The former Sinn Féin president said: “This little publication reflects the work, the courage, and the leadership of Pat who was a dedicated human rights lawyer. It also seeks to honour Pat the person, the Falls Road man, the son, the father, the brother and the husband.”

Pat Finucane was murdered on 12 February 1989 at the hands of a British state sponsored death squad. He was just 39 when he was murdered.

Adams added: “As a human rights lawyer it didn’t matter to Pat whether you were a republican, a unionist, a loyalist, or none of these.  He was a lawyer working within a unionist and British dominated legal and judicial process in which the torture and beating of detainees was part and parcel of the system of arrest and interrogation.”

The British state “determined to silence Pat Finucane”, said Adams and “working with its agents within the UDA they shot him in front of Geraldine and the children on 12 February 1989. They thought they had silenced Pat but they were wrong. Geraldine, the family, and his many friends have fought a determined campaign for truth and justice since then.”

Adams continued: “Pat’s voice continues to haunt the corridors of power within the British political and security system. Last week the family were back in court challenging the British government’s refusal to establish the independent inquiry that was agreed at Weston Park in 2001. That refusal is because the Pat Finucane case exemplifies the use of state collusion between the British government, its military and intelligence agencies, the RUC and unionist deaths squads. It exposes the use of those death squads at the highest level of government; British involvement in the mass murder of citizens, and in the smuggling of weapons into this statelet to facilitate this.”

Collusion reminded Adams “was not just the occasional use of spies or agents by the British operating within the IRA or loyalist paramilitary organisations. Collusion was a matter of institutional practice by successive British governments. It involved the establishing of unionist paramilitary groups; the systematic infiltration by the British of all unionist death squads at the highest levels; controlling and directing these groups; arming; training; and providing them with information on people to be killed. That’s why the British government doggedly fights to deny an inquiry.”