the RUC to act in a more professional manner when interrogating suspects, and also to establish another fundamental right of an arrested person, that he have his lawyer present during questioning, I think that particular part of the emergency legislation should be repealed.
And it is worth mentioning that the same law, the Prevention of Terrorism Act, which runs throughout Britain and not just in Northern Ireland, in the rest of Britain lawyers representing clients detained under the Prevention of Terrorism Act have been allowed in to attend interviews. But the same piece of legislation when operated in Northern Ireland has been operated in a completely different fashion.
And it is also worth mentioning that the discretion as to whether to allow a lawyer to attend upon his client while in custody is a complete discretion at the level of a senior officer of the RUC. The comments that I referred to earlier in my testimony I daresay would not have happened had my father been in the room.
Mr. SMITH. Just let me add something before Mr. Kelly responds. ''At the Crossroads: Human Rights in Northern Ireland Peace Process,'' is a study put out by the Lawyers Committee for Human Rights. In it, they make the point that when somebody from the RUC is charged with something—a soldier or police officer—they are never detained for 7 days. And they also point out that they have access to counsel of choice, which is never denied to agents of the State under investigation for offenses.
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So when the accusation goes the other way against somebody from the RUC, full access to a legal counsel is provided.
Again, there is this double standard. I noted at the outset of the hearing that it is inconceivable to me that we continue to have a double standard when this mature democracy known as the United Kingdom, with all of its hallowed principles in the area of jurisprudence, would so cavalierly disregard them for people in Northern Ireland. But they do not disregard it for their own people.
Mr. FINUCANE. I think it is also worth mentioning that for the first 48 hours a person cannot have a lawyer at all, and no consultation is allowed, and it is usually in this 48 hours that the most damaging admissions are made by detainees when very often they are disoriented, confused, and under the severe pressure of rotating of RUC detectives who are trained to get admissions by any means at their disposal.
Mr. SMITH. Is most of it physical or psychological?
Mr. FINUCANE. These are cases of both types of pressure, and in some cases are well documented. The case I referred to in my testimony involved a man who after having been arrested was taken to Castlereagh Interrogation Center and was beaten so badly that one of his ear drums was perforated, and he spent some time in the hospital after that, after being released from Castlereagh.
Mr. KELLY. I would, of course, like to see the repeal of the Emergency Provisions Act because it was actually under the Emergency Provisions Act that the Diplock Courts were set up, and it was in the Diplock Courts that Sean was tried and convicted. And all independent observers who have studied the transcripts of the trial and the trial judgment all agree that if these three had come before a jury court, that they would not have been convicted.
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I would welcome the repeal of the Emergency Provisions Act. However, whether it is likely to be repealed prior to any sort of settlement is a matter of conjecture. I do not know what Tony Blair he will do. He might have the strength to do that where he has not got people looking over his shoulder, where maybe with the backing of your own government he might feel that he is able to take on that burden.
Mrs. DOWNES. I would also like to see a repeal of the emergency courts. Again, when you look at the whole legitimacy of the police and the British soldiers under this legislation and these laws, they act with carte blanche and are not accountable to anybody, so I would also want repeal on those grounds.
Mr. WALLACE. I would agree that for long-term peace and justice that those particular laws, even though they are called emergency, would have to be repealed, even though many times this window dressing that they remove an offender it seems as though instead of just changing the players, you would have to change the rules also. And for fairness. We know our country is not perfect, but our system works, and they should take examples from us. Perhaps this committee might put together an advisory committee to go over and offer a bit of education in their justice system.
Mrs. PAGLIONE. I have to agree with the previous speakers and with Mr. Wallace that things will have to change. We will try to change here in our country and hopefully they will change in Ireland and the repeal of the act is taken care of.
Mr. SMITH. Thank you very much.
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Mr. Gilman.
Mr. GILMAN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I regret I had to be on the floor. We have a little matter of the Most Favored Nation debate on with China, and my staff has brought me up to date.
I was just reading the background on John Downes' slaying, and Mrs. Downes, let me ask you, have you ever received a death certificate?
Mrs. DOWNES. I eventually got a death certificate 7 years later.
Mr. GILMAN. You did receive it, you say?
Mrs. DOWNES. Seven years later.
Mr. GILMAN. And what did the death certificate show as cause of death?
Mrs. DOWNES. Hemorrhage to the heart.
Mr. GILMAN. Are you aware of where these plastic bullets are made? Have you ever heard any information about where they come from or where they are manufactured?
