Social Development Minister John Spellar said:

“After decades of underperformance, Belfast is on the way back. These early years of the new millennium are Belfast’s decade for growth and renewal. It's time to utilise the value of the land in the North East and North West of the City Centre and make that value work for Belfast. The masterplans identify locations for two large department stores. Retail opportunities for local independent traders as well as international brands new to the City are also on the horizon. This type of shopping will position Belfast as a major regional retail destination. These proposals hold the potential to deliver at least 4,000 new jobs in addition to the 3,000 at Victoria Square. These jobs will provide career opportunities for our young people and the prospect of building a better life for those who live in deprived neighbourhoods.

“Victoria Square remains Government’s priority to spearhead retail-led regeneration and provides the bedrock for renewing the City Centre. The development of the North East and North West Quarters needs to complement Victoria Square by expanding the retail sector at a pace which maximises opportunity for investors and consumers.

“Both Quarters have their own unique history, challenges and potential for growth and renewal. That is why we have prepared distinct masterplans for the North East and North West. The future of both areas deserves specific detailed consideration.

“Looking ahead, we see a decade of renewal for the City Centre starting with Victoria Square and then accommodating two further schemes. There is an early decision to be made on the order in which further development proceeds. The period of public consultation on the masterplans getting underway today is therefore of great importance. We want your views on the draft masterplans. I look forward to receiving your comments.

“Last autumn, I announced that William Ewart Properties, principal landholders in the North East Quarter, would be given first opportunity to respond to the future development brief for that area.

“Castlecourt is of central and strategic importance to the regeneration of the North West Quarter and access to Castlecourt must be secured if we are to achieve the comprehensive redevelopment proposed in the masterplan. Westfield Shoppingtowns Ltd, owner of Castlecourt, has a proven track record in delivering large scale and complex development projects. I am therefore announcing, for public consultation, that Westfield should be given first opportunity to respond to the future development brief for the North West Quarter. In parallel with the consultation on the draft masterplan, I am seeking comments on this proposal before I take a final decision later this year."

UTV Internet reported:

Chairman Michael Mates, said some years ago Northern Ireland was the first part of the UK to develop a waste management strategy in response to EU directives setting out how it would deal with the issue of waste.

:: No clear estimate of how much funding would be required to deal with waste over the life of the strategy existed - and there was not clear funding plan for how new infrastructure would be delivered.

The IRA has owned up publicly. It has made some attempt to deliver on promised expulsions, conceding 'involvement', but leaving unresolved what the McCartneys want in terms of justice. Having killed their victim and seriously injured his friend, members of the organisation then destroyed the evidence of the crime. The IRA would have done nothing to rectify this without the courageous campaign of the family. The subsequent IRA investigation was secret, illegal, and carried the implied threat of further illegal sanctions and of possible violence.

However, he points out:

Some will welcome their move as better than nothing. But it does not meet the position of the McCartney's sisters, who have expressed confidence in the PSNI investigation. They want those with information to give it to the police. The people with information are the IRA. The IRA will not co-operate with the PSNI investigation.

With an echo of Lear, he hints that the organisation's reassurances can be read an ominnous intent to do nothing:

This puts in question the IRA's statement that "nothing" should impede the family's search for justice. It is also ominous about further possible violence in the references to the fact that "intimidation or threats will not be tolerated".

As well as the family's rejection of the version of events included in the IRA statement, there's also a brief account of the confrontation at the rally between an uncle of Robert McCartney and Sinn Féin's Alex Maskey -

Despite the IRA's court martial and expulsion of three members - allegedly including the former officer commanding the Belfast brigade - the family claim at least nine others implicated in the killing are being sheltered by the organisation.

They also claimed the IRA's version of the murder outside a Belfast pub - in which Mr McCartney and a friend were beaten, stabbed and left for dead - was wrong and that a whispering campaign against the family was being conducted.

The unprecedented protest in Sinn Féin's heartland has put the party under severe pressure with Alex Maskey, the former Sinn Féin mayor of Belfast, openly confronted on the street yesterday.

Asked whether, as residents claim, two of the men involved in the clean-up after the murder had previously acted as his election workers, he said he would not comment on "falsehoods in the media".

He also denied claims by residents that republicans had ordered children to riot in the Markets area to impede police investigating the murder.

As he was answering these questions, one of Robert McCartney's uncles burst through the crowd, shouting: "You have nine other members of this gang ... who butchered my nephew. When are you going to hand them over? You couldn't even remember Robert's name [after the murder]. Hand over the 12."

There are claims that those involved in the murder are still under IRA protection -

Despite the IRA's call on Friday night that no one should be intimidated into not giving evidence, one Short Strand source said the three expelled IRA men were still considered to be under their protection.

The source said the IRA members were at their homes and one was at an IRA safe house. One of the men involved in the murder had been expelled before, but was allowed back shortly afterwards, after undergoing a punishment shooting.

A senior local IRA member was seen at the rally and several IRA members not involved in the murder were seen walking around the area before the rally. One source said: "This was a subtle form of intimidation."

And, as reported in today's Irish News, the individual who was widely reported as giving a statement to the police was not one of those expelled by the IRA -

A man who was questioned by police and released this weekend was not one of the three expelled IRA men.

Some detail of SF's Head Office accounts, and official assets, are given -

Mr Mackin said the party owns numbers 44 and 58 Parnell Square, Dublin, and 51, Falls Road. Its accounts give a value of €1.88 million to these buildings. Number 58 Parnell Square was bought in 1984 for Ir£47,000.

"We've benefited from the boom," he said.

Number 51-55 Falls Road, Belfast, is owned by a company called Sevastapol Developments, on behalf of the party, which leases it.

Wages and salaries in 2003 were €550,190. Mr Mackin said everyone employed by head office gets the same salary, €500 a week gross. There were 22 positions during 2003 in Northern Ireland and the Republic.

Secretaries and assistants employed by elected representatives are not paid by the party but by the British and Irish exchequers.

Additionally local cumainn's accounts are not included in the head office accounts -

Local cumainn also raise finance and own or rent property, and their finances are not included in the head office accounts. Most properties owned have mortgages against them.

Mr Mackin produced a list showing 16 properties in the Republic and 31 in Northern Ireland, that are owned or leased by local party units. He said 5, Blessington Street, Dublin, was sold by the party a few years ago.

Ownership of 44 Parnell Square goes back to 1911, he said.

Recently the party had set up two companies, Republican Merchandising Ltd and Parnell Publications Ltd, which are concerned with, respectively, the party's Dublin shop and internet site, and its newspaper, An Phoblacht.

As the companies were only recently set up, no accounts have yet been filed. The setting up of the companies will mean the party will save on VAT payments.

Mr Mackin said operations such as the Felons Club in Belfast are heavily regulated and have nothing to do with Sinn Féin's finances. "Apart from merchandising, we have no other form of business whatsoever," he said.

The article finishes with some details of Mr Mackin's own business dealings -

Mr Mackin, a native of Belfast, was joint Sinn Féin national treasurer with the late Joe Cahill for 10 years up to about four years ago, when the party established the position of finance director.

He is a member of the ardcomhairle. Arrested in 1972, he served three years in prison in the North for membership of the IRA.

He said he was always interested in business and this was why he worked on the party's finances.

He said that "around about the time of the ceasefire" he became more involved in his personal business affairs and now owns businesses and property here and property in Portugal.

His first business venture was a pool hall in Dundalk, where he now lives. He secured loans from the bank to buy and develop the business, he said.

He made investments in property in Dublin "for tax reasons" in the period before property prices in the city began to rise steeply.

Working with an old friend based in Belfast, he established a cleaning company and a security services company. Both of these were involved in supplying services to the Sheridan IMX cinema complex on Parnell Street, Dublin and other companies in the area.

The Sheridan businesses collapsed a number of years ago though the operation of one, Century City, an amusement arcade, has since been taken on by Mr Mackin.

No doubt some wag will ask whether these figures include all recent transactions.. and, according to the Electoral Commission, with representation in either Westminster, the NI Assembly or the European Parliament, a political party is required to have an accounting year of 1 January to 31 December.

But the cynic in me has to note the fact that in a 2003 High Court judgement, in SF's failed appeal against the refusal of an Electoral Commission policy development grant, specific mention was made of the fact that "there was no suggestion that Sinn Fein was so lacking in financial resources that its failure to receive the grant would prevent it from imparting information or ideas, or from developing policies for electioneering".. hmmm.. Will that decision now face a renewed legal challenge?

The article deserves to be read in full, so I'll resist the temptation to excerpt isolated lines or paragraphs, but I have added emphasis -

Sinn Féin's credibility problem - John Waters

My daughter and her friend recently gleefully posed me a riddle: There are two towns, Liestown, where the inhabitants always lie, and Truthstown, where everyone tells the truth. A man from one of the towns says: "I am from Liestown" - do you believe him?

Sinn Féin's credibility problem is a bit like this. In republican theology, Sinn Féin members who also belong to the IRA are obliged to deny this connection because it involves a criminal offence. Sinn Féin denials of criminality, therefore, literally cannot be believed.

Similarly, persistent demands by Sinn Féin for "proof" of criminality, implying that no charge can be sustained against the republican movement other than on the basis of the accepted legal standard of "beyond reasonable doubt", are an unsustainable invocation of the logic of Truthstown.

Everyone knows the IRA exists, what it does and why, that it has leaders, and that there are strong ties and a high degree of cross-membership between Sinn Féin and the IRA. And everyone knows also that Sinn Féin, to the extent that it is separate from the IRA, not merely respects but venerates the military wing. To suggest that there is something preposterous in the observations being made about such connections is to treat the public as though it was unentitled to employ common sense.

Although continuing exchanges about republican criminality exhibit superficial similarities to a debate, the discussion is taking place in two distinct languages pertaining to irreconcilable perceptions of reality. Politicians such as Michael McDowell believe that, as defenders of the rule of law, they speak to the highest form of public morality.

But republicans, in their own minds, also inhabit the high moral ground. They believe that years of combating injustice under the banner of the Irish nation's struggle for integrity confer on them the right not merely to engage in what Michael McDowell insists on calling "criminality", and to deny such involvement in order to prevent him putting them in jail, but to refuse the idea that the term "criminality" is appropriate at all.

Thus, republicanism is protected by a series of semantic Chinese walls which the logic of the wider world is not just incapable of penetrating but actually doomed to strengthen with every attack. This siege mentality will ensure that recent events may prevent Sinn Féin making political progress while failing to dent its existing base.

There is a political background to this. The Belfast Agreement offered, in theory at least, the opportunity for all sides to stand down traditional positions and strategies, inviting each to concede something in the interests of a settlement. You could argue, as I did at the time, that unionists acted in bad faith by seeking retrospectively to turn the agreement into a republican surrender. But republicans also refused to stand down their core rationale, based on their sense of being beleaguered in a state run by their political enemies.

What was being offered to republicanism in the Belfast Agreement was not just power- sharing but co-ownership of a peaceful, democratic society. You might say that the true act of decommissioning required of republicans in return was not of bullets, bats and rackets, but of victimology, the standing down of the sense of grievance that had been their driving force.

The republican leaders ultimately lacked the confidence to accept that challenge, and instead encouraged their constituency to cling to a historic sense of victimhood. Their big mistake was believing that the duplicity of their opponents took all the pressure off them - that as long as unionists continued to behave as unionists always had, the republican culture of grievance-based subversion could continue. The IRA could go on, the rackets could go on, the "community policing" too - and, more than that, the nod and wink, the "aren't we the bould Fenian boyos" mentality, could continue.

Republicans have misunderstood the motives of many who supported their right to a voice, misreading a desire for peace as an endorsement of their overall demeanour and ethos. Many of those who worked for their inclusion do not think the Provisionals anywhere near as cute, clever, sexy, bould or even Fenian as they appear to think themselves. There is widespread repugnance of the Jesuitical contortions they have achieved to redraw lines between right and wrong, enabling a settled justification of actions incompatible with democracy.

And there is a growing perception that the corruption of idealism within the movement has vindicated the most apocalyptic prophecies of the Provisionals' most virulent opponents.

These are serious questions in the minds of people who bear Sinn Féin no particular antipathy. If, regardless, republicans wish to continue standing on their claims of victimhood and demands for judicial proof of every suspicion voiced about them, then we, the public, are entitled to draw conclusions. The alternative is for Sinn Féin to emerge from the ghetto and make a significant concession to the disquiet of the world outside itself.

© The Irish Times

[emphasis mine]

Moloney remembers that Adams manoeuvred the ranks of the IRA, who were unaware of his long-term aims, along the path of his peace strategy by allowing them to use the human bomb tactic which put the hawks in an impossible position.

" It would be difficult to devise a greater PR disaster yet it was approved by the Army Council, on which Adams and Martin McGuinness sat, at a time when both men were repeatedly warning the IRA against operations that endangered civilian life. The effect of the tactic was to whip up outrage throughout Ireland and to isolate and demoralise the IRA. It undermined the use of violence and strengthened those, like Adams and McGuinness, who were arguing for a political alternative such as the peace process. The episode was an important staging post on the way to the IRA ceasefire.
In a similar fashion the decision to rob the Northern Bank has left the IRA with only two options: to stay still or carry on down the road that Gerry Adams and Martin McGuinness have mapped out for it. "

As Moloney points out Sinn Féin was unlikely to be seriously damaged by an attack on a bank. However, in combination with the McCartney murder, the effect has been far more serious than expected although the tactic might work yet. As Moloney points out the ball is now in the IRA’s court. Their call.

At the end of Victoria's reign, the novelist George Moore announced that the "sceptre of intelligence" was now being handed from London to Dublin; several notable figures returned to the Irish capital (including Moore himself), to take part in the various cultural experiments developing against a background of political radicalisation. One of the most celebrated was Yeats's Abbey Theatre, and the programmes from their first tours to London are displayed at the end of the NPG exhibition: symbolically austere and avant garde, they mark the distance travelled from the florid presentations of the Boucicault era. Max Beerbohm, providing a rave review, referred to the modern style and "exotic" charm of the Irish players. The Guildhall Show of Irish painters in 1904 similarly suggested that an indigenous, Ireland-based culture was now being exported from a country in the throes of cultural renaissance.

