Intelligence

Al-Qaeda's airport bomb plot - the Irish connection

Al-Qaeda's airport bomb plot | UK News | The Observer

An Islamist explosives expert now in a Northern Ireland prison conducted dummy runs for terror attacks at Dublin and Knock

Henry McDonald, Ireland editor
Sunday November 19, 2006
The Observer

A convicted al-Qaeda bomb-maker serving a jail sentence in Northern Ireland carried out dummy runs for a potential terrorist plot at Dublin and Knock airports, The Observer can reveal.

Last Tuesday the expelled Islamist cleric Omar Bakri Mohammed was seen exhorting young British Muslims in an online broadcast from Beirut to target Dublin because he incorrectly believed US troops used the airport as a transit centre on the way to Iraq and Afghanistan. Now it has emerged that key al-Qaeda bomb-making expert Abbas Boutrab visited both Dublin and Knock airports. Information on the airports was found at his north Belfast flat three years ago, according to evidence at his trial in Belfast Crown Court last November.

Boutrab lived in the Irish Republic for four years after successfully applying for political asylum using a fake identity. He left Lucan, Dublin, in 2002 after becoming the main suspect in a knife attack on an asylum seeker and moved to Belfast, where he lived under another false ID.

He was arrested after a joint MI5-PSNI operation in 2003 and information on his PC showed he had advanced a method of adapting ordinary electronic devices - including a cassette recorder - to detonate explosives in an aircraft.

Boutrab was convicted of possessing information on bomb-making and sentenced to six years' imprisonment. Evidence given at his trial stated that he was part of the al-Qaeda plot to smuggle the bomb on to an aircraft and detonate the device as it circled over a major American city.

While Boutrab lived in Lucan, under the alias 'Yocef Djafari', he attracted no suspicion. Papers discovered in Belfast showed that he entered the Republic unchallenged and successfully applied for asylum status in 2001.

It was also discovered that he stole a passport in Dublin airport in September 2001 from an Italian tourist named Fabio Parenti, and had used this in Northern Ireland.

The origins of Boutrab have yet to be established, though it was discovered that his first trace in Europe was in 1992 when fingerprints matching his were found in Holland belonging to a man travelling under the alias Maured Benali. When he was arrested in Belfast three years ago he was found to have nine separate sets of identity papers.

Al-Qaeda's presence in Ireland became apparent last August when the Garda seized a DVD with lectures on how to construct detonators and bombs while it was on its way to Britain. One senior officer in the Garda Siochana described the content of the training DVD as 'brilliant and terrifying'.

November 18, 2006 at 08:59 PM in Ireland | Permalink | Top of page | Blog Home

Loyalist paramilitaries told to 'stand down'

ePolitix.com - Loyalist paramilitaries told to 'stand down'

The Loyalist Volunteer Force has ordered its 'military units' to stand down.

The LVF said it was responding to the IRA's arms decommissioning arms.

However, some observers believe it has more to do with the conclusion of a feud between the group and the Ulster Volunteer Force, from which it split from originally.

In an earlier statement, Reverend Mervyn Gibson said the loyalist feud, which claimed four lives in Belfast in July and August, had "permanently ended".

He said the group of church and community figures had been holding mediation talks "for some time".

A special report by the ceasefire watchdog said the LVF carried out two murder bids, but their violence was mainly a response to UVF attacks.

The report on the loyalist paramilitary feud led Northern Ireland Secretary Peter Hain to declare the UVF ceasefire had broken down.

DUP MP Nigel Dodds said he "warmly welcomed" the end of the feud.

"Communities have been set on edge and put into turmoil. I pay tribute to those who have worked so hard to bring this resolution about," he added.

Ulster Unionist leader Sir Reg Empey said the move was another positive development in the political process.

"Yesterday's announcement that the feud is over, last week the UDA sent a delegation to see the decommissioning body and Gerry Adams, for the first time allowed the words 'the war is over' to pass his lips," he said.

"Now when we take all those things together I think we have had a fairly positive week and something that I think we need to build on."

October 31, 2005 at 01:15 PM in Ireland | Permalink | Top of page | Blog Home

Few tears as loyalist thugs kill their own

Britain, UK news from The Times and The Sunday Times - Times Online

By David Sharrock, Ireland Correspondent
WAS Doris Day about to sing? As police made six arrests over the murder of Jim Gray, a notoriously violent loyalist terrorist leader nicknamed after the 1960s singer/actress for his camp dress sense, the word on the street was that he was murdered by former comrades who feared that he was preparing to tell all as part of a plea bargain.

If so, the only public reaction to the removal of the “Bling Brigadier” on the streets of East Belfast, where he and his henchmen — known as “the Spice Boys” — plied their drugs and extortion rackets, was a sense of relief.

Gray, 47, was shot five times in the back on Tuesday after being tricked into dropping his guard, it emerged last night. He was assassinated as he shifted weightlifting equipment from the boot of a car outside his father’s home in the Clarawood Estate in East Belfast.

He was the highest- profile loyalist godfather in Northern Ireland after Johnny Adair was forced to flee by rivals. Adair was found guilty in Bolton last week of intimidation and also pleaded guilty to beating his wife, Gina.

Gray had been living at his father’s home since his release on police bail three weeks ago on charges of money laundering. He had been arrested in March as he drove towards the Irish border with a bank draft for €10,000 euros (£6,800) and £3,000 cash in his car. It was believed that he was about to fly from Dublin to the Costa del Sol, either to lie low for a while. A few days earlier he had been deposed by the five other “brigadiers” of the Ulster Defence Association’s ruling inner council. Gray had ruled East Belfast for years from his Avenue One Bar on the Newtownards Road, opposite the UDA’s “Freedom Corner” — murals urging the Irish to leave Ulster and depicting Cuchulainn, a mythical warrior, as a loyalist leader.

With the arrival of paramilitary ceasefires, figures such as Gray — a man who issued death warrants to be carried out by his men — drifted ever deeper into purely criminal activities such as drug trafficking. He used his licensed premises to launder the money.

Gray was said to have been a cocaine user and his son, Jonathan, 19, died of an overdose at a party in Thailand that both men attended in 2002.

Belfast’s terrorist underworld has always been a shadowy place but, unlike the tight discipline of the republican groups, loyalist chiefs have a history of falling victim to their own vanity and perishing as a result of it.While some loyalists sought to formulate political statements, Gray seemed exclusively committed to parading his misguided fashion statements. When he joined other loyalist leaders to meet John Reid, the Northern Ireland Secretary, in July 2002, he wore a Hawaiian shirt, chunky gold necklace and bracelet, earring, sunglasses and a pink pullover.

With his thinning peroxide-blond hair and chubby form, he looked like a cut-price Elton John; but unlike some other loyalist patriarchs who tried to portray themselves in a benign light, Gray did not care what people thought of his cruel, bullying ways. Before a captive audience at a Rod Stewart concert at Stormont Castle in 2002, he battered and kicked a man who had spilled a drink on his clothes while his lieutenants held the victim down.

Two months after meeting Mr Reid, Gray was shot, reputedly by the Loyalist Volunteer Force in retaliation for a murder. It was not clear if the shooting was a murder attempt or an attack on Gray’s vanity, since the gunman aimed at his face.

Detectives said yesterday that their main line of inquiry was that Gray had been killed by fellow UDA members. Some of his associates were reported to have gone into hiding last month as rumours grew that he had done a deal with officers investigating loyalist racketeering. Whether or not there is substance to the allegations, Gray has joined the list of other toppled UDA brigadiers.

In truth, he and his former cohorts had been running on empty for a decade, waiting for the courage of the public to consign them finally to the past; but on the Protestant side of the community there has so far been no equivalent to the McCartney sisters’ campaign, which weakened the Provisional IRA’s stranglehold.

John “Grug” Gregg, who led a murder attempt on Gerry Adams in the 1980s, was killed in an internal feud in 2003. Jim “Jimbo” Simpson earned the derisory nickname “the Bacardi Brigadier” and was also swept aside. Billy “King Rat” Wright was killed in jail. That leaves Andre Shoukri, known as “The Egyptian”, as the leading loyalist tabloid subject, with Irish newspapers for months relating stories about his £10,000- a-day gambling addiction.While their nicknames may reduce them to cartoon proportions, the danger they pose to the public may have diminished but cannot be written off. As a local radio commentator, voicing the sentiment on the street, said of Gray yesterday: “He’s been taken out — who cares so long as it’s only the bad elements killing one another?”

LINE OF FIRE
# Jim “Doris Day” Gray, 47, killed on Tuesday. Former UDA brigadier East Belfast

# John “Grug” Gregg, 45, UDA brigadier for South East Antrim. Killed February 2003 on his way home from a Glasgow Rangers football match. UDA “C Company” blamed

# Andre “The Egyptian” Shoukri, 26, North Belfast UDA brigadier. The son of an Egyptian Copt who settled in Northern Ireland and married. His gambling habit is said to be threatening his position. Served part of a six-year sentence for possession of a gun. Keen amateur boxer

# Billy “King Rat” Wright, 37, was a member of the Ulster Volunteer Force but, disaffected by the peace process, formed the breakaway Loyalist Volunteer Force. He was killed by republicans in jail in 1997

October 5, 2005 at 10:09 PM in Ireland | Permalink | Top of page | Blog Home

Six arrested over killing of 'flash' loyalist leader

Hunt for killers of senior loyalist - World - Times Online

By Philippe Naughton and agencies

Jim Gray , who was shot dead in Belfast yesterday, at the funeral of a UDA commander in 2003 (Paul Faith/PA)

Six people were being questioned today about the murder of a flamboyant loyalist terror boss shot dead at point blank range outside his Belfast home last night.

Northern Ireland police said that the six were arrested during searches following the killing of Jim Gray, the Ulster Defence Association's former "brigadier" in East Belfast.

The killers are believed to have been lying in wait outside the house for Gray, 47, to return and shot him several times as he got out of his silver car. He died at the scene shortly after 8pm and his body was left lying in the driveway of the semi-detached house beside the car.

Police sealed off the area and covered the body with a white sheet as a crowds of 30 local youths gathered.

