Concerns in Europe: January - June 2001
41
Amnesty International September 2001
AI Index: EUR 01/003/2001
for the person whose right is violated.
On the occasion of the examination of Ireland’s
second periodic report in July 2000, the Committee
had expressed concerns about the continued operation
of the Special Criminal Court (see AI Index: EUR
01/001/2001 and EUR 29/01/00).
Death penalty
In June, following a referendum, the death penalty
was removed from the Irish Constitution. The death
penalty had been removed from the statute books and
effectively abolished in the Republic of Ireland in July
1990. No execution had taken place since 1954.
According to the amendment which was passed by the
referendum, and which will be the Twenty-first
Amendment of the Irish Constitution, “The
Oireachtas [the Irish Parliament] shall not enact any
law providing for the imposition of the death penalty”.
About 62 percent of voters voted for the removal
of the death penalty from the Irish Constitution,
although the turnout at the referendum (which
included two other proposed amendments, one on the
acceptance of the jurisdiction of the International
Criminal Court, and one on the ratification of the
Treaty of Nice) was about 34 percent.
The International Criminal Court
During the above-mentioned referendum, the
proposed amendment of the Irish Constitution
regarding Ireland’s acceptance of the jurisdiction of
the International Criminal Court was also passed.
Human rights aspects of the Multi-Party
Agreement
(update to AI Index: EUR 01/001/2001)
By the end of June the Irish Government had still
failed to produce legislation which would bring into
effect its commitment under the Multi-Party
Agreement 1998 to incorporate the European
Convention on the Protection of Human Rights and
Fundamental Freedoms (ECHR) into domestic law,
and to “ensure at least equivalent level of protection
of human rights as will pertain in Northern Ireland”.
The European Convention on Human Rights bill was
deferred until October/November to allow for further
consultation. AI was concerned that in favouring an
“interpretative” incorporation at a sub-constitutional
level of the ECHR the Irish Government would fall
short of meeting its requirements under the agreement,
as it would not provide people with full access to the
ECHR rights.
A separate bill was about to be introduced, aimed
at placing the Human Rights Commission - whose
establishment also flows out of the government’s
undertakings in the Multi-Party Agreement - on a
statutory basis. The controversy over the process of
appointment of the members of the Human Rights
Commission, which had delayed its establishment in
2000, was solved through an expansion of its
membership.
Shootings by the security forces: Updates
John Carthy
In April a sub-committee of the Parliamentary Joint
Committee on Justice, Equality, Defence and
Women’s Rights began an inquiry into the killing of
John Carthy. The inquiry was, however, soon
suspended pending the examination of an application
to the secretary-general to the government by police
officers involved in the siege in which John Carthy
died, seeking an exemption from giving evidence, and
a judicial review challenge brought by police officers
involved in the siege. John Carthy was shot by the
police Emergency Response Unit (ERU) in April 2000
after being barricaded for 24 hours in his home in
Abbeylara, Co. Longford (see AI Index: EUR
01/03/00 and EUR 01/001/2001).
The sub-committee was formed to examine in
public the internal police report into the shooting and
the submissions on the police report made by
interested parties, including the family of John Carthy
and the Irish Council for Civil Liberties. The sub-
committee was given powers to compel witnesses to
appear under oath and to order the discovery of
documents. Four parties were reportedly granted legal
representation: senior members of the police; 25
named police officers, including the members of the
ERU who fired the shots which killed John Carthy; the
deceased and his family; and a consultant psychiatrist.
The members of the United States of America Federal
Bureau of Investigation, who conducted a report into
the incident, were initially excluded from the list of
persons called to give evidence.
Members of the sub-committee visited the area of
the incident. However, the house where the shooting
occurred had been demolished by Longford County
Council within weeks of the event.
In the course of its hearings the sub-committee
heard representations from the lawyer of the 25 named
police officers allegedly involved in the incident and
from the lawyer representing the family of John
Carthy. The family’s lawyer criticized the police
report into the incident, including because it presented
a picture of the deceased which was unrecognisable to
the family. He also referred to a number of issues of
concern to the family which were raised in their
submission, including the exclusion of the State
Pathologist’s report from the Garda (Police) report
and the failure to give John Carthy access to a
solicitor. The sub-committee also heard evidence from
the Garda Commissioner, the senior police officer
responsible for calling in the ERU, the senior police
officer
who
conducted
the
internal
police
investigation, and the police press officer in charge of
relations with the media while John Carthy was
barricaded in his home.
At the end of April, nine members of the ERU,
including the two who shot John Carthy, sought
exemptions from giving evidence from the secretary-
general to the government. They argued that their
giving evidence at public hearings might affect the