Bloody Sunday group demands photo evidence

Campaigners will today mark the anniversary of Bloody Sunday by handing a letter to the British Prime Minister demanding the …

Campaigners will today mark the anniversary of Bloody Sunday by handing a letter to the British Prime Minister demanding the disclosure of photographs and film footage shot during the massacre 31 years ago.

The Bloody Sunday Organising Committee (BSOC) claims the original helicopter footage and over 1,000 photographs said to be held by the Ministry of Defence are crucial to the inquiry, chaired by Lord Saville.

The inquiry, which started five years ago, was not sitting today at Methodist Central Hall in London as a mark of respect on the anniversary of the shooting of 13 Catholic men on a civil rights march in Derry in 1972.

The letter states that the group was informed by the families and those wounded on Bloody Sunday that the British army's operation order specified that 10 photographers and one cine film team in a helicopter would provide "maximum photo coverage" of the march.

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The letter says Col Colin Overbury of Army Legal Services, who represented the army in 1972, confirmed the photographs were available to him at the original Widgery Inquiry, which has been declared a "whitewash" by survivors and families of the victims.

The group is due to hand its letter in to 10 Downing Street at 2 p.m.

PA