The UK Government has been urged to name the Army’s top spy in the Provisional IRA following a major independent probe into his activities.
Operation Kenova found in its interim report that more lives were probably lost than saved through the operation of Stakeknife, an agent who “committed grotesque, serious crime” including torture and murder.
Following the final report, Kenova chief Sir Iain Livingstone said there is a “compelling ethical case for the UK Government to derogate from the Neither Confirm Nor Deny (NCND) policy regarding the agent Stakeknife’s identity”.
He added: “It is in the public interest that Stakeknife is named.”
The agent Stakeknife was widely believed to be west Belfast man, Freddie Scappaticci, who was 77 when he died in 2023.
Following the publication of the interim report last year, MI5 told Kenova it had found previously undisclosed material.
Sir Iain underlined the material had come eight months after the establishment of Kenova and two months after the final prosecution decisions, and the timing meant Kenova “was prohibited from investigating their contents”.
The final Kenova report, published on Tuesday, updates 10 recommendations made in the interim report last year, including a call for the UK government to acknowledge and apologise to bereaved families and surviving victims.
It also calls for a full apology from the Republican Movement for the Provisional IRA’s abduction, torture and murder of those it suspected of being agents.
The final report includes a report of Operation Denton, which reviewed a series of attacks carried out by loyalists with involvement by some members of the security forces in the 1970s known as the Glenanne Gang.
It finds that an “easily defined Glenanne Gang did not exist”.
It contends the term “evolved” to become a “convenient shorthand construct to group together the horrific activities of a broader network of paramilitary groups, “primarily the wider UVF and Mid Ulster UVF acting with corrupt members of the security forces, including the RUC and UDR”.
It also finds that the UVF was responsible for the 1974 Dublin and Monaghan bombings, and there was no specific intelligence that could have prevented the attacks, which claimed 33 lives.
It remains the biggest loss of life on any single day of the Troubles.
Kenova’s 10 recommendations also include a call to designate the longest day, June 21, as a day to remember all those lost, injured or harmed as a result of the Troubles.
The probe was initially set up to investigate the activities of Stakeknife within the PIRA’s internal security unit and commenced in 2016.
It examined 101 murders and abductions linked to the unit responsible for interrogating and torturing people suspected of passing information to the security forces during the conflict.
In total, it discovered 3,517 intelligence reports from Stakeknife, including 377 in an 18-month period.
However, the report found that “time and time again”, the reports were not acted on, apparently prioritising the protection of the agent over those who “could and should have been saved”.
Last week, the Public Prosecution Service (PPS) in Northern Ireland announced that no prosecutions would be pursued after consideration of the last batch of files from the investigation.
Some 32 people, including former police, former military personnel and people linked with the IRA, were considered for prosecution on a range of charges from murder and abduction to misconduct in public office and perjury.
However, the PPS found there was insufficient evidence to pursue cases.
The report also finds that the cultivation and recruitment of Stakeknife started in the 1970s and he continued to operate as an agent into the 1990s.
He was offered “financial incentives” during and after the period when he was operationally active, ranging from the equivalent of an annual wage to lump sums of thousands of pounds, including to assist with the purchase of a property.
Kenova was unable to ascertain how much money he was paid in total.
The report also found there had been two incidents when his handlers took him out of Northern Ireland for a holiday when they knew he was wanted for by police for murder.