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Mrs. DOWNES. They had been made here in the United States, a company in Alabama had been making the plastic bullets. Emma Groves traveled here a number of years ago, along with another young fellow from Derry who also lost an eye, and the company making them stopped.
Brocks in Scotland had been manufacturing plastic bullets. We campaigned for a number of years. They then ceased to make them. But a new company, Standard, took over their contract. We have with us additional information which will be submitted that has a whole list of places who are manufacturing these weapons.
Mr. GILMAN. Can you submit that information to our committee?
Mrs. DOWNES. Yes.
Mr. GILMAN. We would welcome that.
Allegedly the purpose of these bullets is to try to deter the use of petrol bombs against the police, but we cannot understand why they have not been used against numerous reported instances of fire bombings in Great Britain.
Mr. Chairman, I would like to ask to be included in the record a list that I have of some recent riots involving petrol bombs in England where no plastic bullets were ever used, if that could be made a part of the record.
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Mr. SMITH. Without objection, so ordered.
Mr. GILMAN. Thank you very much.
[The material appears in the appendix.]
Mr. GILMAN. Mr. Kelly, what did the British authorities do to investigate or follow up on the witness, the former school teacher of Sean who was on the site and said he did not go into the park where the soldiers were taken? Did they ever follow up on that?
Mr. KELLY. That schoolmaster has never been interviewed. And I met one of Sean's former teachers, and a lot of years after Sean was convicted, as a matter of fact after his first appeal was refused, and during the course of conversation it emerged that he had seen Sean outside the gates of Casement Park. This, he believes, was at the time when the gates to the park were closed, and the soldiers were inside the park. He gave a statement to a solicitor and that statement was forwarded on, and it was the Committee for Alliance of Lawyers from here in the States who actually included it in a submission to the then Secretary of State, Patrick Mayhew.
I was talking to Fergus, the school teacher, not less than 3 weeks ago, and up until that date he hadn't been interviewed.
Mr. GILMAN. But that statement was made part of the record?
Mr. KELLY. That statement was made part of the record.
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Mr. GILMAN. And who submitted this statement? You say the Alliance of Lawyers?
Mr. KELLY. The American Alliance of Lawyers for Justice in Ireland. It was part of the coordinator, Ed Lynch's submission to Patrick Mayhew looking for a referral of the cases back to the Court of Appeal.
Mr. GILMAN. What is the status now of your son's case? Is it being reviewed?
Mr. KELLY. That former Secretary of State Patrick Mayhew had actually considered the cases of the three men and decided to refer the case of Patrick Kane alone on the grounds of Patrick's slow IQ and his hearing difficulty. He refused the request to send Sean's and Michael Timmons' case back to the Court of Appeal.
The British Government set up, I believe it was in April, a new commission to look into miscarriage of justice and the case has been referred to them. However, how long their consideration will take, I have no way of knowing.
Mr. GILMAN. So at this point there is no further pending legal action.
Mr. KELLY. There is no further legal action.
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Mr. GILMAN. I am just wondering, how could there be a common purpose with all three of these young men, who never knew each other, who met at the march for the first time, on the day of the funeral?
Mr. KELLY. Exactly my sentiments.
Sean and Michael did not know each other, and in fact the indictment was that they were charged with murder in that they aided and abetted others' murder. And when the trial judge submitted his written considered judgment he commented that the defendants could not be found guilty of aiding and abetting murder because apparently under law to be found guilty of aiding and abetting, you must be present.
The other two constituents of aiding and abetting is conscious and procuring, the four elements needed for murder. There was no evidence offered of conscious and procurement, which seemed to be the case of murder against the three of them. The judge did not comment further on them but then went on to find them guilty under a principle of common purpose.
And from my knowledge, the principle of common purpose contains two elements. One, that there must have been some sort of premeditation. I already commented on the fact that the guys didn't know each other. They were at the funeral for different reasons and different things. There was no preplan, and there was no meeting of minds and there was no evidence offered for meeting of the minds.
Mr. GILMAN. Mr. Kelly, was the person being buried a cab driver?
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Mr. KELLY. Yes, he was.
Mr. GILMAN. Were you a fellow cab driver?
Mr. KELLY. He was one of my co-workers.
Mr. GILMAN. That is why you went to the funeral?
Mr. KELLY. That is why I was at the funeral.
Mr. GILMAN. And did you mention to Sean the night before the funeral that you were going to be in the line of march?
Mr. KELLY. Sean knew I would be at the funeral, yes.
