Sinn Féin president Gerry Adams has stated that the secret burials of Jean McConville and the other "disappeared" were a violation of human rights, although he declined to comment on whether the actual killings were such a violation.
On Friday, Northern Ireland Police Ombudsman Nuala O'Loan said from her investigation of the police handling of the murder investigation into Mrs McConville's death in 1972 that she found she was not a British army informer.
The IRA, however, responded with a weekend statement saying Mrs McConville "was working as an informer for the British army".
Mr Adams said yesterday that up to a week or two ago he had been in regular contact with Michael McConville, son of Mrs McConville, who has asked the IRA to apologise for labelling her an informer.
He understood that Mr McConville rejected the IRA claim.
"I think the McConville family in many ways epitomise the awful wrong that was done to people who weren't allowed to bury those who were killed by the IRA," he added.
His and the republican commitment was to "continue with this in good times and bad times", to try to help locate the bodies so that the families of the "disappeared" could find "closure".
"I don't think republicans deserve any credit for any of what they are trying to do. I think it is a simple straightforward case of being a human rights violation, of being an injustice, of being a wrong, and us trying to do our best to correct that in so far as we can," he added.
The Irish Times asked him was it a human rights violation that Jean McConville and the others were killed?
"It is a human rights violation that they didn't have their remains to be buried," he said, also making reference to "the whole other issue of the 3,000 people who were killed in the course of the conflict".
When further asked was the actual killing of Mrs McConville and the "disappeared" not one of the key questions to be answered by republicans following the weekend statements by the IRA and the Police Ombudsman, he replied: "With respect, it was not the key question that was asked. It was the key question some people were asking. I talked to republican families whose loved ones were killed as informers and, while they obviously have no grá for the IRA over this, they also were angry that the British government or British forces had tricked or blackmailed or trapped their loved ones into being informers. So, I am just not going to go down that road."
He was further asked by The Irish Times was he not avoiding what many believed was a key question: was the IRA justified in killing Jean McConville? Mr Adams replied: "I am not going to answer the question. I don't trust the way you would carry such an interview." Opinion, page 14
