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Pringle says clarity needed on British role in reported collusion
- Updated: 23rd February 2022
Independent TD for Donegal, Thomas Pringle, said the Irish government must be clear about the role of the British government in reports of collusion between the Royal Ulster Constabulary, the Special Branch and loyalist paramilitaries during the Troubles.
Deputy Pringle addressed the Dáil today on the Police Ombudsman’s report in the North on police handling of certain paramilitary murders and attempted murders during the period 1989 to 1993.
Deputy Pringle said: “There is no doubt that the Ombudsman’s report is a damning one. The report confirmed in black and white that the RUC worked with informers that were part of loyalist paramilitary groups, that targeted individuals such as Eddie Fullerton were not warned of the threat against their lives and that over 80 people were murdered by loyalist weapons imported in an arms shipment that the RUC were aware of.
“Although the report gives evidence to what we already know, it is an important step in recognising and justifying the families of the victims’ concerns and an important step of furthering the peace process in the North,” he said.
The deputy said that while the report made a point of using the term “collusive behaviours”, he said, “We should really just call it what it is: outright collusion.”
Deputy Pringle said: “The report is very clear about RUC collusion but it is important for us to remember that this did not happen in isolation. The fact is that the British government was controlling all these organisations through MI5, the police and the paramilitaries. They knew what was happening and were not silent observers to the outcome of their policies. That is, I think, one of the big lies of the peace process that allowed the British to somehow present themselves as innocent observers.
“I hope that we in the South start to take a more active role in this process to ensure a fairer and better society across the whole island of Ireland and it should be and can only be through the recognition that these actions, while they were collusion on behalf of the RUC, the RUC wasn’t acting in isolation. The RUC wasn’t doing this off its own bat.
“The RUC was doing this with the blessing of the British government, and I think that we, as an Irish government and as an Irish parliament, have to lay that out clearly as well,” he said.
Deputy Pringle called the report a shocking but not surprising read, saying, “It was common knowledge that the RUC were working alongside loyalist paramilitaries at the time, however it is long overdue for this to be recognised in an official sense, which has now been done with the publication of the Ombudsman’s report.”
