'Co-Conspirators in Murder': Dirty Wars, Meta-Conflicts and Bipartisan Transitional Justice.

The article focuses on the 2024 Kenova inquiry into conflict-era murders in Northern Ireland involving a British state informer within the Irish Republican Army's (IRA) counter-informing unit, highlighting the bipartisan nature of violence during the conflict. The inquiry found that both the British state and the IRA were complicit in killings of alleged informers, revealing a complex entanglement of responsibility that challenges rigid, partisan narratives typical of transitional justice frameworks. This "co-conspiracy in murder" complicates traditional victim-perpetrator distinctions and suggests that addressing the "dirty war" aspects of conflicts—marked by betrayal and counter-betrayal—could foster more integrative, bipartisan approaches to transitional justice. The article argues that such an approach may help transcend zero-sum meta-conflicts over contested histories and open new avenues for reconciliation and accountability beyond Northern Ireland.