Names of several senior soldiers involved in Bloody Sunday may have been accidentally divulged to representatives of the victims' families, it emerged today.
The new Saville Inquiry into the 1972 shootings, which left 14 civilians dead, last night denied a Tory MP's claim that it had released signed statements by five army officers involved in the day's events to solicitors acting for the families.
However, a spokesman admitted that last autumn a series of 73 sets of documents presented to the original 1972 Widgery Inquiry had been released to interested parties' solicitors.
Among the documents were statements by five ex-Paras who were involved in the events of January 30th, 1972, but were not among the 17 who opened fire.
The statements contained the soldiers' names, ranks and army serial numbers and appear to have been released in the mistaken belief they had been in the public domain since 1972.
The admission came from the Saville Inquiry in a statement denying a claim by Aldershot MP Gerald Howarth.
Mr Howarth said in the House of Commons that the inquiry's lawyers had passed on full statements given by members of the Parachute Regiment to relatives of the victims.
He said: "In advance of a hearing in the High Court, the solicitors acting on behalf of the Inquiry have released to the relatives of those dead and wounded in that incident the statements given by those soldiers with their rank, name and number."
But the inquiry denied the claim and said that statements taken by a solicitor's firm for the current inquiry had been "distributed only to the soldiers' own solicitors and to no one else".
A judicial review to decide the issue is due to take place today.
Solicitors representing the majority of the families of the dead and wounded last night denied they had received statements as claimed by Mr Howarth.
Patricia Coyle of Madden and Finucane said: "We have not today received any soldiers' statements from the Bloody Sunday inquiry which contained names, ranks and army serial numbers. We refer to the press announcement issued by the inquiry to confirm that."
She added: "We are alarmed at the timing of this statement by Gerald Howarth, MP, the day before the issue of anonymity is considered by the High Court in London for a second time."
Mr Paul O'Connor of the Pat Finucane Centre in Derry said he understood that many of the relatives of the Bloody Sunday victims were aware of the names of the paratroopers involved, and that they had had this information for quite some time. This information did not come from the Bloody Sunday inquiry, he added.