It must ever be remembered that the man whose murder is at the centre of this controversy, Pat Finucane, was a man who was alleged to be a member of the IRA by former members of that terrorist organisation. He represented terrorists and murderers as a solicitor and his three brothers, John, Dermot and Seamus – were connected with republican activities. The first was an IRA man killed in a car crash, the second was one of the Maze 1983 escapees, and the third was a former prisoner, who was arrested alongside Bobby Sands after an IRA bombing and gunfight (Belfast Newsletter 30/10/20).
No matter how the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, Hilary Benn, dresses up his decision to grant that which is utterly denied to the thousands of other victims of terrorism, he cannot hide his shameful subservience to murderous Irish Republicanism behind a cloak of legal gobbledygook!
Jim Allister MP told the News Letter:
“The double standards here are appalling. As I pointed out to the Secretary of State yesterday, not only are the Finucane family being treated differently from everyone else they are again being offered something which they had previously rejected.
“It is a gross insult to the thousands of innocent victims in Northern Ireland that Mr Benn should describe this murder and this one alone as ‘unique’.
“That the new government should do this at such an early stage sends entirely the wrong message to innocent victims.
“As the excellent editorial in Thursday’s News Letter highlighted, Lord Trimble had previously made the point that any inquiry into the murder of Pat Finucane should also involve a probe into the activities of Mr Finucane.
“Wicked and evil as this murder was, it was no more wicked and evil than the murders of Resident Magistrate William Staunton (who was shot by the IRA in front of his young daughter and her school friends), Judge Rory Conaghan (another judge shot in front of his daughter), Resident Magistrate Martin McBirney (shot again in his home in front of his family), Judge William Doyle (murdered as he left mass), Lord and Lady Gibson or law lecturer Edgar Graham. One also thinks of attack on the family of Judge Tom Travers in which young Mary Travers was murdered.
“For all the lectures about truth and justice, the truth is that the party John Finucane now represents not only defended and justified those wicked murders at the time but continues to do so right up to and including the present day.”
Rev Ivan Foster (Rtd)
13th September 2024