But many of those most influential in the process had learned their trade in London and (like Yeats, Shaw, Lavery and many others) continued to base their operations there. In this, they were following in the footsteps of a long-established tradition whereby Irish writers, painters, actors, politicians, lawyers and others played a notable part in the cultural and political history of the metropolis, often by using Irish contact-systems and presenting Irish material. These traditions can be traced down to our own day, too. Conquering, then as now, can be a two-way process.

In response, Paisley says: “That is a widely held view out there. I do my job. It if attracts adverse publicity, so be it. There’s no point in disputing these matters. I am not going to thump the table."

Those final paragrpahs indicate that he clearly believes that any talk of an IRA split is only talk. And, more importantly, he notes that it was the public pressure, in support of the McCartney family, that forced the IRA to take the (limited) action they have taken -

The IRA action [expelling three members] also settles another issue, that of growing speculation about a split between IRA hardliners and the Sinn Féin pragmatists on the Army Council. This is a decision that will benefit Sinn Féin, not least by removing any threat of electoral damage, but if there really was a split and the hardliners were in the ascendancy, as some observers have claimed, it never would have happened. Had they been in charge the IRA hardliners would have insisted on standing with their men and hunkering down for the storm. If anything the decision demonstrates that it is the Sinn Féin element of the IRA leadership which is calling the shots.[my emphasis]

Having said that the IRA and its political spokesmen had to be dragged, almost kicking and screaming to this decision and had it not been for the persistence and courage of Robert McCartney's sisters it is likely this would never have happened.

This carries an important message about the way this IRA and Sinn Féin leadership behaves and it has lessons for the wider problems caused to the peace process by the Northern Bank robbery. Without intense and unrelenting pressure that leadership will resist making any move at all in the hope that it if it sits long enough something will happen to improve fortunes. But if the pressure is applied strongly and resolutely enough that leadership will move. [emphasis mine]

As the Irish and British governments look forward to new peace talks and the hope that they can persuade the IRA to disband, decommission fully and abandon criminality it is a lesson they would be foolish to overlook.

O’Rawe suggests in his book , “Blanketmen, An Untold Story of the H-Block Hunger Strike�, which is published tomorrow that this was because “the IRA wanted to use continuing sympathy for the hunger strikers to win a by-election.�.

“The concessions offered to end the hunger strike were put to Gerry Adams, now the Sinn Fein leader, by a Foreign Office intermediary known as “the Mountain Climber�. His identity remains a mystery.
Thatcher’s government effectively conceded four of the IRA demands including the abolition of prison uniforms, more visits and letters, and segregation of prisoners on political lines. Prison work for IRA men was to have been widely defined to include educational courses and handicrafts. The only point the government refused to concede was free association of prisoners on the IRA wing. “

O’Rawe is blunt :

“Omission, rather than lies, was the order of the day. The leadership never told the hunger strikers’ relatives of Mountain Climber’s intervention and they washed their hands of any responsibility for making or breaking the deal,� he says.

The Hungerstrikes continued, 6 more men died, and were settled on less favourable terms.

O’Rawe is quoted :

“No matter which way one views it, the outside leadership alone, not the prison leadership, took the decision to play brinkmanship with McDonnell’s life. If Bik and I had had our way, Joe and the five comrades who followed him to the grave would be alive today.�

Bik being Brendan ‘Bik’ McFarlane , the IRA prison commander at the Maze, who, according to O’Rawe, felt the terms offered were acceptable.

The article finishes with:

" Adams declined to comment until he had read the book, but Danny Morrison, a former republican publicity officer, said O’Rawe’s claims were wrong. He questioned the authenticity of the deal offered by the government and claimed the IRA army council did not run the hunger strike. “The prisoners were sovereign, it was their call.� “

Extract from book.

"I say that mindful of all the difficulties that we have had trying to straighten out and get a proper judicial system and so on, but I think that this is such a serious situation."

The IRA said one of those expelled made a statement to a solicitor and called on the others to take responsibility. Two of the men dismissed were described by the IRA as "high ranking volunteers".

The expulsions came after what the IRA called "an investigation" into last month's killing.

As reported in the NY Times, he had initially embraced his well-deserved fame as a dancing fiend.. but not for long - talk show appearances have been cancelled and he, apparently, is now living as a virtual recluse.. the burden of that difficult second video clip torments him - How can he top what has gone before?

Let me just echo what John has already said on his blog, and add that the thought that I had contributed to this guy's misery did cross my mind, briefly. But he hadn't been duped, he hadn't had the clip stolen or posted without his knowledge. He made it, and posted it, himself. And it IS a GENIUS clip! That's why everyone.. well.. most of us.. well.. some of us.. linked to it.

Dude.. listen to what your friend, Corey Dzielinski, says in the NY Times article - "Gary this is your one chance to be famous - embrace it"

Richard Delevan has an appropriate quotation from an interview in the Irish Times that fingers a crucial problem for the party, its (apparently) sudden loss of the moral ground in its own heartland. It seems the McCartney murder has given wider coverage to others whose cases had been kept very local:

"When did we hand over our right to run our own community? When did we sell our birthright and allow others to deal with our problems? And why can't these others stop the thugs who roam our streets and terrorise us? Why can't they stop the joyriders, the drug dealers and the hoods? I think we all know the answer to that one. Shame on them."

However, his caveat raises interesting questions about who else might be in a position to help the family and others in the communities affected. Adams is very unspecific on this: "but if they are not comfortable with that then let them go forward to a reputable body to get the family get where they want to be".

No doubt everyone will have their own theories about which reputable bodies will be. Amongst them may be a number of NGOs with good records in supporting people affected by crime within a community context. But none of them can replace a police force, in its capacity to clearly and accountably form prosecutions and see them through to court.

If, as many will suspect, the IRA is one of the reputable bodies Adams has in mind, it may come to be seen to be compromised on a number of counts. Not least that several of its (albeit lately disowned) members are accused of using their authority to conceal their own supposed guilt or complicity in the crime. But more fundamentally (and some of its members may grudgingly accept this), it is not a police force.

Ironically, the PSNI is now one of the most accountable police forces in the developed world. This is largley a result of sustained pressure on the part of the SDLP and Sinn Fein, with the purpose of enhancing the confidence of Nationalists in a comprehensive police force.

Will the party see out the pressure and continue to withhold its recognition of the PSNI as some kind of quid pro quo for the final exit of the IRA from Irish politics? Or will it recognise a vastly reformed police service and give practical support to the McCartney's or indeed others who may have suspended their own quest for justice?

The problem with the former is that it's value may have already fallen into serious negative equity. The risk of the latter could be the fragmentation of the movement. But as the dramatic fall in Adams's own popularity ratings shows, continued inaction has serious costs of its own.

"Under such a law, the biggest potential loss for Sinn Fein would be its annual Party Leader's Allowance which came to €285,550 last year and which is intended to fund parliamentary research and policy. As the Provisionals' best-known Oireachtas research recently has been a spying operation targeting government ministers and TDs, a case could be made for withholding the Party Leader's Allowance".

"In 2004, Sinn Fein qualified for an additional windfall worth €310,730 in reimbursements from the Department of Finance following the local and European elections. While the party declared an expenditure of €313,939 and 81c in the European election campaign, it was repaid €38,092 for each of its four candidates. At the same time, its 25 candidates in the local elections received a combined reimbursement payment of nearly €160,000".

By contrast, the Progressive Democrats, home of Justice Minister and Sinn Fein bete noire Michael McDowell, did not receive a cent from the taxpayer for last year's Euro elections as it did not field a candidate. The year before, it qualified for €303,264 Exchequer funding, compared to Sinn Fein's €416,566.

Follow the link to vote yes or no www.irwinsbakery.com/stpatricksdayoff
and to validate the vote one ends up having to supply one's name and address to a bakery.

This is classified as "News".

I call it sexist exploitative advertising.

And although I'm not terribly religious I think our national Saint deserves better treatment than a naff article featuring a scantily clad woman in a paper providing back-door advertising for a 'celebrity chef' and a bakery .

Off Soapbox.

This is not an unexpected announcement, as it is understood to have also been recommended in the Chilcott report (which was never published), but it is a proposal that hasn't really been analysed.

The new leading role for MI5 is interesting in a number of respects.

Firstly, the timing. Policing and Justice was supposed to be devolved (in the context of IRA decommissioning) to the Assembly, with legislation to that effect to be introduced by this summer, according to the Comprehensive Agreement. Whether the Government is still aiming to work to the timetable of this practically defunct document is unclear, but a cross-community vote would have been required and the British Government said it "will work to promote the necessary confidence to allow such a vote to take place within two years".

Anyway, in 2007, it was expected - and if there is a political miracle, I suppose it still could happen - that Ministers in a Northern Ireland Executive in the Assembly would be in ultimate charge of the PSNI. As it is, a Direct Rule Minister will remain where the buck stops.

The PSNI currently has security primacy in Northern Ireland, while 'the Security Service' (what most of us know MI5 as) has had the lead responsibility throughout the rest of the UK since 1992. It is no big secret that there has been tremendous competition between different security agencies in the past, here and in GB.

That unhealthy rivalry has, during the Troubles, meant information was not shared properly. It could lead to botched operations, as detailed in, for example 'Phoenix: Policing the Shadows', when an Army patrol might stumble blindly into a police security operation, causing it to be abandoned. In the worst circumstances, this lack of communication led to agents who were being run by one arm of the State killing agents in another, as suggested by Martin Ingram in 'Stakeknife'.

The Police Ombudsman is currently investigating a number of controversial killings . However, she can only investigate complaints against the PSNI, not the military, although their work often intertwines.

For example, the PSNI hasn't fired a plastic bullet since 2002, and that has been influenced by the fact that the Ombudsman must investigate all such incidents when they happen, and there is much greater control over how the police use them. However, the Army can also use plastic bullets, and while there are mechanisms to hold it to account, they are unlikely to result in any action.

While it could be argued that the Army has fired plastic bullets in justifiable circumstances in recent years, we know from experience that it is not held to account by the Courts or the Independent Assessor for Complaints Against the Military for misdeeds in Northern Ireland. Any punishment during the Troubles has been token.

To extrapolate the plastic bullets situation to intelligence gathering - part of which includes agent handling and running informers - in national security matters (as opposed to 'ordinary' criminal matters) raises further concerns about accountability. If these practices become the exclusive preserve of MI5, the Ombudsman will, from 2007, not be able to investigate complaints about informers and agents, because they will be under the control of the military Security Service.

Given the past activities of some agents or informers - and that's not to deny that many have saved lives in very difficult and dangerous circumstances - that amounts to a real democratic deficit.

Security Minister Ian Pearson has said: “I am not persuaded therefore that looking at complaints made against members of the armed forces would be appropriate [for the Ombudsman]. There are separate arrangements through the MoD for a completely different complaints procedure.

“I am sure I could contemplate cases where complaints might be made that relate to both the Army and to the police jointly. In those circumstances, the Police Ombudsman would investigate the complaint against the police or officers and it would be for the Army complaints procedure to deal with the complaints against Army personnel.�

While the Government has “encouraged� “good working protocols� between the two, it is hardly the best way to operate where there are joint cases, particularly as the remits of the Ombudsman and the Independent Assessor of Military Complaints differ so much. The latter has far fewer powers, and it is difficult to see how the Government will attempt to resolve potentially differing interpretations of the circumstances of a case where the Ombudsman says one thing and the Army complaints assessor another.

In addition, the European Committee for the Prevention of Torture and Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment (CPT) has noted that police investigations of alleged criminal behaviour by members of the armed forces could not be supervised by the Independent Commission for Police Complaints for Northern Ireland (ICPC) or the Independent Assessor of Military Complaints Procedures.

The Human Rights Commission has already pointed out the accountability problem:

“[W]e are distinctly unhappy that the remit of the Police Ombudsman does not extend to investigating allegations of improper conduct raised against members of the British Army in Northern Ireland, even when at the time the soldiers in question were operating in aid of the civil power.

“In this regard there is a serious gap in the current accountability arrangements, since the Independent Assessor of Military Complaints Procedures (currently Mr Jim McDonald), who holds office under section 98 of the Terrorism Act 2000, has no power to himself conduct investigations into alleged misconduct by soldiers. The army would be investigating itself in these instances, or the police would doing so even though the police were directing the army in the situation in question.

“In these three areas we would like to see the remit of the office of the Police Ombudsman extended. We hope very much that the Northern Ireland Affairs Committee will make recommendations to that effect when it issues its report.�

The Northern Ireland Affairs Committee, chaired by former NIO minister Michael Mates MP, saw some merit in this argument in its recent report on the Police Ombudsman, and it will be interesting to see if the Government pays attention to this recommendation:

“While it is not presently clear that the extensions to the Ombudsman ’s remit sought by the Northern Ireland Human Rights Commission are justified, we do believe that these proposals have illuminated potential weaknesses in the present complaints arrangements which have been identified by the Ombudsman herself. We think that these deserve further, thorough consideration by the government.�

The SDLP said it was the only party that met Sir John Chilcott to oppose his alleged recommendation about the transfer of lead responsibility on national security matters. Mark Durkan said:

"The SDLP gave Mr Chilcott a very clear message. We are totally opposed to any move to take intelligence policing from the PSNI and give it to MI5 or British Army intelligence. That would put intelligence policing beyond the accountability of the Policing Board and the Police Ombudsman, Nuala O'Loan - just as they are breaking through and completely reworking how intelligence policing is carried out in our society.

"Sinn Fein's simplistic slogan on disbanding Special Branch is dangerous. The securocrats are alarmed by the success of the Policing Board and the Police Ombudsman in reworking intelligence policing. They could use Sinn Fein's slogan as a guise to hand it over to MI5. That would undermine Patten. Worse, it would give intelligence policing over to those most involved in collusion. The SDLP will not tolerate it. We will fight any such proposal tooth and nail. The police service must have the range of responsibilities set out in Patten, including intelligence policing."

