IRELAND
Irish Independent

COLM KELPIE – 01 JUNE 2013

THE United Nations’ torture watchdog has criticised the McAleese inquiry into the Magdalene Laundries and has called on the Government to set out plans for a full-scale independent investigation.

The United Nations Committee Against Torture said it received information from several sources that the inquiry, chaired by former Senator Dr Martin McAleese, did not conduct a “fully independent investigation into allegations of arbitrary detention, forced labour or ill treatment.”

In a letter to Gerard Corr, Ireland’s ambassador to the UN in Geneva, the Committee questioned whether the state would set up an independent inquiry.