NROTHERN IRELAND
Channel 4 News
A former army intelligence officer says he alerted MI5 to abuse at Kincora boys’ home, but was told to stop digging. It is not the first time MI5 has been accused of covering up child abuse.
Channel 4 News brought Kincora victim Richard Kerr face to face with Brian Gemmell, who worked as an army intelligence officer in Belfast in the 1970s. Mr Gemmell said he put in an official report about Kincora to a senior MI5 officer, but to his astonishment he claims he was ordered to stop digging and forget about it.
Speaking to Mr Kerr, he said: “That’s the thing that hits me – that if I really pushed the thing through in 75-76, you could have been rescued. I’m sorry.” Channel 4 News has contacted MI5 via the Home Office and is awaiting a response to Mr Gemmell’s claims.
Mr Gemmell said he believed what happened at Kincora decades ago should be brought within the scope of the over-arching, judge-led inquiry Home Secretary Theresa May set up “to consider the extent to which state and non-state institutions have failed in their duty of care to protect children from sexual abuse and exploitation”.
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