The six suspects were being held today at the Serious Crime Suite in Antrim police station. Superintendent George Hamilton, the officer in charge of the inquiry, also confirmed that Gray’s former associates were believed to have carried out the killing.

He said: "A significant and major line of inquiry is that Mr Gray was murdered by the UDA, an organisation with which he had an association in the past."

The former paramilitary chief - nicknamed "Doris Day" because of his bleached blond hair, and heavy tan - had been released from prison on bail less than three weeks ago. He had been in custody since April facing charges involving money laundering.

At a bail hearing last month the prosecution said that the release of Gray, who had been expelled by the UDA several months ago, could lead to an outbreak of violence, as he was under paramilitary threat.

Gray had many enemies and was not a difficult target to find - his address was well known and the terms of the High Court bail set last month put him under virtual night-time curfew in his house. He had also been ordered not to leave Northern Ireland and had to report to the police five times a week.

The paramilitary chief survived a previous murder bid when he was shot in the face during a feud in 2002. He was arrested in April by detectives investigating alleged money laundering. Police allegedly found a bank draft for 10,000 euros and nearly £3,000 in cash in his car when Gray was stopped outside Banbridge, Co Down. He was believed to have been heading for the Irish border.

Police said today that Gray had been a target both in prison and since his release.

"Since Mr Gray’s arrest and retention in Maghaberry Prison in April, there has been a number of threats made against him," Mr Hamilton said. "Police have complied with our obligation in terms of advising him about these and given advice about personal security. Those threats were given to him while in prison and since his release."

But the detective denied that Gray was under police surveillance or police protection.

Despite Gray's notorious reputation, police pledged to try to hunt down the murder gang. Mr Hamilton said: "I want to be very clear about this, Mr Gray was murdered. This was the brutal killing of a man by another human being. The Police Service of Northern Ireland will fulfil its obligation in attempting to bring to justice those responsible for the murder of James Gray."

David Sharrock, Ireland Correspondent of The Times, said from Belfast today that the UDA may have ordered his killing because of rumours that he was about to turn police informer.

"He was only released on bail recently and there were rumours - the sort of rumours always generated when someone is released from police custody - that he had done some sort of deal and was going to turn informer," Sharrock said. "So it is possible that the decision was taken by the UDA to prevent him doing that."

The killing is unlikely to have any impact on the peace process but it will again highlight demands from republicans for loyalist paramilitary groups to follow the lead of the IRA and disarm.

Jim Rodgers, Ulster Unionist Assembly member for East Belfast, visited the scene of the killing and spoke to investigating police.

"It would seem at this stage the victim was getting out of his car and heading towards the house when he was mown down by the gunmen," he said.

"Regardless of what the victim has been accused of doing, no one has the right to take the law into their own hands," he added. "Murder is wrong and I would appeal for no retaliation."

Peter Robinson, Demoncratic Unionist Party (DUP) MP for East Belfast said: "This murderous attack must be condemned by all right-thinking people. Those who take the law into their own hands have nothing to contribute to society. There is no excuse for acting as judge, jury and executioner."

The DUP’s justice spokesman, Ian Paisley Jnr, condemned the killing as "another despicable murder that cannot be justified". Mr Paisley is a member of the Northern Ireland Policing Board and is due to attend a board meeting today when he plans to question Ulster's Chief Constable, Sir Hugh Orde, about the murder.

October 5, 2005 at 08:37 AM in Ireland | Permalink | Top of page | Blog Home

Hain 'to denounce' UVF ceasefire

The government is expected to announce that it no longer legally recognises the Ulster Volunteer Force's ceasefire.

It is expected to announce its decision to "specify" the loyalist organisation on Wednesday.

The government has been considering a report from the Independent Monitoring Commission on the UVF's feud with the Loyalist Volunteer Force.

Progressive Unionist Party leader David Ervine said the move by the government was "hardly unexpected".

He described it as "tragic" and said it would mean there would be more ground to cover once the UVF was restored to the political process.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/low/northern_ireland/4242388.stm

The four-strong commission forwarded its report on the loyalist feud to Northern Ireland Secretary Peter Hain and the Irish government last week.

The UVF has been linked to four recent murders and has also been blamed for orchestrating violence across Northern Ireland following the Orange Order's Whiterock parade in north Belfast on Saturday.

The PUP is linked to the UVF and Red Hand Commando.

In July, Northern Ireland Secretary Peter Hain said he intended to withhold the PUP's assembly allowances for another year.

The decision followed the latest report from the Independent Monitoring Commission, which said the UVF and Red Hand Commando remained active, violent and involved in organised crime.

The Independent Monitoring Commission was set up by the British and Irish governments in January 2004.

It is a crucial element in the two governments' plans for restoring devolution, which was suspended in October 2002 amid allegations of IRA intelligence gathering at the Northern Ireland Office.

September 13, 2005 at 02:49 PM in Ireland | Permalink | Top of page | Blog Home

Ceasefire in jeopardy after 32 police hurt in violence

By David Sharrock, Ireland Correspondent

THE Government will come under pressure today to declare a loyalist ceasefire over when Peter Hain, the Northern Ireland Secretary, meets the province’s chief constable to assess a weekend of violence in which 32 police officers were injured when they came under fire.

There was further trouble last night after 700 people took to the streets of Belfast and bomb blasts rocked the city. Loyalist petrol bombers attacked security lines drawn on the Albertbridge Road in the east of the city. One policeman was injured.

Up to 100 masked men attacked police with petrol bombs on the Ardoyne Road. Near by, a blast bomb caused minor damage to New Barnsley Police Station. In the south of the city a car and van were hijacked and set alight.

Two men hijacked a bus full of passengers in Bangor, Co Down. The vehicle was driven from the Belfast Road to the Clandeboye Road where those on board were robbed before being ordered off and the vehicle set alight.

Sir Hugh Orde, the chief of the Police Service of Northern Ireland (PSNI), said yesterday that rioters had intended to kill his officers and that it was lucky “we have no dead”. A bomb factory was discovered and seven guns seized by police after violence on Saturday, which followed the re-routing of an Orange Order parade.

Sir Hugh said the order must bear substantial responsibility. “This violence was completely organised and the heroic actions of my officers prevented it escalating,” he said.

At least 50 shots were fired at police and soldiers on Saturday evening in west and north Belfast. The security forces returned live fire seven times. They discharged 450 baton rounds. About 1,000 police and 1,000 soldiers were deployed to deal with the violence.

The Ulster Volunteer Force is suspected of having been behind much of the violence. Last week Mr Hain delayed giving his verdict on an official report expected to confirm that the paramilitary group has breached its ceasefire.

A man injured by a blast bomb was in a critical condition in hospital last night.

“Attempted murder cannot in any way be justified,” Mr Hain said, before his meeting today with Sir Hugh.

“There can be no ambiguity or excuse for breaking the law. All those with influence in the community, including the Orange Order and unionist politicians, must condemn this violence and give their full support to the PSNI.”

The Orange Order described Sir Hugh’s remarks as “inflammatory” and accused his officers of acting in a “brutal” manner towards its members; but at a news conference in Belfast yesterday Sir Hugh said that he saw members of the Orange Order attacking PSNI officers.

“Petrol bombs don’t appear by accident, blast bombs do not appear by accident and certainly firearms have to be planned to be produced in the way they were produced,” he said.

The parade had “become illegal” and “fundamentally breached” the Parades Commission’s determination to re-route it away from a largely nationalist area on several counts, the chief constable said.

The Rev Ian Paisley, the Democratic Unionist, blamed the Parades Commission for sparking the violence and appealed for calm.

There was also serious rioting in Ballymena. Petrol bombs were thrown at the police and trouble spread to Ahoghill, where youths gathered, setting cars on fire, damaging houses and throwing fireworks at police. Cars were hijacked and roads were also blocked in Ballyclare, Glengormley, Rathcoole, Larne and Carrickfergus, as the violence spread.

Dermot Ahern, the Irish Foreign Minister, said that evidence that children as young as five were getting involved in violence did not augur well for the future.

“Children and teenagers are becoming brutalised,” he said. “A new generation is being blooded in sectarian hatred . . . [and] is being spawned by this type of incitement.”

September 12, 2005 at 11:33 AM in Ireland | Permalink | Top of page | Blog Home

Top secret intelligence unit will quit Belfast for new role in Iraq

Top secret intelligence unit will quit Belfast for new role in Iraq - Britain - Times Online

By Michael Evans, Defence Editor
THE most secret military unit serving in Northern Ireland is to be pulled out of the Province and posted to Iraq and to other operational missions overseas.

The Joint Support Group (JSG), which runs agents under the control of the Intelligence Corps, is one of a number of units expected to leave Belfast as part of the �normalisation process� under which the Government plans to cut troop levels by more than half to about 5,000.

Paul Murphy, the Northern Ireland Secretary, announced in February that MI5 will take over primacy for national security intelligence in Northern Ireland by 2007.

The JSG is the successor of the Force Research Unit (FRU), which acquired notoriety in the 1980s amid allegations that the unit of about 40 intelligence officers colluded with Special Branch officers of the Royal Ulster Constabulary and the loyalist terrorist Ulster Defence Association (UDA) in the murder of several republicans.

Brian Nelson, who was the UDA�s chief intelligence officer when he was recruited to become one of the FRU�s top agents, was jailed for ten years in 1992 after admitting five counts of conspiracy to murder. He died of a brain haemorrhage in April 2003.

The FRU and its former leader, Brigadier Gordon Kerr, who became military attach� in Beijing, are the subject of continuing inquiries by Lord Stevens of Kirkwhelpington, who retired as Metropolitan Police Commissioner in January.

The JSG has continued the role performed by the FRU, although agent-handling rules were tightened after concerns were raised over the level of control of informers after Nelson�s confessions.

The Government�s intention is to complete the withdrawals from Ulster within two years of a final peace settlement but steps are being taken to exploit the unique experience gleaned in Northern Ireland in theatres of operation elsewhere in the world.

This month Geoff Hoon, the Defence Secretary, announced the establishment of a new regiment, the Special Reconnaissance Regiment (SRR), to provide covert surveillance expertise for operations by the SAS and the Special Boat Service.

