Niall Ó Donnghaile (Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I move:

That Seanad Éireann supports the call from the victims of torture known as "the hooded men" for the Government to appeal the decision of the European Court of Human Rights of 20 March 2018 to the Grand Chamber of the European Court of Human Rights, and that the flawed decision of 1978 in relation to their case should not be allowed to stand.

I welcome the Minister of State to the House and I appreciate his time. I acknowledge that it is a busy time for the Government and while I mean no disrespect to the Minister of State, I am disappointed, as I expect all those interested in this case will be, that the Government did not feel it appropriate to send a more senior Minister for this debate considering its significance.

I welcome Mr. Shannon to the House today. He is here on behalf of the group known as the hooded men, 14 in all, who were selected by the British and unionist governments for special attention. They were separated out and isolated from several hundred men who, like them, were arrested in swoops in the days and weeks after internment was introduced in the North in August 1971. That special attention led to these 14 men experiencing a horrendous period at a secret location, which we now know to be Ballykelly army barracks, where they were tortured by highly-trained members of the British Crown forces whose identity, despite the passage of 50 years, remains unknown to these 14 men. Their identity remains protected by the British Government on whose behalf they practised their nefarious deeds on these defenceless, captive men.

For almost 50 years, the hooded men have been on a mission for truth and justice for themselves, their families and for humanity itself. Four of the 14 men have died during this time and our solidarity and support is with their families today. The remainder continue on their quest for justice. It is a quest that began in August 1971, in a dark, despairing and dangerous dungeon where these men, individually and separately, were hooded, handcuffed to a radiator and systematically and ruthlessly interrogated beyond the point of exhaustion over a seven to ten day period. These vulnerable men were cruelly and grievously injured, physically and psychologically, by their captors. The full resources of the British state were used to try to crush the will of these 14 men. They were guinea pigs in a torture experiment which the British Government had used in other colonies and on other defenceless and captured prisoners.

The methods deployed on Irish citizens, the ABCs of torture, are still followed to this day throughout the world. The toolkit of the torturer was multi-layered. The first and most essential part of the torturers' tool kit was the knowledge that what he was doing had the approval of the British and unionist governments and that he had immunity from prosecution or accountability for his cruel behaviour.The second part was the knowledge that the torturer was trained in his dark arts by the British Ministry of Defence and was well paid for his service. The toolkit also included the torturer's menu - the infamous five techniques. These techniques, when combined, subjected the men to so-called "deep interrogation". These techniques were meticulously refined to have maximum impact on the helpless individual being experimented on. For the techniques to work effectively, however, the men had to be in a state of fear and uncertainty.

They were violently arrested from their homes by the British Crown forces. They were hooded and taken by helicopter to an unknown destination where silence and isolation reigned. They were stripped of their clothes and personal belongings and forced to wear a boiler suit and hood. As Mr. Francie McGuigan told us at the recent briefing here in Leinster House, at times they were stripped and photographed, with their torturers holding up their brutalised bodies by the hair - another form of so-called degrading treatment. That was just like in Guantanamo, in Abu Ghraib and in Palestine. The torturer's handbook is followed meticulously to this very day.

One of the most noted stories of torture endured by these men was when they were hooded. They were brought from the specially-designed torture chamber at Ballykelly to a helicopter and flown for a prolonged period but just four or five feet in the air. While hooded, they were thrown backwards out of the helicopter, thinking they were God knows how high up. The psychology behind all of this was to deprive the men of their normal everyday sensory experience of life. The boiler suit and the hood over their heads covered their naked bodies. They lived in their boiler suits for over a week and performed all bodily functions. The hood was only removed during interrogations. The five techniques included prolonged periods of standing against the wall with arms and legs spreadeagled - the so-called stress position. They were hooded day and night and were deprived of sleep by what the men described as a high pitched hissing noise. They was also deprived of food and drink.

During the recent briefing in Leinster House, we were told it was like the noise went in through one's head and then penetrated every sinew and muscle of the body. It went down into the lungs and came out through the toes. The men were repeatedly and viciously beaten about the head and had their genitals kicked. They were continuously threatened with death. The effect of this was prolonged pain, physical and mental exhaustion, severe anxiety, depression, hallucinations, disorientation and repeated loss of consciousness. Having listened to the men's story, I contest that not only were they subjected to torture over this period but so too were their families. These men were taken from their homes and their people. Their mothers and fathers, brothers and sisters and wives and girlfriends knew nothing of their whereabouts during the whole duration of their torture. Families were crippled with fear because they did not know where their loved ones had been taken. They went to hospitals. They even went to mortuaries. Their fathers pleaded with the Royal Ulster Constabulary, RUC. It said it did not have them. However, we know it had them. It had them in Ballykelly barracks.

