McGuinness 'lied to Bloody Sunday probe'

Sinn Féin chief Martin McGuinness was accused today of lying to the Saville Inquiry when he claimed he sought permission from a family to give the whereabouts of an IRA safe house on Bloody Sunday.

On the final day of oral evidence at the inquiry, the leader of the Provos in Derry in January 1972 said the house at Stanley’s Walk in the Bogside, where members of the IRA met in the aftermath of the shootings, was now derelict.

Asked if he was putting anyone in danger by pointing out the location of the house, the former OC, known as PIRA 24, said: “Not at all.”

Edwin Glasgow QC, representing most of the soldiers, said this showed that Mr McGuinness had engaged in an elaborate deception.

He said the Sinn Féin chief had testified on oath that he had gone to the family and asked for permission to identify the house.

“I am going to suggest that was an elaborate piece of deceit but, so far as you know, there is no reason at all why the address of that house should not have been frankly identified straight away.”

On the second day of his evidence, PIRA 24 refused to name the whereabouts of an arms dump in the Bogside, from where he claimed weapons were moved the night before Bloody Sunday.

Mr Glasgow said he would be submitting that he was in contempt of the tribunal but PIRA 24 insisted that the location was not relevant to the inquiry.

The lawyer called on him to explain his reasons for not answering to the families and the soldiers and the people on both sides of the Irish Sea.

“Why should the commanding officer of the IRA, who has come along, stage-managed to give his evidence on the last day of this tribunal, why should he be in contempt of this tribunal and effectively sneer at all the people that I have just outlined?” he asked.

When PIRA 24 completes his testimony, the evidence session at the tribunal will come to an end.

Lord Saville and his two fellow judges, William Hoyt and John Toohey, are expected to deliver the findings in the first half of 2005, more than seven years after Prime Minister Tony Blair announced to the House of Commons that the inquiry was being set up.

The quest to find out the truth of what happened on January 1972 has occupied 427 days of direct testimony.

Now the lawyers will go away and prepare their written submissions which have to be delivered to the tribunal and circulated to other interested parties by March 12.

On June 7, the inquiry team will return to the Guildhall in Derry for oral sessions to seek clarification of anything in the written submissions.

The equipment will be kept in place at the Guildhall for the closing statement by Counsel to the Inquiry Christopher Clarke QC, beginning on October 4.