The SDLP did not make a submission to the NI Affairs Committee (the UUP and Sinn Fein did), despite this rhetoric. The SDLP also have a strange interpretation of the Patten report, which was explicit about where responsibility should lie. However, the party has raised legitimate points.

Given its interest in these matters, it seems odd to say the least that Sinn Fein did not once refer to any of this in its submission to the NI Affairs Committee, which should keep conspiracy theorists happy.

It is now clear though, that when Sinn Fein eventually signs up to policing (which is expected to coincide with the IRA ending all paramilitary activity, or at least putting clear blue water between itself and SF), that it will not have access to the sensitive PSNI intelligence. That will have been shifted to MI5. Is SF's hatred of Special Branch so great that it is prepared to forego such potential goodies? It just seems so unlike SF...

The SDLP has numerous direct references to this subject on its website. Despite lots of press releases about collusion with loyalists involving MI5, the Sinn Fein website refers to the transfer of lead responsibility of intelligence gathering to MI5 just once - on Thursday.

In his own analysis in the Indo, Alan Murray writes: "Amazingly, Gerry Adams welcomes this potential change which probably leaves the British mandarins at Stormont chortling with laughter.

"Because the implication that accompanies MI5 intelligence supremacy in the North, is the reality that if and when Sinn Fein joins the Policing Board, the Chief Constable of the day will be able to respond to penetrating questions from republican representatives with the perfectly legitimate and honest response "Sorry Gerry, that is an intelligence matter, I don't know and it's not my responsibility.""

The Sinn Fein statement was remarkably muted, in comparison to its response to other British announcements. Gerry Kelly said:

"Today's announcement is a pre-emptive strike by the British establishment ahead of the transfer of powers. It is designed to prejudice the transfer of powers in favour of British state interests by designating matters due to be transferred, as excepted matters. Sinn Fein made it clear to both governments that this is unacceptable."

Perhaps there are other reasons for SF's relative silence on the issue, based on the very different cultures within Special Branch and MI5. Five is deeply analytical, highly bureaucratic, hoards information, and has been criticised for being slow to act, poring over intelligence assessments instead of taking necessary action. Special Branch here has been seen as emotionally attached to the notion of beating the IRA, 'taking the battle' to republicans in some senses. MI5 also shifts its desk officers around every couple of years, whereas a Special Branch officer would have built up years of experience in Northern Ireland.

Perhaps it is MI5’s lack of emotional attachment to taking on Irish terrorism, and occasional inaction and incompetence that defines Sinn Féin’s relaxed attitude to future changes in counter-terrorism.

MI5 whistleblower David Shayler seemed frustrated by the emphasis on analysis, and questioned why MI5 was not more pro-active when taking on the IRA.

“It was farcicial. There I was with a fast-moving target – the IRA were planting bombs down the street and our Security Service remained obsess with pedantic drafting and redrafting of documents.

“I questioned whether time would be better spent investigating these IRA terrorist targets… I could see no point in spending days poring over the wording of routine documents,� he said, in a possible reference to the warrants for telephone taps.

Murray raised other pertinent questions in his article: "For instance will the Garda be allowed to communicate and liaise with British spooks? Will Bertie Ahern or his successor from 2007 be able to get answers from the Secretary of State in the North after MI5 takes over and closes down the limited information access through the Policing Board that currently exists?"

The PSNI Chief Constable has also been remarkably relaxed about his responsibilities handed to another agency. He told the Blanket last year that transfer of national security powers was a "matter for government, it is as simple as that, it is not a matter for policing."

"I am not sure you devolve responsibility for something that is a national issue," Hugh Orde added, perhaps unsurprisingly for a Met cop who investigated allegations of collusion between the security agencies here and loyalist paramilitaries, and who is probably comfortable with the model employed in London.

Security journalist Alan Murray has also pointed out that there has been a drastic reduction in the sheer numbers of informers used in Northern Ireland. He estimates 300 have gone, and more officers left Special Branch after Patten than any other part of the police service.

The SDLP disagrees with the Chief Constable’s position and has called for "[t]he devolution of justice powers, with unionists and nationalists underwriting each other’s security. Regional security should be left in the hand of the politicians of the region. That is fundamental to solving the divisions in our society".

Also in the SDLP's response to the Chilcott report, it stated:

"During those meetings [with Chilcott] it became clear to us that Sir John, as part of his remit to consider wider lessons, was examining the relationship between the police and MI5 in intelligence gathering. One of the reasons for this was the need to prepare for the devolution of justice and policing powers. Others have also informed us of a great anxiety within the British system at the prospect of devolved ministers having responsibility for policing.

"The British Government appears to have received the report from Sir John in July 2003. However, no details of it have been published, despite SDLP requests that this be done. Indeed, the Secretary of State has refused to provide us with any information on it whatsoever.

"Newspaper reports have, however, alleged that Sir John recommends giving MI5 oversight of all intelligence gathered in the North, including all Special Branch informants, and that MI5 is to recruit handlers to this end. These changes, it is reported, would erode Special Branch’s current role."

Chilcott, a former Permanent Secretary at the Northern Ireland Office, was originally asked to report on the Castlereagh holding centre break-in, where even some outspoken unionist politicians seemed to restrain themselves from blaming the IRA.

If Chilcott did indeed recommend that MI5 take on national security, it merely reinforces the theories of those who suspected that the purpose of the robbery was not to acquire information on informers, but to discredit Special Branch in order to make the transition of responsibilities to MI5 that much easier.

Another theory that implicates British intelligence is that the break-in was to protect the agent Stakeknife, while another accuses rogue or retired Special Branch officers of involvement in a bid to undermine the Agreement.

The Daily Telegraph said Chilcott concluded that "at least one serving officer and one retired officer offered the IRA the opportunity to get the information. Their motivation is believed to have been an attempt to undermine the political process because they knew the Provisionals would be found with the documents and blamed for their theft". I have no idea if this is true.

It is probably only coincidence that Larry ‘the Chef’ Zaitschek expressed fears of his imminent extradition in January.

Special Branch chief Bill Lowry's swift and angry exit from the scene after 'Stormontgate' also indicates further major differences in attitude towards the Republican Movement between Special Branch and the Government. (The Police Ombudsman investigated a complaint by Lowry that he had been forced out by MI5, but she rejected his claim.)

Perhaps it is possible to draw some parallels between what has been happening behind the scenes in Northern Ireland recently, and what occurred when MI5 took the lead in the fight against the IRA in Great Britain in 1992, where there was undisguised hostility between the Security Service and the Metropolitan Police Special Branch (MPSB).

Each agency argued that the other was ineffective. For example, in its submission to the Cabinet for retaining primacy, the MPSB falsely blamed MI5 for the death of WPC Yvonne Fletcher in 1984, which infuriated MI5. This, and MPSB leaks to the press about MI5 ineffectiveness, was said to have turned the Home Office against the Met’s Special Branch.

Although the MPSB had had reasonable success in GB against IRA operations in the late 1980s, the mortar attack on 10 Downing Street encouraged MI5 - seeking a strong post-Cold War role - to lobby for primacy.

The Soho bomb in April 1992, in which the IRA bomber had been under MPSB surveillance, and the explosion in the City of London just days after the general election, appear to have been the final nails in the MPSB's coffin. Home Secretary Ken Clarke moved swiftly, and announced the change in responsibility for counter-terrorism on May 8.

It is entirely possible that events surrounding Omagh, Castlereagh and Stormontgate have been used as evidence of ineffectiveness by different agencies here, as leaks to the press always have.

It is difficult to understand why such a recommendation on national security would have been placed within Chilcott's remit to report on, and as the report was never published, his official conclusion that there was no evidence of government agency involvement in the break-in carries little real weight. Certainly the tactics at Castlereagh bore some similarity to those used by the covert methods of entry team that destroyed Steven Inquiry files on British agent Brian Nelson in Carrickfergus.

If the Government is telling us that it is transferring responsibilities to MI5 in Northern Ireland because it was recommended by the Patten report, then it should also pay attention to the NI Affairs Committee recommendation above and to another of Patten's proposals (6.44) - that a senior judicial figure based in Northern Ireland should be appointed to independently monitor surveillance activities, the use of informants, undercover operations and the interception of communications.

Until it does, no-one will be watching the watchers.

Barry McCaffrey reported in the Irish News yesterday:

A bitter war of words erupted last night with Sinn Fein accusing the Ulster Unionists of attempting to criminalise its voters.

“The attempt to criminalise republicans is nothing new.�

The mortgage lender says it has currently 654 million euros in capital employed and is expanding on the island.

It will open a regional headquarters in Belfast with the logic behind this move is that Northern Ireland is beginning to show signs of strong growth.

Marah says that it is partly the peace dividend, and partly the fact that economic expansion in the Republic is beginning to make an impact north of the border.

"If you look at employment growth in the course of 2004, it was below the Republic, which was 2.3%," he says.

"They had a 1.8% growth in Northern Ireland, in comparison with a European average of 0.5% and a British growth rate of 1.0%.

"You're looking at a growth rate that's 80% above that of the UK and almost four times the European average."

He also points out that there has been a shift in the nature of employment in the North, with job numbers in traditional industries falling by 6% and those in services and construction increasing by 8%.

"It's very similar to what happened here in the recent past," he says.

Speaking at the launch, Sinn Fein President Gerry Adams said:

"In 1992 Sinn Féin published a document 'Towards a Lasting Peace in Ireland' which set out our party's peace strategy. That document signposted the development and evolution of the peace process.

"This campaign will form the centerpiece of this the centenary year of Sinn Féin. We will be seeking support in every county in Ireland and among the Irish Diaspora. We will be engaging with political parties, the social partners, local communities, the churches, young people. We will be working to ensure that Irish unity is a reality in our lifetime."

On the Northern Bank robbery, Former Presbyterian Moderator the Rev Dr Alastair Dunlop said: "This wilful and planned act violated the law of God, subjected bank employees and their families to terror and cruelty, betrayed relationships with the two governments, other political parties and people of goodwill, and destroyed trust in the commitment of Sinn Fein to seek peace."

AS reported in the Examiner by Michael O’Farrell,

A FORMER director of the Bank of Scotland (Ireland) has confirmed he travelled to Bulgaria last month with Government troubleshooter Phil Flynn and Cork money lender Ted Cunningham.

However, Denis O’Connell, who is also a former ICC official, said he was “100% innocent and had nothing to hide in this matter�.

THe Examiner quotes from a statement by Mr O'Connell -

Mr O’Connell also said he had been asked by Phil Flynn to “carry out preliminary checks on Chesterton Finance as part of his assessment to become involved with the company�.

Mr O’Connell added that he was subsequently asked by Mr Flynn to travel to Bulgaria as one of a group of seven “for the purpose of investigating potential property opportunities�.

He added: “The reason I was asked to go to Bulgaria is because I have travelled on many occasions to Eastern Europe - particularly Croatia - where I have an interest in property.�

One point to note here. When Phil Flynn resigned from the Bank of Scotland(Ireland) board he described the decision to join Chesterton Finance as "a mistake" after initially saying that the company was "clean".

Again according to the statement quoted in the Examiner -

Mr O’Connell said that while in Bulgaria the group had met “auctioneers, property developers and builders, all in relation to property in Bulgaria�.

But he also distanced himself from Chesterton Finance and Ted Cunningham -

He said: “I attended some of these meetings - all of which were connected with the Bulgarian property market. Apart from the above, I have no other involvement with Chesterton Finance or Ted Cunningham.�

Although, I'd quite like to hear the results of his 'preliminary checks' into Chesterton Finance on behalf of Mr Flynn.

The Examiner recaps its earlier reports -

Earlier this week, the Irish Examiner confirmed Mr Flynn and Mr Cunningham opened two bank accounts and registered three new companies during the trip.

Mr Flynn and Mr Cunningham also met with a senior banker and finance minister Ilia Lingorski, who is responsible for foreign inward investment.

However, since he resigned from all his public positions and as chairman of the Bank of Scotland (Ireland) last week, Mr Flynn has repeatedly denied any involvement in IRA money laundering.

When speaking to the Irish Examiner on Monday, he promised to make all the details of his business links to Bulgaria public when the Criminal Assets Bureau returns the files it confiscated last week.

UTV reported:

The poll asked a cross-section of the Irish public a number of questions, among them:

While support for Sinn Féin has not dropped appreciably, falling only one percentage point to 9%, Gerry Adams personal approval rating now ranks him as the least popular leader of any party sitting in the Dáil, having plummeted from 52% in October of 2002 to just 31% for February of this year.

I don't buy into the idea that, although symbolic, simply joining the Policing Board is by itself sufficient "evidence that the IRA has stood down" -

Sinn Féin's endorsement of the PSNI and their appearance on the Policing Board with government approval will provide the crucial evidence that the IRA has stood down.

Why? It would be preposterous for the IRA to continue its activities if senior republicans were on a Policing Board charged with stopping IRA activities.

Clearly that could not happen.

That argument relies on the same logic which predicted that an end to IRA activity would follow inexorably from the signing of the 1998 Agreement. It was flawed logic then.. and it is flawed logic now.

But the part of Brian Feeney's article that stood out, for me, was this -

Whether or not that was the explanation behind the IRA's actions, the opportunity of months absent of political developments cuts both ways. The Irish government has clearly decided to take full advantage of the vacant period to force an end to the phase of the peace process which should have been completed five years ago, namely decommissioning and the removal of the IRA from the equation. As Bertie Ahern told the Dail, three major efforts in 2002, 2003 and December 2004 had failed.

Now he's telling the republican movement to act unilaterally. The message from Dublin is that they have no bargaining counters left. Far from the IRA being an advantage, it's a millstone round the neck of republicans.

No-one, and certainly not the DUP, will join them at a negotiating table while the IRA remains in business, or should that be in finance?

It's hard, maybe impossible, for republicans to see this but what Bertie Ahern and his ministers are doing queuing up to take a poke at Sinn Féin leaders, is trying to make it easier for Adams and McGuinness to convince their movement that the IRA must retire from the field and become an old comrades association.[emphasis mine]

As he points out, the Taioseach has been cautiously encouraging through the current crisis -

Throughout all this drama the taoiseach has tried to keep republicans' eyes on his target. While openly repeating his allegations that the Sinn Féin leaders he was negotiating with knew of IRA plans, he has taken every chance to repeat that he wants a comprehensive agreement that includes Sinn Féin. In other words, last December's deal is still available but only republicans can make it happen.

