At its meeting in Strasbourg on 7 December, the Council of Europe Committee of Ministers discussed the implementation of the judgments in the McKerr and Others group of cases which includes the case of the late Pat Finucane, to which the Deputy specifically refers.
Ireland’s statement to the Committee expressed the Government’s disappointment that the legacy institutions provided for in the Stormont House Agreement have not yet been established and its determination to continue to work to achieve this as soon as possible. Our statement also proposed that the Committee of Ministers should strongly encourage the UK to do all it can to make progress in these matters, in recognition of its obligations under the Convention and the judgments of the European Court of Human Rights in the McKerr group of cases.
The Committee of Ministers’ review of the implementation of judgments of the European Court of Human Rights in the McKerr group of cases relates to the need for effective investigations compliant with Article 2 of the Convention. The Committee therefore did not directly consider the Independent Commission on Information Retrieval (ICIR). The ICIR is one of the bodies provided for under the Stormont House Agreement and Ireland’s statement made clear the Government’s support for this comprehensive legacy framework; this framework included a Historical Investigations Unit (HIU) which will deal specifically with the investigation of Troubles related deaths.
In relation to the case of the late Pat Finucane, the Government underlined its long standing position that a satisfactory outcome will be best achieved through a full public inquiry, and called on the British Government to fulfil the commitment made in this regard at Weston Park in 2001. The Committee of Ministers maintained their decision that it would reconsider the re-opening of measures on the Finucane case when the ongoing domestic proceedings have concluded.
The full text of Ireland’s statement to the Committee of Ministers is available on my Department’s website at: www.dfa.ie/news-and-media/press-releases/press-release-archive/2016/december/legacy-issues-council-of-europe/.
