Operation Kenova: British spy in IRA ‘cost more lives than it saved’, damning Stakeknife report finds
A British spy inside the IRA during the Northern Ireland Troubles probably cost more lives than the operation saved, a major independent investigation has found.
The interim findings of Operation Kenova were published on Friday following an examination of 101 murders and abductions linked to the Provisional IRA’s so-called “nutting squad”, which was responsible for interrogating, torturing and murdering people suspected of passing information to the security forces.
The report, which follows a seven-year investigation, found that the agent, known as Stakeknife, saved “between high single figures and low double figures” of lives but “nowhere near hundreds [as] sometimes claimed”.
The families of victims have said the report proves “both state and the IRA were co-conspirators in the murder of its citizens”.
The report scrutinised the role of a embedded in the heart of the IRA’s Internal Security Unit (ISU) throughout the conflict.