In the meantime, to concentrate their minds, the gardai and Criminal Assets Bureau will set about dismantling the IRA's financial structures built up since the late 1970s and laying bare the linkages within republicanism.

One embarrassing revelation will follow another in the coming months.

However, the implication seems to be that if the 'millstone' is shed, then that 'strategy' may be adapted. But, surely, the process of tackling organised crime of this nature should continue whether that 'millstone' is shed by Sinn Féin or not?

heh heh..

'We need inventive ways of using the Irish banking sector' By Newton Emerson

In lieu of his usual column Newton Emerson this week offers the following excerpts from current Sinn Féin policy documents without further comment [Do I still have to pay him - Ed?]:

It has been clearly shown that the private and public banking companies have at times been active participants in systematic tax fraud.

- from the 2002 Sinn Féin pre-budget submission

When it comes to formulating tax policy there has been one question that successive governments have been afraid to ask. Who is paying tax and more importantly who isn't?

- from the 2003 Sinn Féin pre-budget submission

We need more inventive and positive ways of using the massive financial resources of the Irish banking sector.

- from the 2004 Sinn Féin pre-budget submission

It is essential to reform and re-weigh the taxation system in favour of the low paid and to increase the overall tax take by targeting wealth, speculative property and corporate profits. Measures should include:

End tax avoidance schemes.

Measured increase in Corporation Tax and increased Capital Gains Tax for owners of multiple residential properties.

Create a 50 per cent tax band for incomes in excess of €100,000.

- from the 2005 Sinn Féin pre-budget submission

Creating new businesses and helping existing ones grow does not happen in a vacuum. It comes about in the context of the supply of skilled workers with access to transport.

- from the 2002 Sinn Féin general election manifesto

Communities have often formed their own new co-operatives, local currency networks, social enterprise and development projects.

- from the 2001 Sinn Féin policy review Breaking the Cycle

There is widespread recognition throughout Irish society of the need to invest in the new communications technologies.

- from the 2001 Sinn Féin Westminster election manifesto

Private property has been and remains an instrument of oppression of people the world over.

- from the 2003 Sinn Féin submission to the Oireachtas Committee on the Constitution

Sinn Féin proposes a tax on international financial speculation, with revenue to be used to promote development in the poorer regions of the world.

- from the 2002 Sinn Féin pre-budget submission

Sinn Féin believes that community economic regeneration and the partnership concept can act as catalysts for genuine socio-economic change if they are premised upon an ethos of inclusion and the principle of sustainable development at a local level.

- from the 1998 Sinn Féin policy overview Putting People First

Incineration and all attempts to impose incineration on communities against their will to be opposed.

- from the 2004 Sinn Féin local government manifesto

Poverty is a by-product of domination of the needs of profit over the needs of people.

- from the 2004 Sinn Féin discussion paper Eliminating Poverty

Society will pay greater costs in the future for the "free money" the politicians seek today.

- from the 2003 Sinn Féin policy document on private finance initiatives

We have a taxation system riven with systematic inequality, where vested interests are pampered and protected.

- from the 2002 Sinn Féin election document Building a Just Economy

It is to the continuing shame of recent governments that a large section of our high-income individuals have been able to pay tax at rates which are effectively below those of even the (lower) standard rate.

- from the 2002 Sinn Féin general election manifesto

Tax "loopholes" are indicative of the dominant culture of tax avoidance in which wealthy individuals and companies have grown accustomed to paying less than their fair share.

- from the 2002 Sinn Féin general election manifesto

Sinn Féin proposes to address both legal avoidance and illegal tax evasion as a high priority, confident in the knowledge that closing these gaps and effectively policing tax compliance will result in a dramatic increase in receipts taken.

- from the 2002 Sinn Féin general election manifesto

A rural investment bank needs to be set up that offers low-interest loans.

- from the 1998 Sinn Féin policy overview Putting People First

Everyone should have a meaningful role to play in developing the economy, particularly at a local level.

- from the 1997 Sinn Féin submission to the multi-party talks

The EU Council still meets and takes decisions in secret, without transparency or accountability

- from the 2004 Sinn Féin European election manifesto

Our view is that those who run the media should run it in public, and not behind closed doors.

- from the 2002 Sinn Féin general election manifesto

Government shall be accountable to the people and be based on openness, transparency and effective freedom of information legislation.

- from the 2004 Sinn Féin discussion document Rights for All

Newton Emerson is editor of the satirical website portadownnews.com

© The Irish Times
[just in case]

" At some point in this process, however, this effort demanded a fundamental act of reciprocity from republicanism - an irreversible embrace of peaceful means at the expense of violence and criminality. The moment for that conclusive act seems at last to have been reached. It is make your mind up time for the IRA, Sinn Féin and their supporters. And high time too.

Thus far, the response of Sinn Féin into this challenge has been inadequate. The vow to banish criminality from the republican movement is naturally encouraging, as far as it goes. But it is actions that count, not words. This is especially the case when the twisted theology of parts of republicanism, in which the possibility of a self-proclaimed political movement such as Sinn Féin or the IRA committing any act of criminality is still a contradiction in terms. This is a culture in which, all too often, to stab someone to death in a bar, as happened to Mr McCartney, to threaten witnesses not to talk to the police, or to rob a bank of millions of pounds do not qualify as criminal acts. Gerry Adams may talk of an end to criminality. But when he does so against the backdrop of a uniformed honour guard at an IRA commemoration it is meaningless to the outside world. It suggests that a new generation of republican leaders may be needed to take the great leap into lawful and democratic activity."

Press Association reports:

In a lengthy letter to Northern Ireland Secretary Paul Murphy, Chief Commissioner Professor Brice Dickson castigated the British Government for failing to give his commission proper powers, running down its numbers and ignoring or rejecting its recommendations.

Prof Dickson retired at the end of this month after heading the Commission during its first six years, a time when he has often clashed with the British Government.

Feeney writes:

The Irish government has clearly decided to take full advantage of the vacant period to force an end to the phase of the peace process which should have been completed five years ago, namely decommissioning and the removal of the IRA from the equation. As Bertie Ahern told the Dail, three major efforts in 2002, 2003 and December 2004 had failed.

No-one, and certainly not the DUP, will join them at a negotiating table while the IRA remains in business, or should that be in finance?

Feeney also - and rightly in my opinion - identifies the point at which the IRA will 'go away' as an active paramilitary organisation; when Sinn Fein eventually sign up to the Policing Board, which I believe is ultimately inevitable, if not likely in the short term.

Indeed, if the DUP had the wit to see it, Sinn Fein’s endorsement of the PSNI and their appearance on the Policing Board with government approval will provide the crucial evidence that the IRA has stood down.

Why? It would be preposterous for the IRA to continue its activities if senior republicans were on a Policing Board charged with stopping IRA activities.

The message from Dublin is clear; the ball is in Republican Movement's court. It has to deal with criminality, and until then, there will be a window of opportunity for the Irish (and to a lesser extent, the British) authorities to take on the RM financially.

If Sinn Fein and the IRA do not face the challenge, then it is likely that the continuing drip-drip effect of negative publicity surrounding republican criminality will be the result, which could affect Sinn Fein electorally at a time when the party is anxious to expand quickly.

It may also be worth noting Sinn Féin TD Aengus Ó Snodaigh's response to those recent convictions when interviewed on RTÉ news - including the claim that he, Mr Ó Snodaigh, could not be held responsible for Niall Binead, a SF member [and election agent IIRC] convicted last November of, as RTÉ reports, "similar offences."

So, is that an example of a Sinn Féin member convicted of a criminal activity?

The Irish Examiner report claims the group of six included two more Irish citizens, as well as Flynn and Cunningham, but cites legal reasons for not naming them. The report also has details of the trip as compiled by the Bulgarian newspaper 24 Chasa (24 Hours) -

A source close to the investigation here confirmed the membership of the group and the creation of the companies.

But the source does dispute some of the details of the Bulgarian report - regarding the newly registered company names and the amounts of money deposited in bank accounts.

Bulgarian officials are now confirming Phil Flynn did meet with a Ministry of Finance official during the trip -

The details emerged last night as Bulgarian officials confirmed Mr Flynn’s assertion in yesterday’s Irish Examiner that he had met a senior Ministry of Finance official during his visit.

A statement from the ministry had earlier denied any such meeting but it was later stated that Ilia Lingorski, deputy finance minister with responsibility for foreign inward investment, had met the Irish visitors.

The ministry insisted, however, that it was normal practice for him to meet with potential investors and said any discussions concerned only the “general business environment�.

Bulgarian police, meanwhile, said they had the names of the property developers the Irish men met and the lawyers they hired.

Additionally, the Bulgarian Financial Investigation Agency is reported to be invesigating the money-laundering allegations.. but dismisses the reported story of an 'attempt to buy a bank' -

Bulgaria’s Financial Investigation Agency said it was also investigating the money laundering allegations, but dismissed reports that suggested the IRA was planning to buy a bank or set up its own financial institution.

“We have intercepted neither any large-scale financial operation to launder money through the financial system of the country nor an attempt to buy a bank,� agency director Vasil Kirov told Bulgarian News Network.

“No one can come to buy a bank here and remain unnoticed,� he added.

Indeed, he believes that there is little private dissent within Republican communities from the view that the IRA did do the Northern job, and that it did so for its own good reasons:

...there is a sense that the IRA twice stuck its neck out and twice had its head chopped off - that actual decommissioning and a further offer to put all arms beyond use and for the IRA to move into a "new mode", was thrown back into the republican face. And, it was in this climate that the bank raid happened.

If there is even an ounce of truth in this analysis, the question has to be that if the political climate is likely to get worse rather than better, what exactly has the IRA got planned for the next stage of its fight back?

But this week, statements by Sinn Féin are no longer accepted by politicians at face value. And behind Mr Adams, at an IRA commemoration in Strabane on Sunday, stood an honour guard in full paramilitary uniform. The message was clear: We are still here, despite Mr Adams saying that conditions had to be created so that the IRA "ceases to be". That central paradox of the republican movement is the unavoidable hook on which Sinn Féin is now caught.

Whether the IRA did or didn't do the Northern Bank, or whether its volunteers were or were not involved in the brutal slaughter of Robert McCartney and its apparent coverup, the party has uncharacteristically found itself in permenent defence against a raft of accusations, which difficult though they may be to prove, they will be even more difficult for Sinn Fein and the IRA to disprove.

The move follows the Quigley review into parades and the Northern Ireland Affairs Committee's investigation into the issue.

However, according to the BBC report, the review's recommendation for two separate bodies to replace the commission, will not be implemented.

"The Northern Ireland Affairs Committee concluded that the Parades Commission remains the best hope for developing the peaceful resolution of disputes and I endorse that view," said Mr Pearson.

The announcement has been welcomed by SDLP Policing Board member Alex Attwood and Sinn Fein's Gerry Kelly but DUP MP Nigel Dodds claimed the new legislation was aimed at penalising parade supporters.

Ulster Unionist Assembly member David McNarry has also condemned the decision, calling it another "evil tool". Steady on David.

Starting with a letter an IT reader sent to the paper three weeks after voting for Sinn Fein's Mary Lou McDonald in last June's European election, where he claimed he was "duped" as his vote was out of recognition of SF's efforts in the peace process but immediately saw "they haven't changed at all", O'Toole goes on to say this wasn't surprising as

"we had entered an Orwellian world where the way to support peace and democracy was to be nice to those who had most blood on their hands. Lies were creative ambiguity ... most of us, to a degree, allowed ourselves to lose our moral bearings."

O'Toole goes on to say that now we have left our holiday in "Wonderland" the consensus appears to be that the peace process is in trouble.

"Actually, though, the peace process is going very well. It has moved forward, at last, to a point that should have been reached long ago. The journey has passed through a boggy swamp of strategic evasion and reached the hard ground of clarity. The mechanical side of the process - the institutional deal-making - may be going nowhere, but the more important fundamental side - the shifting of perceptions - is making real progress...

...Ten years ago, a photograph of Gerry Adams surrounded by men and women in military uniforms with black berets and sunglasses would hardly have been worth printing. Now, the photographs of the Sinn Fein president at an IRA commemoration in Strabane last weekend scream out the remarkable fact that a would-be Taoiseach still hangs round with a private army. Slowly but surely, a sense of normality has been regained."

With permission, Mr Speaker, I should like to make a statement on Northern Ireland.

I came to the House on 11 January to make a statement relating to the Northern Bank robbery on 20 December. To recall the background: a highly organised and brutal gang kidnapped the families of two staff from the Bank’s headquarters in Belfast, threatening them with death unless the individuals co-operated in the execution of the largest robbery ever seen in these Islands.

Since then a major police investigation has been under way. As the House is aware the Chief Constable of Northern Ireland made his conclusion clear that the Provisional IRA were responsible for the robbery. The Prime Minister and I have indicated that we accept the Chief Constable’s judgement which is also shared by the Irish Government and their security advisers. The Chief Constable’s statement, seen in the context of other subsequent events, serves to reinforce the extent of the challenge that we all face in working towards peace and stability in Northern Ireland.

Earlier this month, on 10 February, I laid before the House a copy of a report presented to the British and Irish Governments by the Independent Monitoring Commission. That report, which the Commission had elected to produce in addition to its normal twice-yearly reports to the two Governments, concluded that the Northern Bank robbery was planned and undertaken by the Provisional IRA and that this organisation was also responsible for three other major robberies during the course of 2004.

I am very grateful to the members of the Commission for their quick response to the very grave situation created by the robbery and its attribution.

The IMC concluded, on the basis of its own careful scrutiny, that Sinn Fein must bear its share of the responsibility for these incidents. They indicated that, had the Northern Ireland Assembly been sitting, they would have recommended that the full range of measures referred to in the relevant legislation be applied to Sinn Fein, including the exclusion of its members from holding Ministerial office. In the context of suspension, they recommended that I should consider exercising the powers I have to apply financial penalties to Sinn Fein.

