Fresh drive to locate remains of 'disappeared'
A confidential telephone number and address are to be set up to help locate the bodies of people abducted, murdered and secretly buried by the IRA, it was announced today.
British and Irish government officials hope the telephone line and PO Box address will encourage more people to come forward with information about the exact location of the bodies.
The move is one of a series of a measures announced by both governments today in conjunction with the Independent Commission for the Location of Victims Remains.
As a result of a report received earlier this year from the commission, the two governments also plan to:
:: Collect DNA samples from the closest biological relatives of the remaining disappeared, securing any surviving medical and dental records;
:: Retain the forensic expert they appointed to help the search for the remaining bodies and establish a project team within the commission to take forward the recommendations of its report;
:: Carry out non-invasive surveys of all locations where bodies are believed to have been buried, including examinations of all relevant contemporary mapping, forestry records and aerial photography of the sites, using imagery analysts;
:: Use other experts and resources where beneficial, including existing body disposal sites;
:: Establish a family liaison officer and a point of contact for the media within the commission.
The bodies of five people the Provisional IRA has admitted having kidnapped and killed have not yet been recovered from sites in the Irish Republic.
They are:
:: Columba McVeigh, 17, from Donaghmore in Co Tyrone, who the IRA abducted in 1975 and accused of being a spy. Her body is believed to be buried near Emyvale, Co Monaghan;
:: Kevin McKee and Seamus Wright, both 25, who disappeared from the Andersontown area of west Belfast in October 1972, and who the IRA claimed were buried at Coghallstown, near Navan, in Co Meath;
:: Danny McIlhone, from west Belfast, who went missing in July 1981 and whose body is believed to be concealed at Ballynultagh in Co Wicklow;
:: Brendan Megraw, 24, from Twinbrook, on the outskirts of west Belfast, who was abducted in April 1978 and is believed to be buried at Oristown, near Kells, in Co Meath.
Four bodies have been found.
On the day the commission was formed in May 1999, the body of Eamon Malloy, from north Belfast, who went missing in 1975, was recovered in a coffin in an old graveyard in Faughart, Co Louth.
The remains of John McClory, 18, and Brian McKinney, 22, from west Belfast, who disappeared in May 1978 were also discovered in marshlands in Cloghagh, Co Monaghan.
In August 2003, a man walking with his children on Shelling Hill beach in Co Louth discovered the remains of Jean McConville, a 37-year-old Belfast mother of 10, who was abducted in December 1972 for treating a wounded soldier outside her home, following two unsuccessful digs in the area.
The forensic expert has also looked at the cases of four disappeared who the IRA and the Irish National Liberation Army have not claimed as having abducted.
They include Co Armagh men Charles Armstrong, 57, from Crossmaglen, who vanished in August 1981, Gerard Evans, 24, who was last seen alive in Castleblayney in Co Monaghan in March 1979, and Captain Robert Nairac, 29, who disappeared in south Armagh in May 1977.
Seamus Ruddy, a 33-year-old member of the Irish Republican Sociality Party, is believed to have been abducted in France in May 1985, murdered and buried by members of the INLA, to which his party was allied.
Northern Ireland Secretary Peter Hain said today that both Governments were committed to doing what they could to bring closure to the heartache of those families whose loved ones’ remains had not been found.
“At the core of this tragedy we have a number of families grieving for the return of the remains of their loved ones and it is important that they are kept fully informed of the work of the commission,” he said.
However, Mr Hain added that it was vital the expectations of the families were not raised unrealistically, especially since a number of excavations in previous years had proven unsuccessful.
