Hume denies passing information to British Army

Former SDLP leader John Hume has denied giving information about IRA arms dumps to the British Army in the months before Bloody Sunday.

In evidence to the Saville Inquiry today, Colonel Roy Jackson, a commander in the Royal Anglican Regiment at the time, said Mr Hume passed on the information in August 1971 after he was arrested at an anti-internment protest.

Colonel Jackson said Mr Hume directed him towards a place in the Bogside where arms and explosives could possibly be found.

Speaking from the United States, where he is on a lecture tour, Mr Hume said the Colonel's claims were designed to deflect attention from the real subject of the inquiry - the killing of 13 unarmed Catholic civil rights marchers by British soldiers on January 30, 1972.

The 1998 Nobel Peace Prize winner said: "The allegation that I gave information to the British Army about the location of weapons in Derry in 1971 is absolute nonsense. It is completely untrue.

"I wouldn't even have had a clue where arms dumps were. This is a cynical attempt to divert attention away from those guilty of the slaughter of innocent people in Derry on Bloody Sunday."