Sir, – I was saddened to read that Taoiseach Leo Varadkar was threatening to take Britain to the European Court of Human Rights if the UK’s Troubles legacy Bill becomes law, saying in the Dáil he would “give consideration to whether an interstate case is appropriate” (News, June 21st).
There is a strong element of hypocrisy in attacks on the Bill’s proposed immunity, given the three 1920s amnesties in the Irish Free State for soldiers, on all sides, a topic not brought up during recent discussions in the decade of centenaries.
Since the 1998 Belfast Agreement, there have also been a large number of part-amnesties to which the Irish government has subscribed, like the early release of convicted prisoners, or even demanded, like an end to UK requests for extradition. This is not to mention the “On the Run” letters of comfort for those who fled across the Border.
An interstate case is inappropriate for a number of reasons, both political and practical. There are a series of cases known as the McKerr Group already in front of the Committee of Ministers, the court’s enforcement body in Strasbourg. The lead case was judged nearly 25 years ago and refers to a death in 1982.
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The UK is called to account every quarter at these meetings where Ireland takes the lead role.
The issues remain unresolved but the UK argues that the legacy Bill can and will meet the court’s requirements. Ireland will obviously continue to argue not.
However, there is no need to clutter the already hugely overcrowded human rights court with a duplicate application.
Ireland’s last interstate case against the UK, a demand in 2014 to reopen the 1971 torture allegations, that were judged in 1978 by the court to involve inhumane treatment, failed by seven votes to one. It took four years to decide.
Such a timeframe suggests the new arrangements proposed in the legacy Bill would be near conclusion before any further Strasbourg judgment and thus a further application would be practically pointless.
Dublin, in its diplomatic policy, seems increasingly led by Northern ultras on these issues but the end result is more likely to undermine support for the Council of Europe in Britain, already a live and fraught debate, than force London to radically amend its Bill.
Interstate cases are rare. The only current one, not involving Russia or Armenia, is Liechtenstein v the Czech Republic which concerns the seizure in 1945 of the art treasures of head of state Prince Hans-Adam II.
I have been through Strasbourg, in a seven-year case judged in my favour in 1981 over a breach of human rights due to the criminalisation of homosexuals in Northern Ireland. A year later, London changed the law. In the case of David Norris’s Strasbourg success, it took the Irish government five years from 1988 to 1993 to effect decriminalisation.
Strasbourg is best kept as a guardian a court of last resort regarding extreme denials of rights where governments concerned are not minded to compromise and not for repetitive point-scoring. – Yours, etc,
JEFF DUDGEON,
Belfast.