Bloody Sunday, the truth at last

Ahead of its June 15 publication, the Guardian has revealed that the long awaited report into the 1972 Bloody Sunday massacre in Northern Ireland is to conclude that “a number of the fatal shootings of civilians by British soldiers were unlawful”. Thirteen unarmed nationalists were shot dead at a civil rights march in Derry, but the inquiry held in the immediate aftermath concluded that the soldiers had acted in legitimate self-defence. The conclusions of the latest inquiry opened in 1998 - the longest in British legal history - now means that survivors shot on the day and families of the dead could now demand that British soldiers be prosecuted, a scenario which one Unionist MP has described as a "hand-grenade with the pin pulled out.” Bloody Sunday is a highly emotive issue in Ireland, and “electrified nationalist protests against British rule,” the London daily explains, “… dramatically boosting the popularity of the Provisional IRA in the province”.