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24 December 2004: In a statement issued by The Celtic League Secretary General, Mr Bernard Moffatt, reports that he had  written to the the Irish Minister for Justice, Mr Michael McDowell, asking why there were apparent obstructions being placed in the path of the long delayed inquest into the Seamus Ludlow murder.

Surprisingly, as Mr Moffatt reports, the Department of Justice says that the Garda Síochána has "always tried to cooperate fully with the Louth County Coroner over his enquiries into the death of Seamus Ludlow, who was murdered by Loyalist paramilitary's (very likely part of a murder gang run by the British Intelligence Services) almost thirty years ago".

A reply, dated 20th December 2004, from the Ministers Private Secretary
says;

"The Minister is informed by the Garda authorities that legal considerations arose in relation to the Louth County Coroner's request in this matter. However, the Minister is pleased to inform you that these issues have now been resolved, and it is understood that four documents, suitably redacted, have now been forwarded to the coroner and that these are in excess of the original request.

The Minister is further assured by the Garda authorities that the Garda Síochána has at all times sought to cooperate to the fullest extent possible with the Louth County Coroner on this issue."

To read the full Celtic League statement please follow this link >>>>.

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11 November 2004: In an RTE television  news report headlined Ludlow inquest preliminary hearing soon, it is revealed:

The Louth County Coroner is to hold a preliminary hearing in the coming weeks into the death of Seamus Ludlow, the forestry worker murdered by loyalists on 2 May 1976.

Ronan McGuire recently received and is still studying the so-called Murphy Report. That was the review of the original garda investigation into the murder, carried out by Superintendent Ted Murphy in the late 1990s.

Mr McGuire said he proposed holding a preliminary hearing involving members of the Ludlow family and garda representatives to discuss the scope of the inquest.

The full hearing into the death of Mr Ludlow will take place at a later date

The complete RTE report can be accessed by clicking on this link >>>.

See also: The Irish Daily Star (Northern Edition): Family wants truth about murder for a Ludlow family comment on the Barron inquiry.

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20 December 2003: See the following articles from the local Dundalk Democrat newspaper for comments on the recently published Barron Report on the Dublin and Monaghan bombings.

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10 December 2003: The long awaited publication of the private Barron Inquiry Report into the 17 May 1974 Dublin and Monaghan bombings, which caused the deaths of 33 men, women and children - plus an unborn child - and left some 240 people injured, failed to answer all the questions still being asked about this the worst single atrocity of the Troubles.

The Ludlow family, with another Barron Inquiry report into Seamus Ludlow's murder expected early in 2004, shares the Dublin and Monaghan families' disappointment in the failure of this Barron Report to bring final closure to the bereaved and injured. This failure now makes ever more pressing the families' demands for a public judicial inquiry where witnesses can be compelled to attend and give evidence under oath.

The outcome, after four years of investigation by Mr Justice Barron, and by his predecessor the late  Mr Justice Liam Hamilton, does not promote confidence in the private inquiry's forthcoming reports on the Dundalk bombing and the murder of Seamus Ludlow. These inquiries will also be hampered by missing files in the Department of Justice in Dublin and by British government indifference to requests for cooperation.

Mr Justice Barron's Report has disappointed many of the surviving victims and their relatives in that he failed to find evidence of high level collusion between the loyalist UVF murder gang and the British authorities in the Six Counties. 

Angela O'Neill, who lost her father in the attacks, said the report contained nothing that they did not already know.

"I do believe that the British State needs to be held accountable for the loss of those 33 lives... and the Irish State needs to be held accountable for their negligence in that," she said.

A solicitor representing relatives of some of the victims called for a public inquiry with powers to subpoena witnesses and documents.

"The problem is that this inquiry has been working behind closed doors for some time and simply hasn't delivered," said Des Doherty

"It's the fault of the process more than anything else - there's no other mechanism available."

He added: "How documents can go missing or cannot be found simply beggars belief."