Although he did not specify which experts he had in mind, the new regiment is largely based around the surveillance specialists of the 14th Intelligence Company, also known as �the Det� (Detachment), which has operated in Northern Ireland for many years.

April 18, 2005 at 04:07 PM in Ireland | Permalink | Top of page | Blog Home

Bush intervention raises fresh hope for peace in Ulster

Times Online - Newspaper Edition

By Greg Hurst, Political Correspondent and Roland Watson

PRESIDENT BUSH expressed hope yesterday that his surprise intervention in the Northern Ireland peace process could help to push both sides towards a deal.

Mr Bush interrupted his Thanksgiving holiday to speak by telephone to the Rev Ian Paisley, the Democratic Unionist Party leader, and Gerry Adams, the Sinn Fein leader. �I�m trying to be a part of the process of getting both Ian Paisley and Gerry Adams to the table to get a deal done; in other words, to close the agreement they have been working on for some time,� Mr Bush said.

Speaking outside the only caf� in Crawford, Texas, the hamlet seven miles from his ranch, Mr Bush said: �Hopefully it will help. Anything I can do to help keep the process moving forward, I�m willing to do,� he added before heading inside for a burger lunch.

Officials in Washington said that Mr Bush�s call was a sign of how close both sides may be to clinching a deal. Mr Bush has made it a rule not to involve himself personally in peace negotiations, be they in the Middle East or Northern Ireland, unless he believes that both sides are committed to the compromises required to move forward.

But Mr Paisley gave a sharp reminder to President Bush of his own uncompromising stance against terrorism.

He told Mr Bush that it would be �inconceivable� that terrorists would be allowed to join the US Administration in Washington.

�I reminded the President of the fact that he would not have terrorists in his Government and we must be satisfied that IRA terrorism is over and cannot return,� Mr Paisley said.

The involvement of President Bush, which would have been at the request of Tony Blair, was another indication of the critical stage reached in the intensive talks seeking to restore devolved government to Northern Ireland. An initial deadline of yesterday has now slipped to Tuesday.

Unlike President Clinton, his predecessor, whose similar eleventh-hour calls to party leaders before the Good Friday agreement were a symptom of his close involvement in the process, President Bush has until now stood back from the politics of Northern Ireland.

Mr Paisley, who has resisted pressure to conclude the process while demanding significant concessions during the talks, said that President Bush had offered his involvement should it be of help.

�He wished me well in our endeavours and told me I could come back to him if I wanted to speak again to him. I told him we have been praying for ever in this country and I wished him well at this time,� Mr Paisley said.

The DUP�s executive was due to meet in Belfast last night to discuss whether to strike a deal with Sinn Fein to form a powersharing government in place of direct rule from London.

November 28, 2004 at 12:39 PM in Ireland | Permalink | Top of page | Blog Home

The future's bright for Donegal's Orangemen

Irish News - Irish Independent Online - Sunday Independent , Irish newspapers, News Ireland

Sashes and bowler hats will be on show tomorrow as 15,000 people gather in the village of Rossnowlagh to watch the annual parade by marching bands. Marese McDonagh reports

Brian Britton remembers as a small boy being thrilled by the spectacle. Brought up in the small coastal village of Rossnowlagh, which in winter time has a population of just 60 people, he and his friends looked forward to the marching bands and the drums and the chaos.

Catholic and Protestant schoolchildren - the village is evenly divided between the two communities - grew up with this annual performance of the Orange anthem, The Sash, by dozens of bands, crammed into the narrow country roads, who joyfully belted out their hymns as they marched towards the sea.

Tomorrow the marching bands will be back and Mr Britton will be there with possibly the best view of proceedings from the roof of his four-star Sand House Hotel, which overlooks Rossnowlagh's spectacular beach.

An estimated 15,000 people from Orange lodges in counties Donegal, Cavan, Monaghan and Leitrim will gather in the village. Many will come from the North and there will also be Orange Order members from the East coast and from Liverpool and Scotland.

The Rossnowlagh parade has long been held up as a symbol of what can be achieved by peoples of differing cultures not afraid of each other's traditions.

The Donegal County Grand Master, David Mahon, is proud of his traditions. In the hallway of his holiday home a few miles from Rossnowlagh, the walls are lined with formal group photographs of Orange Order members with their sashes and bowler hats.

In pride of place over the fireplace in the sitting room is a happy photograph of the Ballymagroarty band featuring four of his seven children. Next Saturday morning the Mahon family will gather at this house, a short walk from Ballymagroarty Orange Hall, where they will meet other lodge members before heading to a church service in Ballintra and then onto Rossnowlagh for the main event.

The Orange hall is a simple stone structure, built at the turn of the century, and is surrounded by rolling meadows in a landscape dotted by substantial modern dwellings.

The price of sites is a topic of conversation as Mr Mahon, a genial man in his 40s, poses self-consciously in front of the rural hall. Clutching his orange 'colarette', which he obediently dons only when the photographer is ready to press the button, he apologetically frets about how silly he must look, even though the narrow country road is deserted.

Mr Mahon admits that he didn't bring his bowler hat as requested for the photo session. He is not comfortable wearing it but he is careful to explain the discomfort is purely practical in that he never wears hats.

The County Grand Master has been a guest of President McAleese in the Aras - but never for her July 12 garden party because that would mean missing a parade.

Next weekend the property dealer, farmer and businessman will attend three parades. Rossnowlagh is traditionally held on the Saturday before the Twelfth. There will be parades on Sunday and then on Monday he will head for Co Fermanagh to enjoy the highlight of the marching season in a parade that will dwarf Rossnowlagh.

With his wide navy pinstripes, his burgundy Range Rover and his successful tourism business across the border in Kesh, Mr Mahon is the epitome of the prosperous farmer/businessman.

He joined the Ballymagroarty lodge at the age of 17 - his parents were not members but that wasn't remarkable - having been brought up in the immediate neighbourhood a few miles from Rossnowlagh. He is proud of his Donegal roots but baulks when asked if he considers himself Irish. "I don't think in those terms," he replies, adding quickly that he has an Irish passport.

Mervyn Wylie, another prominent Orange Order member in Donegal, has no reservations about his Irishness, saying he believes people belong to whatever country they were born into and reared. "I plan to be here for the rest of my life," he adds.

The Wylie family will also march across the border on Monday but there is a special place in their hearts for Rossnowlagh and tomorrow morning, after the 60 cows are milked, they will set out on the 65-mile journey to the west coast of Donegal.

"It's a great day out for all the family, a bit like an agricultural show," says Mr Wylie. "The same people go every year and it's the only place you meet many of them."

Mr Wylie, the No 3 District Master in Donegal, insists that the Orange Order is not a political organisation. "It was brought into politics in the North but it was never intended to be political," he insisted. "It is a religious organisation."

A Protestant who went to a Catholic school, he is typical of the Orange Order member in the Republic who has common ground with those he meets at the annual parades but also with those he works with in the Inishowen peninsula. As chairman of the Muff branch of the IFA, he has as much to say about the problems of farmers as he has about the need to refurbish the 17 Orange halls in Co Donegal.

His sons are typical of many youngsters in the area who love soccer and are passionate supporters of the Donegal GAA team.

The Orange hall in Muff is used more than many in the county, with IFA meetings held there regularly as well as 'cross-community' ladies' keep-fit classes.

"We had a meeting about a week ago with some TDs in Dublin about getting funds to do up Orange halls," says Mr Wylie. "Many were built in rural areas at a time when people cycled everywhere and there are no car parks or proper toilet facilities."

He believes that a little more involvement in domestic politics might be of benefit in this regard. "I suppose you have to be in there to get your view across."

Mr Mahon noted that Protestants in Co Donegal had a tradition of voting for Fine Gael but this had changed in the past 20 years. "You get as many voting for Fianna Fail now," he says.

While he sees July 12 as "a massive festival, which takes place across 19 different venues", he has never been to the Drumcree parade. "I did go to Drumcree Church once just to have a look."

Despite the calm last weekend, he doesn't seem optimistic about resolving all the tensions associated with some parades in the North. "It's what happens in heavily populated areas where people don't know each other and don't work together," he says.

The stories of the harmony associated with Rossnowlagh are retold every year. The Ancient Order of Hibernians in the Rossnowlagh area are reputed to have excellent relations with local lodge members, with accordions and drums regularly being lent between the two for their respective parades.

The Franciscan Friary in Rossnowlagh, which opened in 1947, was initially expected to be vulnerable during the Orange parade and local legend has it that armed gardai were, in the early years, assigned to the grounds to guard the priests and monks. Wiser counsel soon prevailed and the gardai emphasise every year that traffic control is the only headache they have in Rossnowlagh.

Mr Britton, a Catholic, owns the field where the Orange Order assembles at the end of the route, another sign of the close cooperation between the communities in Rossnowlagh. "Why change a tradition which was there before my family owned that field," he says.

The last census, which for the first time recorded an increase in the number of Protestants in the Republic, also showed that the most Catholic town in Ireland is in Co Donegal. More than 94pc of the population of Buncrana are Catholics.

Mr Mahon estimates there are anything from 500 to 600 Orange Order members in the county now, a figure that has remained relatively stable over the years, with many new members joining as others die off. His local district is proud of the fact that Tony Blair's maternal grandfather, George Corscaddon, was a member of a lodge near Rossnowlagh.

The Orange Order in Belfast couldn't say how many of the 50,000-strong membership are based in the Republic. A spokeswoman said there are 46 lodges here, almost all of them in the border counties, and that membership can range from 15 to 100. There are also junior and women's lodges but the Orange Order stressed that the women's is a totally separate organisation with its own hierarchy.

Mr Wylie remarks sadly that Drumcree had "blackened" the name of the Orange Order. "People think the Orange Order in Donegal is the same as the Orange Order in Drumcree," he says.

But as the trouble-makers and almost everybody else stayed away from Drumcree last weekend, it seems that the festival atmosphere of Rossnowlagh could well be where the future lies for Orangeism.