Mr. GILMAN. So Sean had good knowledge that you were going to be there and that is why he was looking for you?
Mr. KELLY. However, I must point out that I did not know Sean would be at the funeral because in fact Sean did not attend the funeral as a mourner, as a spectator. He was actually passing the funeral on the footpath when the soldier's car entered the footpath. And that is how far away he was from any sort of knowledge of what was going to happen or what eventually did occur with the death of the two soldiers.
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Mr. GILMAN. Well, I am going to join with Chairman Smith in our call to the British Government to review the Casement case once again.
Mr. KELLY. Thank you, sir.
Mr. GILMAN. We must raise some of these issues.
These hearings, I think, Mr. Chairman, have put a human face on Northern Ireland. It has also made it clear that as Chairman Smith has said, friends such as the United States and the United Kingdom need to have a frank dialog on the unacceptable human rights situation in the north. And these historic hearings I hope will open the door for that dialog.
I want to thank your good co-chairman of our Irish caucus, Peter King, who has done such an outstanding job. And please forgive me for having to run back and forth between the floor and this hearing. I just wish I could have sat through the entire hearing. But I want to commend our panelists for taking the time out of your lives to be here on a very important occasion. Thank you.
And thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. KING. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
We are joined by Congresswoman Sue Kelly. You can join us up here if you wish. Congresswoman Kelly is from New York and has a long interest in this issue.
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I want to thank all the panelists for being here today, especially those of you who took the time to come from Ireland to really illuminate us with your testimony.
I think it is important your being here and that you put this into a totally different perspective from what the American people usually hear; and with all the talk of terrorism and violence in the north of Ireland, and often justification given by the British that they have to take certain action against paramilitaries of the IRA.
I would just like to ask, Mr. Finucane. was your father ever a member of the IRA?
Mr. FINUCANE. No, he was not.
Mr. KING. Mr. Kelly, is there any allegation ever made that your son was a member of the IRA?
Mr. KELLY. No, quite the reverse.
Mr. KING. Mrs. Downes, any allegation that your husband, John, was a member of the IRA?
Mrs. DOWNES. No.
Mr. KING. And I know Mrs. Groves' daughter is here. Obviously, your mother was never a member of the IRA. And my understanding of your mother's case is that she was shot and blinded by a British soldier. She was in her home listening to Irish music. And that was the justification for shooting her, she was listening to music.
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Ms. GROVES. That is correct.
Mr. KING. OK. Mr. Finucane, in your testimony you described events leading up to your father's death, how there was a statement of Mr. Hogg, how there was statements being made by RUC officers to defendants about your father being killed.
Could you also describe anything that occurred on the ground that day? Was that neighborhood where your family lived, was the area cleared before the Loyalists came in?
Mr. FINUCANE. Yes, where my family home is situated in Belfast is a smaller, quieter street off a main thoroughfare. That main road had been the subject of RUC traffic check points up until approximately 30 minutes before the murder took place. And again, no reason has been forthcoming as to why they were removed, but one thing is very, very clear, that the access which the assassins had on the night my father was murdered was made very much easier by the absence of police in the area. And, of course, they were afforded a clean getaway afterwards.
Mr. KING. Have the RUC or the British Government or the Secretary of State given you an update on the status of the investigation of your father's death?
Mr. FINUCANE. The status of the investigation, as I understand it, is that 14 people were arrested in a very short time afterwards, i.e., 1989. Since then as far as I am aware nothing has been done.
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Mr. KING. And what happened to the 14 who were arrested?
Mr. FINUCANE. They were released without charge.
Mr. KING. I would just like to state for the record that I knew your father very well over a number of years, both in Ireland and the United States He did an outstanding job for the course of human rights.
Mr. Kelly, is there any difference between your son's case and the case of Pat Kane who was released on Friday?
Mr. KELLY. Well, they were able to isolate Pat only in the fact that he had a low mental IQ, and at the time of interrogation had a severe hearing difficulty, which the Appeal Court was able to interpret as—that he couldn't have been responsible for the confessions that he was alleged to have made, a confession in a sense that he confessed to killing, the confessions that he had stomped on one of the soldiers. So that was the distinction that was made between Pat's case and the case of Michael and Sean.
Mr. KING. What efforts are you taking right now to have this case brought up for review again?
