The Irish Times view on the Hooded Men: an apology, 52 years later

It would take a ruling from the UK supreme court to force the hand of a reluctant Police Service of Northern Ireland (PSNI). The court had said the treatment in 1971 of 14 “Hooded Men”, held without trial at Ballykelly army base, had been administered as “deliberate policy” by state agencies, was “deplorable”, and “would, if it occurred today, properly be characterised as torture”. The decision of the PSNI to discontinue an investigation into their claims was deemed unlawful.

Fifty two years on, as one of the 14 lay on his deathbed – Joe Clarke has since died – the PSNI letter of apology says that “we have acknowledged the findings of the United Kingdom supreme court that , by today’s standards, the treatment of these men at that time would likely be characterised as torture.” It then “formally apologised for the actions and omissions of police officers involved”.

It does not acknowledge that the PSNI regards the methods used as torture, or spell out specifically those “actions and omissions.” An apology of sorts.

The men had been interned without trial and alleged that they faced prolonged hooding, being forced to stand in the “stress position”, being forced to listen to white noise, being deprived of sleep, food and water, and being thrown from helicopters hovering near the ground which they believed were high in the air. In 1976, the advisory European Commission of Human Rights ruled that the five techniques used on the men amounted to torture. But in 1978 the full European Court of Human Rights held that the UK had carried out inhuman and degrading treatment, but fell short of defining it as torture. The issue has since been subject to further litigation in the Northern Ireland and British courts.

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The Hooded Men have welcomed the apology though qualifying it, with some justice, as “too little, too late”. They will rightly continue to campaign for a full apology from the British government. Justice delayed is justice denied.