The Five Demands

Parla Jackie McDonald, ‘brigadiere’ dell’UDA

Jackie McDonald in un’intervista al Belfast Telegraph il giorno seguente alla bocciatura del Rapporto Eames/Bradley, ha indicato un’amnistia ‘all inclusive’ come unico mezzo che creerebbe condizioni necessarie ad un incontro tra le vittime ed i responsabili.
Un’amnistia ‘tutto compreso’, ovvero una risoluzione che si estenda a tutte le oraginizzazioni paramilitari lealiste e repubblicane, alle forze di sicurezza, ai servizi segreti.
“La gente che ha ucciso, ha fatto quanto gli è stato detto di fare”, ha dichiarato McDonald.
“Erano persone genuine. Quando si crede in qualcosa, il modo migliore per difendere il tuo Paese è quello di uccidere le persone che stanno cercando portartelo via”.
“Non si poteva lasciare l’IRA venisse vista come questa élite, la forza invincibile. Abbiamo dovuto dimostrare che erano vulnerabili “, ha aggiunto.
Jackie McDonald è parte del direttivo del gruppo denominato Ulster Freedom Fighters, che negli anni dei Troubles si è macchiata di decine di omicidi a sfondo settario.
Il leader lealista è ben consapevole che l’amnistia possa essere vista come una mera utopia, ma è “probabilmente la cosa migliore”.
“Molte persone saranno furiose”, ha affermato.
“Ma cosa fai?”.
“Se vuoi il futuro, il passato è un’ancora”.
“Se vuoi una ipoteca sul futuro, cosa faresti pagare?”.
Ha detto che il prezzo delle informazioni potrebbe essere elevato.
“Se vuoi sapere ci deve essere un compromesso – a cui la persona che sta parlando con te non può esserne suscettibile” ha detto.
“Abbiamo bisogno che i gruppi delle vittime si seggano con i responsabili”.
“Non so come farlo – è come l’olio e l’acqua”.
“(Ma) questa è la conversazione che risponde alle domande”.

Only a total amnesty will bring answers: UDA boss (Belfast Telegraph)
Senior UDA figure Jackie McDonald tells Brian Rowan of the high moral price for information from former paramilitaries
Paramilitary ‘brigadier’ Jackie McDonald wants an “all-inclusive amnesty” to allow victims and perpetrators to meet.
The UDA leader believes such a move would create “the conversation that answers the questions” from Northern Ireland’s violent past.
“You can’t cherry pick an amnesty,” he told the Belfast Telegraph. “It has to be all-inclusive,” he added — meaning stretching across the loyalist and republican organisations and security forces and services.
“The people who did the killing, they were doing what they were told,” he said.
“An awful lot of killers I know just believed in what they were doing. They were genuine people. When you believe in something, the best way to defend your country is to kill the people who are trying to take it off you.
“You couldn’t let the IRA be seen as this elite, invincible force. You had to show that they were vulnerable,” he said.
McDonald is part of the so-called ‘inner council’ leadership of an organisation that carried out scores of sectarian killings under the cover of the Ulster Freedom Fighters (UFF) — an organisation that paraded figures such as Johnny Adair, Michael Stone, John White and Jim Gray on Ulster’s war stage.
The paramilitary leader accepts that an amnesty is a difficult issue, but argues that it is “probably the best thing”.
“A lot of people will be furious,” he said.
“But what do you do?
“If you want a future, the past is an anchor.
“If you want a mortgage on the future, what would you pay for it?” he asked.
He said the price for information would be high.
“If you want to know there has to be a compromise — that the person talking to you cannot be made amenable for it,” he said.
“We need the victims groups to sit down with the perpetrators,” he said.
“I don’t know how you do that — it’s like oil and water.
“(But) that’s the conversation that answers the questions.
“It has to be a warts and all conversation.”
However, proposals for any amnesty are likely to prove controversial with victims of paramilitaries in Northern Ireland.
Earlier this week it emerged that proposals on how to deal with the past had been largely rejected by people here in a consultation exercise.
The rejections were revealed in responses to proposals put forward by the Consultative Group on the Past, headed by Lord Eames and Denis Bradley.
Of the 174 people who responded to the report, most rejected it without comment. Among the report’s 31 recommendations was a payout of £12,000 to the families of those killed in the Troubles — including relatives of dead paramilitaries.