Mr. KELLY. There are a couple of outstanding court cases in the House of Lords in England that are trying to deal with this issue of using the principle of common purpose in a murder trial. And I believe that both the defense lawyers and the judges, the appeal judges who have ruled on Pat Kane's case are waiting for that verdict, to see if somehow they can apply it to Sean and Michael Timmons. That verdict is expected, I believe, in the middle of July, and we are hoping, of course, that it will be of a positive nature, and that that alone will allow the cases to be referred back to the Court of Appeal.
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Mr. KING. All right. To put it in perspective, the day that your son was there at the funeral, it was Kevin Brady's funeral. There were cameras from all over the world. There were thousands of people there.
Did anyone have any idea that that car driven by the two British corporals was going to be at the funeral at that place in time?
Mr. KELLY. No. I mean, I was at that funeral. In fact, my feeling at the time of the funeral was that I was relieved that this was the last in a series of long funerals. I mean, that month, I think, we were at something like nine funerals. I belong to the West Belfast Taxi Association, and regularly when there is this type of funeral on the road we knock off work for an hour, you know, because the funeral processions usually take over the whole road. And because there was no security present, my feeling was of relief. I was half way back in the funeral cortege when whatever happened at the front happened, and all the young lives ran forward. And all the feeling, the fear, the dread, the apprehension all returned on the thing because of just Kevin Brady himself was killed just 3 days previous, another type of funeral, and that attack resulted in 3 dead and 68 injured.
So it was not just the case of going to a funeral, a car stranded until the funeral and sat upon by a frenzy mob which is how the authorities and some of the media portrayed it. This was a highly charged atmosphere, and the bubble burst when these two guys—the tires were squealing, this was not just an interruption of the funeral, this was an aggressive interruption of the funeral. Armed, dressed as civilians, and the crowd believed that this was another just copycat type of killing.
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Mr. KING. Who fired the first shots?
Mr. KELLY. There was only one shot actually fired. It was discharged out of the soldier's gun. I believe that was during the struggle when they were trying to drag him out of the car.
Mr. KING. And obviously nobody in the crowd would have known that they were soldiers?
Mr. KELLY. No, not at the time. I believe there is speculation about when, in fact, their identity was established.
Mr. KING. And there is no way that your son would have known that that car was going to enter the funeral procession at that point, that he would have known that those two men in the car were British soldiers and he could have been waiting for them?
Mr. KELLY. Not only would Sean not have known, nobody in that funeral procession would have known.
Mr. KING. With all of the camera crews that were there, with all those photographers that were there, was there any evidence at all of your son being involved in an illegal act? Was there any video tape produced?
Mr. KELLY. No. Sean was shown as part of the crowd to run toward the car. In fact, the prosecution presented the case that Sean attacked the car, and after careful examination of his interpretation of it, the judges concurred that he didn't attack the car. He only came within arm's length of it.
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Mr. KING. Did your son make any effort to escape that day?
Mr. KELLY. Well, it's kind of reverse. I mean, the judges apply a logic called the actions of man who are carrying out illogical deeds. In this instance you have a car that arrives on the scene, somebody says they are armed. Logic tells you you go the other way. So how can the judge apply logic to guys who run against the men, it does not—I mean, the judge cannot apply a proper man's reaction to illogical actions of a man who believes somewhat that they are defending themselves or reacting as part of a crowd or reacting to what they perceive to be another Loyalist attack.
Mr. KING. He was first arrested a year later, right?
Mr. KELLY. Yes, almost a year later.
Mr. KING. During that year did he make any attempt to hide? Did he leave the country?
Mr. KELLY. No time whatsoever. He lived with myself and his mother.
Mr. KING. Even though he knew that everything that he had done had been photographed, videotaped, he still made no effort to hide or escape?
Mr. KELLY. I think part of what is actually missing is, you know, there was no feeling of guilt. They did not do anything. They did not believe that what they had done led to the death of the two soldiers. The IRA killed these two guys, all right? They did not believe that anything that they had done was illegal, wrong or anything. In fact, they were surprised when they were arrested, not so much surprised because there were hundreds of people arrested and questioned over the thing.
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In fact, it is an ongoing investigation because the man who actually killed the soldiers has never come before the courts.
Mr. KING. OK. I have one more question for Mr. Finucane, and then I will ask Congressman Neal if he has any questions, or Congressman Kelly.
Mr. Finucane, you make a very compelling case that there was obvious collusion between the Loyalist paramilitaries and the Royal Ulster Constabulary. That was 8 years ago.
Mr. FINUCANE. Yes.
Mr. KING. Has that situation improved at all or do you believe that that same type of collusion exists today?
