McGuinness tells lawyers not to cross-examine MI5 witnesses

SINN FÉIN’S Martin McGuinness has instructed his legal team to play no part in the cross-examination of MI5 agents due to give evidence to the Bloody Sunday tribunal this week.

Mr McGuinness, who has admitted being the Provisional IRA’s number two on Bloody Sunday, has denied claims by an agent known as Infliction that he fired the first shot on the day.

Infliction is not appearing at the inquiry, but his handlers will give evidence tomorrow.

Speaking in Belfast yesterday, Mr McGuinness described the allegation as “bogus and wholly unsubstantiated”. He was critical of the fact that neither his lawyers nor those representing the Bloody Sunday families would be able to cross-examine Infliction or challenge his allegations.

“My legal team have been informed that the cross-examination of the British intelligence handlers and other security officers, who are being called to authenticate the evidence of unnamed informers, will be restricted in an unprecedented manner,” he said.

He added that, following consultation with his legal team, he had decided that “they should not participate in this sham of a cross-examination”.

Meanwhile, an MI5 informer who alleged he was told the IRA fired the first shots was described as a brave man and a valuable agent yesterday.

An MI5 officer who handled Observer B in the 1970s said he believed the information given by the deceased informer was reliable.

The officer, known only by his codename Julian, was screened from the public gallery at the Saville Inquiry in Methodist Central Hall in London to maintain his anonymity.

He said Observer B, who also claimed he saw IRA members being drilled in military techniques in the week before Bloody Sunday, was “perfectly reliable and truthful”.

“I would say that Observer B, also known as Julian, was a valuable agent. He didn’t have anything to gain by lying to us. I believe his motivation to have been a desire for peace. He was a brave man in that the work he undertook was very dangerous,” he said.

Observer B is the first of several security service officers who will give evidence to the inquiry in the next two weeks about what intelligence they had about IRA activity at the time of Bloody Sunday.

The inquiry is examining the events of January 30, 1972, when 13 civilians were shot dead by soldiers during a civil rights march in Londonderry. A 14th person died later.