Mairéad Farrell
Mairéad Farrell
Born	3 March 1957 Belfast, Northern Ireland
Died	6 March 1988 Gibraltar
Cause of death	Multiple bullet wounds caused by the SAS
Resting place	Milltown Cemetery, Belfast, Northern Ireland
Nationality	British subject
Other names	Máiréad Ní Fhearghail / Ní Fhearail

Mairéad Farrell (Irish: 'Máiréad Ní Fhearghail'^[1]/Mairéad Ní Fhearail^[2];1957 - 1988) was an Irish volunteer of the Provisional Irish Republican Army (IRA). She was killed by SAS soldiers during Operation Flavius, a British Army operation to prevent a bombing in Gibraltar.^[3]

Early life

Farrell was born in Belfast, Northern Ireland to a middle class family with no link to militant Irish Republicanism other than her grandfather, who was interned during the Irish War of Independence. She was educated at Rathmore Grammar School, Belfast which she left, aged 18, to work in an insurance broker's office. She met an IRA volunteer named Bobby Storey, who persuaded her to join the IRA.^[3][4]

First term of active service, 1975-1976

On 1 March 1976, the British Government revoked Special Category Status for prisoners convicted from this date under anti-terrorism legislation. In response, the IRA instigated a wave of bombings and shootings across Northern Ireland; younger members such as Farrell were asked to participate. On 5 April 1976 she and two others bombed the Conway Hotel, Dunmurry in what is believed was an unsuccessful attempt to kill members of the security forces who frequented the hotel.^[5] She was arrested by members of the Royal Ulster Constabulary (RUC) within an hour of planting the bombs. Sean McDermott, another member of the IRA Active Service Unit, was shot dead by a member of the RUC reserve at a nearby housing estate.

At her trial she refused to recognise the court as it was an institution of the British State and was sentenced to fourteen years in prison for explosives offences to be served in Armagh Women's Prison. During her imprisonment she led her fellow prisoners in various struggles against the prison authorities.

Imprisonment, 1976-1986

When she arrived in Armagh Jail, Farrell refused to wear prison uniform in protest at the designation of paramilitary prisoners as criminals. She was the first woman to do so although the second person after Kieran Nugent, a prisoner in the H-Blocks of HMP Maze. Farrell instigated a dirty protest in February 1980. This meant that prisoners refused to slop-out and would smear excrement and menstrual material on the walls of their cells instead of risking being attacked by the guards while slopping-out.^{[6][7][8][9][10][11]} On December 1 Farrell, along with Mary Doyle and Mairead Nugent, began a hunger strike in Armagh prison to coincide with the one already taking place in Long Kesh. It ended on 19 December, a day after the men's strike. The dirty protest ended in March 1981 as the prisoner's rights' campaign was focused on the hunger strike being undertaken by Bobby Sands, Officer Commanding (O/C) of IRA prisoners in the H-Blocks. She was one of the H-Block/Armagh prisoners to stand for election in the Republic of Ireland in the 1981 General Election, standing in Cork North Central and polling 2,751 votes (6.05%).^[12] After the death of Sands and nine of his fellow inmates, the prisoners were granted several of their five demands.

Second term of active service, 1986-1988

Upon her release from jail in October 1986,^[13] Farrell enrolled at Queen's University, Belfast for a course in Political Science and Economics, although she dropped out to play a larger role in the IRA's armed campaign. The IRA sent her, Sean Savage and Daniel McCann to the British Overseas Territory of Gibraltar to plant a bomb in the town area. The target was the British military band^[14] which paraded weekly in connection with the changing of the guard in front of the Governor's residence.

The British Security Service was made aware of their plan and the SAS was deployed to prevent the bombing.^[15] Farrell and her two partners were shot dead (see Operation Flavius).

Farrell (shot eight times), Savage and McCann were shot by the SAS whilst walking towards the frontier with Spain, at the Shell filling station on Winston Churchill Avenue. Some witnesses to the shooting alleged that Farrell and McCann were shot while attempting to surrender and while lying wounded on the ground.^[16]

No radio to remotely control a bomb^[17] was found on the bodies, nor was there a bomb in the car in Gibraltar which had been identified as belonging to the team. However, keys to a car found in Farrell's handbag led to the discovery in Spain of five packages totalling 84 kg of Semtex explosive. These packages had four separate detonators attached. Around this was packed 200 rounds of ammunition as shrapnel. There were two timers, marked 10 hrs 45 mins and 11 hrs 15 mins respectively, but they were not primed or connected.^[18]

According to the details of the briefing given to the soldiers quoted in the ECHR report: "Use of a remote-control device was considered to be far more likely since it was safer from the point of view of the terrorist who could get away from the bomb before it exploded and was more controllable than a timer which once activated was virtually impossible to stop."^[19]

At the inquest, soldiers "A", "B", "C" and "D" stated that they were told at the briefing that the device would be radio-controlled.^[20] "Soldier C" said that "E" stressed to them that it would be a "button job".^[20]