Mr. FINUCANE. I believe that, as was remarked I think by the first speakers——
Mr. KING. Speak a little louder.
Mr. FINUCANE. Sorry. As I think was remarked by the first panel this morning, it is systemic. It is ingrained in the RUC to a very senior level, if not the most senior level, and the leaking of police files is a matter of public record, and indisputable.
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As I understand it, something like 59 people were prosecuted for the possession of these files, but no RUC officer has ever been prosecuted for giving them away. And quite clearly, they just did not walk out with files on their own. Somebody handed them over and no one has been prosecuted.
And from my own opinion, I think one of the most compelling aspects of my father's case is that the threats on the abuse that were being made against him were recorded in his own handwriting, obviously before he died. And therefore it is evidence of something that was going on for a very long time. And I think that situation has not improved.
I am aware of some groups who have been taking testimony from lawyers as recently as 10 days ago, or 10 days to 2 weeks ago, where allegations of abuse were being made against RUC detectives.
And I think it is also worth pointing out that abusing a solicitor or anyone legally representing a person detained is not even so much as a disciplinary offense in the RUC today. That was a position that was in existence 8 years ago, and it is the position that has not changed, and any kind of abuse, verbal or otherwise, I think should be made the subject of at least disciplinary proceedings. That is just not happening where the RUC are concerned.
Mr. KING. Let me ask you the same question I asked the panel before. Without getting into a debate over transforming and restructuring and disbanding or reforming, whatever, what do you think can be done with the RUC? Is it salvageable? Can it be rectified, or is there massive transformation required? Have you given any thought as to what could be done to make the police force in the north of Ireland more accepted by all communities?
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Mr. FINUCANE. Well, one interesting comment that was made by a member of the CAJ to the U.N. Human Rights Committee in Geneva 2 years ago was that the RUC be transformed from a police force to a police service. The difference obviously being that they are there to serve the community as opposed to force them to do what the RUC wants them to do.
I am not really a qualified person in terms of rebuilding law enforcement agencies, so I cannot really offer a strategy for rebuilding the RUC, but one thing I would say is that there are so many things wrong with it that, in effect, if you took out all the compartments of the RUC procedure and the function of an RUC officer, and tried to reform them, you would have such a large job on your hands that by the time you finished performing there would be a completely unrecognizable organization.
I do think, to a large extent, they are beyond redemption because the system and the organization within which RUC officers work has remained the same and has been endorsed and substantiated by the British Government over the years, and no change in that direction seems to be forthcoming.
Mr. KING. Thank you.
I would just like to acknowledge in the audience is the partner of your late father, Peter Madden, who spent his formative years in New York before going back to Belfast. We miss him in New York.
Congressman Neal.
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Mr. NEAL. Thanks, Peter.
Let me welcome the panelists; I apologize for being tardy. My committee has the responsibility for the MFN debate today, and that is where I have spent my time.
What I think is important to acknowledge here is that there are still very few Members of the Congress that have any idea of what plastic bullets are constructed like, and they have very little understanding of how they are used. I spent an afternoon a few years back with Father Matt Wallace, and we had a chance to interview some of the young men who had been hit with plastic bullets. In one case the individual had been hit in the temple, and as a result was paralyzed on the right side of his body. You see, that is a statistic that is lost here in America.
The application of those plastic bullets, which would never be allowed on the streets in any police force in America, would never be tolerated for one moment. The Brits have used those in an opportunity of what they call crowd control. But overwhelmingly they have been used to keep the Nationalist communities in place.
And the first speech I ever made on the House floor 9 years ago was calling for the abolition of plastic bullets, and I still believe that that is an avenue that we can travel here in the Congress to have some influence on British policy.
The Birmingham Seven and the Gilford Four, those are examples, as well as your testimony today, of how sensitive, I believe, British Government is to American popular opinion. And time and again it has been these sorts of panels with people like you who have had a chance to take us down the road to changing some of that opinion on the other side of the Atlantic.
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What I am struck by is how little attention that meeting received that Peter King and I had with Mo Mowlam just a couple of weeks ago in which she indicated to us at that time that there would be a full review of Bloody Sunday, and that was one of the things that she promised the Nationalist community, and she told me that she had assured John Hume of that occasion.
My point is this; that I know it is nice to hear Tony Blair's comments, but the truth is that from Gladstone to Blair Labour and the Liberals have always said the right thing and never done it. They always give comfort verbally to Nationalist aspirations. Now they have a chance to do something about it.
