Police witnesses at the Bloody Sunday inquiry should be granted anonymity and should only be allowed to give evidence to the three-man tribunal team from behind a protective screen, according to a barrister representing the RUC.
Mr Stephen Ritchie was speaking on the second day of the inquiry in Derry's Guildhall yesterday. The request for anonymity was opposed by a lawyer representing one of the victim's families.
Mr Ritchie said his application referred to three serving policemen, known to the inquiry as Officers A, B and C. He said all three feared for their personal safety if they had to give evidence without screening and without anonymity .
He said Officer A was a Special Branch officer based at the RUC's Belfast headquarters and made frequent visits to a close relative who lives in Derry.
His fear was that were he to give evidence to the inquiry without his anonymity being protected, he would be unable to return to the city, without his life or the life of a relative being placed in jeopardy", Mr Ritchie said.
Officer B was also described by Mr Ritchie as a Special Branch officer who lives in Derry.
"People in the wider community would not necessarily know he was a police officer. Were he to be identified as a police officer, there is the possibility that he could suffer an attack and consequently his effectiveness in his present duties would be adversely affected", he said.
The RUC barrister said Officer C had had to leave Derry twice in the period since 1972, due to intelligence reports that he was being targeted by republican terrorists. He said that Officer C's home was once attacked by the Provisional IRA, who used an explosive device.
He is also stationed in another part of Northern Ireland now and there had been no further incidents, but he feared the consequences of being identified if he is required to give evidence may be renewed attempts on his life.
Mr Ritchie said the evidence of Officers B and C was likely to be controversial. "The fact that it is controversial means that they may be saying things certain people may not agree with, may not want to hear, and thereby the threat to them may be increased", said Mr Ritchie. However, Lord Gifford QC, representing the family of one of the Bloody Sunday victims, said his clients believed it would be fundamentally wrong for the tribunal to grant anonymity to serving or former soldiers or police officers.
"It would negate the very purpose of the inquiry. At its root, the purpose of the inquiry is to discover and to bring to light who killed their relatives and other citizens of this city, in what circumstances they were killed, and why and how they were killed," he said.