Adams ‘proud’ of his ‘association’ with the IRA

SINN FÉIN president Gerry Adams says he is “proud” of the IRA and his “association” with it.

It comes after a new book alleged Mr Adams was a senior IRA figure involved in some of the worst atrocities in the Troubles, including the murder of mother-of-10 Jean McConville in 1972.

Speaking at the Sinn Féin Easter commemoration in Belfast’s Milltown Cemetery yesterday, Mr Adams insisted he was not a “militarist”, but failed to confirm or deny he was a member of the IRA.

He said he would not “bend to the demands” of “anti-republicans” or “hostile sections of the media” to clarify exactly what his “association” entailed.

The book, Voices from the Grave, by journalist Ed Moloney, details interviews with former IRA commander Brendan ‘The Dark’ Hughes which were carried out in 2001 and 2002.

Hughes, who died in 2008, gave the interviews to a Boston College researcher on condition that they would not be published until after his death.

Among Hughes’ allegations are that Mr Adams ordered the “disappearance” of Jean McConville, who was taken from her home, executed and secretly buried because of the IRA’s belief that she was a British Army informer.

Mr Adams has denied the allegations, but said yesterday he was “very conscious of the human cost of the war and the great hurt inflicted by republicans”.

“I have acknowledged this and my regret for this many times. And I do so again today,” he said. “There are victims and citizens who want to know the truth about what happened to loved ones during the conflict. That is their right.”

Mr Adams said Sinn Féin supported the idea of a “truth recovery process” and that he would “be prepared to be part of such a process” if one were established.

But while “the war should never be glamorised or repeated”, neither should the IRA’s involvement in it “be permitted by us to be criminalised or retrospectively delegitimised”, he added.

“I am proud of that army and my association with it,” he said.

“I am not a militarist and I never have been, but without the IRA, the nationalist people of this state would still be on our knees.”

Mr Adams acknowledged that during the 70s, in particular, he and others had to go on the run and assume false names. But he did not divulge further detail.

“We relied totally on the support of the people to protect us,” he said of that time. “And we, in turn, protected the people as best we could.

“We did not divulge their names, their roles, their actions. That is still my position.”