The British government was urged today to create a special unit of the Coroner's Service to investigate controversial killings in Northern Ireland.
Dungannon coroner Dr Roger McLernon, who is conducting an inquest into 10 people killed in suspicious circumstances, said the government did not appear willing to grasp the nettle of an independent investigations branch.
He said the present coroners' system was simply not designed to cope with the killings involving allegations of security-force collusion.
"It may well be that these cases will be seen as unusual but I doubt that. There are always situations where a fully independent investigation is the only way forward to satisfy the public disquiet.
"It is not satisfactory from the families' point of view and the point of view of the administration of justice but we have inherited the system that is there," he said.
The inquests involve the killings of:
- IRA men Peter Ryan, Tony Doris and Lawrence McNally killed on "active service" by the SAS at Coagh in June 1991.
- Jack and Kevin McKearney, shot by an Ulster Volunteer Force gunman as they worked in the family butcher's shop in Moy, Co Tyrone, in January 1992.
- IRA members Kevin Barry O'Donnell, Patrick Vincent, Sean O'Farrell and Peter Clancy, shot in an SAS ambush at Clonoe, Co Tyrone, in February 1992.
- Roseanne Mallon, a 76-year-old pensioner shot dead by the UVF in May 1994. At the time of her death, the house she was in was under army surveillance.