AN OFFICIAL inquiry by the Northern Ireland Office into the discovery of an IRA escape tunnel at the Maze prison, which will be headed by a senior civil servant, has been described as inadequate by the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP).
The investigation began yesterday and will take four weeks. The Northern Secretary, Sir Patrick Mayhew, said it would focus on how security at the jail could be improved to detect escape attempts. "Plainly, there are lessons that have to be learned," he said.
A prison officer on a random search on Sunday night discovered a tunnel in H-Block 7 leading to the perimeter security fence. H-Block 7 houses 95 IRA prisoners.
Unionist politicians had expressed concern about how the prisoners were able to dig the tunnel and conceal an estimated 13 tonnes of soil. Visits to republican prisoners in H4, H5 and H7 were cancelled yesterday.
Sir Patrick said he was glad that alert patrolling had thwarted the break-out attempt. He denied allegations that prisoners had too much freedom in the Maze and were effectively in control of the jail.
The inquiry will be led by Mr John Steele, the Northern Ireland Office's director of security policy and a former controller of prisons.
The DUP deputy leader, Mr Peter Robinson, said it was a "sham and a scandal" that the inquiry was to be carried out by the NIO.
"The Secretary of State is very deliberately asking the problem causers to investigate the problem," he said. "The public will not be satisfied with this. An independent outside review is essential, nothing else will do."
The Ulster Democratic Party's prisons spokesman, Mr John White, expressed concern that the inquiry would lead to more stringent conditions for loyalist inmates, who had acted blamelessly.
The Ulster Unionist Party has criticised the North's Security Minister, Sir John Wheeler, and the head of the prison service, Mr Alan Shannon, for refusing to comment on the break-out attempt. The party's security spokesman, Mr Ken Maginnis, said their silence was deplorable.
"They should have issued an initial statement because the public are very deeply concerned about what is going on inside the Maze," he said.
The Sinn Fein president, Mr Gerry Adams, said he would not want to see "reprisals" against republican prisoners in the Maze. A punitive penal policy would be counterproductive, he said. He called for visits for IRA inmates to be reintroduced immediately.
"The whole issue of the escape needs to be put into the context of the need to resolve the prison issue and of the positive contribution by the prisoners to the search for peace," he said.