The British government has announced it will hold a public inquiry into the killing of Pat Finucane. He was a lawyer whose 1989 slaying raised questions of collusion between U.K. security forces and Loyalist paramilitaries in Northern Ireland. Finucane was shot dead in his Belfast home by the Ulster Defense Association, a banned Protestant militia. A series of investigations concluded there was British state collusion in the murder. Successive British governments declined to hold an independent inquiry, despite pledging to do so. In a change of stance, the center-left Labour Party government elected in July said it would appoint a chair for an inquiry “as soon as possible” The victim’s son John Finucane welcomed the inquiry.
