Internment: methods of interrogation

The majority of internees were taken to the Maze Prison

By the BBC's Chris West

Top Secret cabinet papers released today disclose how the British government gave its approval to controversial methods of interrogation used when internment was introduced in Northern Ireland in 1971.

Hundreds of men were arrested, but many of them were released, after the authorities realised they had been relying on often out-of-date or inaccurate information.

Allegations were made by civil rights groups that those still detained had been subjected to inhuman and degrading interrogation techniques, such as disorientation and exposure to insistent electronic noise. An official inquiry was ordered.

According to cabinet minutes marked Top Secret, released under the 30-year disclosure rule, the Defence Secretary was told of the principles governing the methods of interrogation, on the day after internment was brought in, in August 1971.

Lord Carver was the army's Chief of General Staff in 1971

"Strict discipline"

"Detainees should be subject to medical supervision, there should be no brutal or degrading treatment, and interrogation should be carried out humanely, but under strict discipline.

"Techniques designed to isolate detainees, to prevent them from obtaining any exact sense of time and location, and to impose fatigue by exposure to insistent and disturbing noise were regarded as proper."

The meeting attended by the Prime Minister Edward Heath, with senior cabinet members and military chiefs, heard that the methods of interrogation used in Northern Ireland had not differed greatly from those used against insurgents in Cyprus or Malaya.

Intelligence

The minutes continue: "while it was important that methods of interrogation should not overstep the proper bounds, it had to be remembered that the lives of British soldiers and innocent civilians depended on intelligence.

"We were dealing with an enemy who had no scruples, and we should not be unduly squeamish over methods of interrogation in these circumstances."

I demanded to know details of the methods that had been applied, and I found great difficulty.

Lord Carver

In an interview recorded for UK Confidential shortly before his death in December, Lord Carver, then the army's Chief of General Staff, recalls that he had not been informed that such techniques would be used.

"I demanded to know details of the methods that had been applied, and I found great difficulty. I got very evasive answers, and I found great difficulty in getting the full details."

According to Cabinet minutes from the end of October 1971, Sir Philip Allen, Home Office permanent under secretary, told the Prime Minister and other senior cabinet members that there was "little doubt" that the treatment of detainees would be considered legally to constitute an assault. The matter could be referred to the European Commission on Human Rights.

The warning was well founded: the Irish government made a formal complaint to the European Commission, then to the European Court of Human Rights. The Commission found Britain guilty of torture: the European Court ruled that the treatment was inhuman and degrading but did not constitute torture.