British 'are holding up bomb probe'
Liam Clarke

AN OFFICIAL inquiry into the Dublin and Monaghan bombings is likely to end in the next few months unless the British government co-operates with it.

British authorities have been asked to supply military and intelligence reports about the 1974 loyalist attacks, which claimed 33 lives. But Henry Barron, the retired judge in charge of the inquiry, is known to be impatient with their delays in handing over the documents and has told friends that his investigation could be wrapped up quickly if he got the information.

Barron, appointed by the Irish government, is examining claims that explosives and expertise for the attacks were supplied by rogue elements within the British Army.

Last night Greg O'Neill, a solicitor representing the victims' families, said: "The judge and his staff cannot wait for the British government indefinitely. I expect him to make a decision in September or October. He could wind up his inquiries and say that he did not receive co-operation from the British government, or delay concluding his report to see whether he gets co-operation."

In March, Barron formally asked the British government for all intelligence and military information it held on the attacks, together with military and security assessments of the suspects. The Irish government has been requesting the information since December 1999.

There have been assurances from Downing Street, Adam Ingram, the former Northern Ireland security minister, and Jane Kennedy, the current minister, that the information would be provided but nothing has been forthcoming.

The issue is a sensitive one because of claims that members of the Ulster Volunteer Force (UVF) team that bombed Dublin and Monaghan had been military intelligence agents and were assisted by members of the security forces. These claims were backed by John Weir, a former RUC sergeant jailed for colluding with loyalists in the murder of a Catholic.

Barron has now interviewed Weir. The former RUC officer claims the Monaghan car bomb was loaded at the Co Armagh home of a former RUC reservist and that the explosives were supplied by a businessman who was a part-time officer in the Ulster Defence Regiment (UDR), part of the British Army. Weir said the bombing was organised by Billy Hanna, an Armagh member of the UVF and UDR, later murdered on suspicion of being an informer by loyalist paramilitaries.

Barron has also been studying a report from a former British Army bomb disposal expert which suggests that the Dublin bombs were made from ANFO (ammonium nitrate fuel oil), an IRA home-made explosive that the loyalists were incapable of manufacturing.

The expert, who worked in bomb disposal at the time of the attacks, suggests that the only way the UVF could have obtained supplies of ANFO, which is made from ammonium nitrate prills (granules) found in fertiliser, was from stocks seized by the security forces.

The most damning conclusion of his 100-page report is that "the loyalist terrorists who undertook this operation were at least guided, and very likely directed, by somebody with considerable knowledge of terrorist bombing activities. The most likely sort of person who could have provided that guidance is an ammunition technical officer or ammunition technician with experience of intelligence processes and practices and who had access to loyalist terrorists".

The report narrows this down to about five people, who are not named, one of whom is now a senior official in the Ministry of Defence in London.

The explosives expert concludes that the Monaghan bomb, which detonated 90 minutes after the Dublin blasts and killed eight people, was of standard UVF construction and was probably set off as a diversion to allow the Dublin bombers to escape.

The three Dublin bombs went off simultaneously without warning to cause maximum carnage. The report says: "Loyalist terrorist groups did not have the skills to undertake this operation in 1974. Further, I do not believe they have ever possessed them, otherwise a similarly complex operation would have been repeated."