July 11, 2004 at 09:23 AM in Ireland | Permalink | TrackBack (96) | Top of page | Blog Home

Irish trio cleared of charges in Colombia

Irish trio cleared of charges in Colombia

BOGOTA, Colombia (Reuters) - Three Irishmen have left a maximum security Colombian prison after being cleared of training Marxist rebels to build bombs and paying fines for carrying false passports.

But Jim Monaghan, Niall Connolly and Martin McCauley will not be allowed to leave Colombia until an appeal by the state runs its course, according to a court document obtained earlier in the day by Reuters.

The attorney general's office accuses the trio of being Irish Republican Army guerrillas.

If the case reached the Supreme Court, legal experts say the appeals process could take as long as five years.

Making no statements, and packed into civilian vehicles with tinted windows, the three men were driven away from Bogota's Modelo prison -- their home for most of the past three years.

The men were arrested at a Bogota airport in August 2001 after visiting a stronghold of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, a 17,000-member guerrilla army known by its Spanish initials FARC.

Monaghan, Connolly and McCauley -- who deny any ties to the IRA -- admitted in court to meeting with FARC members and spending several weeks near a large guerrilla camp. But they said they travelled to the area to learn about peace talks, which subsequently collapsed.

A judge in April dismissed the state's charges, backed largely by circumstantial evidence, that the men trained the FARC in advanced bomb techniques.

But a Bogota court also dismissed their petition that they be allowed to await the state's verdict in Ireland instead of Colombia, where their lawyers say they risk reprisals by right-wing paramilitary death squads.

The trio were released on parole for carrying false passports, after paying fines of about $7,000 each.

Connolly was once a representative in Cuba of Sinn Fein, the IRA's political ally.

June 15, 2004 at 10:45 PM in Ireland | Permalink | TrackBack (41) | Top of page | Blog Home

Protestant feud could go "out of control"

Protestant feud could go "out of control"

BELFAST (Reuters) - A growing feud between Protestant groups in Northern Ireland could spiral out of control, a senior police officer says.
A street war between the Ulster Volunteer Force (UVF) and the smaller Loyalist Volunteer Force (LVF) erupted a week ago when 34-year-old LVF man Brian Stewart was shot dead as he arrived for work in mainly Protestant east Belfast.

"Clearly it would be fair to say there is an on-going feud between those two organisations," said Assistant Chief Constable Duncan McCausland, the city's top police officer.

"Since the murder of Mr Stewart this time last week, we've had six separate attacks, five bomb attacks and one shooting incident."

McCausland described the feud as a "turf war", but refused to speculate on what was behind the latest flare-up between two outlawed organisations with a history of bad blood.

In an effort to keep a lid on the situation, British troops, an increasingly rare sight on the streets of the province since the paramilitary ceasefires which preceded the 1998 Good Friday peace deal, have been deployed in hardline Protestant areas.

"I have concerns this could spiral out of control, but at this moment in time we have got pro-active police patrolling on the streets supported by military colleagues," McCausland said. "It's important everybody uses their influence to stop this."

Northern Ireland's police chief Hugh Orde and Security Minister Ian Pearson were due to meet later on Tuesday to discuss the situation.

The UVF and LVF are both "loyalist" groups, so-called because they violently opposed the IRA's campaign to end British rule in Northern Ireland.

The LVF was founded by maverick paramilitary boss Billy "King Rat" Wright, who was thrown out of the UVF in 1996 after being blamed for a sectarian killing unsanctioned by the leadership.

Since then there has been a history of feuding between the two organisations.

May 25, 2004 at 10:14 AM in Ireland | Permalink | TrackBack (11) | Top of page | Blog Home

Fresh inquiry into murder of soldier by IRA

Liam Clarke

AN OFFICIAL reinvestigation of the murder by the IRA of a British soldier more than 30 years ago has been launched amid concerns that the wrong man may have been convicted.
The Criminal Cases Review Commission has launched a review of the case following claims made by Nigel Mumford, a former member of the parachute regiment and the SAS, to The Sunday Times

Mumford says an innocent man has been convicted of the killing of his best friend in west Belfast in 1972.

He was first on the scene after Francis Bell, 18, a fellow para, was killed by a single shot from a sniper while on patrol on the Ballymurphy estate. Shortly afterwards, Mumford claims to have seen Gerry Adams near the scene and is now calling on the Sinn Fein president to reveal what he knows about the shooting.

Bell died three days later in hospital.

Mumford believes Liam Holden, the 18-year-old chef who was convicted, should be cleared. Adams�s possible presence and doubts over Holden�s guilt were first highlighted in an article in The Sunday Times in 1998.

�I am quite sure Liam Holden is innocent and I don�t mind helping the lad. I would love the man responsible to be done, but I�d also like the innocent man to be cleared,� said Mumford, who was a medical officer at the time of the killing and treated Bell�s wounds within three minutes of him being shot. �I have a very clear memory of this because it was my friend who was killed, I often dream about it.�

Holden served 17 years for the killing and has had difficulty socialising ever since his conviction.

Despite Mumford�s role, he was not called as a witness in the trial and only learnt someone had been convicted when he showed The Sunday Times a memoir of his time in Belfast.

After tending to his dying friend, Mumford and a group of other soldiers carried out an impromptu raid on a block of flats from where they believed the shots had come. There they found three men, one of whom he believes was Adams. The Sinn Fein leader denies IRA membership but is widely believed to have been the terrorist group�s officer commanding the Ballymurphy area at the time.

In his autobiography, Before the Dawn, Adams gives a fictionalised account of the murder of a paratrooper in similar circumstances. There is a difference in that the victim is an officer not a private and the IRA gunman is taken away in a car.

Much of the evidence would not be admitted in court today. The arrest was irregular and Holden made several attempts to withdraw his confession. The bullet that killed Bell was never recovered and there was nothing to link the alleged murder weapon to the fatal wound. No forensic traces were found on Holden either. An informer who had implicated him was never produced as a witness, nor was Mumford.

Patricia Coyle, Holden�s solicitor said: �Mr Holden doesn�t want any publicity at the moment. The application has been lodged and the CCRC is going through the process of assessing it and conducting their inquiries.�


Copyright 2004 Times Newspapers Ltd.

April 9, 2004 at 09:03 PM in Ireland | Permalink | TrackBack (52) | Top of page | Blog Home

RUC 'covered up agent's murders'

Times Online - Sunday Times

Liam Clarke

POLICE in Northern Ireland covered up nine murders committed by an informer to protect the flow of intelligence, a whistleblower claims.
The retired detective says his colleagues prevented the arrest of an Ulster Volunteer Force spy who took part in at least nine killings and ordered several more.

The accusations, made by Johnston Brown, a former sergeant, are contained in three dossiers being investigated by Nuala O�Loan, the Northern Ireland police ombudsman. Last week the whistleblower stopped co-operating with her investigators after they threatened to interview him under caution for failing to prevent the killings.

�It has made me question whether the ombudsman is the appropriate person to investigate this case,� said Brown. �I am risking my neck by exposing wrongdoing but it seemed that I was the one being put in the dock. I am putting the matter in the hands of my solicitor.�

Brown, who has 30 years service as a detective, is best known as the man whose evidence jailed Johnny Adair, the Ulster Freedom Fighters mobster known as Mad Dog. He also brought to light the allegation that the man who police believe killed Pat Finucane, the Catholic lawyer, was a Special Branch agent who had allegedly confessed to the crime but had not been charged.

The deaths in which Brown believes this informer was personally involved include:

Sharon McKenna, 27, a Catholic taxi driver, who was shot dead at the home of a Protestant pensioner for whom she was cooking dinner on January 17, 1993. McKenna had been supplying information to the CID in light of her concern about paramilitary activity.

Thomas Sheppard, 41, who was shot dead on March 21, 1996, allegedly by the informant, who was a personal friend of his. Sheppard had been lured to a meeting in Towers Tavern, Ballymena, Co Antrim, and his murder was part of an internal UVF dispute.

William Harbinson, 39, a Shankill Road Protestant who died on May 19, 1997, after being handcuffed and beaten in an alley on north Belfast�s Shore Road.

David Templeton, 43, a Presbyterian minister who died of a heart attack some weeks after a punishment beating in February 1997. He had earlier resigned from the ministry after being arrested by customs with a gay pornographic video.

Gary Convie, 24, and Eamon Fox, 44, Co Tyrone Catholics gunned down at a north Belfast building site in May 1997 in a sectarian killing.

David McIlwaine, 18, and Andrew Robb, 19, both Protestants who were found stabbed to death by the side of Druminure Road near Tandragee, Co Armagh, on Feburary 19, 2000. They were victims of a feud involving the UVF and the Loyalist Volunteer Force.

Tommy English and David Greer, two loyalists shot dead by the UVF during a feud with the Ulster Defence Association in October 2000.
The informer also ordered an attack in which Raymond McCord Jr was beaten to death, and then dumped in a Ballyduff quarry in November 1997. This killing was part of a dispute over drugs money. McCord�s father, also called Raymond, has since become a campaigner against paramilitary violence.

�In CID we were hearing of this man�s involvement in these murders from informants who were working around him and with him,� said Brown. �Every time we reported his actions, we were taken to task for feeding information that was embarrassing a Special Branch source. Some of the informants who told us about it also suffered for helping us.�

Questioned about Brown�s allegations, a spokesman for O�Loan said: �[We] have been talking to a former police officer in relation to a current investigation and have had discussions with him about how we could interview him at a later stage. At no time did we say we would arrest him.�

Brown�s dossiers indicate there was strong competition between the Special Branch, which gathers intelligence, and the CID, which investigates crime, for control of key agents within the paramilitary underworld.

Brown recruited three agents, each of which is the subject of a separate dossier. He believes two were �burnt off� by Special Branch for reporting crimes by fellow agents. One fled and the other was jailed. �In some cases, the loyalist paramilitaries were warned that these people were helping me,� he said.

The third informant was handed over to Special Branch in October 1991, because he was a senior figure in the UVF. His information was judged too valuable for CID to manage. �When I was handling him he saved lives: when Special Branch took control he became a killer. Once he started to take life, you could have caught this boy real handy and I tried a few times but I wasn�t allowed,� said the whistleblower.