Mr Speaker, the House will recall that following the IMC’s first report in April last year, I issued a direction removing, for a period of twelve months, the block financial assistance paid to Assembly parties in respect of both Sinn Fein and the Progressive Unionist Party.

Having reflected on the IMC’s latest report, I have concluded that it would be appropriate for me to issue a further direction removing Sinn Fein’s entitlement to this block financial assistance for a further twelve month period, the maximum period permitted under the legislation.

I am, therefore, minded to make a further direction to come into effect on 29th April – the day after the existing direction expires. Before reaching a final decision, however, I will take into account any representations made to me by Sinn Fein by next Tuesday.

Mr Speaker, I will make a decision on whether to extend the financial penalties imposed on the PUP last April when I receive the next IMC report covering all paramilitary groups, which is expected in April.

The Commission’s report also refers to other public money which Sinn Fein receive, although recommendations on this are outside their remit. In this context, I am conscious that Hon Members on both sides of the House have raised concerns in the past about the payment of financial allowances to the four Sinn Fein members who decline to take up their seats here.

Mr Speaker, I hope that the House will welcome the opportunity to debate, in the near future, a Government motion proposing that these allowances be suspended on a timescale in parallel with the arrangements at Stormont, in recognition of recent events. The debate on that motion is for another day, but I should emphasise to the House, lest anyone accuse us of denying the extent of Sinn Féin’s electoral support, that the measures we are proposing are designed to express the disapproval of all those who are committed to purely democratic politics at the actions of the Provisional IRA. All in this House recognise the degree of support for Sinn Féin, but we also believe that the actions of the republican movement are letting down everyone in Northern Ireland, including Sinn Féin voters.

There are those who will argue that these financial sanctions are insufficient as a signal of the Government’s and Parliament’s condemnation of recent events. They may well argue that I should take steps to exclude Sinn Fein from the political process, or from the Assembly, now. I want to deal with those arguments directly, because they are sincerely made and with a strength of feeling that I well understand.

The Government’s ultimate goal remains the achievement of an inclusive power-sharing Executive in Northern Ireland. I need not remind the House that the robbery has set back the timescale for achieving that. But the reality remains that long-term stability in Northern Ireland will not come about if we focus on exclusion. That objective requires inclusion: dialogue with Sinn Fein must continue in order to see how that long-term goal can be achieved. But I am clear that this must be inclusion on the basis of a complete and demonstrable commitment to non-violence and exclusively peaceful and democratic means, that fundamental principle of the Good Friday Agreement, enshrined in the Pledge of Office.

Had the robbery occurred while the Assembly was in operation, however, the decision about exclusion would have been very different. It is inconceivable, in my view, that members of Sinn Fein could again hold Ministerial office while the issue of paramilitary activity and criminality on the part of the Provisional IRA remained unresolved.

The suggestion is made in some quarters that I should restore the Assembly and then, if the Assembly itself failed to take action to exclude Sinn Fein, that I should take action myself using the powers available to me to exclude them. Mr Speaker, this would be very difficult in the absence of a clear plan which would see the parties in the Assembly come together on a cross-community basis to form a government for Northern Ireland. But as I said to the House on 11 January, I have not ruled anything in or out as we continue to assess possible ways forward for achieving greater local political accountability.

As my Rt Hon Friend the Prime Minister has said, if we can’t achieve a comprehensive settlement in the short term will we need to consider other ways forward.

In the meantime our focus will remain strongly on dealing with the underlying issue of ongoing criminal activity in all its forms. The police investigation into the Northern Bank robbery is the largest undertaken by the PSNI, who are continuing to follow up every lead. This is inevitably an intensive and time consuming process. In parallel with this, I am taking the opportunity to ensure that our arrangements for tackling organised crime remain fit for purpose and have asked my Honourable Friend, the Member for Dudley South, to review the Organised Crime Task Force to see whether, and how, it might be strengthened.

We continue to have excellent co-operation at both a political and operational level with colleagues from the South of Ireland. I met yesterday with Michael McDowell for a regular bilateral along with the police chiefs from both jurisdictions. At that meeting, I was pleased to see this co-operation further strengthened by the signing, by the Chief Constable and Garda Commissioner, of protocols which facilitate the movement of officers between both forces in terms of personnel exchanges and secondments with policing powers. This development can only serve to strengthen the existing co-operation between the two police services in tackling terrorism and other crime.

But whatever our success in tackling criminality and paramilitary activity, the fact of the matter is that the commitment to peaceful and democratic means is not one this Government needs to make. As we said in the Joint Declaration of April 2003, “ongoing paramilitary activity, sectarian violence and criminality masquerading as a political cause are all corrosive of the trust and confidence that are necessary to sustain a durable political process.�

In the present context it is, as the Prime Minister and the Taoiseach have both indicated, for Sinn Fein and the Provisional IRA to do that. They need to step forward and tell us how they will demonstrate their full commitment to all the principles of the Good Friday Agreement and how they intend to demonstrate to all the other parties in the political process and to the people of Northern Ireland, that the kind of behaviour identified in the IMC report is in the past. Financial penalties of the kind I have described today may signify our strong disapproval of what has happened, but of themselves they do not rebuild the trust which is necessary if confidence is to be restored. That is a matter for the Republican movement in general, and Sinn Féin in particular.

Quite a contrast. On the one hand Mairtin O'Muilleoir, Robin Livingstone and Peter Quinn are taking on Michael McDowell for "repeated allegations that the Daily Ireland, an all-Ireland republican newspaper, is backed by the IRA. Last month he compared the Belfast-based newspaper with Völkischer Beobachter, a Nazi propaganda sheet of the 1930s." Minister McDowell also named Senior SF officials as members of the IRA Army council - Mairtin O'Muilleoir is reported thus:

he was not surprised that the attack on his newspaper had come in the "same breath" as criticism of the largest republican party in Northern Ireland.
"It's open season on northern nationalists and especially northern nationalists who are sympathetic to Sinn Féin. There is an attempt to criminalise that body of opinion."

Meanwhile, David aaronovitch, who admits that Adams is a "man I've come to admire" describes a scene which would come close to a modern-day version of a Nazi Rally Where Mr Adams addresses men who
participated in a :

"republican rally in the town of Strabane last weekend, a rally in which 1,000 marchers paraded through the streets chanting, "IRA! IRA!"

and asks

"But what the hell is he doing still in that company? Behind him and around him are men in combat fatigues and berets, some in the stand-at ease position, one with a flag. Whose army, exactly, are they? Whose taxes maintain them? What parliament or assembly appointed or regulated them? The newspapers call them a "colour party", but what battle honours are on their flags? Enniskillen? The Baltic Exchange? Warrington? "

To quote Dan Milmo :

Mr O'Muilleoir said he was not surprised that the attack on his newspaper had come in the "same breath" as criticism of the largest republican party in Northern Ireland.

"It's open season on northern nationalists and especially northern nationalists who are sympathetic to Sinn Féin. There is an attempt to criminalise that body of opinion."

Photographs such as those taken Strabane, February 2005, of the President of Sinn Féin as seen in various newspapers do not help Sinn Féin and indirectly the Daily Ireland's cause.

When one's admirer writes:

There isn't another mainstream party whose leaders make speeches flanked by members of their own private armies; there isn't another mainstream party whose activists carry out punishment beatings; there isn't another mainstream party whose overt political organisation is covertly interlinked with that of a secret paramilitary organisation. In a normal democracy you can expect just a little criticism for these practices.

surely it's time for some serious reflection?

No doubt many of the commenters here on Slugger agree.. although, perhaps, for different reasons..

And it will not go unnoticed for long that five people have just been convicted for membership of an illegal organisation at the Special Criminal Court.

From the Irish Examiner report -

"If these claims[by Minister McDowell] are true, these men are guilty of membership of a subversive organisation which is punishable by a five-year jail term," said Labour spokesman Joe Costello.

"The minister’s statement has huge repercussions and people will want to know will these people be prosecuted.

"A word of a garda superintendent who tells a court he believes someone is a member of proscribed organisation is now sufficient to convict that person.

"Here we have a minister, one of the highest office holders in the land, stating categorically that these three men are members of the IRA Army Council - one of them a member of the Dáil," Mr Costello added.

In response to the comments by Michael McDowell, Sinn Féin's Martin McGuinness told RTÉ, "I am not a member of the IRA - I was years ago - I am not a member of IRA Army Council."

Taioseach Bertie Ahern has, so far, simply stated that he does not know who the members of the IRA army council are.... but it's difficult to see how he will be able to maintain that position for long.

Especially when, as Defence Minister Willie O'Dea has stated, “We[the Irish Government] are no longer prepared to accept the farce that Sinn Féin and the IRA are separate - they are indivisible�.

The Guardian has report including a great quote from Christopher Lehmann-Haupt writing in the New York Times in 1973 - worried Thompson might someday "lapse into good taste".

"That would be a shame, for while he doesn't see America as Grandma Moses depicted it, or the way they painted it for us in civics class, he does in his own mad way betray a profound democratic concern for the polity," he wrote. "And in its own mad way, it's damned refreshing."

and, appropriately, Thompson's own view of his life and writing,

"Fiction is based on reality unless you're a fairytale artist," Thompson said in 2003. "You have to get your knowledge of life from somewhere. You have to know the material you're writing about before you alter it."

RIP Hunter.

Added link.
The Guardian also has a short profile, with some links to other articles...

including some, selected, quotes

According to the report, the PSNI said those taking part were given two warnings and the matter would be forwarded to the DPP.

If convicted should those participants be thrown out of the Orange Order to show that the organisation will not turn a blind eye to their members' assembling illegally or were they justified to ignore the police and march into the city centre to commemorate two Ulster Defence Regiment soldiers who were murdered in the 1980s?

He has already given his answer to the question he poses early in the article

If Adams and McGuinness knew about the robbery and/or money laundering, they cannot be trusted. How could other political parties enter government with anyone who has been so duplicitous?

having written in the Sunday Business Post two weeks ago (blogged here) -

Having known Adams for many years, and having met him recently, I do not believe that he knew in advance of the Belfast bank robbery.

Back then he raised the spectre of the IRA returning to war

What is more scary is the prospect of the IRA going back to war, this time with a €38 million war chest (if they did indeed do the bank job).

If that happens, they will not fool around with the old brigade rifles and Semtex: there will be more devastating stuff, with more devastating consequences in terms of human life, destruction and political fallout.

Now, he does the same thing, but the difference is he no longer doubts that they were responsible for the Northern Bank raid -

It is no longer credible, given the evidence of Sinn Féin engagement in money-laundering, that it - or rather the IRA (if the distinction makes any difference) - did not carry out the Northern Bank job.

We are talking about vast amounts of money, almost €40 million. What would a political party do with that amount?

I don't believe the point of stealing such money was to underwrite Sinn Féin for several years to come.

I think there must be some other, far more sinister, purpose, such as going back to war at some stage in the future - this time with far more sophisticated and devastating weaponry than anything previously deployed by the Provos.[emphasis mine]

And he asks the question, of which we know his answer, again -

If that is what they are about, then it is just as well we know now. It would bring an end to the peace process and other means must be secured to stabilise the North and preserve the peace generally on these islands. That is if Adams and McGuinness knew about it.

If they did not, the situation may be even more perilous. It would mean that they are no longer in control of the movement, that others are in charge and running things to a very different agenda.

That ignores, or perhaps dismisses, Adams' own recent comments on this situation - no crisis within.

Then to his consideration of just a couple of the options -

Adams and McGuinness have the option either of going along with this for a while, in the hope of turning things around, or abandoning ship, as both seemed to be hinting at in the last few days.

Abandoning ship amounts to the same thing as abandoning the peace process. The point of the peace process was to bring a united republican movement into exclusively democratically peaceful politics.

Adams and McGuinness abandoning ship now means abandoning that objective.

We are then left with the prospect of attempting to construct arrangements, vulnerable to the destruction of a still-powerful IRA, still supported by a sizeable section - albeit a minority - of the nationalist community in the North. It would not work.

And so to the point of the article.. it did take a while..

The best outcome is that Adams and McGuinness remain involved and that they attempt to retrieve the situation.

In his view that is. He doesn't entirely ignore the reasons why there are serious problems with such an approach, but doesn't elaborate on them much either -

The problem for the rest of us is knowing whether Adams and McGuinness are attempting to retrieve a situation internally where they have lost control, or whether they have been involved in this carry-on all along. If it is the latter, then doing business with them is hazardous.[my emphasis]

And so, he supposes, softly softly -

I suppose the answer is simply to assume the benign scenario and edge them and the republican movement back to the position of December 8, when they were about to agree to complete decommissioning and, more significantly, to accept the police force in the North.

It's an scenario that assumes that endorsement of the PSNI by Sinn Féin was imminent in December and ignores the implications of his earlier argument - "It would mean that they[Adams and McGuinness] are no longer in control of the movement, that others are in charge and running things to a very different agenda"

By way of a comparison, Gerry Moriarty in the Irish Times, in January this year, wrote about a similar choice between a malign and a "slightly more benign scenario" behind the Northern Bank raid, The Provos are in Egypt, and argued at the time that the Irish Government were inclined to believe his slightly more benign scenario.. at the time my own view was that he was closer to the mark with the first scenario he outlined -

The first, and most malign, is from a senior nationalist who is now convinced that the provisional republican movement effectively has abandoned the Belfast Agreement.

In brief he argued that Sinn Féin and the IRA reckons it's pointless "wasting time in trying to do a deal with the DUP" when with its electoral power bases in the North and South, it should be aiming for bigger gains, particularly when there is now a real chance of achieving the balance of power in the Republic. Therefore, bypass the agreement and strive to leapfrog to joint authority to enhance the chances of a united Ireland by 2016.

The second scenario is that the IRA gave the go-ahead for the robbery only after the collapse of the talks in December. Republicans believed that unionists, especially with Ian Paisley talking of humiliating the IRA and Sinn Féin, had spurned a good deal and needed to be taught a salutary lesson short of a return to war. Sure, where was the political danger; wouldn't the robbery be yesterday's news in a week or two?

Whether the Irish Government still believes that benign scenario remains to be seen.

