A man was cleared today of murdering Robert McCartney, who was beaten and stabbed to death outside a Belfast bar in an attack blamed on IRA members.

Robert McCartney turned to his friend during the vicious assault which ended in his fatal stabbing and gasped: “Nobody deserves this”, a court heard today.

A woman testified today from behind a screen, her voice disguised but her weeping still apparent, that she was assaulted and tortured with beatings and electric shocks by Saddam Hussein’s agents.