UK laws dealing with Troubles legacy face legal challenge in North

It is incumbent on the Irish Government to “stand with victims” and pursue an interstate case against the UK government’s controversial law ending Troubles-related prosecutions, according to Amnesty International. The human rights organisation was speaking outside the High Court in Belfast on Tuesday ahead of a legal challenge by victims’ families to the legislation, which will offer an conditional amnesty to perpetrators of crimes linked to the North’s 30-year conflict.

Inquests into those who died during the Troubles will also end under the new law. On the first day of the hearing expected to last a week, a bereaved widow said her family has been “destroyed” by the murder of her husband by loyalist paramilitaries in 1997. Martina Dillon appealed to the courts to intervene.

Seamus Dillon (45) was shot dead by the Loyalist Volunteer Force (LVF) when he was working as a doorman outside a disco at a Dungannon hotel two days after Christmas in retaliation for the murder of LVF leader, Billy Wright. A priest at Mr Dillon’s funeral said he gave his life trying to protect hundreds of young Co Tyrone people.

“I’ve had three days of an inquest last April and if my inquest isn’t finished by May, I won’t have an inquest,” Martina Dillon said on Tuesday. “I’ll never get over losing my husband. His family will never get over losing him. It never goes away, you live with it morning, noon and night. It’s with you all the time. “I’ve put all my hope and faith into this (legal challenge) and hope the courts will listen to us. Please help us all … truth and justice are not too much to ask, we shouldn’t have to fight for decades to get it.”

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Fiercely opposed by the North’s five main political parties, the Irish Government, US politicians and human rights groups, the Northern Ireland Troubles (Legacy and Reconciliation) Act received royal assent in September. A new independent body has been created by the British government to promote reconciliation and “information recovery” in its aim to “draw a line” under the North’s past.

Nineteen separate legal challenges were lodged against the legislation, but a judge ruled that only one lead case would be heard due to time pressures. The case is being brought by a number of relatives of victims, as well a survivor of a gun attack.

Opening the hearing on their behalf, John Larkin told the court how each relative had been affected by the conflict, adding that their hurt was so intense that “no words of mine can pretend to do justice to them.”

In September, Taoiseach Leo Varadkar said the Government was waiting on legal advice on the possibility of taking an interstate case against the UK government to challenge the law. Addressing media prior to the court hearing, Amnesty’s International’s UK Northern Ireland deputy director, Gráinne Teggart, called on the Government to act “swiftly”, saying it is “not right that the burden of legal challenge falls solely on the shoulders of victims”.

“The Irish Government has been unequivocal from the outset in their opposition to this law; that is welcome,” she added. “But we need to see the follow-through with that opposition now. There is one course of action available to the Irish government and it is an interstate case. Let’s not forget there is precedent for this - we saw it in the case of the Hooded Men. So it incumbent on the Irish Government to stand with victims and we call on them to do that.”