No more Savilles

With the publication of the Saville report, Northern Ireland will be dragged back into one of the bloodiest years of our painful past. In 1972, 496 people died in our Troubles the highest death count during 30 years of violence. It was a year marked by bloodshed and grief: Bloody Sunday, Bloody Friday (when the IRA targeted Belfast's civilian population) and the murders of 17 police officers and 134 soldiers.

Now 38 years later, Northern Ireland's politics and society will be again bitterly divided by the events and grief of that year. Saville addresses one set of victims, those who lost loved ones on 30th January 1972. The pain and grief of other families will wrongly be largely ignored tomorrow. Just days before Bloody Sunday, police Sergeant Peter Gilgunn and Constable David Montgomery were murdered by Republicans in Londonderry. A 12 year, £200 million inquiry has considered the circumstances surrounding the deaths of 13 people on 30th January 1972. But the two constables murdered on 27th January 1972 have been forgotten. Put simply, this is no way to approach our past.

In the controversy that will inevitably surround the publication of Saville, three issues need to be borne in mind. Firstly, whatever the confusions and mistakes of Bloody Sunday, it must always be recognised that the honourable service and sacrifice of the Army and the RUC delivered Northern Ireland from even worse violence and eventually established the foundations for peace. In particular, this includes recognising the service and sacrifice of the Parachute Regiment.

Secondly, there was no justification for the IRA's campaign of terror. That campaign was already well under way before the events of 30th January 1972. In 1971, the IRA had murdered 86 people. In opening weeks of January 1972, the IRA was responsible for 8 murders. Any attempt by Republicans to use Bloody Sunday to retrospectively justify three decades of terrorism is a perversion of history.

Finally, Saville has exposed the fatal weakness of a selective approach to dealing with the Past. 497 people died in the worst year of our Troubles. Saville is a selective inquiry into the deaths of 13. The pain and loss of those families must be recognized - but it is a pain and loss shared by many hundreds of families in Northern Ireland and Great Britain.

It is against this background that many of us in Northern Ireland will reflect on the findings of Saville. We will sympathise with the pain and grief of the families while remembering the many more families who also grieve. We will continue to respect the rule of law, knowing that it separated the security forces from the terrorists while asking if, 38 years after the events of that confusing day in January 1972, the public interest is served in prosecuting soldiers but not the godfathers of terrorism. And we will refute any attempt by Sinn Fein to manipulate those events to serve as attempted justification for decades of murders and bombings.

There is another aspect of the debate around Saville that cannot be ignored, despite the difficulties it raises for the political process.

While former soldiers from the Parachute Regiment and their commanders were exposed to intense scrutiny of their actions on that day, the IRA and its members have not been exposed to similar scrutiny. It was the IRA which created the context for Bloody Sunday forcing the government to deploy the military on the streets of Northern Ireland. And it was the IRA which targeted and murdered soldiers and police officers in the run-up to Bloody Sunday. This leaves a question mark hanging over the actions of the deputy First Minister, Martin McGuinness. By his own admission, he was 2nd in command of the IRA in Londonderry in January 1972. When asked during the Saville Inquiry about IRA activities in the events leading up to and on the day itself, he refused to answer on the basis of the Republican 'code of honour'.

His refusal to provide an honest and complete account of his activities leaves many significant questions unanswered. Not the least of these is his role in and knowledge of the murders of Sergeant Gilgunn and Constable Montgomery in the Creggan on 27th January 1972. Until he and other IRA members give the people of Northern Ireland an honest and complete account of their activities, we will not know the full truth about Bloody Sunday in particular and the Troubles in general. The continued claim by Sinn Fein leader Gerry Adams that he was never a member of the IRA is an example of Republicanism's inability to confront the truth of its role during the Troubles.

The cost of Saville has not just been the £200million of taxpayers' money. It is also in the pain and division it has brought through a selective investigation into the Past. It has brought Northern Ireland back to a time of bloodshed and bitter divisions. It has alienated many because of its focus on the loss of some. If we have learnt one thing, it must be this - no more Savilles.