March 27, 2004 at 11:23 PM in Ireland | Permalink | TrackBack (12) | Top of page | Blog Home

British cable group, NTL are to investigate the tampering of its phone line

MoD Panic Attacks Its Former FRU Secret Agents

9 March 2004
British cable group, NTL are to investigate the tampering of its phone line after former British secret agent Kevin Fulton's house phone was tampered with last week. This was after the leaking of tapes of Stakeknife to Cryptome. NTL have confirmed to Fulton that wires to his phone were not in the proper place and that no work order was given on his line.
This follows a Special Branch raid last year at the request last year by MI5 under the Official Secrets Act (OSA) act to search Fulton's London home. Two months later the police refused a request by the Ministry of Defence to arrest Fulton under the OSA act as they had no proof he was the source of the leak.

March 11, 2004 at 07:29 PM in Ireland | Permalink | TrackBack (40) | Top of page | Blog Home

Scappaticci takes North's security minister to court

Stakeknife Named: British double agent who murdered for the IRA

25 May 2003
By Barry O Kelly, Crime Correspondent
Freddie Scappaticci is taking an unprecedented legal action against the North's security minister in a bid to force her to confirm or deny that he is the IRA double agent Stakeknife. The Sunday Business Post has learned that Scappaticci, 59, has lodged papers in the High Court in Belfast, applying for a judicial review against the minister, Jane Kennedy. If successful, he could be in line for massive libel damages awards.

Scappaticci recently wrote to the minister, asking her to confirm that he was not Stakeknife. But Kennedy replied that she would not "comment on security issues''. The Belfast man's solicitor, Michael Flanigan, said this weekend: "We want the minister to confirm that our client is not the agent, spelled as Stakeknife or Steakknife.'' Flanigan will ask the Belfast High Court this week to deal urgently with the application "because Mr Scappaticci's life could be at risk''. One ground for the action is Article Two of the European Convention on Human Rights -- a government's duty of care to protect citizens.

March 11, 2004 at 07:27 PM in Ireland | Permalink | TrackBack (31) | Top of page | Blog Home

The pain behind Ulster's peaceful face

Telegraph | News | The pain behind Ulster's peaceful face

By Stephen Robinson
(Filed: 08/03/2004)

The inside of the Police Service of Northern Ireland headquarters on the outskirts of Belfast feels more like the offices of a computer software business than the old fortress that once housed the Royal Ulster Constabulary.

All the old photographs and Unionist mementos have been removed, and a ban is enforced against any potentially insensitive material, including Union flags or pictures of the Queen.

Posters in the reception area emphasise the self-conscious desire of a purged organisation to demonstrate how much it has changed.

"We're all different - that's why we make a great team," declares one poster. Another boasts of the commitment of the new reformed police force - or police "service", as it prefers to be styled - to "professional, progressive policing".

Erasing the strong Protestant and Unionist ethos of the old RUC was a central, and perhaps understandable, demand of Nationalists and Republicans when the Good Friday Agreement was signed nearly six years ago.

Under strong pressure from London, and in the face of Unionists' protests at what they regarded as "crude ethnic cleansing", hundreds of experienced Protestant officers were encouraged to take early retirement. The force committed itself to a new policy requiring half of new recruits to be Catholic. New cross-community supervisory boards were set up to establish trust.

Six years on, Nationalist recruitment is improving and much has changed, but one thing, crucially, has not. "My biggest problem is that Sinn Fein still won't sit on the police board, and still won't talk to me," says Hugh Orde, the chief constable, who was recruited from the Metropolitan Police 18 months ago to take charge of the reborn police force.

He is not liked by Unionists, who delight in impersonating his London accent and parodying his politically correct mainland way of talking. But neither is he trusted by Republicans, despite the clear concessions his force has made.

In the past few days he has caused an Ulster controversy by baldly stating what everyone in the province knows to be true: the IRA is breaking the ceasefire agreement by carrying out so-called "punishment" beatings and shootings at the rate of one a week.

Mr Orde also blames the IRA leadership for ordering the kidnap of a Republican dissident. Bobby Tohill was picked up by an IRA "nutting squad" intent on driving him over the border and shooting him. Luckily for him, the vehicle was stopped by police on the outskirts of Belfast.

Guns and violence remain at the heart of Ulster politics, and this reality is undermining efforts to revive the Stormont Assembly. It is also spurring Sinn Fein's apparently relentless progress in recent elections, and fuelling Unionist cynicism about the peace process.

Ulster has a "reformed" police service, now driving round in white-painted Land Rovers like a United Nations monitoring group in Africa, yet the force will not go into paramilitary heartlands and remove guns. No wonder people on all sides of the sectarian divide increasingly refer to the "peace process" only with heavy irony.

There is no denying that Northern Ireland has been transformed for the better in recent years. Belfast was an economically depressed and uniquely depressing backwater even 20 years ago, when you had to pass through security turnstiles to go shopping, when bombs exploded, and when civilians, policemen and soldiers were routinely murdered.

Hotels and restaurants have sprung up on the post-industrial wasteland, "loft-style" apartments can be bought in the centre of town, and many people seem much richer. "Stalemate is infinitely preferable to violence," says one Unionist, "and this stalemate is eminently bearable." Yet in many respects, Belfast feels disappointingly familiar. The "peace line", a collection of temporary walls and fences thrown up during the Troubles at "community interface points", still stands, and is being reinforced in some places. The vast majority of Catholic and Protestant children still live in their "own" areas, and attend their "own" schools.

Over dinner in a restaurant on Belfast's new waterfront development, Anthony McIntyre, who served 18 years in the Maze for IRA activities including the murder of a loyalist, expresses bafflement that the British ever expected the IRA to give up their weapons.

"The maintenance of the IRA is essential to Gerry Adams. His whole strength is based on having them around. If the IRA were got rid of, who then would listen to Adams? His importance in London, and in America, lies in his image as the problem solver."

Mr McIntyre is an unusual Republican in that he is prepared to voice his criticisms of the Sinn Fein leadership, particularly Mr Adams. Like many Republicans, he is baffled by the British Government's pretence to see any distinction between Sinn Fein and the IRA. "Do they honestly think when Adams says he must consult the IRA that he goes knocking on a secret door to talk to men in hoods?"

Norman Hamilton, a Presbyterian minister in North Belfast, believes that support for David Trimble's UUP is drifting to the more hardline DUP because Protestants sense his loss of moral authority in the face of rising paramilitary activity. The fact that the British Government has scarcely condemned recent activities such as the Tohill abduction compounds Mr Trimble's political problems.

The Good Friday Agreement, Mr Hamilton believes, was too heavily dependent on goodwill and personal chemistry to make it work. "I fear the agreement has now broken down irretrievably. But just because a marriage breaks down, that does not mean marriage is a flawed institution."

Belfast sometimes seems too inured to violence to be shocked by it but a recent spate of suicides in the Roman Catholic Ardoyne area have highlighted the crisis.

Angela and George Cairns are still in shock from the suicide last month of their 18-year-old-son, Barney. After an altercation in the street 18 months ago, Barney had both his shins shot through by thugs from the INLA, a Republican splinter group infamous throughout the Troubles for its brutality. Barney emerged from hospital with one leg shorter than the other, but the real damage was psychological. He plunged into depression and became withdrawn and erratic. His friend Anthony O'Neill, who was also bullied by paramilitaries, committed suicide last month.

Barney kissed his sisters goodbye and slipped away early from the wake after Anthony's funeral, ostensibly to buy his mother some cigarettes. Instead he climbed scaffolding at the church where they had buried his friend and hanged himself with his jacket.

There was a deliberate and eerie theatricality to his death. He chose the highest and most visible place in Ardoyne to take his own life. It was almost as if, abandoned by the police and his "community", Barney wanted to expose the horrors of paramilitary persecution.

"I think his attitude by then was, I'm going to kill myself before those bastards do," his father George said.

As he talked tearfully about his son's death, Mr Cairns apologised for sounding bitter. "You cannot imagine how heartbreaking it is to lose a son like this, a teenager standing up to a thug more than twice his age. And this will not be the last suicide."

Mr Cairns has a particular loathing for the INLA but blames all the paramilitary groups for failing to honour the peace principles.

"Sinn Fein-IRA say they don't approve of punishment shootings, but actually they are saying, 'Carry on, lads'. It's a disgrace, a national disgrace," he said.

When asked if police knew which INLA member had maimed her son, Angela Cairns replied: "The dogs in the street know who did it."

There is an uncomfortable irony underlying Barney's death. During the Troubles, the IRA would have wiped out the INLA gang operating in the Ardoyne. Today, launching such a counter-strike would be so blatant a breach of the ceasefire that Downing Street could not ignore it.

Meanwhile, Ulster's new police service, reformed but still lacking the Republicans' authority to act in Catholic areas and take statements from Nationalist witnesses, remains aloof.

In all her sorrow over Barney's maiming and subsequent suicide, Mrs Cairns is most upset when she recalls what the policeman said to her at the hospital as the doctors examined the shattered legs of her son.

"He said to me, 'What did he do to get this?' I told him Barney had done nothing, and then he said to me, 'They don't shoot them for nothing'."

March 7, 2004 at 10:50 PM in Ireland | Permalink | TrackBack (10) | Top of page | Blog Home

Sinn F�in warns Blair to confront unionists

Guardian Unlimited | Special reports | Sinn F�in warns Blair to confront unionists

Nicholas Watt, political correspondent
Monday March 1, 2004
The Guardian

Sinn F�in yesterday gave a blunt warning that the Northern Ireland peace process is facing a "dangerous crisis" because of Tony Blair's failure to stand up to unionists who are refusing to share power with republicans.

In a hard-hitting speech to the party's annual conference in Dublin, its chief negotiator, Martin McGuinness, accused Downing Street of failing to live up to its commitments to implement the Good Friday agreement. "There is no getting away from the fact that the process is in serious crisis," he said in his annual political report. "This is a dangerous crisis."

His remarks came as London and Dublin battle to keep alive the review of the Good Friday agreement, which was launched amid the refusal of unionists to share power with Sinn F�in in the light of continuing IRA activity.

David Trimble, the leader of the moderate Ulster Unionist party, which was replaced as the province's largest unionist party by the hardline Democratic Unionists in last year's assembly elections, has threatened to pull out of the review after the Provisional IRA attempted to kidnap a dissident republican.

