At last we've seen the sordid truth of what happened on that fateful Sunday afternoon in Derry in 1972. It's a truth that for many was suspected. After one establishment cover-up in the 1970s (aka Lord Widgery's Enquiry), the Saville Enquiry - all those years later - has disclosed that the British Army were the first to fire the shots which resulted in a significant number of civilian deaths. For the sake of the Catholic families affected by this atrocity, I'm glad that they have had the result that had been denied them for so long.
Although I understand and sympathise with their reasons, I'm no starry-eyed supporter of the IRA/Sinn Fein; they - along with their Loyalist paramilitary counterparts - have a great deal of blood on their hands and in their consciences. Although political processes grind on and public memories tend to blur after the passage of time now that a measure of peace and stability has been established, the undeniable fact is that the UK Government must also bear a significant share of the blame for this and a lot of other wanton bloodshed. After all, the cosy collusion with the loyalists ensured that the Roman Catholic majority were denied basic civil rights, which sparked off the Troubles in the first place. They knew what they were doing. The duplicity of the UK Government in Northern Ireland through the secret services and the Army is an unpalatable truth that has yet to embed itself into the public consciousness over here.
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