‘No one questions presidents and prime ministers’: Conor Murphy slams ‘double standards’ in criticism of republican death tributes

Former Economy Minister Conor Murphy has hit out at the “double standard” he says he faces when paying tribute to veteran republicans when they die.

The Sinn Fein politician, who left Stormont in February to take on a role in the Seanad, said that while questions about his own actions “do not anger” him, he often feels there is hypocrisy in the criticism of Sinn Fein’s tributes.

It follows the death of IRA killer Brendan ‘Bik’ McFarlane last month.

McFarlane was sentenced to life for the IRA gun and bomb attack on the Bayardo Bar in Belfast in August 1975 in which five Protestants died, and he is believed to have been involved in a kidnapping in which an Irish policeman and soldier were killed.

“It doesn’t anger me to be questioned about these things,” Mr Murphy said on The Currency news podcast when asked about McFarlane.

“I was a republican involved in struggle. But the double standard angers me — that people get indignant and worked up about these issues but can look away from whole other issues involving other established politicians.”

Mr Murphy said he does not understand why US presidents and UK prime ministers do not receive the same criticism following the funerals of veterans.

“There is no glory in conflict. There are horrible things done; people get drawn into a conflict because they see no alternative,” he explained.

“That’s not to say everyone gets involved — it’s a small minority.

“I get that when I say something, people will say: ‘Oh, but you were involved in this and you were involved in that.’

“I knew Brendan McFarlane — he was a friend of mine — so I know the history of how it’s viewed from the other side, and I get that.

“But there are people who died and have been buried by American presidents, and British prime ministers who created conflict, and they do not get questioned on that.”

Elsewhere in a wide-ranging interview conducted just weeks after Mr Murphy took on the role of leader of Sinn Fein in the Seanad, the Armagh-born politician reflected on his controversial comments in 2005 at a Conservative Party Conference, in which he said the 1984 bombing of the Tory conference, which left five people dead, was “part of a war”.

“I regret the loss of life, I do. There were innocent lives lost, [but] the decision to go and attack the British state, the heart of the state, the Prime Minister — no,” he said when asked again if he regretted the Brighton bombing, which was intended to kill Margaret Thatcher.

“As part of a campaign of resistance, I will not deny I supported it at that time. And, no, I would not have regretted that decision against Britain.

“You can make judgments at the end of things. I suppose it’s interesting from an academic view. You think ‘Was there an opportunity to sue for peace earlier?’ — but you can’t predict.

“People went to England before and conducted IRA and republican campaigns there, with particularly disastrous consequences, so this wasn’t the first and wasn’t the last instance of going over to England.”

He was also questioned on Sinn Fein’s role in “reaching out to Protestants” as it campaigns for a united Ireland. He said he had engaged in repeated dialogue with unionists while in politics in NI.

“We’ve been doing that. People interpret the response from unionism, but I have been in constructive dialogue with unionism since the early ’90s — that’s nearly 30 years.

“I have friends who are members of the Orange Order, people involved in the British Army and RUC, and we’ve had a dialogue at the local level.

“I had the leader of the Orange Order in my kitchen for coffee years ago. We’ve had that type of dialogue.

“They understand — and this is not to say they embrace it — our need to have due regard for our dead and people involved with us, just as we understand their need for remembrance of the British Army and the RUC as heroes. We have a different view of that, but we understand they stand at cenotaphs because they believe it’s people who deserve that tribute.

“There is a better understanding between us in the North that doesn’t often find public expression.”

Mr Murphy also reiterated on the podcast his apology for controversial comments about the murder of Paul Quinn, a 21-year-old from Co Armagh who was beaten to death in a barn near Oram, Co Monaghan, in 2007. Mr Murphy had said in a BBC documentary that Mr Quinn was “involved with smuggling and criminality”.

“I apologised. I made comments I regret making. I wasn’t alone in making observations, but that was not the essence of the story. Instead, it was that a young man was brutally killed, and his family are still searching for answers.

“I fully support their request and have repeatedly called for people who may have information to come forward to the Gardaí.”

He also said he has offered to speak to the family privately “numerous times” but that the offer has “never been taken up”.