In 1987, at Loughgall - the greatest single defeat of the IRA by the SAS - eight heavily armed IRA murderers attacked Loughgall police station with a 400-pound bomb and automatic weapons. The SAS shot the eight terrorists dead.
One of the IRA members killed was Patrick Kelly. Intelligence linked Kelly personally to at least five killings, including the murders of two UDR soldiers.
The Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, Hilary Benn, has now promised a sister of this same terrorist a new inquest into the events at Loughgall.
One of Patrick Kelly's family have said, "I have never denied that my brother went out to blow up a barracks…. but they were unmanned barracks. He went out to blow up, not to kill."
This is absurd. Immediately after the bomb detonated, they fired battlefield-calibre weapons at the building, no doubt in the expectation of killing any policeman who emerged.
We should not be facilitating attempts to rewrite history by the IRA at the expense of our veterans.