Adams accuses Blair of ‘protecting’ army officers

BRITISH Prime Minister Tony Blair was yesterday accused of “protecting” army intelligence officers involved in killings in Northern Ireland.

On the 15th anniversary of the controversial shooting of Belfast solicitor Pat Finucane by the Ulster Freedom Fighters, Sinn Féin president Gerry Adams accused the British Government of hiding from allegations of security force involvement.

As the nationalist SDLP and Sinn Féin staged protests in Belfast about the Government’s failure to publish a report by retired Canadian judge Peter Cory into the solicitor’s killing, Mr Adams said in Australia: “Pat Finucane was murdered as a result of Britain’s very deliberate policy of state-sanctioned murder.