§ Mr. McNamaraTo ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs if he will list those people who were issued a copy of the document produced by Adrian Thorpe on Derry in June 1972; what was his Department's response to Adrian Thorpe's document; if he will place a copy of the document in the Library; and what positions Adrian Thorpe has held in his Department. [140304]
§ Mr. VazMr. Thorpe was a desk officer in Republic of Ireland Department in 1972. His manuscript note summarised the contents of a large document which looked at several options for containing the violence in Londonderry. It went only to his Head of Department, whose response was that the issues it addressed had been overtaken by events. The document was submitted to the Saville Inquiry by the FCO, and has been passed to the interested parties by the Inquiry. It would be wrong for us to publish, piecemeal and out of context, individual documents submitted to the Inquiry while it is still sitting. Mr. Thorpe joined the FCO in 1965 and has had postings in Beirut, Tokyo, Bonn, Kuala Lumpur and Manila. He is currently Ambassador to Mexico.