Did those killed provoke the shooting by British soldiers?
• "None of the casualties shot by soldiers of Support Company was armed with a firearm or (with the probable exception of Gerald Donaghey) a bomb of any description. None was posing any threat of causing death or serious injury. In no case was any warning given before soldiers opened fire," the report said.
• Evidence from soldiers to the inquiry that they had fired after coming under attack was rejected. "We have concluded that none of them fired in response to attacks or threatened attacks by nail or petrol bombers. No one threw or threatened to throw a nail or petrol bomb at the soldiers on Bloody Sunday."
• The credibility of the accounts given by the soldiers was "materially undermined" because all soldiers bar one who were responsible for the casualties "insisted that they had shot at gunmen or bombers, which they had not". Saville said: "Many of these soldiers have knowingly put forward false accounts in order to seek to justify their firing".
Why did the soldiers open fire?
• The report concluded that officers reacted because of "the mistaken belief among them that republican paramilitaries were responding in force to their arrival in the Bogside", based on initial shots fired by one of their number, namely, Lieutenant N. "Our overall conclusion is that there was a serious and widespread loss of fire discipline among the soldiers of Support Company".
• Saville admonished Lieutenant N "not only for firing, but also for failing to realise the effect that his firing would be likely to have on the other soldiers who had come into the Bogside".
http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2010/jun/15/bloody-sunday-inquiry-key-findings