Brits used CR Gas on Republican Prisoners

Published: 24 August, 2006

A former leader of the IRA in Long Kesh has claimed a senior British government official admitted to him during a private conversation that CR gas was used on republican prisoners during a riot in the jail.
West Belfast man George Gillen was officer commanding in charge of IRA internees in Long Kesh in October 1974.
Three weeks after republicans wrecked the prison, he was taken to a meeting with then Long Kesh chief prison officer William “Punchy” Wright. Also present at the meeting was a senior British prison official from London.
According to Mr Gillen, they wanted to know why the prisoners had rioted.
They summoned him in his capacity as leader of the internees.
In an Interview with Daily Ireland, Mr Gillen said that, before the meeting started, the British prison official had immediately distanced himself and Long Kesh prison staff from the riot.
“I hadn’t even sat down when this guy started talking about CR gas,” said Mr Gillen.
“To be honest, I really didn’t know what he was on about. But he said to me — I can still remember it clearly — he said: ‘Everything I tell you is off the record. The prison officers had nothing to do with the distribution of CR gas.’
“It wasn’t until years later, when the stuff about CR gas being used on us came out, that I realised what he had meant.
“The man who was introduced to me as a senior British prisons official from London admitted CR gas had been used against the prisoners,” added Mr Gillen.
“It is obvious to me and everyone else who was there on the day of the riot that the Brits used CR gas on the prisoners.
“It was fired from helicopters that flew above the football pitches where prisoners were fighting with the British soldiers.
“It made you feel as if you were on fire.
“I was in absolute agony and couldn’t get a breath. I reckon I was knocked out almost instantaneously.”
The controversy over the British army’s use of CR gas on republican inmates reopened this week when former soldiers from the Duke of Edinburgh’s Royal Regiment, who were in Long Kesh during the disturbances, told Daily Ireland an “unknown” gas had been used.
One ex-squaddie who fought with inmates on the prison pitches said: “I can tell you now, because I have seen CS gas [a less harmful gas] being used, that it wasn’t CS which was fired from the helicopters.
“I don’t know what it was. We weren’t told and we didn’t ask questions.”
The British government has always denied using CR gas, which can cause cancer, on the prisoners.
However, it has admitted that 200 handheld sprays containing CR gas were being kept in Long Kesh at the time of the riot and that clearance for the use of the chemical had been granted in 1973.
Around 300 prisoners were affected by the gas, a fifth of whom have since died or are suffering from rare forms of cancer.
Following the British soldiers’ admissions that an “unknown” gas was used on the prisoners, Sinn Féin has called on the British government to finally come clean on the issue.
Foyle assembly member Raymond McCartney said: “The British government now needs to come clean. Thirty years on, the people deserve to know the truth.
“A group of former prisoners are preparing a legal challenge on this issue.
“The British government attempts to conceal the truth about that night in October 1974 must end, and the truth must emerge.”