I have had a chance to visit the Nationalist center and I have had a chance to interact with many people in this room today on this issue, and there is a golden opportunity here for everybody who is involved. And the question is not just how far the Nationalist people are willing to move; it is how far the British are willing to move. And if the intransigents of David Trumball and others is allowed to stand, there never will be progress. That is the obligation of the British Government, to move the Unionist parties and to bring them to the bargaining table without preconditions.
And I thank you for the testimony you bring here. It is not lost on deaf ears. We have changed the opinion in the House of Representatives. We now regularly, I believe, can count on up to 150 members of the House that are sympathetic to the argument we make. That is a long way from where we were 10 years ago.
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So when you come here and you offer this testimony it is very important in helping us to develop what I think are opinions that are shared on the other side of the Atlantic and that do count with the British Government.
Thanks, Peter.
Mr. KING. Congresswoman Kelly.
Ms. KELLY. First of all, I want to thank you, Mr. Chairman, for allowing me to sit in and participate with this panel. I am only sorry that I was not able to be here earlier, but I had previous commitments on my schedule today. I came because I wanted to learn, and this is what I have just learned about, which I think is absolutely astounding. I had no idea of the size and I had no idea of the damage it could do. So I thank you for being here and telling me, and you can be assured that I am interested in making sure that other people in Congress, who do not know this information, can hear it from my lips as well as these other Congressmen.
As the mother of four children, and as someone who is interested in the peace in Ireland, I wonder, apart from the militants on both sides of the conflict, I am wondering about the other people in Ireland. How open to reconciliation and working out a peaceful coexistence are the average Protestants and Catholics in Northern Ireland? Is the situation at this point, or do you think it can be?
And I am throwing this question open to all of you, and if you would like, you are welcome all of you to answer each in your own turn. I understand it is difficult to generalize, but I really am interested in the possibility of whether there is something that we can maybe work out. I am beginning to worry and, quite frankly, to despair. So maybe you want to start with from one direction or just pick it up as however you wish.
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Mr. FINUCANE. I would like to say that it was commented by a number of members of the Subcommittee earlier that the division between people in Northern Ireland really runs much closer to political division rather than religious division.
The Catholic population and the Protestant population of Northern Ireland really have a lot in common. The difficulties of providing support for one's family or earning a living really do not change because you go from one religious faith to the other.
Where I think the solution lies is the taking up of the responsibility that is on all the political leaders in Northern Ireland, and to work together and find a compromise, and I think, as has been mentioned a few moments ago, the intransigents of certain parties and the unwillingness to even negotiate, never mind compromise, is a great cause for despair. And I think that responsibility extends all the way back to the British Government in Westminster. I think they have a huge role to play. I think they have a huge responsibility to bring about a resolution of the conflict. I do not think anyone else can fulfill the role that they have, and I really sincerely hope that the new Prime Minister of the British Government will take up his responsibility and perhaps provide us with a solution that every single person in Northern Ireland not only needs but richly deserves.
Mr. KING. Sue, if I could just add one point on that. Michael's father, who was murdered, was a Catholic. His mother who was wounded, was a Protestant. So certainly in that family there was not a division between Protestant and Catholic.
Ms. KELLY. May I just follow up with that based on some thing you have said? You said that you hope that the new British leader will take it upon himself. I think my question was really aimed more at can the will of the Irish people rise up to such an extent that they will themselves create peace if given the opportunity by the British leader?
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Mr. FINUCANE. Yes, I think everyone in Northern Ireland wants peace more than anything, and the difficulties that have been placed in the way of peace settlement unfortunately were of a political nature, and the last British administration, it is an accepted political reality that Mr. Major had a very, very narrow majority and depended on a certain group of individuals for support. Otherwise, he could not run his government. And in that situation very many capitulations were made to the Unionist voting block, which certainly raised the tensions in the Nationalist community because they perceived themselves as being discriminated against, and it was being done on the basis of return of favors.
I think that sort of political situation highlights very much the need for parties to put aside all divisions. The problem, I think, is that not that the people do not have the will or the ability or the need to come to a reconciliation, but that the further up the pyramid you go the narrower the mind.
Ms. KELLY. Would anyone else like to address that? You have done it so eloquently, I must say.