The signing, at Hillsborough Castle in Co Down, will be attended by the Northern Ireland Secretary Paul Murphy and Irish Justice Minister Michael McDowell.

The exchanges were first recommended in the Patten Report and the Irish and British governments carried forward the idea in an inter-governmental agreement on policing which they signed in 2002.

Is this a politically motivated cross-border scheme or just a necessary part of good policing on the island of Ireland?

The Northern Bank robbery and the smashing of an IRA money-laundering racket in the Irish Republic a few days ago demonstrate beyond doubt that the continued existence of the republican movement's armed wing has become a millstone around the neck of the Sinn Fein leadership. Why, then, do Gerry Adams and Martin McGuinness still need an IRA?

Open to discussion, but ....

They are, after all, and this is a matter of record, senior members of that organisation's ruling body, the Army Council.

Whoa! Matter of record ?

The answer is simple: the IRA funds the republican movement. As well as being able to impose military discipline on members who also belong to Sinn Fein, the IRA can raise millions of pounds through robberies, smuggling, extortion, blackmail. This war chest funds Sinn Fein's electoral machine.

Again open to discussion... but at least they don't say it's "a matter of record".

I thought the last paragraph was the most incisive passage in the piece. Robin is right on the money with this:

The McCartney affair is potentially more dangerous for Sinn Féin. The best outcome would be a quick and convincing conviction. But if the killer stays free, even without the aid of the IRA, that fact will come to be the fault of republicans for what they did or didn't do in the days after the killing [my italics]. The ghosts of the disappeared and the grim search for their bodies have haunted the IRA for years. How ironic it would be if the last of the disappeared remained alive, was one of their own, and did them most damage.

Despite some of the 'previous' reporting on the bank raid recently (we still await any evidence that Jim Cusick's claim that £10 million has been recovered and connected to the IRA, is in any way accurate), I would not underestimate its capacity for damage, both direct and collateral for whoever carried out that raid. Apart from anything else, it adds to a growing sense that certain areas (Loyalist as well as Republican) in Northern Ireland are simply out of anyone's control.

"Flynn denies any wrong-doing and may well be an innocent party. He is certainly getting the benefit of the doubt from most media, which are otherwise going to town on the other people arrested and hugely prejudicing their prospects of a fair trial. The practice of not publicly naming criminal suspects before they are charged has broken down somewhat in the media's breathless excitement about recent events. Police in the Republic say it may be months before the investigation leads to a clear set of charges. And there is an awful lot of money still unaccounted-for -- much of untraceable."

Lynch mobs are never pleasant.

The Irish Independent reports that "loss of live television coverage will be a major blow to the party, as the ard fheis takes place the weekend before the Meath and Kildare North by-elections.

The decision to seek legal advice arises because the by-elections are so close to the ard fheis weekend, which is from March 4 to March 6.

Senior executives in RTE have to take account of the fact that the provision of normal coverage for the ard fheis could be regarded by other candidates as conferring an unfair advantage to Sinn Fein in an election atmosphere.

One of the difficulties facing RTE is that this may be the first time there has been a clash between the timing of an ard fheis and by-election campaigns.

It is understood that Sinn Fein has already opted for an hour-long slot between 5pm and 6pm on Saturday March 5 for live coverage of the presidential address by Gerry Adams on RTE One, rather than 30 minutes between 8.30pm and 9pm."

Only one man so far faces charges, former Sinn Fein man and a former leading light in Cork Sinn Fein, who is now reportedly a dissident. But we may find that the financial investigations turn up a lot more than deadweight cash from the Northern Bank.

The Irish Times also quotes from the statement by the Bank of Scotland -

In a Bank of Scotland (Ireland), statement last night Mr Flynn said: "I am guilty of no wrongdoing, but the bank and I have decided that it is best I step down from my position as non-executive chairman with immediate effect in order to ensure Bank of Scotland (Ireland) is not affected by recent publicity."

In the Irish Examiner report he states that he was co-operating with the Gardai and had handed over all files in relation to Chesterton Finance, the Cork-based finance company which has been at the centre of the the garda investigation into money laundering, to the Criminal Assets Bureau.

Mr Flynn, a former vice-president of Sinn Féin, also resigned as chairman the Irish Government's decentralisation committee and as a board member of the VHI.

The Daily Ireland report claims that he was "Caught in the Crossfire", and states that "Mr Flynn has been a strong supporter of the Daily Ireland project since its inception though he does not serve as a director", although it is already a little out of date with some of the details and doesn't offer any further details of his actual role, Flynn and Daily Ireland.

My only objection to this otherwise excellent article is that he ignores the terrorising of the families held hostage during the robbery.

His comments about Wednesday's IRA statement ring true, although the slightly acidic "keening" jars -

Sinn Féin's terse response that anyone who knew anything should make a statement to their solicitor was in keeping with their opposition to the Police Service of Northern Ireland, but it sounded callous against the keening of the McCartney sisters, and the grumblings of discontent in Short Strand could be heard in Cork. Hence Wednesday's unexpected IRA statement, which was warmly welcomed by the family. "Anyone who can help the family should do so," the statement read.

Whether any witnesses will take advantage of this effective amnesty from the IRA to come forward only time will tell.

After pointing out that SF should consider themselves lucky to have 10 weeks to recover and regroup, he ends the article with a surprising reminder of the damage done by the disappeared.

Next week no doubt there will be another gripping installment of... well, we'll have to wait see what the name of the game then! I'm away from Slugger Central for the week, so will only be dropping into the comment zone from time to time to help keep order.

No doubt that's true in the heartland, and amongst the core of workers that have driven the party forward with a work ethic that would put the average protestant to shame. But everywhere else that support is being shaken rather than stirred. The movement would have find a very powerful silver bullet capable of putting several rather nasty genies back in their bottles.

Fear of some kind of return to a violent offensive is uppermost in many minds. In the last 24 hours, Slugger has spoken to three people from very different political backgrounds who accept there will be no return to war as such, but still fear the IRA will find some way to punish what it considers its illtreatment in the press and media.

At this point nothing major is expected before the election results. Before the controversy, Sinn Fein was expected to walk home. Now things are a little more difficult to call. Eddie McGrady's workers feel their man has a hard task against Catriona Ruane, but will now probably keep his South Down seat.

In Derry, Mark Durkan may now be in a position to start hooking back those Hume nationalists who had been contemplating the Sinn Fein Chair Mitchel McLaughlin as a natural successor to their local hero. It is doubtful whether his performance on Questions and Answers will have damaged him anywhere near as much as the current impression of his party as unwilling to deliver the original Hume deal.

A interesting fight may be on the cards in South Belfast. If Alex Maskey (who worked hard in his year as Lord Mayor of Belfast to break down barriers with unionists) runs he may find himself dogged by a series of questions over his stance on the rioting in the Markets in the immediate aftermath of the McCartney killing. McDonnell will not pull his punches.

For now, Adams and McGuinness look safe. Conor Murphy (who SDLPers claim has gone to ground since this crisis began) also looks too far ahead at this stage to be caught, as does Pat Doherty in West Tyrone. Michelle Gildernew's fate probably lies with whether the Unionist party can make up and mend fences rather than on the strength of a resurgent SDLP.

For now, there is no telling what lies in wait for the Republican movement around the corner. Two months ago the SDLP looked as if it might be swept clean from the House of Commons altogether. It seems to be slowly clawing its way back into political life.

If things remain as they are, then Sinn Fein will be thankful to have ridden out yet another political storm. But if this atrocious PR continues, it would be a foolish punter who would bet against another one or two of those seats moving from solid to vulnerable.

And if there is some kind of political upset, all attention will inevitably turn to the reaction of the IRA!

What is Sudan I ?

Sudan I – your questions answered

Since a temporary exclusion from office was what the IMC recommended (if the Assembly had still been functioning), it will be very interesting to hear what Paul Murphy has to say in the Commons on Monday.

Taoiseach Bertie Ahern still opposes exclusion, despite ruling out Sinn Fein in his own coalition government until the issues surrounding the IRA are resolved. Such double standards make you wonder why exclusion was ever written into the Agreement...

In a letter to the Prime Minister, Trimble wrote:

“The government clearly has a duty to act on all the Commission’s recommendations. It also has power both under the Suspension Act and the legislation governing the International Monitoring Commission to enable such action. It would be utterly perverse to use the fact of suspension, itself a consequence of earlier republican wrongdoing, to frustrate a clear recommendation of the Commission and prevent the resumption of the institutions created by the Belfast Agreement 1998.

Proceeding along these lines would also administer a shock to Sinn Fein which might result in it taking seriously the calls which we have all made repeatedly over the last two and a half years. It would show that we were indeed moving on from the fork in the road, where we have all been marking time since October 2002.�

Much of what Whelan writes continues to hold a bearing on Sinn Fein's current dilemma:

For the IRA, and for many in Sinn Féin, the use of violence is seen as justified not only for ‘political’ purposes but also in the enforcement of internal discipline and in order to ‘police’ certain communities. As a result, for many in the IRA violence has become a way of life. The availability of such regular opportunities for violent activity inevitably attracts or generates psychopaths.

The crux:

The IRA also gives authority to local commanders over operatives and communities in a defined area and sanctions the use of violence to maintain control therein. In that set-up it becomes almost inevitable that some of those local commanders on occasion will deploy that violence in personal rather than ‘political’ disputes.

The letter ends with:

I believe that decent IRA members are not merely disgusted by it, but totally repulsed. Both the vigil to honour my nephew and his subsequent funeral were attended by people who remain supporters of Sinn Fein – for now anyway. The ball has been placed firmly at the feet of the Sinn Fein leadership. Henceforth, their words and actions will be scrutinised by all but their most blind adherents and sycophants.

Thus, the leadership will determine its own political future. As pointed out by Mr Kelly, my son and many others, Robert McCartney’s horrific murder was a civil crime – not a political act. If Sinn Fein's leaders fail to publicly and unambiguously call on every person with information regarding this crime to give that information to the police – everything, from the seemingly insignificant to the perpetrators’ names – then I see, in the not too distant future, Sinn Fein's headstone etched with the words, 'Death By Suicide'.

There is no indication of a sea change in nationalist areas yet, but:

Given the dramatis personae, it will not take Sherlock Holmes to persuade the Taoiseach and most others except Sinn Fein, that they were right all along to blame the Provos. However it was the events in the Markets area of Belfast as they unfolded which first showed that Sinn Fein was not completely invulnerable to public opinion in their strongest areas, and that that opinion was outraged by what was going on.

It's as if Sinn Fein was unconscious of the message the killing sent to its own constituents:

The killing had no political purpose (as if that would justify it), it served the ends of no organisation, unless that were to instil terror. It was the result of a vulgar brawl, an act of personal revenge and great brutality. And yet, the first instinct of IRA and Sinn Fein was to close ranks, to cover up, to defend the indefensible because those concerned were prominent enough in the movement that they could neither be disowned or discovered. This was to disregard moral values, the suffering of the family in their quest for justice, and the feelings of the community.

One of the most damaging things (although it may not be the most damaging) is the sense that the party is moving backwards at a pace clearly not of their own choosing:

The first reaction was to applaud the rioting children and to complain of police heavy-handedness. Then it was tell somebody, tell anybody, but not the police. Finally it was tell the police if you must, or someone in authority. Intimidation too was disowned as the days passed, finally even by the IRA. And eventually too, a definition of justice as arrest, trial in the courts, conviction and imprisonment was dragged from a spokesman as Sinn Fein began to come into the real world.

Speaking before last night’s developments, Mr O Caolain said he was “galled� by the media’s continued focus on whether IRA members were involved in law-breaking on both sides of the border.

“It galls me because none of the issues [to which the media refers] is under my or my party’s control,� he said.

Excellent timing Caomhghin and Davy!

According to the Irish Examiner Ted Cunningham, who is a registered moneylender, was placed under surveillance several months ago by Special Branch detectives and would appear to be the initial focus of the investigation.

A convenient time-line on the events of the last couple of days from the Irish Examiner -

Wednesday:

4.30pm: Three men, two from Derry and one from Cork, arrested at Heuston station. The Corkman was found carrying €94,000 in cash. The two men from Derry have strong republican links.

9pm: Two men arrested in Cork - one in Passage West and the other in Douglas. George Hegarty, who is in his early 50s, was arrested at his home at Donnybrook Cottages, Douglas where £60,000 in Northern Bank notes was discovered. It's believed Mr Hegarty has links to Sinn Féin.

The man arrested in Passage West was last night being held at Togher Garda Station in Cork city. Mr Hegarty was detained at Mayfield Garda Station.

Thursday

9am: A financial premises in Ballincollig, Co Cork, is raided by detectives who remove a number of files.

11am: Financier Ted Cunningham and his partner, Cathy Armstrong, were arrested at a house at Church View, Farran, nine miles west of Cork city. Gardaí discovered over £2.3 million (€3.2m) in cash.

Gardaí also secure a number of other premises across the city.

5pm: Local reports of garda raids in a number of premises in Dundalk. There were no arrests, but a number of documents were seized. However, the garda press office refused to comment.

For those who can't stand the tension, here's an ice breaker on the imminent abolition of the Smartie tube! Thanks to Alan2 for the heads up!

Mick Fealty @ 11:04 AM | Comments (6)

Cork arrests blogged...
Cork based Gavin Sheridan has lots of updates in a single post.

Mick Fealty @ 10:56 AM | Comments (0)

Flynn and Daily Ireland
Flynn's connection with Daily Ireland is confirmed by checking out the paper's prospectus on page 6. His CV is impressive, and the paper can surely argue that a confidant of the taoiseach should be a substantial character reference in and of itself.

It has to be stressed that Flynn's fellow directors have only been been helping the Guards with their inquiries. To that extent Sinn Féin is entirely correct to suggest that people should continue to suspend their judgements on this and other matters pertaining to the Bank Raid follow up.

It is also likely to be quite some time before there is any real clarity on this. Financial prosecutions are notoriously long and complicated and subject to all manner of scrutiny and counter-scrutiny. But there is huge potential here to set in train an investigation on a scale the island has not yet witnessed.

