Northern Ireland

Kingsmill families ‘treated with utter contempt’ says victims campaigner

Bereaved deserve to know identities of the killers says Kenny Donaldson

The bullet-riddled minibus at the scene of the massacre of 10 protestant workman shot dead by the provisional IRA massacre at Kingsmill, County Armagh in 1976. Picture by Alan Lewis, Photopress
The bullet-riddled minibus at the scene of the massacre of 10 protestant workman shot dead by the provisional IRA massacre at Kingsmill, County Armagh in 1976. Picture by Alan Lewis, Photopress
By Staff Reporter

The families bereaved by the Kingsmill massacre have been “treated with utter contempt”, a victims campaigner has said.

An inquest into the 1976 killing of ten Protestant workmen in Co Armagh concluded on Friday, stating that the murders were carried out by the IRA in an overtly sectarian attack.

But Kenny Donaldson of the SEFF victims group, said the failure by the coroner to disclose the names of perpetrators had failed the families.

No-one has ever been held to account for the murders.

“What they want and deserve to know is the identities of individuals involved, particularly those now deceased,“” said Mr Donaldson.

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“They expected to receive open justice.

“For ten years they have been psychologically tortured whilst others connived to draw the process out and to have so-called disclosure sessions in private, free from any meaningful level of accountability.”

Kenny Donaldson of the South East Fermanagh Foundation at an event at Corick House, Clogher, Co Tyrone
Kenny Donaldson of the South East Fermanagh Foundation (SEFF). (Brian Lawless/PA)

The sole survivor of the Kingsmill attack, Alan Black, has already called for a public inquiry.

Now aged 80, Mr Black was shot 18 times during the onslaught.

“The families have dwindled in number over the last decade, with several first generation victims passing on, never having a sense of inner peace that justice and accountability was served,” said Mr Donaldson.

“We will listen intently to families around what next steps they feel can be taken and we will aim to be as supportive as we can be.”