British security forces colluded with loyalist paramilitaries to murder Belfast solicitor Pat Finucane, the head of Northern Ireland's Human Rights Commission said today.
Professor Brice Dickson added that an inquiry into the murder nearly 13 years ago is now a matter of time.
Mr Finucane was shot dead outside his home ago by loyalists for his representation of nationalists in the North.
Prof Dickson told a human rights conference in Dublin that the Human Rights Commission for Northern Ireland was satisfied there had been collusion between loyalist paramilitaries and the British security forces in Mr Finucane’s murder.
Calling for public judicial inquiry into the murder, Prof Dickson said: "I believe some such inquiry will eventually take place – it is now only a question of when rather than if."
But he said he did not believe the inquiry called for by the Irish and British government in August 2001 would go far enough to allay the Commission’s concerns over the case.
Prof Dickson said the Commission would continue to monitor the case of human rights lawyer Ms Rosemary Nelson’s killing but said it had not seen enough evidence of collusion to call for a public inquiry.
Criticising RUC Special Branches’ handling of informers in the North, Prof Dickson said: "I firmly believe that there is a very nasty can of worms still to be opened as far as that particular kind of activity is concerned."
The Police Ombudsman for Northern Ireland’s report on the police investigation into the Omagh bomb in 1998 indicated "what horrors" may still need to be uncovered, he said.
Prof Dickson expressed his disappointment with the British government in its failure to grant the Commission the legal power to compel people to give written or verbal evidence. This impinged on its ability to uncover human rights abuses.
The Commissioner paid tribute to Sunday Worldjournalist Martin O'Hagan who was murdered by loyalists last year. He also commended the work of Mr Martin O'Brien and Ms Jane Winter along with investigative journalists who worked to uncover human rights abuses.