In the meantime, here's the gossip in Cork on the latest arrests.

Mick Fealty @ 10:30 AM | Comments (3)

No parade in Cork
As mentioned elsewhere - the Orange Order has pulled out of the Saint Patrick`s Day parade in Cork due to concerns over safety.

"Orange Order grand secretary Drew Nelson said both his organisation and the parade organisers were disappointed that the Order would not be attending the festivities.

He added that he welcomed the invitation and hoped the Order would be able to participate in the event next year."

Aughavey @ 09:58 AM | Comments (73)

Spreading mess of the Northern Bank raid
Looks like this bank raid mess may be about to spread and broaden. Bertie Ahern is playing down the significance of the arrests at the moment, but Phil Flynn (a man who Sam Smyth claims is a director of Daily Ireland), a director of money lending company Chesterton Finance, has been desparately trying to talk to his two director collegues there, who are currently helping the Gardai with their inquiries. If Flynn is implicated in any serious way (there's no indication that he is at the moment), there may be serious ramifications for government as well as Sinn Fein. It's not what Daily Ireland need at the moment either. Thanks for heads up Richard!

Mick Fealty @ 08:21 AM | Comments (9)

February 17, 2005

Tough call for Kelly...
LET'S Talk is on BBC1 Northern Ireland at 10.35pm this evening. It should be worth watching, as Sinn Fein policing and justice spokesman Gerry Kelly will be on the panel. Also commenting will be Belfast Telegraph columnist, the recently-married UUP adviser Steven King; Eamon O Cuiv from the Irish cabinet; republican and rights campaigner Bernadette McAliskey and Alliance MLA Naomi Long.

Belfast Gonzo @ 04:53 PM | Comments (26)

Arrests in money-laundering raids
RTE is reporting that in a series of raids by Garda officers, in an "investigation focused on money-laundering" 7 people have been arrested, 4 in Cork and 3 in Dublin.. According to the RTE report "the gardaí seized more than £2m sterling in the Cork operations, which targetted funding to the Provisional IRA" and "they seized £60,000 which they believe to have come from the raid on the Northern Bank." - The BBC is also reporting the RTE story but isn't confirming the link to the Northern Bank.

Update

The RTE report now states that an unnamed Sinn Féin politician was among those arrested in Cork.

While the BBC report notes -

Sinn Fein's Martin McGuiness has told RTE that he was unaware of the arrests and said he would make no comment on the matter until he had more information.

Update to the Update

The RTE report now states "It is understood that a former Sinn Féin elected representative is among those arrested"

pete baker @ 04:00 PM | Comments (165)

Sinn Fein's cynical crisis management
Anthony McIntyre is critical of some of the more obvious attempts create political capital out of Sinn Fein's current difficulites, but believes that that should not obscure what he terms the cynical opportunism of Sinn Fein.

Mick Fealty @ 03:20 PM | Comments (0)

IRA faces death by a thousand cuts?
Paul Colgan looks at the rapid reversal in the fortunes of the Republican movement. Considering much of the trouble it has found itself in has arisen out of difficult to falsify speculation over the activities of its armed wing, that it now faces a difficult choice between further political progress and retaining its guns. As Colgan puts it, "it's options are limited".

Mick Fealty @ 02:56 PM | Comments (0)

The "lively tongue" lives on
The Belfast Telegraph reports that "Rhyming Weavers & Other Country Poets Of Antrim And Down", published by The Blackstaff Press is to be reisssued with a new foreword by Tom Paulin at £7.99.Preserving the local words and customs of rural life. With Industrialisation of the weaving industry this way of life was lost, but thankfully the great John Hewitt left us a record.

To A Hedgehog, Samuel Thomson :

"Thou grimmest far o' gruesome tykes

Grubbing thy food by thorny dykes,

Gudefaith, thou disna want for pikes

Baith sharp an' rauckle;

Thou looks (Lord save's) array'd in spikes,

A creepin' heckle...."

Ambrose Uprichard @ 02:33 PM | Comments (5)

Miller: a rebel beyond Broadway
The undoubted coup of Daily Ireland's early days was in attracting ude Collins away from his regular slot on page 2 of the Irish News. Today he writes on the man he sees as a quinntessential American rebel, playwright Arthur Miller.

He sees echoes in the paranoid atmosphere of Miller's Crucible in contemporary Northern Ireland:

Criminality and evil, they say, and those who consort with criminals and evil-doers, must be cast out. The guilty ones in our society will be identified not by logic or legal process, but by the word of experts in such dark affairs. These experts cannot share their frightening knowledge with us because if they did it could destroy society. So they must keep what they know secret and we must take their word as to who the evildoers are and what they have done. If we don’t, our society is at risk.

Mick Fealty @ 02:12 PM | Comments (8)

Planning for a united Ireland
One thing that's immediately obvious when spending any time in and around Leinster House is the general indifference towards a united Ireland. There is also a heavy workload facing the Oireachtas, especially in regard of monitoring EU directives. But Jarlath Kearney reports on Sinn Fein's latest call for a Green Paper on the subject.

The party's proposals to progress "practical planning for a united Ireland" include urging the Taoiseach's office to bring forward a green paper within 12 months, which would involve an intensive consultation process across the island.

The draft green paper would then be referred to a specially constituted Oireachtas joint committee on Irish unity, to include input from political representatives across the island. A minister of state solely responsible for the progress and co-ordination of all-Ireland activity would also be appointed.

Sinn Féin is calling for a substantial increase in the number of North-South bodies and in the resources made available to them, specifically the expansion of the North/South Ministerial Council and the existing implementation bodies.

The party also wants to see the establishment of an all-Ireland consultative civic forum and an all-Ireland interparliamentary forum — both of which were set out in the Good Friday agreement.

Mick Fealty @ 01:54 PM | Comments (84)

IRA recognises right of PSNI to investigate?
The Newsletter's leader this morning notes that the pressure on the Repoublican movement is twofold, locally in the Short Strand area, and internationally from the local US Consul General, Dean Pittman. It refers to the IRA's statement last night as a surprising and unprecedented intervention.

It notes:

This in effect comes very close to suggesting that anyone with information about the murder should pass it on to the legitimate law-enforcement agency in this jurisdiction, which happens to be the PSNI.

And ends by speculating that:

...a strategy is now being prepared which may attempt to get Sinn Fein off the hook on the serious misdeeds currently under police investigation on both sides of the border.

Mick Fealty @ 12:50 PM | Comments (5)

Protestant cleric attacks invite to Orangemen
The Examiner reports, "A Church of Ireland clergyman, who was driven from his Northern home, has said Orange zealots should be banned from taking part in Cork's St Patrick's Day parade." Hat tip Maca!

"Rev Armstrong, his wife June, and their children, Sarah and Mark, were forced to flee their home in Limavaddy, Co Derry, in the Eighties after extending the hand of friendship to Catholic neighbours.

They lived across the road from a Catholic Church which was bombed in 1985. Rev Armstrong publicly criticised the attack.

"Threats came along. The bible was quoted to me by men in bowler hats who said this was God's work," he said."

Mick Fealty @ 11:20 AM | Comments (71)

But that is literally what you said
As Carrie with the Broom of Anger reminds us, Adams' re-stating of his remarks from that interview on Madrid radio is the second time in as many weeks that the SF leadership have demanded that their comments should NOT be taken at face-value - "Well it may be literally [what I said] but don't literally interpret what I say!", Martin McGuinness on RTE's Q&A, 7th Feb.

pete baker @ 11:10 AM | Comments (0)

Kyoto comes quietly into force...
The Kyoto Protocol came into force yesterday with only RTE it seems giving the subject any decent air time (sound file). Apparently only 4 per cent of Ireland's energy outputs are renewable.

And the WWF calls on DETI to put together a strategy to tackle its status as "the worst climate culprit in the UK with CO2 and greenhouse gas emissions 3.0% and 1.9% higher respectively in 2002, compared to 1990 levels". Ah, if only we had politicians in a position to care and do something about such matters.

Mick Fealty @ 09:05 AM | Comments (39)

Adams not sure that IRA is in the clear
The FT, Daily Telegraph, The Scotsman, The Times of London, The Independent and The Guardian all carry the Adams's equivocation over the bank raid story.

Mick Fealty @ 08:16 AM | Comments (21)

Man arrested in connection with killing
Ireland Online is reporting an arrest in connection with the McCartney murder. It comes surprisingly quickly in the wake of the IRA's statement. As yet there are few details and no charges have yet been made public.

Mick Fealty @ 08:13 AM | Comments (0)

Temporary change of email address...
Please note that during the transfer of my personal site to a new server, I will only be contactable through my gmail account, which you can find on the top right hand side of Slugger.

Mick Fealty @ 08:05 AM | Comments (5)

February 16, 2005

Justified Criticism
If we take it as read that the headline is open to debate, RTE reports in NI and UK slammed over probe non-cooperation that an Oireachtas Committee has been very critical of British authorities failure to co-operate with investigations into a series of murders in the Republic during the 1970's. Would procedings at the European Court of Human Rights embarrass those so critical of the alleged cover-up in Short Strand ?

Ambrose Uprichard @ 10:28 PM | Comments (3)

Pressure pays off...
AFTER the sisters of murder victim Robert McCartney secured American support today in the quest for their brother's alleged IRA killer(s), the IRA released a statement in which it says "no-one should hinder or impede the dead man's family in their search for truth and justice". Mark Durkan is to raise the issue with US Envoy Mitchell Reiss in Washington this week. If the IRA are prepared to be passive in this case, will Sinn Fein be active in its support?

The IRA said:

"We wish to extend our sympathy to the McCartney family for the loss of Robert and for the grief that they are suffering.

"The IRA was not involved in the brutal killing of Robert McCartney.

"It has been reported that people are being intimidated or prevented from assisting the McCartney family in their search for truth and justice.

"We wish to make it absolutely clear that no-one should hinder or impede the McCartney family in their search for truth and justice. Anyone who can help the family in this should do so."

Belfast Gonzo @ 07:18 PM | Comments (31)

More movement
According to Breaking News "The IRA tonight washed their hands of the republicans suspected of a Belfast pub brawl murder." IRA speak out against 'brutal' McCartney killing

In a statement tonight, the IRA said it was not involved in what it described as a brutal killing.

But significantly, they added: “Those who were involved must take responsibility for their own actions which run contrary to republican ideals.�

Ambrose Uprichard @ 07:11 PM | Comments (0)

Adams blinks first..?
A SPANISH radio station is carrying an interview - reported here by the BBC - in which Gerry Adams says that he "might be wrong" about IRA involvement in the Northern Bank raid. Listen here. Ma Bear points out that this is not the first time the Sinn Fein leadership has deliberately refused to be definitive about an IRA role in the robbery.

Belfast Gonzo @ 06:25 PM | Comments (35)

Waugh's new approach to agreement...
ERIC Waugh has become increasibgly disillusioned with the Agreement, and here, he says a new approach is needed next tmie round. He identifies three problem issues - a lack of trust between parties in a form of government where trust is essential; lack of local experience at being in government; and mechanisms that promote divisions, rather than bridge them.

Pointing out the benefits of a stable voluntary coalition over an unstable enforced executive, Waugh writes:

In any other corner of the world, the escape road from the current imbroglio would be quite clear and straightforward. In any democracy suffering the collapse of its government with no single party commanding the necessary majority to mount a new one, a general election would follow.

That election having failed to produce an overall majority for any party, a coalition would be negotiated which, by setting out a policy for good governance in the interests of all, would command a majority.

That is democracy. But in its classical simplicity it is not for us. Our history has impaled us on the fork of inclusiveness. The snag is that it is unlikely to work for very long.

The existence of any coalition depends upon compromise. But compromise is a foreign concept on this island. (That coalition works in Dublin is due largely to the absence of the normal left-right division between the major parties in the Dail.)

In Northern Ireland, though, when you add to the need for compromise the harnessing together of those who support the existence of the State and those whose associates hoard guns and explosives to destroy it, you get our imbroglio.

Belfast Gonzo @ 04:38 PM | Comments (2)

Full of bad intentions..?
BEN Lowry reported yesterday in the Tele how a lecturer on terrism at the University of Ulster has said that it had "been apparent for years" that the Provisional IRA had no intention of abandoning violence or criminality such as the Northern Bank raid.

Lowry wrote:

James Dingley, of the University of Ulster, said that there had been an "understandable reluctance" to hear some truths about paramilitarism in the wake of the Good Friday Agreement.

"It is not surprising that, in yearning for peace after 30 years, people have been reluctant to hear a negative interpretation of the peace process.

"Many people hoped that the IRA would be hooked on politics, but that expectation forgets that instability suits the IRA.

"Violence or the threat of it is their major political weapon and it has been seen to work successfully over 30 years.

"It is central to their existence. This has been apparent for years."

Mr Dingley, the only Northern Ireland academic who lectures on terrorism, added: "The debate over whether the bank raid should lead to sanctions that the IRA would consider minor, or no sanctions at all, will confirm the IRA's belief that events revolve around them, and that there is no real will to confront them."

Mr Dingley was speaking in the wake of the Independent Monitoring Commission's report that the IRA, including senior Sinn Fein members, sanctioned the £26.5m heist and other raids last year worth £3m.

Mr Dingley, who has been studying terrorism for 20 years, said that the Provisional IRA Army Council, including some Sinn Fein leaders, was "pretty unified" so that opponents of the IRA should not raise their hopes of a split.

"PIRA have never stopped buying and making weapons, targeting, recruiting and training."

In the autumn, amid rising expectations of a deal between Sinn Fein and the DUP, Mr Dingley was predicting that the IRA would be able to produce a major act of decommissioning with ease because it had been relentlessly buying weapons.

"Mortars are so easy to make, as are home-made bombs.

"Even more sophisticated weaponry like assault rifles and assault machine guns - they are happy to get rid of them, particularly those that have forensic fingerprints.

"They can decommission such weapons and then use totally clean ones."

Mr Dingley gathers information from talking to political and paramilitary sources, members of the security forces, and journalists.