The government has postponed today's session of the review, which is to discuss continuing paramilitary activity, until tomorrow to buy some breathing space.

Sinn F�in warned the government that it must not throw the republican party - the province's largest pro-agreement grouping - out of the review, a view shared by Downing Street, which does not want the republicans to play the "victims' card". The republicans made clear that the government must stand up to Mr Trimble and other unionist leaders who have seized on the alleged kidnapping attempt - what Sinn F�in called a "pub brawl" - to try to derail the peace process.

Mr McGuinness said: "The current stalemate is a crisis, a dangerous crisis. But it is not a crisis that began one week ago outside a bar in Belfast. It is not a crisis around the IRA or IRA intentions. The institutions have been suspended now for almost 18 months. This is the fourth suspension.

"In the same period the IRA have taken a number of initiatives to move the process forward, whereas both [the British and Irish] governments, and particularly the British, have failed repeatedly to deliver on their commitments. In the same period the securocrats have succeeded in stalling the process of change. But that is all they have managed to do. They have not halted this process, nor have they reversed it. Nor will we allow them to."

His tough message was echoed by Gerry Adams who used his presidential address on Saturday night to warn of the intense pressure faced by the Sinn F�in leadership from the republican grassroots. Mr Adams told the conference he had faced "profound difficulties" after persuading the IRA last October to embark on its largest act of disarmament, only for that to be rejected by Mr Trimble.

"Many republicans have raised what they and I consider to be reasonable questions about our handling of that episode," he said.

"There was, as one comrade put it to me, a question over the decisions made by us and by the [IRA] army leadership. 'Surely you knew better than to depend on David Trimble? Did you really expect the two governments to keep their commitments? Why is it always republicans who have to take initiatives?'".

But Mr Adams made clear that republicans were still prepared to offer further concessions if the government and unionists live up to their side of the bargain.

Sinn F�in wants the British government to embark on a wholesale process of demilitarisation, and for unionists to give a firm commitment to share power.

Describing the peace process as a "collective endeavour", Mr Adams said: "There can be no doubt if the two governments apply themselves to acts of completion of the Good Friday agreement, then others must do likewise."

February 29, 2004 at 11:39 PM in Ireland | Permalink | TrackBack (7) | Top of page | Blog Home

'Execution kidnap' fuels fears over IRA ceasefire

Telegraph | News | 'Execution kidnap' fuels fears over IRA ceasefire

By Thomas Harding, Ireland Correspondent
(Filed: 23/02/2004)

The violent abduction of a dissident republican has severely damaged the chances of restoring power sharing in Northern Ireland, political sources said yesterday.

While the Government believes that a return to full-scale IRA violence is unlikely, there is an increasing worry that the paramilitary ceasefires are faltering as politicians fail to make progress to restore the collapsed Stormont assembly.

The IRA is suspected of kidnapping Bobby Tohill, an alleged member of the Real IRA, to take him to South Armagh for torture and execution because of his criticism of the Provisionals.

He needed 98 stitches after being beaten by four men armed with police batons who then sprayed Mr Tohill with CS gas before bundling him into a car.

The vehicle was rammed by a police car as it headed out of central Belfast and four men were arrested on Friday night. Another two were arrested yesterday. Hugh Orde, the Chief Constable, publicly blamed the Provisional IRA for the kidnapping that he said was part of numerous punishment beatings by the terror group.

The latest kidnapping puts considerable pressure on the political process, with trust between the republicans and unionists being further undermined.

Ian Paisley's Democratic Unionists, Northern Ireland's biggest party, won last year's election on a mandate of not sharing power with Sinn Fein while its military wing, the IRA, remained active.

Ian Paisley Jnr said the arrests "vindicated our stance that we cannot go into government with Sinn Fein while the IRA exists".

There was also strong condemnation from the Irish Republic where Sinn Fein hopes to build a substantial political base in coming local and European elections.

Michael McDowell, the justice minister, accused Sinn Fein of "stomach-churning hypocrisy" by discussing human rights while the IRA was still "breaking people's legs when it suits them".

The IRA's refusal to cease all paramilitary activity and disarm has dogged the peace negotiations since the 1998 Good Friday Agreement.

David Trimble's Ulster Unionist Party paid the price of agreeing to sharing government with Sinn Fein after it was beaten in last year's election, mainly as a result of the IRA's failure to disband.

A Downing Street source said IRA activity had to end "otherwise the whole process won't work".

Mr Tohill, 44, who has a conviction for murdering a part-time soldier, told a Sunday newspaper that the IRA "nutting squad" told him "that they would take me across the border, torture me and then execute me".

Gerry Adams, the Sinn Fein leader, suggested that it was not proven that the IRA was involved and reiterated his party's "commitment to peaceful and democratic politics".

February 22, 2004 at 09:59 PM in Ireland | Permalink | TrackBack (34) | Top of page | Blog Home

Police accuse IRA of kidnap

Times Online - Newspaper Edition

THE IRA has been accused of defying the Northern Ireland peace agreement by kidnapping and assaulting a dissident republican and being behind a spate of punishment beatings, writes Chris Ryder.
Hugh Orde, chief constable of the Police Service of Northern Ireland, yesterday blamed the terrorist group for what he called a “serious crime” uncovered by police on Friday.

Shortly after 6pm, Bobby Tohill, 44, a former republican prisoner, was kidnapped from a bar in Belfast city centre.

Tohill was found when two police officers stopped a blue van in the city centre. Four men were arrested while Tohill was taken to hospital suffering from what police said were �serious injuries�. He later discharged himself.

At a conference on policing in Belfast yesterday Orde said: �The arrested people are connected to the Provisional IRA and we have uncovered what we say is a serious crime. What we�re talking about is kidnapping and abduction.

�I�m also clear, as we have said recently, that the punishment beatings that go on in republican areas are also carried out by the Provisional IRA. A number of operations are going on in defiance of the Belfast agreement.�

February 21, 2004 at 11:41 PM in Ireland | Permalink | TrackBack (27) | Top of page | Blog Home

On the streets where beatings are routine, terror is driving teenage boys to suicide

Times Online - Newspaper Edition

By Stefanie Marsh

THE two teenage boys planned to commit suicide together. But after a punishment beating by paramilitaries, Anthony O’Neill couldn't wait. Last week he took a belt and hanged himself.
At his graveside, his best friend, 17-year-old Bernard Cairns, said under his breath: We were supposed to do this together . . . I'll be with you soon.

At Anthony’s wake, Bernard told his sister Bernie about their plan to commit suicide together. Then he climbed to the the top of scaffolding attached to a church above the Belfast ghetto where he grew up and hanged himself with his fleece jacket.

Anthony and Bernard are the latest in a spate of suicides that have claimed 13 young lives since January in North and West Belfast.

Both boys had been victims of paramilitary �punishments�. Two years ago, Bernard was abducted from a friend�s house, taken to a deserted spot and had a hole shot through both his shins.

When Anthony�s turn came he was grabbed from his bed in the middle of the night and stuffed down a manhole.

That was when the two boys decided that only their deaths stood any chance of bringing an end to the terrorism that was wrecking their lives and those of many other teenagers in the Ardoyne.

Yesterday Bernie Cairns told The Times: �We were at (Anthony�s) wake, and Barney told me that he and Anthony had decided to highlight what was going on by killing themselves in a pact.�

She believes the boys were driven to their deaths by the sheer fear to which they and their friends had been subjected since the 1998 ceasefire that has allowed INLA paramilitaries to tighten their grip on the area in the name of �community policing�. In May, another close friend, 18-year-old Philip �Pip� McTaggart, hanged himself with a length of hosepipe outside the Holy Cross Church where Bernard Cairns took his life.

Mr McTaggart was an ostensibly happy young man who had just started work in a job he loved. He killed himself a day after he smashed a car window belonging to a member of the INLA. It is thought that, fearing violent consequences, he pre-empted a paramilitary reckoning.

He knew what he could expect; just recently, a 14-year-old among his circle of friends was tarred and feathered then dragged from his home and shot through the back of the knee after the INLA accused him of being a police informer. The boy claims that the group�s leader has since threatened him with rape.

The boys, who grew up on the same street, were part of a close-knit group of seven teenagers who attended St Gabriel�s College in Ardoyne and spent all their spare time with each other. Of those seven, just two now survive.

Three other friends, Gary Black, 23, David Anderson, 18, and Piers Doherty, 18, died when the black Ford Mondeo they were driving torpedoed into a brick wall. It is believed that one of the victims, who had made an attempt on his own life in December, was also expecting a knee-capping from the INLA. In the Ardoyne, boys of 13 are approached as they play in the park and told they will be eligible for their first shooting come their next birthday. Teenagers who commit petty misdemeanours must brace themselves for the worst.

The �six pack� is a paramilitary speciality. It involves shattering the ankles, knees and elbows. The day Bernard Cairns had his legs permanently crippled, members of the INLA waited outside his house chanting: �Come out to play, Barney.�

The reaction of children brought up in the area is becoming fatalistic. Philip McGarry, a consultant psychiatrist at the Mater Hospital in North Belfast, says: �In a culture where it is acceptable for a young man to be dragged down an alleyway and shot, children grow up believing there is no such thing as respect for human dignity. They often become depressive or develop anxiety and a fatalistic approach to their own lives.

�Suicide and homicide are intimately linked. Some of these children are contemplating suicide or self-harm almost as a protective measure. They�re thinking, it�s going to happen anyway so I�ll do it instead of someone else.�

Although the police do not keep figures on paramilitary-style attacks where both perpetrators and victims are of the same religion, many of those living and working in North and West Belfast�s traditionally violent areas, claim that they have increased. �Since the Good Friday agreement and the IRA ceasefire we�ve seen more shootings and beatings than ever before,� Dr McGarry said. �We�ve seen fewer people injured by bombs or beatings from the so-called �other side� and more of these young fellows attacked by people of their own religion.

