Gerry Adams 'categorically' denies IRA bombing allegations

LONDON (AFP) — Former Irish republican leader Gerry Adams on Tuesday “categorically” denied allegations in a London civil trial brought by three IRA bomb victims seeking to hold him personally responsible for the attacks.

Adams led Sinn Fein, the Irish Republican Army’s former political wing, during the Troubles — the three-decades-long violent sectarian conflict over British rule in Northern Ireland.

His role as its president during the Troubles, which largely ended after a 1998 peace accord, made him a hated figure for many Protestants in the British province.

But Adams has always denied being a member of the IRA, a statement that he repeated multiple times at the High Court in London.

It was the first time the 77-year-old — who has been embroiled in several legal spats over his role in the Troubles — has testified in an English court.

He is being sued by John Clark, a victim of a 1973 IRA attack on London’s Old Bailey courthouse, as well as Jonathan Ganesh and Barry Laycock, who were injured in IRA attacks in 1996 at London’s Docklands and in Manchester, respectively.

Three people died in the three bombings, and scores more were injured. The claimants are suing for symbolic damage of one pound for “vindicatory purposes.”

They accuse him of “directing” the 1973 and 1996 attacks.

“To be clear, I had no involvement in or advance knowledge” of the bombings, Adams said in a written witness statement.

“Although I deny categorically the allegations made by the claimants of my involvement in those bombings in any way, nothing in this statement should be taken as criticism of the claimants,” he added.

‘Right to resist’

The three claimants allege that Adams was a senior IRA figure for over 25 years who “acted with others in furtherance of a common design to bomb the British mainland.”

“These allegations are untrue. I was never a member of the IRA or its Army Council,” Adams said in his witness statement.

“I do not defend all the IRA actions,” Adams told the Royal Courts of Justice. But “people have the right to resist occupation,” he said.

More than 3,600 people were killed during the Troubles, a conflict mainly in Northern Ireland over whether the province should remain under British rule or become part of a United Ireland.

Adams became president of Sinn Fein in 1983 and served as a lawmaker from 1983 to 1992, and again from 1997 to 2011 before sitting in the Irish Parliament between 2011 and 2020.

He stepped down as leader of Sinn Fein in 2018. Although interned twice in the 1970s, Adams has never been found guilty of IRA membership.

In 2020, he had convictions for attempting to escape jail quashed by the U.K. Supreme Court.

Last year he won a libel case in Dublin against the BBC over a report containing allegations he was involved in killing a British spy.

Wearing a shamrock and a Palestinian flag pin, the former Sinn Fein leader wished the London High Court judge “a very happy St. Patrick’s Day” at the top of the hearing.

—

By Agence France-Presse