The Bloody Sunday Inquiry/Day 348 The officer in charge of the British soldiers responsible for the killing of 13 civilians and wounding of 13 others in Derry on Bloody Sunday yesterday declined to apologise to the family of one of the victims.
Retired Col Edward Loden, who commanded the soldiers from the Parachute Regiment in the Bogside on January 30th, 1972, said he would await the outcome of the inquiry before deciding whether or not to apologise to the family of Bernard McGuigan.
Mr McGuigan (41), a father of six children, was the oldest of the 13 unarmed men shot dead on Bloody Sunday. He was shot in the back of the head by a paratrooper as he went out from the shelter of the Rossville Flats complex to assist the fatally wounded Paddy Doherty.
Mr Michael Mansfield QC told Col Loden on the 348th day of the inquiry that Mr McGuigan's family were among his clients.
Earlier Col Loden told the inquiry he had interviewed those soldiers under his command who had opened fire on the day, but none of them had referred to "this particular incident".
Mr Mansfield described Mr McGuigan as a middle-aged man who walked out "holding a handkerchief and is shot dead". He told the witness that none of the soldiers told him about the killing during his interviews with them.
"Do you accept any responsibility for what the soldier did who shot Mr McGuigan, do you accept any responsibility for what happened?" he asked the witness.
Col Loden said he accepted responsibility "in that I was in command of that company, but I did not squeeze the trigger on this particular occasion, I was not able to look down the sights of the chap's rifle and therefore I cannot tell you whether he was correct or not in opening fire".
Asked if, after 30 years, he would be prepared to apologise to the family of Mr McGuigan, Col Loden replied: "Mr Mansfield, I will await the outcome of the inquiry."
Col Loden was accused of having a selective memory in relation to who shot first on Bloody Sunday by Mr Kevin O'Donovan, the lawyer who represents five former members of the Official IRA, who have been granted anonymity by the inquiry. Mr O'Donovan said while the witness had no memory of some matters relating to Bloody Sunday, his "memory is infallible" in his assertion that the first shots fired on the day were fired by the IRA.
He asked: "Colonel, are you deliberately denying the fallibility of your memory on this issue because you want to perpetuate a belief that it was an IRA volunteer who fired before the Parachute Regiment fired, and are you just holding to that as a position out of loyalty to your regiment?"
Col Loden replied he was "holding to this position because it is a fact which I recall very well".