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THREE YEARS ON, RECALLING THE PROMISE OF SAVILLE

Author Don Mullan's account of his experience at the opening of the ongoing Saville Inquiry captures all the raw emotion -- the anger, the skepticism, the determination -- of those who spent decades working to reopen a probe into the January 30, 1972, "Bloody Sunday" massacre. Activist Jim McCann said then of Saville: "We will watch to discover whether the truth is at last to be made available." Three years on, the world still awaits.

By Don Mullan

Derry, Northern Ireland -- March 30, 2000 -- The time was 4.52 pm on Sunday 26th March 2000. It was now 28 years, 56 days and 12 minutes since the 1st Battalion the Parachute Regiment had withdrawn from the Bogside, leaving behind 13 corpses and 15 wounded.

I was driving with Michael Bradley and his wife Mona from Dublin to Derry to participate in a candlelight procession from Free Derry Corner to Derry's Guildhall in advance of the opening of the new Bloody Sunday Inquiry, chaired by Lord Saville. Michael is one of the wounded, shot as he angrily remonstrated with a Para whom he suspected of having just murdered his neighbour and friend, Jack Duddy.

From "Eyewitness Bloody Sunday" courtesy of Colman Doyle British paras round up "terrorist" suspects on "Bloody Sunday."

Suddenly Michael lost his cool and began to shout, "That's the fucking Paras." For an instant I glanced at him thinking he was having a flashback or, perhaps, suffering an attack of posttraumatic stress. But his eyes were fixated on something ahead. I looked and there they were - a foot patrol of four heavily armed Paratroopers walking towards us with their distinctive red berets. We had just crossed the Monaghan/Tyrone border and were travelling the road between Aughnacloy and the Ballygawley roundabout.

As we drew close, other Paras were scrambling up an embankment and spilling onto the road. Mona spoke sternly to her husband, telling him to keep his cool and concentrate on driving.

It was uncanny and a sign of the open wound which Bloody Sunday still is and the ability of a British red beret to send Irish blood pressure skywards. The presence of Paratroopers on the open road on the eve of the most costly and controversial Tribunal of Inquiry in British legal history, carried overtones of the deep resentment of the British Army and MoD over the establishment of the new Bloody Sunday Inquiry. We saw no other troops on our journey.

"... we add our voices to all those which cry out against tyranny in our world."

Several thousand people gathered at Free Derry Corner as dusk descended on the Bogside. They had come to show their solidarity with the families of the dead and the Bloody Sunday wounded and to follow them in a silent and dignified procession to the steps of Derry's Guildhall. There was poignant symbolism in seeing veteran Civil Rights campaigner, Eamon McCann, step onto the platform lorry to address the gathering. It was to prevent him, Bernadette Devlin and other Civil Rights leaders from doing just that, and at this very spot, that the Paras were deployed in Derry on 30th January 1972.

There was a sense of the unstoppable progression of history. Just as King Canute failed to halt the encroachment of the tide, neither too could the might and brutality of an elite British Army regiment halt the march of a risen people. We had arrived and the walls of Jericho were crumbling in the face of families who had never doubted the innocence of their loved ones.

McCann spoke with riveting eloquence and passion. "Everything is in place to lay out the truth, to lay out what happened on January 30, 1972. All that remains to be discovered is whether the will exists to seek out the truth and to lay it out for the world to see. We will watch to discover whether the truth is at last to be made available."

From "Eyewitness Bloody Sunday" courtesy of Lawrence Doherty/Derry Journal Seventeen year old Jack Duddy.

Conor Duddy, a nephew of murdered Jack Duddy, then read a statement on behalf of the families. "We say again that all those killed and injured on Bloody Sunday were innocent. We restate our determination to establish the truth of what happened in our town on that day, and to achieve justice… We do so mindful of the vast suffering endured by so many others over the years of conflict… We see Bloody Sunday in Derry in the context of the history of our own country and also in the context of the suffering of peoples around the world whose rights have been denied, and lives snatched away, by the forces of oppressive power.

"The victims of Bloody Sunday are listed in a litany, which includes the innocent dead of My Lai in Vietnam, of Sharpeville in South Africa, of Dili in East Timor. In asking for justice for the dead and injured of Bloody Sunday, we add our voices to all those which cry out against tyranny in our world."

The following morning I had the privilege of walking with the families and wounded from the location on William Street where the Bloody Sunday march was halted and again processing with quiet dignity to the Guildhall.

Inside, the ornate chamber had been transformed into a virtual reality courtroom with dozens of high tech terminals and scores of lawyers facing three elevated chairs occupied by Lord Saville, Sir Edward Somers and Mr. Justice William Hoyt. Nothing before in British or Irish legal history has been conducted in this way. The spoken word is almost instantly translated into text on the terminals. The O.J. Simpson murder trial in America was our first glimpse at this technology. Each evening the full transcript of the proceedings will be placed on the Internet by the Inquiry.

Derry, January 30, 1972. A bright Sunday afternoon. In a "carnival atmosphere" a peaceful anti-internment march begins. A few hours later, thirteen men have been shot dead. Finally today, 30 years after the tragedy, a second British commission searches for the truth, and Don Mullen's book is one of the reasons. These accounts of Bloody Sunday tell a dramatic human story of tragedy, brutality, and heroism. Read: Eyewitness Bloody Sunday (Revised)

At 10.30 am, Saville uttered a few opening remarks and invited Counsel for the Tribunal, Christopher Clarke, QC, to take the floor - and history began. Almost immediately Saville's approach as a contract lawyer became apparent. Lord Widgery conducted his 1972 Inquiry into Bloody Sunday like a high-speed steamroller, issuing his crushing report ten weeks after the event. Saville's Inquiry will take at least 18 months and might even run to three years. This Tribunal will be exhaustive, systematic and very expensive. It will cost at least £100 million sterling, perhaps even double that amount. It is the scandalous legacy and responsibility of Edward Heath and the Lord Chief Justice of England, Lord Widgery. British soldiers, including members of the 1st Battalion the Parachute Regiment murdered 14 unarmed civilians on Bloody Sunday. Heath and Widgery murdered the truth.

There was no implicit criticism of the now discredited Lord Widgery. But immediately Saville's Tribunal did what Widgery failed to do by setting Bloody Sunday in a political and historic context with particular reference to the introduction of Internment without Trial the previous August.

Secret documents, military memos and memoirs, and letters exchanged between the Officer Commanding, General Tuzo, and Unionist Premier Brian Falkner, were woven into a fascinating tapestry. All of a sudden it became clear that this costly exercise is not just about the stated objective of discovering the truth of Bloody Sunday. This Inquiry will also be a public evaluation by Britain of its historic role in Ireland and how its policy, in the wake of the just demands of the early Northern Ireland Civil Rights Movement, became so militarised. At its core will be a re-evaluation of the relationship between Britain and Ulster Unionism and how that relationship ultimately led to the embarrassment of this Tribunal of Inquiry before the international community.

Derry native Don Mullan, co-producer of the film "Bloody Sunday," is author of "Eyewitness: Bloody Sunday: The Truth" (Wolfhound Press 1997), which became an important catalyst in the victims' families' successful campaign for the establishment of a new "Bloody Sunday" inquiry. A new edition was published to coincide with the North American launch of the movie, with a foreword by director Paul Greengrass. Buy: Eyewitness Bloody Sunday (Revised)

You can address your questions and comments about the Anglo-Irish film "Bloody Sunday" and the actual events of January 30, 1972 to Don Mullan in The Wild Geese Forum -- IRISH HISTORY, NON-STOP, WORLDWIDE

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