Bloody Sunday pledge from Mowlam

A new Labour government would look again at the continuing controversy over the Bloody Sunday killings with an open mind, the party's Northern Ireland spokesman, Mo Mowlam, said yesterday.

Dr Mowlam, who described the new evidence which had emerged as "disturbing", was speaking as the Irish government - along with most of the other major parties - continued to press for the reopening of inquiries into the incident, when 13 men and youths were shot dead by paratroops in Londonderry in January 1972.

The latest surge of interest has been generated by reports on Channel 4 News and in the Dublin Sunday Business Post, both of which produced comments from a paratrooper who was present that day. On Channel 4 News a soldier said: "Command and control was absent for a period of 15 minutes. During that period a number of fairly unfortunate ... decisions were made by individuals on the ground which led to some shameful and disgraceful acts being perpetrated."

The Dublin newspaper produced an account of a soldier who made a number of serious allegations. Among these were claims that some of the killings had occurred after an order had been given to ceasefire, and that soldiers had made use of illegal "dum-dum" bullets, which had been doctored to inflict maximum damage.

According to this soldier his statement of events, to be given to the Widgery tribunal which investigated the deaths, had been replaced by a fictionalised account designed to conceal the fact that shots had been fired into a crowd.

The Irish government is compiling a dossier, incorporating this and other evidence, which is to be presented to the British government. The Taoiseach, John Bruton, has taken a personal interest in the controversy and described the soldier's claims about his statement as "incredibly worrying".