�These kids are growing up in a society where violence is acceptable, where you can go to the Sinn Fein or INLA office and they will tell you, yes, an attack is planned on your child.�

The Northern Ireland police said that, despite high levels of policing, many people in Ardoyne were still afraid to contact them for help. �We�re trying very hard but people in these areas feel they can�t be seen to support the police as Sinn Fein is not represented on the policing board.�

Father Aidan Troy, a local figurehead who came to international recognition during the Holy Cross stand-off, said: �There�s a certain tolerance of the punishment culture that arises from decades of violence and no policing but I think people are beginning to say that this is not place for any self-appointed group.�

On Sunday Patricia O�Neill, the sister of Anthony, plans to lead a peace march to the door of a key INLA member. Her plea: a guarantee from the group that no teenager in Ardoyne is under threat.

It is a brave act, never before contemplated in a country where paramilitaries are known for their vengeful tendencies.

Audrey Cairns, the mother of Bernard, plans to join Patricia on the march, along with at least 200 others.

�The INLA made my child commit suicide and it�s time that they were made to take account,� she said. �I am not afraid of the consequences of this. The worst they can do is kill you.

February 21, 2004 at 12:26 AM in Ireland | Permalink | TrackBack (9) | Top of page | Blog Home

Kerry condemns Bush's approach to Northern Ireland

Guardian Unlimited | US elections 2004 | Kerry condemns Bush's approach to Northern Ireland

Press Association
Tuesday February 17, 2004

Senator John Kerry has castigated the US president, George Bush, for pushing the Northern Ireland peace process down the White House's foreign policy agenda, it emerged today.
Mr Kerry - the frontrunner to win the Democratic nomination to fight Mr Bush in November's presidential elections - also criticised Ian Paisley's Democratic Unionists for "refusing to form a government with Sinn Fein".

The senator, who has already won 14 of his party's 16 state primaries and is expected to win another in Wisconsin tonight, accused the Bush administration of failing to build on Bill Clinton's efforts to promote the peace process.

He outlined his views in a comprehensive statement on the process that has been circulated to Irish-American groups over recent weeks.

In the statement, Mr Kerry urged the IRA and loyalists to get rid of their weapons and bring an end to all paramilitary activity. A statement from the Massachusetts senator's campaign team said: "John Kerry will put the Northern Ireland peace process high on America's foreign policy agenda.

"On this issue, he will continue to follow the path set by Senator [Edward] Kennedy, President Clinton and Senator [George] Mitchell."

The team said that there had not been a US ambassador to Ireland for more than a year, adding that the Bush administration's "lack of urgency" in appointing one was "clear evidence that Ireland is not a high priority".

During his four-year term, Mr Bush has had two advisers on Northern Ireland - former State Department official Ambassador Richard Haass and his recently appointed successor, Ambassador Mitchell Reiss.

Ambassador Haass paid several visits to Northern Ireland to urge political leaders to reach agreement on power-sharing and support IRA disarmament.

He also supported police reform in the province, and the integrated education of Protestant and Catholic schoolchildren.

Last April, Mr Bush met politicians during a visit to Northern Ireland. He issued a joint statement with the prime minister, Tony Blair, and the Irish taoiseach, Bertie Ahern, urging the province to consign paramilitarism to history.

However, the primary purpose of his visit was a summit at Hillsborough Castle with Mr Blair on the Iraq war.

Mr Bush has also held St Patrick's Day receptions for Mr Ahern and Northern Ireland's leaders in the White House, although they have been more muted than those hosted by the Clinton administration.

Mr Kerry said that there had been many positive developments in Northern Ireland since the Good Friday Agreement in 1998, including a marked reduction in sectarian killings, devolution, the scaling down of the British army presence, a beginning to IRA disarmament and the setting up of cross-border and British-Irish institutions.

His statement welcomed the new police service, which he hoped would "soon command the support of everyone in Northern Ireland".

However, the presidential hopeful acknowledged that more work needed to be done. His campaign team's statement said: "As a supporter of the need to hold recent elections for the Northern Ireland Assembly, he believes that repeatedly suspending democratic institutions is not the way forward for Northern Ireland.

"He urges all parties involved to work for the earliest resumption of the assembly, and he believes the review of the Belfast agreement must be just that - a review, not a renegotiation.

"The problem is not the structures of the agreement itself, but rather the failure of all to fully implement it.

"The DUP cannot be permitted to disenfranchise half the population of Northern Ireland by refusing to form a government with Sinn Fein."

Mr Kerry said that the full implementation of the agreement could not be put on hold during the review at Stormont. He added that further action was needed on the scaling down of security in the province, and on human rights.

"It is equally important that the IRA takes further substantive measures of decommissioning," he said.

"The guns are silent, which is a positive step, but the guns must be removed forever, and an end must come to all paramilitary activity, both republican and loyalist."

The statement paid tribute to the role of the Irish community in the US, and noted that the US had also played its part in building peace and in the creation of the Irish Republic's Celtic tiger economy.

Economic ties between the two countries meant that Irish companies were also a large investor in the US, creating more than 100,000 jobs, he said.

Political stability in Northern Ireland could only strengthen economic links between the province, the Irish Republic and the US, he added.

"John Kerry's administration will support these growing business ties which bring economic benefits to all," the campaign statement pledged.

Arguing that Ireland served as "an important bridge between the United States and the European Union", Mr Kerry also said that he would work with the Dublin government to repair US ties with Europe, "which were greatly damaged in President Bush's handling of the situation in Iraq".

Meanwhile, a Republican congressman is due to visit Belfast tomorrow for talks with political leaders.

New York Congressman Jim Walsh will travel to the province to meet Sinn Fein and other parties taking part in the review of the Good Friday agreement.

Sinn Fein president Gerry Adams is due to march in a St Patrick's day parade in Congressman Walsh's home town of Syracuse next month.

February 17, 2004 at 05:01 PM in Ireland | Permalink | TrackBack (4) | Top of page | Blog Home

Hume 'was Dublin spy'

::: u.tv :::

A secret document compiled by RUC Special Branch claimed that former SDLP leader John Hume and three colleagues worked as agents of the Irish government at the time of Bloody Sunday.
By:Press Association

The intelligence paper, which was submitted to the Bloody Sunday inquiry, also claimed that Taoiseach Jack Lynch had promised funds to groups working to overthrow the Stormont government.

The document stated that Mr Lynch had already paid money to the SDLP and mentioned Mr Hume, then a leading member of the party, and colleagues Ivan Cooper, Austin Currie and Paddy O`Hanlon as intelligence officers.

It stated: ``It is also worth recalling previous intelligence to the effect that Mr Lynch`s intelligence officers in Northern Ireland are Messrs Cooper, Currie, O`Hanlon and Hume, the latter now having publicly stated that only a united Ireland will satisfy the minority.``

The Special Branch assessment for the period up to February 3, 1972 claimed the shooting of 13 civilians on January 30 in Londonderry occurred after soldiers were fired on by snipers operating from flats in the Bogside.

It added that prior to a civil rights march in the city, there had been reliable intelligence that the IRA intended to exploit the presence of crowds as cover for their gunmen.

Former Special Branch Detective Chief Inspector Samuel Donnelly, giving evidence to the inquiry today, said he had no memory of intelligence relating to the intentions of either wing of the IRA on Bloody Sunday.

Mr Donnelly said: ``I have no recollection of any intelligence or information received from any source about the movements of the IRA or any other organisation before Bloody Sunday.

"Specifically I do not recall what information, if any, Special Branch received about the likely actions of the IRA on the day or the sources of any such information."

February 12, 2004 at 06:51 PM in Ireland | Permalink | TrackBack (15) | Top of page | Blog Home

Playing the 'Green Card' - Financing the Provisional IRA: Part 1

JOHN HORGAN and MAX. TAYLOR
_______________________________________________________________
Terrorism and Political Violence. Vol. 11, No.2 (Summer 1999).
pp. 1-38 PUBLISHED BY FRANK CASS, LONDON
_______________________________________________________________
In the first of two articles on the fundraising activities of the
Provisional IRA (PIRA), the extent and nature of the PIRA's finance
operations are described. The areas of kidnapping for ransom, armed
robbery. extortion and drug trading, although very specific, serve to
illustrate the nature and potential complexity of fundraising activities,
the general issues that surround them, as well as specific internal
organizational issues and factors indicative of an acute awareness by
PIRA leaders of the environments within which they and members of
their organization operate. How the PIRAs involvement in certain
kinds of criminal activities can and does influence not only their
operational development and successes but also the development and
sustenance of support for the PIRA's political wing, Sinn Fein, is
discussed. It is clear that the absence of direct PIRA involvement in
certain forms of criminality is imperative for the development of Sinn
Fein's political successes. In the second article, which describes how
and why PIRA financing operations have evolved into a much more
sophisticated and technical set of activities (including money
laundering), what emerges is a picture of the PIRA and Sinn Fein
which serves to portray one of the most important long-term,
fundamental, limiting factors for the development of a large,
sophisticated terrorist group (and its political wing) as finance, and
not solely the personal or ideological commitment of its active
members. Both of these articles will illustrate the PIRA leadership's
many internal organizational concerns relating to fundraising, the
links between the PIRA's militants and Sinn Fein - and between PIRA
and Sinn Fein fundraising - and the relative sophistication of the
Republican movement as a whole. Aiding these illustrations will be
case study material, interview data and both public and privately-held
documentation. The descriptive data, surrounding issues and its
implications presented here, along with case-study material,
discussions and interpretations presented in a second article serve to
illustrate the many more general and conceptual issues emerging from
terrorist financing.

For the full report in pdf, read below.

Download file

February 6, 2004 at 11:15 PM in Ireland | Permalink | TrackBack (20) | Top of page | Blog Home

Northern Ireland loyalists turn to race violence

Northern Ireland loyalists turn to race violence

By Steve James
6 February 2004

A series of racial attacks in Northern Ireland point to organised efforts by Ulster loyalist paramilitaries to purge Protestant areas of non-whites.

During three decades of conflict between the Irish Republican Army (IRA) and the British government, very little was heard about conditions facing the tiny number of people who were members of an ethnic minority group in Northern Ireland. A 1995 report counted the entire minority population of the province at a mere 8,270, consisting mainly of Chinese, Indians, Pakistanis and Irish travellers, out of a total population of 1.697 million people.

