{"id":81850,"date":"2025-05-07T12:37:08","date_gmt":"2025-05-07T12:37:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/81850\/"},"modified":"2025-05-07T12:37:08","modified_gmt":"2025-05-07T12:37:08","slug":"gerry-adams-claims-bbc-allegations-about-him-undermined-northern-ireland-peace-process-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/81850\/","title":{"rendered":"Gerry Adams claims BBC allegations about him undermined Northern Ireland peace process \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"

Gerry Adams<\/a> has claimed allegations made about him in a BBC Spotlight programme undermined progress achieved during the Northern Ireland peace process.<\/p>\n

The former Sinn F\u00e9in<\/a> leader was giving evidence during the second week of his High Court action against the BBC, in which he claims a Spotlight programme and a related article published in 2016 defamed him by falsely accusing him of sanctioning the 2006 killing of British agent Denis Donaldson.<\/p>\n

The BBC denies it defamed Mr Adams, who insists he had no involvement in Mr Donaldson\u2019s death, which dissident republicans claimed responsibility for in 2009.<\/p>\n

Continuing his cross-examination of Mr Adams on Wednesday, Paul Gallagher SC, for the BBC, referred to allegations about Mr Adams made in various books and newspapers.<\/p>\n

Mr Adams said counsel was attempting to \u201csmother\u201d the jury with \u201cobscure\u201d allegations, and that he was trying to persuade the jury that his reputation is \u201cuseless\u201d, that he has \u201cno reputation whatsoever\u201d.<\/p>\n

Mr Adams said that he never sued over previous, repeated claims made that he was a member of the IRA and sat on its army council because he was advised by his solicitors he would not get a fair trial.<\/p>\n

The fact he has sued the BBC over the claims made in the Spotlight programme shows how serious he takes the allegations made in it, Mr Adams said.<\/p>\n

He said the inference of the Spotlight programme that his and others\u2019 efforts to persuade the IRA to end its armed campaign and \u201cleave the stage\u201d was a \u201cscam\u201d.<\/p>\n

Mr Adams continued that the programme inferred the IRA leadership authorised the killing of Mr Donaldson, and they came to him for \u201cpermission\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cI consider that to be a grievous, grievous smear, and could have no other impact on the peace process but to undermine what we have achieved,\u201d Mr Adams said.<\/p>\n

Mr Adams said that counsel was seeking to persuade the jury that he had \u201cno reputation whatsoever\u201d because of allegations that he was a member of the IRA and sat on its army council.<\/p>\n

Mr Adams\u2019 barristers objected to Mr Gallagher\u2019s questioning during the cross-examination, submitting that material from news articles was being advanced as the truth of their contents.<\/p>\n

Mr Justice Alexander Owens reminded the jury that \u201call of this blather\u201d about Mr Adams being a member of the army council is not something they have to decide on. He said they were entitled to consider relevant material in the public domain.<\/p>\n

Mr Adams later said he\u2019d acknowledge that certain allegations made about him were in the public domain \u201cfor a very, very long time\u201d. <\/p>\n

He added: \u201cI don\u2019t for a second recognise their accuracy … in fact I deny them.\u201d<\/p>\n

Asked if he was \u201cappalled\u201d by an allegation in an article that he sat on the army council, Mr Adams said he was \u201cirritated\u201d by it. He said the allegation was \u201cgetting in the way\u201d.<\/p>\n

Questioned by Mr Gallagher about a speech he made at Sinn F\u00e9in\u2019s ardfheis in 1986 \u2013 in which he advocated for the party to end its policy of abstentionism \u2013 Mr Adams said that he has \u201cnever purported to speak for the IRA, ever\u201d.<\/p>\n

The trial continues.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Gerry Adams has claimed allegations made about him in a BBC Spotlight programme undermined progress achieved during the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":81851,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5011],"tags":[192,39680,18226,1144,11528,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-81850","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-northern-ireland","8":"tag-bbc","9":"tag-gerry-adams","10":"tag-high-court","11":"tag-northern-ireland","12":"tag-sinn-fein","13":"tag-uk","14":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/114466589495609476","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/81850","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=81850"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/81850\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/81851"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=81850"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=81850"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=81850"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}