So Tony B Liar is summoned before the Greater England Parliament committee to give evidence about those “On The Run” letters.
This was all supposed to be secret.
Then there was the unfortunate business when John Downey appeared in a London court and his solicitors produced a letter saying he wasnt wanted by the Law.
And as it turns out, a lot of people have such letters. All signed by the Brits saying they are not on a wanted list. The On The Runs returned home.

It was all a big secret. Because of course there is “no amnesty” for the IRA. It is of course all Semantics. In order to get and keep Sinn Féin-IRA into the Peace Process the letters were deemed necessary. Indeed probably also necessary for the IRA to persuade its own hawks that the British had granted an amnesty.
Ten years ago, the British had effectively decided that they could not put their faith in the moderate unionists (UUP) and the moderate nationalists (SDLP) to really deliver long term Peace. Maybe they were right. But what is certain is that the Brits were already working on undermining UUP and SDLP and boosting DUP and Sinn Féin.

Five things.
Sinn Féin needed their Amnesty…the On The Run letters.
And DUP did not want to know what was going on.
And the Brits needed to keep UUP and SDLP in the dark.
UUP and SDLP had their suspicions of course. As Mark Durkan of SDLP has put it …”a dirty war and a dirty peace”.
And the old Royal Ulster Constabulary and British forces have also got an undisclosed Amnesty.

Thats how it is.
It all went wrong when the dirty little secret was revealed in a London Court.

But lets be honest. We are all adults here. Are we really surprised? Thats how these things work.
Of course SDLP are absolutely right to highlight it. It verifies their narrative that Tony Blair is an unprincipled bastard.

What about the Victims?
Well several victims were in the committee room in the English House of Commons to hear Blair. And they didnt like it.
But of course they were only SOME victims…they were victims of “republican terrorism”
But there are a lot of victims of British terrorists (RUC and Army) who will never get Justice either.

But Victims will never get Justice.
It is the price we paid when we voted YES to the Good Friday Agreement.
We kidded ourselves that Victims would get Justice (whatever that is) some time in the Future.
They were sold out…by us all.