Mr. KELLY. I concur with Michael. The problem, I think, with the ordinary people is that they are not getting the example. I think if you look at what has happened with the fringe Loyalists, they are willing to talk, and the Republicans seem to want to talk. But the more elder of the Unionist parties are using the fact that they are not talking, they are getting the example of the British Government, that they are not talking. And the case seems to be talk. Irregardless of what is happening talk. If you are not talking, you are fighting.
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I mean, the ordinary people do not seem to be getting the example or the leadership, but I think that the ordinary people are willing to talk about each other's ideas.
Mrs. DOWNES. Could I also just take the opportunity to reaffirm that this is not a religious conflict. I mean, campaigns for both Nationalists and Loyalists, we protest at any day. And to date there have been 17 people murdered with the plastic bullet. Sixteen of those have been Nationalists, and there has been one Loyalist. We are not sectarian, and when we campaign, we are campaigning for both sides of the community.
Mr. WALLACE. I would also agree that the average Irishman and Irishwoman are tired of what has happened, and seek peace. Certainly those two ladies some years ago, one Catholic and one Protestant; I cannot recall their names, that made history by speaking out and saying that they could live side by side.
Certainly the children are the ones that are really hurt in all of this because it perpetuates generation after generation of mistrust. That is the reason the program Project Children to bring children over to America and other countries was stated, that religion should not be a big factor with people getting along. My wife and I hosted two children, one from Derry and one from Tyrone, and they told us that they had friends that were of the other faith, and that to them religion was not a big thing. But as they grow older, certainly they soon learn what the British have done to them, so they cannot help but pick up the same feelings.
But I think the average person, if asked, certainly would get along.
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Mrs. PAGLIONE. My own personal feeling is the news media plays up the small skirmishes and brings forth the information to us on this side of the ocean that the turmoil there has a large magnitude, but I really feel that—I have only been to Northern Ireland once, and it was during the peace process—but I really feel that people can live side by side, and I think they will try, and maybe just these small skirmishes that are happening can be quelled so that we will see that the people in Northern Ireland can live in peace.
Ms. KELLY. Thank you all very much for responding to that.
Mr. King, I appreciate again your allowing me to be on this panel, and I have no more questions.
Mr. KING. We always welcome your input. Thank you very much.
We are going to close the hearing in a few moments. Just for the record, though, I would like to get certain questions asked and answered so we can have a full record.
Brenda, was Carol Ann Kelly who was murdered by a plastic bullet in Twinbrook in 1981, was she involved in any type of demonstration or riot at all?
Mrs. DOWNES. Carol Ann had gone to the shop for a carton of milk for her mother. There was no riot taking place at that time.
Mr. KING. And she was shot in cold blood by the British without any——
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Mrs. DOWNES. She was shot dead.
Mr. KING. There were no IRA people around her, there were no petrol bombs, there was no disturbance going on?
Mrs. DOWNES. There were no disturbances at all, no.
Mr. KING. OK. And was she shot the same day the British soldiers were involved in another part of Northern Ireland where they suffered casualties?
Mrs. DOWNES. Sorry?
Mr. KING. Are you aware that she was killed the same day as there was an IRA/British army encounter in another part of Northern Ireland that same day?
Mrs. DOWNES. Yes.
Mr. KING. And that the British soldiers when they shot Carol Ann Kelly said this was in return for the soldiers who were killed that day?
Mrs. DOWNES. That is correct.
Mr. KING. OK. Mr. Finucane, just three legal questions and then we will wrap this up.
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Are you aware of any other democratic societies in Europe today that permit an adverse inference to be drawn at trial from a defendant's silence during interrogation?
Mr. FINUCANE. Apart from the United Kingdom?
Mr. KING. Apart from the United Kingdom
Mr. FINUCANE. I cannot really give a yes or a no answer to that because it would not be entirely accurate. What I would say is that some of the systems in Europe which are different and do permit a different type of inquiry have their own safeguards and their own counterbalances where what would be considered hearsay evidence in the U.S. legal system or in the U.K. legal system is admitted for the record in some European countries. There is a different safeguard to counterbalance that.
I think the problem with the abrogation of the right of silence under U.K. legislation is that an inference may now be drawn from an accused person's silence both while being interrogated in custody and also if he refuses to give evidence at trial, but no comparable safeguard has been put back in place such as extended access to legal advice in order to help him combat the adverse inference which may be drawn against him for saying absolutely nothing. And this was a specific point addressed by the European Court. They said that this was unacceptable in any forum where a person's silence could be held against them, but at the same time, and this is the position under the emergency legislation, they were not allowed access to a lawyer.