While he did not exclude the possibility that individual RUC, UDR and British army/intelligence personnel may have been involved in a personal capacity in this outrage, Mr Justice Barron stopped short of contending that such collusion went higher. His failure to locate files in the Department of Justice - either lost or deliberately destroyed to prevent further revelations - and Britain's refusal to cooperate made such suspicions impossible to prove one way or another.

Somewhat implausibly, the Barron Report says the loyalists involved in the Dublin bombing were "capable of doing so without help" from any security forces in the North, "though this does not rule out the involvement of individual RUC, UDR or British army members".

Many, particularly in Dublin, believe the bombings were a warning shot from British intelligence for the Irish government not to interfere in the affairs of the Six Counties.  At least three of the bombing team, all now dead, have been identified as paid British informers.

Jane Winter, the director of British Irish Rights Watch (BIRW), London, who has made detailed submissions to the Barron Inquiry, said: "Forensic evidence suggested that the bombs in Dublin were very much more sophisticated than any bombs loyalists had used before or since. All went off within one and a half minutes of each other - a technical achievement never matched before or since. The implication is that they had outside help in making these bombs."

She said if collusion were found, there would be grave consequences for Britain internationally. "Here we are gaily telling the world how to run its own human rights affairs and holding ourselves up as an example of a developed democracy which doesn't do wicked things. But if Britain did collude with loyalists to bomb another country, that is an act of war."

Mr Justice Barron concluded that the then Fine Gael/Labour coalition government led by Mr Liam Cosgrave showed "little interest" in pursuing the perpetrators of the 1974 Dublin/Monaghan bombings.

The coalition government, according to the inquiry, failed to pursue the British after the prime minister, Mr Harold Wilson, told the then Taoiseach Mr Cosgrave in November 1974 they had identified the bombers and interned them.

"Following the meetings, there is no evidence that the information was passed, either to the minister for justice, or any of his officials, or indeed the Garda commissioner." This "absence of apparent interest", said Mr Justice Barron, "strongly suggested that the government made no efforts to assist the investigation into the bombings at a political level".

Mr Justice Barron said: "It can be said that the Government of the day showed little interest in the bombings."

The Barron Inquiry Report is also heavily critical of the Garda investigation into the Dublin and Monaghan bombing attacks, which Mr Justice Henry Barron said "remain the most devastating attack on the civilian population of this State to have taken place since the Troubles began".

The investigation, which was wound down without explanation in early 1975 - some reports say it was mothballed after only 12 weeks -  "failed to make full use of the information it obtained", according to the 288-page Barron inquiry report.

Criticising the Garda, Mr Justice Barron said: "The Garda investigation failed to make full use of the information it obtained. Certain lines of inquiry that could have been pursued further in this jurisdiction were not pursued." Detectives failed to interview suspects in Northern Ireland with the RUC's co-operation, and to collect vital forensic evidence from the bombing scenes, the report says.

However, the private inquiry found no evidence to back charges that the Garda investigation into the bombings was wound down because of cabinet interference.

The allegation was sharply rejected by the former Taoiseach, Mr Cosgrave and the former minister for justice Mr Paddy Cooney during their meetings with Mr Justice Barron.

The British army, the report said, foiled "a multiple cross-Border bombing attack in March, 1974 - two months before the attacks on Dublin and Monaghan, after it infiltrated loyalist paramilitaries.

"It does not seem believable that an attack on the scale of the Dublin bombings would be allowed to go ahead simply in order to protect an informant," said Mr Justice Barron.

Mr Justice Barron criticised the lack of co-operation by the British government, which refused to make original documents available to the inquiry. 

Following a trawl of 68,000 files, the then Northern Ireland secretary of state Dr John Reid provided a 16-page document - out of  the  millions of relevant documents it held - to the inquiry in February 2002, nearly 18 months after information was sought. With some justification, the British Government was widely criticised  over its “contempt” for the Barron Inquiry 

The Ludlow family is aware that the British authorities are also failing to provide the still ongoing Barron Inquiry with documents it requested regarding the May 1976 murder of Seamus Ludlow.