All of this was done at a time when sectarian killings were rife and when young men were being lifted off the streets to meet the cruelest of ends. Imagine the worry for their families and the torture for their families when the very people who arrested them without trial were then telling their loved ones that they were gone and that they did not have them. What happened to them, ultimately, at the end of this prolonged period of torture? There was no wrap-around care, no after services and no counselling. They went into Long Kesh internment camp. They were arrested and held without trial or charge. The entirety and magnitude of all of these frightening ordeals continue to haunt these men to this very day. Most reasonable people know that what these men experienced was torture.

However, the reason Mr. Liam Shannon is with us today is because the European Court of Human Rights decided that the men were not in fact tortured. They are here because the court has a different threshold when defining torture than that which I have just described. Believe it or not, what I have just described is not torture according to the court. The court does, however, readily accept that what the men experienced was "inhumane and degrading treatment". We all agree on that. I, like many colleagues and most sensible people, am baffled as to the legal difference between torture and inhumane and degrading treatment. What is the difference? I do not believe there is any difference. Human rights organisations around the world do not believe there is a difference. The Irish State does not believe there is a difference and that is why it has taken Britain to the European courts twice since 1971.

In 1971, the Irish Government - on the men's behalf - took the British state to the European Human Rights Commission. The Commission unanimously found the British Government guilty of torturing the men. The British Government appealed that decision and in 1978, the European Court of Human Rights reversed the Commission's verdict and found the British Government guilty of inhuman and degrading treatment and not torture. Here we are today. Under international pressure, however, the British Government announced that it would never again use the five techniques on defenceless prisoners. In December 2014, following renewed efforts by the men and their families, the Irish Government again took the British Government to the European Court of Human Rights to seek to overturn the 1978 verdict on the basis of new facts. It sought to reinstate the European Human Rights Commission verdict of torture.

In March this year, the European Court of Human Rights upheld its 1978 decision that the British Government used inhuman and degrading treatment and not torture. I ask Members to support this motion calling on the Irish Government to appeal the decision earlier this year and to continue the good work the State began in 1971. Time is quickly running out to lodge this appeal. It is a straightforward matter and the Government should act swiftly. The men - and indeed society here in Ireland and across the world - need and look to the Irish Government to pursue justice for them until it is ultimately achieved. Such persistence sends a very clear message to those governments that continue to use inhuman and degrading torture that their actions are being scrutinised and that they will be made accountable for them.

Francie McGuigan put it very succinctly when at the briefing two weeks ago he said that what they were seeking was simple. They want the British Government to wear the label of torturer on the international stage because that is what exactly what it was. There should be no legal or popular tolerance of torture, no matter what the circumstances. Human rights courts need to be crystal clear on this fundamental issue. When the hooded men came to Leinster House, they moved us with their stories. They insisted that this is not a political issue. They further stressed that it certainly is not a party political issue. They told us this is an issue of human rights. Their lawyer, Darragh Mackin, said that the Irish State had taken this case because it knew the truth of what these men endured. Why would one set out on this legal journey and not see it through to the very end?

I agree with all of those sentiments and I have no doubt but that the other Members do too. Regardless of its significance, the term "legacy case" has almost lost its edge and its importance because there is such a litany of so many experiences from the course of the conflict. This is not just a legacy case, however. This has live immediate lived consequences for these men and their families. It has live legal implications for victims of torture all around the world while states continue to use the verdict in respect of to this case as some kind of cloak of convenience or cover for the torture that they inflict on citizens, whether their own or from other countries.

The book written by Father Denis Faul and Monsignor Raymond Murray in 1975 on the experiences of the hooded men continues to sell all around the world to this day. It is a sad reflection of the interest in this case and the example being looked to by victims of torture all around the world in the form of the hooded men and their campaign. I urge the Minister of State, on behalf of the Government, to tell us that this appeal will be lodged and that the Irish State will not just stand for the hooded men but will stand for victims of torture all around the world. More importantly, I refer to the Irish State standing for any further potential victims of torture in order that we can shine a light and expose what happened to the hooded men and that this State will set an example across the EU and beyond that we stand for justice and truth.