It looks like they're running scared. The delay in publishing the Cory
Report, the cloak-and-dagger nature of its delivery to the families, and the
doubt about the nature of any inquiries leaves the impression the State has
plenty to hide.
If it wasn't for the high-profile nature of the Finucanes campaign, or the
long, lonely struggle waged by David Wright, the questions surrounding these
murders could well have been buried with the victims.
We would have dismissed rumours of collusion as crackpot, conspiracy
theories. The occurrence - though perhaps not the extent - of collusion is
finally being accepted across the community, although some believe it was
justified.
They are wrong. For the state to plot, or turn a blind eye to the murder of
its citizens, is the antithesis of the justice and democracy it claims to
uphold.
The government should today set up full judicial public inquiries with the
power to compel witnesses and documents. A Hutton-style inquiry would be
totally inadequate.
Nothing less than absolute openness and transparency will do. Nationalists
tend to support inquiries in the Finucane, Nelson and Hamill cases but
instinctively feel Billy Wright deserved his fate.
Unionists often believe the opposite. Such reactions are small-minded and
sectarian. Solicitors who defend IRA members; working-class nationalist
youths; LVF leaders - they all merit equal rights in life and death.
