Kingsmills Families To Press Taoiseach For Apology

Pressure is mounting on Taoiseach Enda Kenny to apologise for the Republic of Ireland's "blatant inaction" over the Kingmills killings.

Relatives of ten Protestant workers murdered by the IRA in 1976 are traveling to Dublin today to meet the Irish prime minister.

Karen Armstrong, whose brother John McConville was murdered, told the BBC: "The governments at the time, in my opinion, did turn a blind eye to the Kingsmills murders in as far as they failed to discourage the perpetrators taking refuge in their border area at that time.

"It's time for honesty, it's time for openness to discuss this. Primarily we would like the taoiseach to acknowledge what happened."

The textile workers were killed by the IRA for sectarian reasons on January 5 1976, while traveling home from work on a minibus.

One, Alan Black, survived the massacre despite being shot 18 times.

Ulster Unionist MLA for Newry and Armagh Danny Kennedy, who will also be at the meeting, asked for acknowledgment that the IRA men who carried out the massacre operated from across the border.

He said: "It was in the Irish Republic that they kept their weapons and in the Irish Republic that they felt safe.

"Therefore, there was a failure on behalf of the Irish authorities, both the political authorities and the security authorities, to deal effectively with what was going on there."

Colin Worton, whose brother Kenneth died in the massacre, told the News Letter: "An IRA gang crept across the border and hid in a hedge waiting for them. Then they executed Kenneth and ran back across the border - and nobody said boo to them."

(NE)