Victims of Dundalk bombing honoured

 

By Valerie Robinson

Two men killed in the 1975 Dundalk bombing are to be honoured today (Wednesday) when a memorial is unveiled by their families in the Co Louth town on the 32nd anniversary of their murders.

Fireman Jack Rooney and tailor Hugh Watters, both in their sixties, were killed when a car bomb exploded outside Kay's Tavern on Crowe Street, Dundalk on December 19 1975.

Mr Rooney's daughter Maura McKeever said that the bronze and stainless steel memorial would be a celebration of the men's lives, depicting aspects of their professions, rather than concentrating on the violent manner of their killings.

"This is going to be a sad occasion but it will also be happy in that it will help us to remember the men they were," she said.

Dundalk councillor Jim Darcy will conduct the unveiling, which will be witnessed by the dead men's families as well as a number of people killed in the loyalist blast.

Ms McKeever said the families looked forward to the Dail and Seanad debates in the new year on security forces collusion but remained convinced that greater cooperation was needed from the British authorities to move the matter forward.

"We want them to admit that collusion occurred. The British government has always said that the problem only involved a few bad apples but we know that wasn't the case," she said.

Ms McKeever welcomed last month's ruling by the European Court of Human Rights that allegations of security force collusion in a series of loyalist murders in the 1970s were not properly investigated.

The report by Mr Justice Henry Barron had previously said there was a "high probability of collusion between loyalists and security forces", although the allegations had been impossible to prove.

Last December an Oireachtas committee disappointed relatives by falling short of ordering a full public inquiry into the killings.

The so-called Glennane gang, which was made up of UDR and RUC members, is believed to have been behind most of the UVF attacks covered in both reports