[JURIST] The Minister for the Irish Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade [official website], Charles Flanagan, announced on Tuesday he will make a request [press release] to the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) [official website] to review the judgment of a case against the UK for alleged torture. In 1971 during a violent period known as The Troubles, 14 men from Northern Ireland were detained by the UK government and forced to undergo interrogation techniques which included hooding the detainees, continuous white noise, sleep deprivation, food and drink deprivation, and wall-standing. In 1978 the ECHR ruled the techniques, although inhumane and degrading, did not constitute torture. The decision to request ECHR to revise the judgment was made after 12 of the men brought action [Irish Times report] to the High Court to make the request, and after the department reviewed thousands of documents and received legal advice. Many of the documents were obtained from a documentary released in June, which claims the UK cabinet approved the interrogation techniques and that the UK government withheld information from the court. About the statement, the Minister stated:

The Government’s decision was not taken lightly. As EU partners, UK and Ireland have worked together to promote human rights in many fora and during the original case, the UK did not contest before the European Court of Human Rights that a breach of Article 3 of the European Convention of Human rights took place. The British and Irish Governments have both worked hard to build stronger more trusting relations in recent years and I believe that this relationship will now stand to us as we work through the serious matters raised by these cases which have come to light in recent months.

Amnesty International (AI) [advocacy website] welcomed the announcement [press release].

The Troubles [BBC backgrounder] was a time of unrest in Northern Ireland, between 1968 and 1998, when Protestant unionists wished to remain a part of UK, and Catholic republicans and nationalists sought to join the Republic of Ireland. During this time over 3,600 people died and 50,000 were injured throughout the UK. Both Northern Ireland and the British government continue to be affected by The Troubles. Last year AI published a report [JURIST report] stating that Northern Ireland will struggle to move forward due to its failure to establish the truth about abuses committed during its civil unrest, and criticizing Ireland and the UK for failing to investigate human rights abuses during the period. In 2011 the British government announced it would pay reparations [JURIST report] to the families of those killed or wounded in Northern Ireland’s 1972 Bloody Sunday [JURIST news archive], the day on which members of the British Army’s Parachute Regiment opened fire on civil rights marchers in Londonderry. The shooting, which killed 13 Northern Ireland civilians and wounded 15, was later determined to have been unjustified by the UK Bloody Sunday Inquiry [official website].