Security services tried to kill me, says Belfast mayor

Republican who survived two assassination attempts says the authorities colluded with loyalist gunmen

Alex Maskey, Belfast's new Sinn Fein lord mayor, accused the British authorities yesterday of trying to have him assassinated several times in the 1980s and 1990s.

He alleged that elements in the government and intelligence agencies, including MI5, military intelligence and the RUC Special Branch, had been complicit in a number of attacks on him.

In one 1987 attack, he was shot in the stomach and seriously injured. In an attack in 1993, he escaped injury when gunmen who burst into his home shot dead one of his friends. In a further incident an acknowledged British agent, Brian Nelson, tried to have him shot at a restaurant.

Mr Maskey, who took office earlier this month as the first Republican lord mayor of Belfast, said collusion between the authorities and loyalist assassins had resulted from a policy decision taken at the highest level within the British Establishment.

He added: "There were people at very high levels of government who were either quite happy to see people like myself assassinated, or were organising it. I am not interested in recriminations about this. I want to highlight it so it should never happen again."

The lord mayor featured in the 1992 prosecution of Nelson, who received a 10-year sentence after pleading guilty to conspiring to murder Mr Maskey. The judge said Nelson had learnt that Mr Maskey was in a north Belfast restaurant, and had then tried to bring loyalist gunmen to the restaurant to shoot him. In the event they were too late.

Mr Maskey said the Nelson case showed that Special Branch and army intelligence were working hand in hand with loyalists who were actively trying to kill him. He said Nelson had been offered a deal that gave him a very lenient sentence "in return for silence in court and burying the evidence".

The lord mayor's remarks will add fuel to speculation about the contents of the report into alleged collusion that is to be published shortly by the Metropolitan Police Commissioner, Sir John Stevens. The report is said to criticise the Special Branch, but to stop short of confirming allegations of institutionalised collusion such as those made by Mr Maskey. If so, it will do little to lift the pall of suspicion hanging over cases such as the attacks on him.

The Stevens report centres on the 1989 loyalist killing of the solicitor Pat Finucane. The inquiry was in the day-to-day charge of the senior London policeman Hugh Orde, who has just been appointed to head the Police Service of Northern Ireland. Mr Orde will thus be responsible for implementing the recommendations that the Stevens report is expected to make on tightening security and procedures.

At the same time a retired Canadian judge has been given the task of reviewing the files in the Finucane case and five other killings. He will make recommendations that could include the setting up of a judicial inquiry.

The fact that he is expected to take about 18 months to do this has been criticised by the Finucane family and other campaigners, who say the procedure amounts to a deliberate delaying tactic.

* Loyalist paramilitaries promised yesterday they would not start new street violence at Belfast's sectarian flashpoints. A statement from the Loyalist Commission, which includes paramilitary representatives, agreed to the initiative in an effort to end the rioting that has engulfed parts of the city in recent weeks.

It said: "Loyalist paramilitaries will not initiate any action against republican communities, reaffirming their policy of no first strike." One source close to the body described the move as "truly historic".

The commission is an umbrella group consisting of church leaders, politicians and representatives of the Ulster Defence Association and the Ulster Volunteer Force. It was set up last year in a bid to ease tensions among feuding loyalist groupings.

It also called for an end to attacks on the security forces, and urged militant republicans to respond with a similar gesture.