The Gibraltar Inquest

At the inquest into the deaths held in Gibraltar the jury returned a verdict of lawful killing by a 9-2 majority.^[21]

European Court of Human Rights

The case was taken to the European Court of Human Rights in 1995 by the relatives of McCann, Savage and Farrell. By a 10-9 majority it ruled that the human rights of the 'Gibraltar Three' were infringed in breach of Article 2 - right to life, of the European Convention on Human Rights and criticised the authorities for lack of appropriate care in the control and organisation of the arrest operation.^[22]

In sum, having regard to the decision not to prevent the suspects from travelling into Gibraltar, to the failure of the authorities to make sufficient allowances for the possibility that their intelligence assessments might, in some respects at least, be erroneous and to the automatic recourse to lethal force when the soldiers opened fire, the Court is not persuaded that the killing of the three terrorists constituted the use of force which was no more than absolutely necessary in defence of persons from unlawful violence within the meaning of Article 2(2)(a) of the Convention^[23]

Some newspapers reported the decision as a finding that the three were unlawfully killed.^[24][25][26]

The ECHR also ruled that the three had been engaged in an act of terrorism, and consequently dismissed unanimously the applicants’ claims for damages, for costs and expenses incurred in the Gibraltar Inquest and the remainder of the claims for just satisfaction.^[22]

The Court is not empowered to overrule national decisions or annul national laws.^[27]

Related events

In the aftermath of the shooting on Gibraltar, violence escalated in the Belfast area and resulted in at least six further deaths. The three bodies were returned to Belfast on March 14. That evening an IRA sniper, Kevin McCracken, was shot dead in Norglen Crescent, Turf Lodge, Belfast while preparing to attack British soldiers.^[28][29] Those attending the return of the bodies said that the security services were harassing them^[30] and that he was attacking the security services to deflect their attention. According to witnesses, McCracken was beaten while lying wounded by members of the security services.^[31]

At the funeral of the 'Gibraltar Three' on the 16 March, three mourners were killed in a gun and grenade attack by Loyalist paramilitary Michael Stone in what became known as the "Milltown Massacre".

At the funeral of IRA member Caoimhín Mac Brádaigh (English: Kevin Brady) on 19 March - one of the three men killed three days earlier by Michael Stone - two British Army corporals, Derek Wood and David Howes, drove into the funeral cortège, apparently by accident but mourners evidently feared an attack similar to Stone's was taking place.^[13] Scenes relayed on television showed the two corporals being cornered by black taxis and dragged from their car before being taken away to be beaten, stripped, and then shot (see Corporals killings).^[32]

On 10 September 1990, the IRA attempted to kill Air Chief Marshal Sir Peter Terry at his Staffordshire home. Sir Peter had been a prime target since his days as Governor of Gibraltar, where he signed the documents allowing the SAS to pursue IRA members. The attack took place at 9pm at the Main Road house. The gunman opened fire through a window hitting Sir Peter at least 9 times and injuring his wife, Lady Betty, near one of her eyes. The couple's daughter, Elizabeth, was found to be suffering from shock. Peter Terry's face had to be rebuilt as the shots shattered his face and 2 high-velocity bullets lodged a fraction of an inch from his brain.^[33]

In 2008 Sinn Féin asked to hold an International Women's Day event in the Long Gallery at Stormont commemorating Ms Farrell. The Assembly Commission which runs the Stormont estate ruled that it could not go ahead. ^[34]

The families of the three shot visited Gibraltar in March 2008 to lay wreaths.^[35]

Media comment

The New York Times review of 'Death on the Rock' (June 13 1989) stated: "Mairead Farrell might be dismissed as some wild-eyed fanatic except that part of her life has been preserved in several home movies and a television interview taped shortly before her death. What emerges is a portrait of a soft-spoken, attractive woman determined to end what she perceived as the injustices surrounding her everyday life.... The program leaves us pondering the obvious conclusion: "To the people of Falls Road she was a patriot. To the British she was a terrorist. To her family she was a victim of Irish history.""^[36]

Events leading to the Gibraltar killings were depicted in a reconstruction made for a controversial British television documentary by Thames Television, Death on the Rock which raised several questions: Was the I.R.A. trio, carefully followed for days, in fact lured into Gibraltar? Why did the police fail to photograph the bodies or gather forensic evidence? Why was the press - Britain's tabloids were jubilant - told lies about a huge car bomb being defused and about the three suspects having died in a gunfight? According to the documentary: "There was a strong air of Government cover-up and disinformation." ^[36]

See also

• Death on the Rock; a controversial documentary about the shootings.
• Gibraltar Three - an Irish rebel song of whom Mairéad Farrell is a subject.

Notes

Bibliography and further reading

• Death on the Rock - documentary about the shootings.
• Murder on the Rock - book about the shootings.
• Relatives for Justice Site
• Summary and full judgement by the ECHR
• Adams, G, Hope and History: Making Peace in Ireland, Brandon Books, 2003. ISBN 0863223303
• New York Times (June 13, 1989) review of the Frontline documentary, Death of a Terrorist