Statement by TUV leader Jim Allister:
“Today’s finding that the massacre of 10 innocent Protestant workmen at Kingsmill was an “overtly sectarian attack by the IRA” will come as a surprise to no one but it should serve as a timely reminder to the people of Northern Ireland about the nature of Irish Republicanism and the bloody pole they climbed to political power.
“It also highlights the hollowness of Michelle O’Neill’s comments about victims in the aftermath of the Kenova Report. To this day, Republicanism maintains the fiction that the PIRA were not responsible for Kingsmill. Rather than repudiating those responsible for that horrendous night of terror, Sinn Fein have abused their position to name a play park after hunger striker Raymond McCreesh, a terrorist who was arrested in possession of a weapon used in the Kingsmill Massacre.
“Also of note in this inquest was the shameful lack of cooperation from Dublin who frequently seek to interfere in legacy cases in Northern Ireland but does nothing to aid the search for truth by victims of the terrorists for whom their state provided safe haven for three decades.
“Welcome as today’s finding is, the coroner’s failure to name the murderers responsible was a grievous shortcoming. Many unanswered questions remain about this darkest of days in the long annals of terror in our Province. It is for that reason that I believe that nothing short of a full public inquiry is necessary to get to the truth. Today should not be the end of the matter but merely a step along the road towards full truth and justice.”