The British government is approaching its consultation on a truth and reconciliation mechanism for dealing with Northern Ireland's violent past with an open mind, Northern Secretary Mr Paul Murphy insisted last night.
As the British government embarked on a two-stage process which will see Mr Murphy visit South Africa next week on a fact-finding mission, he did not rule out the possibility that a process could in the future be independently led.
"We are going in to this consultation with an entirely open mind. The Prime Minister asked me some weeks ago to address the issue of dealing with the past.
"We have decided to formally begin the debate and I am going to South Africa on Saturday to talk to them about how they dealt with their past because there you have an example of a divided society which has been coming to terms with itself.
"During this process I will talk to as many people as I can who have a role in this, whether they are representatives of victims, the churches, political parties, academics, and experts in the field in Northern Ireland and elsewhere."
Some 3,600 people in Northern Ireland died during the Troubles but around half of those cases of murder have not been solved.
In recent times there has been a particular concentration on high-profile incidents such as Bloody Sunday and controversial killings. Some victims' families feel their loved ones' murders have not been treated in the same way as other, more high-profile killings.
Mr Murphy insisted yesterday that London had no set idea on how to address the issue of all the killings in Northern Ireland and how to move on. The Northern Ireland Policing Board chairman, Prof Desmond Rea, and Police Service of Northern Ireland Chief Constable Hugh Orde have both advocated a truth and reconciliation process.
Mr William Frazer of Families Acting for Innocent Relatives said the Northern Ireland Secretary would be better talking to people in south Armagh who had suffered at the hands of the IRA rather than consulting academics and travelling to South Africa.
Sinn Féin victims' spokesman and North Antrim Assembly member, Mr Phillip McGuigan, called for the government to step back from taking a lead role in the victims' process on the grounds that the British state was a protagonist in the conflict.