Most of these groups have lived in Northern Ireland for decades. The Chinese population, for example, mostly arrived in the early 1960s in search of work. Some Vietnamese �boat people� arrived in the 1970s. Many Indian families moved to Belfast in the 1920s and 1930s, hoping to flee communal violence generated by British rule in India. More arrived immediately following India�s partition in 1947. A small Jewish community has existed for decades, although its numbers declined during �the Troubles.�

Since the IRA ceasefire and the 1998 Good Friday Agreement, small numbers of asylum seekers, overseas students, tourists and foreign workers have visited and attempted to settle in the province. A 2002 report, prepared for the Northern Ireland Executive, estimated that around 2,000 asylum seekers were temporarily resident. Nevertheless, the overwhelming majority of the population�99 percent�remains white.

Sectarian attacks continue

Presented as opening a new era of peaceful development, the agreement, based on incorporating Sinn Fein into the structure of British rule in Northern Ireland, has deepened the sectarian domination of all areas of political and social life and strengthened the grip of the paramilitary groups over working class Protestant and Catholic areas.

The tactics of forced evictions, intimidation and violence have been utilised for many years by paramilitaries on both sides to ensure their control of Protestant and Catholic areas. Sectarian division and violence remains endemic.

July 2003 alone saw the following: a Catholic man stabbed by a loyalist gang; 40 petrol bombs thrown at Protestant homes by Catholic mobs; several Protestant and Catholic churches burnt; a playground used by Catholic children burnt; Ulster Defence Association attacks on traffic in and out of a Catholic enclave in north Belfast; ball bearings, screws, bolts, bricks and rocks thrown at houses and cars in the Catholic Short Strand area of Belfast; two Catholic postal workers in Derry received death threats to their home addresses; 20 loyalists attacked a Catholic man playing golf because he was wearing a Glasgow Celtic football strip; bomb hoaxes directed at Catholic families in Derry; a Protestant woman attacked by a gang of UDA thugs because she had Catholic friends.

Loyalist gangs turn to ethnic cleansing

Since the agreement, however, the paramilitary and gang violence directed against Catholic and Protestant working people has also plagued Chinese, African and Asian people visiting or resident in Northern Ireland. In total, 226 racial incidents were reported in 2003, compared to 185 in 2002. While in part this increase is thought to be due to a greater willingness to report racial incidents, it is also clear that minority populations are being systematically targeted by paramilitary loyalist and fascistic groups and their lumpen hangers-on.

Last July, the chair of the Northern Ireland African Cultural Centre reported that an African man had found two live bullets on his doorstep, and pipe bombs had been thrown at two African family homes, including one with eight-week old twins. A group of tourists, including some black people, were attacking by a stone-throwing mob, while a travel firm ceased sightseeing bus tours following a series of attacks.

Also in July, in the town of Craigavon, near Portadown, a baseball bat-wielding gang attack the home of a Muslim imam. Six children were in the house at the time. The attack forced the family to leave Ireland. The imam�s wife also claimed that their car had been sabotaged, causing a wheel to fall off while they were on a motorway. In August, another Muslim family in Craigavon was forced to leave their home of five years following an attack by a gang throwing stones. In total, nine families have left Craigavon, and the construction of a mosque has been delayed.

The Craigavon attacks followed a campaign by a group calling itself the White Nationalist Party (WNP), which leafleted the area warning that �This is Ulster, not Islamabad.�

The fascist group, which advocates �racial purity,� was reported as working alongside elements of longstanding loyalist groups such as the UDA and the Loyalist Volunteer Force. UDA youth wing members have distributed racist WNP material outside social security offices in Ballymena. Opposition to the mosque was also supported by members of the Ulster Unionist Party. Former Craigavon mayor, Fred Crowe, told the BBC that Muslims were �out to wipe out Christianity.�

In December 2003, two Chinese families and a Ugandan couple were forced to leave their homes in the Village area of south Belfast following a spate of pipe bombings and assaults. Police connected the attacks to efforts by the British National Party (BNP), of which the WNP is an offshoot, to stoke racial tensions in the area. The BNP intend to stand candidates in forthcoming local elections. Duncan Morrow, of the Community Relations Council, warned the Guardian, that under the current circumstances �it is dangerous for people who are from ethnic minorities to be living in some Protestant areas.�

The pressure on Chinese people in south Belfast occurs primarily in streets run by loyalist paramilitaries. In addition to the Chinese and Ugandan families forced to leave, five student houses were recently forced to break up because both Catholic and Protestant students lived in them. A local estate agent told the Guardian that he had been visited by a group he assumed were paramilitaries telling him not to rent property to non-whites. He said, �If a black or a Chinese person tries to rent a property from me I would have to tell them it is not safe. If this goes on someone is going to be burnt alive or murdered.�

On the other side of Belfast, a Zimbabwean businesswoman complained of routine abuse and Ku Klux Klan slogans being painted on her door. She said, �Initially we wanted to move. We called the police. Then we realised that it�s happening everywhere in Belfast. There is nowhere to run to.�

A student from Soweto in South Africa was threatened by a group of men who appeared at her front door. Her two children kept silent upstairs while the family�s TV, kitchen, fireplace and games console were destroyed.

In early January, again in the south Belfast Village area, a six-foot wooden plank was thrown through the window of a Pakistani family, showering the house�s dining area with glass. Two houses occupied by Romanian and Pakistani families, who were away on holiday, were also set alight.

The developing pogromist atmosphere has generated considerable anger and opposition. Last week, hundreds of people demonstrated outside Belfast City Hall to protest the attacks. At the demonstration speakers from Belfast�s Anti-Racist Network condemned the attacks as being orchestrated by loyalist paramilitaries and fascists, called on loyalist leaders to prevent them, and for all sections of the community to extend their protests.

For Northern Ireland�s political elite, the race attacks threaten the worldwide image of the new Ulster as a peaceful and attractive investment and tourist location. The rally was attended by many of Northern Ireland�s political leaders, including Sinn Fein�s Gerry Adams and Martin McGuinness, trade union officials, along with leading figures in the Social Democratic and Labour Party, the Ulster Unionist Party and the loyalist Progressive Unionist Party.

No connection was drawn between the Good Friday Agreement and the upsurge of racist violence. But the agreement, which establishes religious differences as the basis of government legislation while social services are run down, guarantees a continual stoking of social tensions and grievances which the racists and fascists will exploit.

February 6, 2004 at 10:16 PM in Ireland | Permalink | TrackBack (2) | Top of page | Blog Home

Trimble urges progress on 'confidence building' by IRA

Times Online - Newspaper Edition

By David Lister, Ireland Correspondent

DAVID TRIMBLE said yesterday that the IRA needed to engage in acts of “confidence building” before devolution could be returned to Northern Ireland.
The Ulster Unionist leader was speaking at Stormont as the Province’s main political parties began a review of the 1998 Good Friday peace accord. The talks, chaired jointly by Paul Murphy, the Northern Ireland Secretary, and Brian Cowen, the Irish Foreign Minister, are expected to go on until Easter at the earliest. Few observers believe that they have much chance of leading to a restoration of the power-sharing institutions.

�The underlying problem in the political process is the same as ever � the failure of the paramilitaries, most notably the IRA, to engage in acts of completion,� said Mr Trimble. �Until there are meaningful, confidence-building acts of completion there is no real prospect of progress in these review sessions.�

Despite three acts of decommissioning, the IRA has yet to state unequivocally that its �war� against Britain is over or to start the process of winding down as a paramilitary force. Stormont has been suspended since October 2002, when police exposed an alleged IRA spy ring at the Northern Ireland Office.

The polarisation of the political landscape was underlined last November when the Rev Ian Paisley�s hardline Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) outpolled Mr Trimble�s party, becoming the largest Unionist grouping in Northern Ireland.

Mr Paisley was uncharacteristically silent as the talks began yesterday.

However, Peter Robinson, his deputy leader, said that the party had an �agenda that allows us to bring all of the issues that we consider need to be dealt with�. The DUP will present its own proposals for restoring devolution to Tony Blair tomorrow, but they are unlikely to be acceptable to republicans or nationalists.

With the gulf between extreme Unionism and republicanism wider than ever, Gerry Adams, the Sinn Fein president, insisted that the Good Friday agreement would not be renegotiated and blamed the current deadlock on Downing Street�s state of �denial�. Sinn Fein is the largest nationalist party since leapfrogging the moderate SDLP in the November poll. Mr Adams said that he would not allow the peace accord to be �tweaked or twiddled or subverted�.

February 3, 2004 at 11:56 PM in Ireland | Permalink | Top of page | Blog Home

News Letter to fight for Ulster Scots tradition

Times Online - Newspaper Edition

Liam Clarke and Ciaran Byrne

THE new owners of the News Letter, Belfast’s troubled unionist daily, intend to revitalise it as a champion of Protestant and Ulster Scots culture.
David Montgomery, the adviser to 3i, the investment group that bought the newspaper, said tomorrow’s edition will launch a competition to devise a new symbol of Ulster.

Montgomery, who has edited British tabloids and is originally from Bangor, Co Down, wants to provide mainstream unionists with a platform to air their views.

�Protestant, unionist, Scots/Irish culture � call it what you want � is just as strong and as enduring as the nationalist culture,� he said. �But Protestants don�t have the same confidence or pride and probably feel a bit battered. It is up to the News Letter to represent that heritage and protect and nurture that culture.�

Evidence of Montgomery�s opinions came last week when he helped write an editorial headlined �Put the Pride back in Protestant�, claiming that Protestants and unionists had seen their �confidence in their heritage� and �sense of belonging� eroded.

He said Protestants had been made to feel like second-class citizens and must �fling off the burden of guilt that they have been required to shoulder over recent years�. The Guardian has accused Montgomery of attempting to swing the paper behind rejectionist unionism.

Montgomery said he had no regrets. �That is just the world according to The Guardian,� he said, adding �building Protestant confidence is nothing to do with politics or sectarianism. It is in fact the road to a harmonious society�.

The editorial was positively received by some observers. Henry Patterson, professor of politics at the University of Ulster, said: �Rather than trying to accommodate Pai