TD for Cavan-Monaghan Brendan Smith has called on the Government to hold a proper investigation into the Belturbet car bombing which claimed two lives of two teenagers 45 years ago.
“The Government must forcefully insist to the British and Northern Ireland Authorities that maximum co-operation is needed to ensure a full and proper investigation into the bombings and murder of innocent people in Belturbet on 28th December 1972. All obstacles to such a long overdue investigation must be removed,” said Mr Smith.
On December 28th 1972, a car bomb exploded in Belturbet Co Cavan killing local girl Geraldine O’Reilly (15) and Paddy Stanley (16) from Clara in Co Offaly.
Patrick Stanley was working with a gas delivery lorry and was due to leave Belturbet that day. He had to stay overnight due to bad weather conditions and he was calling his family from a phone box to tell them this when the car bomb went off.
He played as a goalkeeper in soccer, gaelic football and hurling and had been nominated for an under-21 GAA All-Star award before he died.
Geraldine O’Reilly lived two miles outside Belturbet and was travelling to the town to get a bag of chips at the time of the bomb. She was a keen Irish dancer and her mother left her dancing costume and school uniform hanging on her bedroom door for years afterwards.
Their families have continued to press for an inquiry into the bombings and that call was today repeated by the Justice for the Forgotten group, which said the families should have the answers they need.
On the same evening as the Belturbet attack, bombs exploded near Pettigo, Co Donegal and Clones, Co Monaghan, though no-one was killed.
Mr Smith said no one has ever been brough to justice for what he described as “an atrocity.”
“Following the signing of the Stormont House Agreement in December 2014 I called for the Belturbet bombing to be referred to the Historical Investigations Unit but unfortunately nothing has progressed in relation to a full investigation on both sides of the border,” said Mr Smith.
“It is now 45 years since that desperate act of brutality was carried out ending the lives of 2 young innocent people.The fact that nobody has been brought to justice for these heinous crimes adds to the terrible suffering and grief that the families continue to endure,” he said.
The Belturbet bombing was one of several investigated on by Judge Henry Barron, who found that loyalists were the most likely culprits. However, no-one was ever charged in connection with the bombing.