Uncovering the truth

The blood, the gunfire, the chaos. Fourteen dead and thirteen injured. Sunday 30 January 1972, Derry, Northern Ireland.

Bloody Sunday is an infamous example of state violence, where the British army opened fire on peaceful civil rights protesters, marking a watershed not only in the Northern Ireland conflict but in relations between the nationalist community and the State.

Edge Hill University's Professor Mark McGovern addresses these controversial issues in his inaugural lecture, Untold Truths: State Violence, Truth Recovery and Post-Conflict Transition on the Ormskirk Campus at 5pm on Tuesday 19 May 2009.

Professor McGovern will talk about the 30-year war in Northern Ireland and the use of state violence, focusing on how it has, or has not, been handled since the ceasefire.

The Good Friday Agreement signed in 1998 signalled the end of the conflict, but it neglected to include any investigation into the many violent events during the period, causing deep and disturbing divisions among its victims.

He will highlight the importance of truth recovery as an essential part of the healing process after any war, citing present day conflicts in Afghanistan and Iraq as examples.

Professor McGovern, who hails from Northern Ireland, said: "Events such as Bloody Sunday in my home town of Derry, and the sense of injustice that it instilled, that people could be shot down by the state in broad daylight and that was covered up, had a massive and lasting effect.

"I believe that dealing properly with the past is the only way to future peace. Truth recovery and state violence remain highly pertinent today, not only for Northern Ireland, but because some of the same issues have emerged, in the ‘War on Terror', the conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan and in the way that Muslims in Britain have become a new ‘suspect community'."

The lecture takes place on Edge Hill's Ormskirk Campus, St Helens Road. To book a place, email Sharon Buckley at buckleys@edgehill.ac.uk.