Ministers apologise to murdered RUC officers’ families

Government ministers have apologised to the families of two senior RUC officers killed by the IRA with the help of at least one or more gardaí.

Chief Superintendent Harry Breen and Superintendent Bob Buchanan were on their way home from Dundalk Garda Station when they were murdered in an IRA ambush just north of the border near Jonesborough, south Armagh, on Mar 20, 1989.

In his 500-page report, Mr Justice Peter Smithwick says there “is no record of a phone call, no traceable payment, no smoking gun” but he is satisfied that “on the balance of probability” one or more gardaí supplied information to the IRA.