Adams: Murdered RUC officers showed 'disregard for security'

An eight-year tribunal into the murders found collusion between the IRA and someone in the Garda force which led to the attack.

Mr Adams said the officers – two of the most high-ranking killed in the Troubles and frequent visitors to the Republic – had a laissez-faire disregard for their own security.

He also accused them of thinking they were immune to an IRA attack.

“If you read the evidence (to tribunal lawyers) by the former IRA volunteers and I say this with as much sensitivity as I can muster – these two very prominent RUC ocfficers were sailing in and out of Dundalk Garda station, (and) were doing so in quite an open way,” Mr Adams said.

“The former IRA volunteers said that one of the officers was spotted coming from the station, that they then used a house overlooking the station to monitor comings and goings, that they were able to trace – I think there was also a pattern in terms of meetings.”

The Sinn Féin leader said: “When you have that type of laissez-faire disregard for their own security, by both An Garda Síochána in relation to these two officers, and more importantly these officers themselves – here they were in the heart of south Armagh in the middle of a very, very severe conflict at that time, and seemed to think that they were immune from attack by the IRA, and tragically as it turned out for them that was not the case.

“When you have that type of failure to protect the RUC operatives in the middle of a war then what happened happens.

“I’m sure the same thing has happened with IRA volunteers who were killed, that it was not necessarily intelligence or inside information but simply that they made a mistake. This has happened tragically in all conflicts.”

In the interview on Newstalk radio this morning Mr Adams said he is not aware of collusion involving the Garda force in IRA killings.

The Smithwick tribunal report, published last night, is a damning expose of collusion, bad policing and misguided loyalty in the Garda.

As well as confirming long-held suspicions of the IRA mole in Dundalk station, Judge Peter Smithwick said there was collusion in the killings but was unable to point the finger at an individual and said he suspects there could have been another person passing information to the IRA.

He also accused current Garda chiefs of trying to protect the reputation of the force by undermining a retired superintendent who testified that he passed intelligence on a death threat against Mr Buchanan to the highest ranks in the force the year before the attack.

The IRA are thought to have been tipped off about the RUC officers’ meeting in Dundalk at about 11.30 on the morning of the ambush.

The information came from inside Dundalk Garda station, the judge found.

Within about three hours the ambush had been set up and carried out, with Mr Breen shot as he tried to surrender and Mr Buchanan killed at the driver’s seat.

Garda Commissioner Martin Callinan is expected to address the damning findings later today.

However Tánaiste Eamon Gilmore said this morning's comments from Mr Adams`do the peace process no favours.

"I don't think today is the day to do that," he said in the Dáil, addressing Deputy Adams directly.

"I don't think you do yourself, your party and with the greatest of respect Deputy Adams - I don't think you do the peace process any service today by saying what you have said."

The comments have also been quoted in the Dáil with the Fianna Fáil leader Micheál Martin calling for the "insulting" remarks to be withdrawn.

Taoiseach Enda Kenny, on an official visit to Japan, said he would meet the families to discuss the report if they felt that was appropriate.

“I found it absolutely shocking I have to say,” he said.

“It is a revelation of another dark patch in Ireland’s recent history.”

On the tribunal’s damning criticisms of the current Garda force where the judge found “loyalty is prized above honesty”, Mr Kenny said: “The judge makes comment about a culture.

“It is true that in the past we have different reflections of culture in Ireland... we are in a different space now.”

Mr Kenny said he fully endorsed an apology on behalf of the Government from Minister for Justice Alan Shatter and Tanaiste and Foreign Affairs Minister Eamon Gilmore.

“This is not the only case where this kind of situation arose,” he said.

“I have met victims of other IRA atrocities north of the border and a sense of closure is very important,” he said.

“I do hope that the Smithwick tribunal, while it has been awaited quite a long time, will bring a measure of closure in the families’ quest for finding out the truth of what happened here.”

Jeffrey Donaldson, Democratic Unionist MP, said he believed collusion with the IRA was not restricted to one incident.

He raised the killings of judge and his wife Sir Maurice and Lady Cecily Gibson in a roadside bomb as they drove home from holiday in 1987. They were 800m from the border in an area security forces regarded as no man’s land and had just personally thanked a Garda patrol which had escorted them from Dublin when the bomb was detonated.

Mr Donaldson also raised the case of Co Louth farmer Tom Oliver who was murdered by the IRA in 1991. The terror group claimed he was an informer.

“I do not think collusion was restricted to one instance,” Mr Donaldson told RTE Radio.

The DUP MP also said the Garda force did not co-operate with the Smithwick tribunal in the way a modern police force should.