Ever
since Peter Brooke, as Northern Ireland Secretary
of State, made his 1990 statement that Britain
had no selfish strategic interest for remaining
in Ireland most people have come to accept that
Brooke called it pretty much as it was. Northern
Irish unionism rather than any imperialist imperative
on the part of the British state was what ensured
the continuation of partition.
Enter
MI5. That situation now demands some reappraisal.
With the new MI5 building at Hollywood, County
Down, designed to monitor and combat ‘international
terrorism’ the British state now has a long
term strategic interest in keeping the North within
the UK. Having a security service as the fulcrum
on which long term political strategy turns is
not without considerable consequences for human
rights.
This
becomes all the more pronounced in the wake of
the Northern Ireland’s policing Ombudsman
Nuala O’Loan’s damming report on collusion
between RUC Special Branch and loyalist murder
gangs. Special Branch emerged from that report
looking pretty indistinguishable from the terrorist
gang, whose murder campaign it was complicit.
The
lesson is simple - those who police society from
the shadows are often more shadowy and sinister
than the forces they seek to monitor. They are
therefore to be trusted only reluctantly and always
in the wake of a serious health and safety check
which pronounces them fit for democratic purpose.
One
crucial body whose task it is in democratic society
to perform such health and safety checks, the
press, is now being forced on the back foot by
a state eager to curb the prowess of the press
and enhance the powers of the security services.
The recently drafted Policing (Miscellaneous Provisions)
Northern Ireland Order allows PSNI personnel to
seize notes and electronic records for up to 96
hours. Claiming that new powers are needed because
of "the increasingly sophisticated nature
of serious crime" the Northern Ireland police
guided by the intelligence agencies will now be
able to mount surgical strikes aimed at heading
off at the pass any journalistic investigation
into the activities of the security agencies.
The irony of course is that the body most recently
exposed as having being up to its neck in terrorism
was a crucial element in the British state security
apparatus, RUC Special Branch. It is a matter
of public record how abusive the security services
are whatever their guise. Why increase their scope
for abuse?
This
move comes at a time when documentation is either,
depending on whose ox is being gored, a crucial
asset or liability being fought over by contesting
sides. MI5 currently want their documents back
from the Stevens team, whose task it has been
for the best part of two decades to investigate
collusion between the security services and armed
groups in the island of Ireland. The new legislation
currently being proposed will allow the same agencies
to pervert the course of justice. It is to curb
journalists from publishing their findings and
also to intimidate whistleblowers and other sources
from providing journalists with the much needed
information that would lift the lid on nefarious
state activities.
There
is of course nothing new about this. The British
state has been involved in numerous cover ups
since it sent its troops onto Northern Irish streets
in 1969. In 1972 Prime Minister Edward Heath set
the parameters for justice when he told Lord Widgery
on the eve of his inquiry into the bloody Sunday
killings to be mindful that the war being waged
by the British had a propaganda dimension. Widgery
duly obliged and his name has been synonymous
with whitewash ever since.
The
former Greater Manchester Chief Constable, John
Stalker, almost had his career destroyed in the
1980s when he began to investigate RUC shoot to
kill operations which were carried out at the
behest of the intelligence agencies. Canadian
Judge Peter Cory, who in recent years investigated
security service collusion, was reportedly furious
with the British government’s tardy and obstructive
approach to his findings and recommendations.
In
other cases, including the 2005 trial of the MI5
agent Denis Donaldson, prosecutions were aborted
or alternatively, Public Immunity Certificates
were issued by the British state in a bid to ensure
that knowledge about informers did not come to
public attention. Arguably this was less rooted
in concern for the welfare of informers than it
was in the need to shield from democratic scrutiny
the fact that information received that could
have prevented death was in fact not acted upon.
This issue is at the heart of concerns over the
role of MI5 in relation to the 1998 Real IRA bombing
of Omagh town which produced massive civilian
casualties.
If
democratic scrutiny is to have any currency in
Northern Ireland, an unhindered press is a necessity
rather than something to be doled out or withdrawn
in accordance with the self serving interests
of the government of the day. Censorship complementing
cover ups might suit the state; it is disastrous
for society.
Index
on Censorship
