Immunity Certificates

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Immunity Certificates
artdoc May=1993

Michael Mates, the Minister responsible for security in Northern
Ireland, has refused to reveal the number of Public Interest
Immunity Certificates which have been issued for court or inquest
proceedings. A recent parliamentary question asked for the
numbers of certificates issued since 1972 but this drew the terse
response that there is no central record. CAJ record two
certificates with respect to inquests. A third was recently
issued to permit several SAS men not to appear at an inquest (in
March) and for three others to give evidence from behind a
screen. The inquest was into the deaths of three Tyrone IRA men
ambushed by the SAS in August 1988, just eleven days after the
IRA killed 8 soldiers and injured 27 others by bombing a bus
which was bringing the soldiers from Aldergrove airport. The
inquest jury was unable to decide whether the SAS or IRA men had
fired first.
See Committee on the Administration of Justice, Inquests and
Disputed Killings in Northern Ireland, Belfast: CAJ, 1992;
Hansard written answer, 30.11.92.

Statewatch vol 3 no 2 March-April 1993

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