Calling for a full public inquiry into the Dublin and Monaghan bombings, Greg O'Neill, the solicitor representing the Justice for the Forgotten group, said the British government must choose "whether or not it wants to be eternally suspected of being involved in supporting terrorism".

In another disturbing aspect of state obstruction  that will likely impact upon Mr Justice Barron's inquiry into the Seamus Ludlow murder and the Dundalk bombing of December 1975, a file of photographs of suspects collected by the Garda, which were shown to potential witnesses in the weeks after the bombings, "have been missing since 1993 at least".

It has been revealed that many relevant files held by the Department of Justice are missing - leading to a suspicion that they may have been shredded, thus hampering the Barron Inquiry effort at reaching the truth behind collusion in these cases. 

Speaking in Leinster House (Irish parliament), the Tanaiste Mary Harney thanked Mr Justice Barron on behalf of the Irish Government for his work on the report, and said she had no doubt its findings would be debated in the House in the New Year.

The Oireachtas committee met in private this afternoon to consider the report and it is expected to discuss its contents with its author, Justice Henry Barron.

A report into the bombings and allegations that British security services colluded with the loyalist paramilitary UVF was ordered more than three years ago by the Irish Government. No one has ever been charged in connection with the offences.

Representatives of Justice for the Forgotten, which represents about 150 survivors of the attacks and victims', met the Taoiseach in private at Government Buildings today. The group is expected to call for a full public inquiry. 

The Barron report was welcomed by Justice for the Forgotten.  Mr Greg O'Neill, solicitor for Justice for the Forgotten, said it was "an immensely important stage in the struggle of families for truth and justice".

However, three families, denouncing the Barron Report as a shambles, walked out of an earlier press conference held by the Joint Oireachtas Committee to announce the findings. Others dismissed the Report as a "re-hash of what is already in the public domain" and renewed calls for a public inquiry. 

Bernadette McNally, the chairperson of Justice for the Forgotten, said the onus was now on the Irish government to seek the full truth of the bombings. 

“It’s the responsibility of the Irish government to open every door, to force it open whatever way they can, take the responsibility for this off (Barron) and do the work they should have done 30 years ago.”

“The combination of incompetence and downright carelessness on the part of those charged with protecting the citizens of Ireland is absolutely damnable,” said Mr O’Neill.

“The time for private inquiries is over. It is no longer our burden. Damnable facts have been established, and it is now your responsibility.

“This campaign is calling on the Irish government ... to take up the responsibilities and to discharge them to the families, to the dead, to the survivors and to the people of Ireland.

“There are people who are available in this state who need to be put in the witness box and cross-examined. The time for private inquiries into these matters is over.” 

The Barron Report can be downloaded in pdf format from http://www.irlgov.ie/oireachtas/Committees-29th-Dáil/jcjedwr-debates/InterimDubMon.pdf

See also: 10.12.03 Statement by An Taoiseach Bertie Ahern TD on the publication of the Barron Report into the Dublin and Monaghan Bombings 1974

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8 November 2003: The Dundalk Democrat published three articles in which Jimmy Sharkey, a member of the Ludlow family, reacted to the recent handing of the completed private Barron Inquiry report on the Dublin and Monaghan bombings to Taoiseach Bertie Ahern, as well as the proposed fresh inquest into the death of his uncle Seamus Ludlow, which is now expected to take place in January 2004. 

Please use the following links to read the three articles: Dundalk bombing and Ludlow murder ignored;

Family feel inquiry will make little difference;

Inquest could be next January

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2 November 3003: In a Sunday Independent article ,  Net is closing in on Dublin car bombers, Joe Tiernan writes about the completion of the private Barron Inquiry report on the Dublin and Monaghan bombings of 17 May 1974. 

Referring to the many unsolved loyalist crimes south of the border, he comments: 

"48 people were killed south of the border, yet not a single individual has been convicted of any of these murders".

Ludlow family member Jimmy Sharkey was one of the interviewees featured in this article.

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Copyright © 2005 the Ludlow family. All rights reserved.
Revised: September 04, 2005