Mr. KING. I believe you are talking about the case of Anto Murray that went to the European Court——
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Mr. FINUCANE. That is correct.
Mr. KING. Has any action been taken by the British Government to address that finding by the European Court?
Mr. FINUCANE. No. No. The provision in the Prevention of Terrorism Act remains. The criminal evidence order which was introduced in 1988 remains in force. It is a general provision of evidence and may be applied in any crime, not just one of a political nature. And persons who are detained under scheduled legislation for a suspected scheduled offense may still be detained the first 48 hours with no access to a lawyer, and for the remainder of the 7-day period which is allowed under the legislation they have limited access to a lawyer, and cannot have him present during interrogation.
Mr. KING. Is it not also true that the British Government has been found guilty of violating human rights more times by the European Court than any other country?
Mr. FINUCANE. I believe that is true, yes.
Mr. KING. Mr. Kelly, was the silence issue, the right to silence issue used in your son's case at all?
Mr. KELLY. Indeed it was. That legislation came in in late 1988, and so that the defendants originally arrested for this offense had, if you want the protection of the right of silence.
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Mr. KING. So the law came into effect in late 1988.
Mr. KELLY. Yes.
Mr. KING. The so-called incident that your son was charged with occurred in March 1988?
Mr. KELLY. That is correct.
Mr. KING. Before the law was changed.
Mr. KELLY. So the ones that were arrested at a later stage, and had a solicitor, they could exercise the right of silence, but they did so that it is likely to be used against them. In fact, what the legislation did was, it was pretty new at the time. The lawyers, I think, were still, if you want, feeling it out. But the advice to Sean from the solicitor was that he did not have to worry about it, and in fact there was no evidence offered against him and therefore he should not take the stand.
And, in fact, that was used as weight of evidence against him, and the other two defendants, their counsel thought otherwise, and thought the two should take the stand, and therefore they were subject to cross-examination. But in the case of Pat Kane where the IQ was not really that great, it was very easy for a skilled prosecutor to, if you want, get out words.
I think this case actually illustrates why the protection of the right-of-silence should have been covered fasten if you want instead of diluted it because here the defendants were arrested some year later where the facts of the case had already become widely known, where the defendants did not feel that they had any guilt about them. They did not feel that they were responsible for the deaths of the two soldiers.
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And therefore when the investigators suggested, well, the thought must have crossed your mind that the IRA might kill these guys, that they did not see the danger and admitting, well, that might have happened. You know, that might have crossed my mind. They did not see that that was enough for the prosecution to say, oh, now, you see, you had thought it out, and therefore the thought entered their mind and therefore you are guilty of the things.
In fact, I think this illustrates why the man said, you know, keep your silence.
Mr. KING. Mr. Finucane, under the emergency powers obviously the judge is the sole trier of fact and law. So enormous power is in the hands of a judge.
Mr. FINUCANE. Yes.
Mr. KING. Certainly on questions like silence and inferences that could be drawn from silence. It gives tremendous authority to judges in the north of Ireland.
How are these judges chosen, and are there any remedies available if they show a pattern of sustained bias?
Mr. FINUCANE. There are no remedies available for any pattern which is systemic in the judgments of the judges of the Diplock Court. The panel of judges currently on the bench in Northern Ireland is appointed by the Lord Chief Justice, I believe, from the senior bar and in consultation with the Secretary of State, I believe. It is a complete appointment process. There is nothing in the nature of an election involved.
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Mr. KING. Do they have a life tenure?
Mr. FINUCANE. Yes, they do.
Mr. KING. I want to thank all of you for your testimony. I certainly want to thank Chairman Smith for putting together this hearing and his staff who worked so hard to get the witnesses here. I want to thank you for traveling here, those of you who traveled from across the sea to join with us today to make the sacrifice to be with us, especially those of you who had relatives who were murdered or Mr. Kelly and Mrs. Kelly's case, whose son has been imprisoned, and Mrs. Groves' daughter was here today, you know, for really showing us how important it is for us as Americans to speak out and be heard, and to use whatever influence we have on the British Government to stop these flagrant violations of human rights and injustice which, unfortunately, have become almost a personification of the society in the north of Ireland.
It is not aberrations. They are not deviations. They are really what the society has become because of British rule in Northern Ireland.
And your testimony today, and certainly the testimony of the prior panel, has added to our information and has added to our wealth of knowledge. So thank you for being here.
The meeting is adjourned.
[Whereupon at 2:30 p.m., the Subcommittee was adjourned.]
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