Belfast Gonzo @ 02:53 PM | Comments (1)

"Shut up with your whining"
A couple of interesting links, courtesy of Instapundit. First up a Times article, which seems more than a little apprehensive about the future direction of political blogs, "there are signs that the growing community of amateur online pundits is becoming an influential force".. Hmmm.. and when you've read the recommendations there.. do yourself a favour and read this very astute piece by Charlie Madigan in the Chicago Tribune - "Shut up with your whining and appreciate the fact that after generations of stagnation, something new has arrived. And like all new things, it's going to take a while for it to work itself out."

The suggestion, from the Times article, would appear to be that political blogs in the UK and Ireland will actively seek to take 'political scalps' in the near future (and I don’t think I’m over-emphasising that suggestion, it does appear to be the writer’s intention to raise that issue) -

"British blogging is running as a very close second to America, I think primarily because we are talking about a much smaller population," said Mr Ireland. "True, no British scalps have been taken yet, but give it time."

There is one quote in the Times that does merit serious consideration -

"UK[and Irish] bloggers have yet to decide whether blogging is a means to promote transparency in politics or another tool for party campaigning."

'A'.. Choose 'A'!!

Back to Charlie Madigan in the Chicago Tribune (who is already moving beyond the Times’ point), addressing the increasingly shrill complaints about blogs -

Shut up with your whining and appreciate the fact that after generations of stagnation, something new has arrived. And like all new things, it's going to take awhile for it to work itself out.

Conventional journalism seems aghast that a whole collection of independent voices from all sides of the political spectrum are popping up now to pick and smear and slander and point accusing fingers, wreck careers, cast aspersions and introduce something besides a century-old sense of entitled hierarchy to the formula for news presentation.

On Wonkette, and on the variety in style (and emphasis) of political blogs -

She knows her market and she knows how to get its loyalty and attention. It's not her fault that the Washington cognoscenti seem drawn to an unusual amalgam of sex fantasy, pretend bad behavior and policy. But it's to her great credit that she found a way to invite them in for a drink, dirty talk and some imaginary misbehavior.

If she's not making a bundle of money on it, she's a fool.

As for the wild-eyed conservatives, welcome aboard.

You finally have a place where you can gas on until you faint.

Sooner or later you will either develop a following or expire from lack of air. Maybe you can ascend to talk radio. Maybe you can disappear. Maybe you can libel someone and get penalized so far back into the economic dark ages that you won't be able to upgrade your launch platform.

Then someone will say, "Whoops, better straighten out."

That's how media has always been, and that's most likely how it's always going to be.[my emphasis]

He suggests there's a useful comparison to be made with previous New Media, a point that has been mentioned in comments on Slugger previously -

It all reminds me of a mix of what I have read about genuinely robust periods in American journalism, the era of the pamphleteers back before everything became so formal, the "yellow kids" era, when the media barons of the 19th and early 20th Centuries were carving up the pie, and maybe the birth of TV, when no one quite knew what to put on the screen.

The difference is that, in those eras, it took decades before media became self-referential enough to develop ethics and standards and journalism schools and thoughtful journals that would deconstruct every aspect of this messy business. Because the medium of blogging is speed-of-light stuff, we have become self-referential and obsessive about what happens well ahead of the historical curve.

Also, it's so easy an idiot could do it. Witness the fact that many are![emphasis mine]

Quiet at the back!

I'm already wondering whether what I am doing is "right" in the "decent and honest" sense that I have always equated with journalism. Can't say. I think it's pretty interesting if you apply the same standards of diligence you apply to newspaper stories, assuming you apply diligence.

The difference is in how you tell it. It's a lot breezier and a lot easier to read, I think. And you can occasionally say, "Shut up you fatuous gasbag!" or ask, "What do you think?"

Geez, it took me five years at UPI back in the 1970s before I started picking at my own stuff and asking the painfully silly question, "What does this all mean?"

We have barely had the time to grow a real nice navel here in the blogging world, and we're already gazing at it. Amazing![my emphasis]

And he has some advice for those in the wider media who are complaining about the apparent power of blogs -

We can either sit back and watch this process[the carving up of the media marketplace] continue and wake up some morning to discover our legs have been taken while we slept.

Or we can be fleet.

He also says, returning to my earlier point - Choose 'A'!!

People who are marketing ideology as truth will eventually go the way of the pamphleteers, I suspect.

What will be left are the people who market truth as ideology.

You want to blog, make that your ideal.[emphasis mine]

Read the Chicago Tribune piece

pete baker @ 02:37 PM | Comments (0)

It's just not fair!
ARE the Ulster Unionists the new MOPEs? Their new leaflet comes across as very 'them vs us', buying into that whole zero-sum 'if they're getting something, we must be losing it' mindset that plagues local politics.

There's no attempt in this unadulterated whingefest to appeal to non-unionists, two mentions of 'Roman Catholics' (none of 'Protestants') and symbolically jingoistic - so it should work a treat... unless nationalist transfers were being sought.

Perhaps the UUP's biggest problem here is convincing people that 'Big House' unionists are being discriminated against or even care about it that much - perhaps akin to Lady Hermon walking into Harrod's only to discover no fur coat section? How orful!

Belfast Gonzo @ 02:27 PM | Comments (90)

Dead sheep of the SDLP
If Mitchel McLaughlin was feeling any pressure from SDLP leader Mark Durkan's spotlight on his comment that Jean McConville's murder was not a crime, he's not showing any sign of it. Elsewhere, the Derry Journal ascribes the SDLP's attack on Sinn Fein as the first shots in an election, without any mention of the merit (or otherwise) of its content.

Mick Fealty @ 02:16 PM | Comments (4)

Parades and profits - the Orange pound...
FIRST we had the pink pound, now we have the Orange one (perhaps worth a 'crown'?). The institution's charm offensive continues by highlighting the economic benefits the 'biggest folk festival in Europe' brings to NI. The Order claims that members and supporters spend £6.3 million on the Twelfth.

Wonder if that figure would cover the PSNI overtime and council clean-ups afterwards?

Meanwhile, Ciaran Barnes points out in Daily Ireland that while the DUP's Nelson McCausland, whose Orange Lodge may be marching in Cork this St Patrick's Day, opposes funding for the Belfast St Pat's carnival, his lodge will be applying to his council for a grant.

Both the Orange Institution and the St Patrick's Day committee appear to be making progress in their attempts to make their events more inclusive. While they both are moving forward, I don't feel that either is there yet, but it might not be long before the changes become noticable.

My fear is that all these good efforts could be wrecked if, for example, either 'side' felt their best interests were served by an unstable marching season. Years of work could go out the window because of the political limbo we're in.

Belfast Gonzo @ 01:38 PM | Comments (7)

Loyalists attacked on racist website...
Daily Ireland carries an interesting piece charting the reaction of several Loyalist spokesmen to their targeting by an unnamed website. We think we've found the site in question but, unusually for us, considering its main purpose seems to about gathering intelligence on anti racist activists, rather than putting a point of view, we've declined to post a link to it.

DI quotes one particularly emotive passage:

Notice there are no union flags on this parade. Plenty of red ones though. How can so-called loyalists mix with these fenian scumbags and still call themselves British? They are a disgrace to this country and should hang their heads in shame.

Mick Fealty @ 12:41 PM | Comments (31)

Peace: the neverending process?
Malachi O'Doherty was asked to describe the local version of a peace process. He has some interesting explanations as to why it has all but disappeared:

He sets out the competitive imperative set up by the process:

So what's the point of a peace process? Well, peace of course. It is a political contest in which fewer people get killed. The parties in Northern Ireland entered the process hesitatingly and determined to undermine each other. In close talks they have played not for completion but for a breakdown without blame.

The Ulster Unionist Party played to try and force the complete disarmament of the IRA. This proved to be a bad strategy. As the Ulster Unionists got angrier about the IRA refusing to disarm, more nationalists voted for Sinn Fein as the party that most annoyed unionists.

Sinn Fein played for the fragmentation of its enemies, the unionists, the erosion of its rivals, the SDLP, and the growth of its own vote.

The peace process grew to be about power rather than the completion of its stated objective, a political settlement. A settlement would have removed the very issues which generate support for the parties engaged in the process.

Rather pessimistically, he concludes there is no incentive for processing to end, and politics begin:

...if the long game means that you never settle your differences, well that's because you have decided that peace processing is still better than the alternatives. Recognise that peace processing is a game and play hard. Resist all appeals to forgiveness and compassion. You really hate these people at the other side of the table. That's OK. They hate you too.

Mick Fealty @ 12:24 PM | Comments (5)

New Face
The Irish news has lost Jude Collins, an excellent and fair writer and "gained" Jim Gibney. First column today - MOPEry, whingefest and in a piece entirely about the Short Strand not a mention of the McCartney murder, merely praise for the IRA. Same tired old nonsense as usual from Sinn Féin. Not Impressed Noel.

"Employment for thousands of protestant men and women. But not for the Catholic men and women, of the Short Strand rearing their families.
>
>
>

By the time the British army arrived at dawn the young men and women with the rifles, had grown in stature. With their weapons, they disappeared into the two-up-two-down houses and found refuge. They reemerged as IRA heroes. The modern IRA was born.
>
>
>

And while the storm of accusation continues unabated about the IRA and Sinn Fein and what their real status is, the people of the Short Strand - like their equivalents all over the country - are proud of the republicans that their district produced since 1969."

Ambrose Uprichard @ 11:32 AM | Comments (25)

February 15, 2005

Constitutional implications of Royal Wedding?
DR JOHN COULTER is a Northern political columnist with the Irish Daily Star. He controversially argues that Charles and Camilla’s wedding could signal the end of the English Monarchy as we know it, with the UK becoming a republic before the end of the century.

By John Coulter

The announcement of Prince Charles’ engagement to his very long-time partner, the divorcee Camilla Parker Bowles, was wonderfully timed in terms of a PR stunt to take advantage of the traditional St Valentine’s Day euphoria across the British Isles.

But the impending marriage on 8th April will signal a St Valentine’s Day Massacre for the future of the English monarchy.

This specific royal marriage will start a chain reaction so devastating that within a century, the monarchy will be so reformed it is irrelevant as an institution, or else the UK will be a republic.

Bloody Mary, the executed catholic Queen of Scots, must be spinning in her grave with laughter at the prospect of Camilla becoming HRH Duchess of Cornwall.

Ardent Royalists have been assured Camilla will never become Queen of England if Charles ever succeeds his mum to the throne. But the fact two divorcees will head the Royal Family after Queen Bess Two dies or retires is the beginning of the end of the English Monarchy as established by King Billy himself in 1688.

It's a far cry from 1936 when suspected Nazi sympathiser King Edward VIII was forced to abdicate, allowing him to wed American divorcee Wallis Simpson. In the years after the death of fairytale Princess Diana, Royalists were also assured Charles and Camilla would never marry as the nation would never allow it.

Less than a decade later on 8 April, the pair will marry. Their marriage effectively sounds the death knell for the 1701 Act of Settlement which decreed all future monarchs must be communicate members of the Protestant Church of England.

With the worldwide Anglican Communion set to split over the ordination of homosexual clergy, the modern day Church of England has slipped a long way spiritually frpm the tough moral stance it imposed on Edward VIII.

The present Queen is in her 70s, so catholic Royalists and ecumenical Anglicans know it is only a matter of time before the full frontal assault on the Act of Settlement can be unleashed.

At some future date, with a catholic once more on the throne of England, a further campaign can begin to reunite the Church of England with Rome – just like in the good auld days of Henry VIII, Bloody Mary and James II.

All these moves also sound alarm bells for the two Orange Orders and the Royal Black Institution. Their loyalty to the English throne is conditional – only a Prod can wear the crown.

For generations since the formations of the Orange Order and Royal Black in the late 18th century, and the Independent Orange Order in the early 20th century, the reading of the ‘loyalty to the English Throne’ resolution at the platform proceedings at the various demonstrations has become as traditional as the banners and bunting.

Fundamentalists within the ranks are already uneasy at the present Queen’s relationship with the Pope. They will feel even more uncomfortable spiritually swearing allegiance to an ex-divorcee if Charles becomes king.

But what happens if a future monarch either is a catholic, or converts to catholicism? Even worse for the Loyal Orders, with the growth of radical Islam in Britain, within a few generations could the death knell of the Act of Settlement eventually see either a muslim queen or an Islamic heir to the throne?

Pro-Diana Royalists had hoped to put enough pressure on Charles – with or without a marriage to Camilla – to persuade him to relinquish his right to succeed to the throne in favour of his eldest son, Prince William.

This campaign found considerable support amongst Royalist in Ulster who merely saw not just a revitalised monarchy, but also the prospect of another King William sitting on the throne. In William, there was the hope the monarchy would become more ‘in tune’ with the ordinary population.

However, the Charles/Camilla package would appear to have a more sinister agenda than simply trying to ingratiate an unpopular long-time lover, fiancee, and soon to be Duchess of Cornwall with a largely sceptical public.

Royal spin doctors will now work 24/7 to sell the present Charles/Camilla wedding package to an already divided nation. They must convince millions of Britons a future King Charles/Princess Camilla is the only hope to prevent the nation from eventually dumping the monarchy and becoming a republic.

The irony of the Royal dilemma is that the Camilla factor may well prove to be the catalyst which an unholy alliance of English republicans and anti-Act of Settlement campaigners have been waiting for to bring about a major reform of the monarchy not witnessed since the early 1700s.

Royalists loyal to the memory of Diana may have lost the battle to prevent Charles and Camilla marrying without any promise from the heir he will give his place as king to his eldest son, William.

Had she lived and Charles had remained faithful to her, the nation would have warmly embraced a Queen Diana. In reality, once Charles has been on the throne for a few years, the spin doctors will hoodwink the nation into believing the monarchy would benefit from having a Queen Camilla.

But far greater worries lie ahead for the Orange and Black institutions. Without the Acts of Union and Settlement, their existence and oaths of allegiance are meaningless. In the 1680s, just as English Protestants looked to Holland to find a Royal champion, maybe the time has come for Orangeism to once more look abroad to find a decent monarch worth swearing allegiance to.

Mick Fealty @ 06:24 PM | Comments (34)

No justice for victims outside 'due process'
The Belfast Telegraph welcomes Gerry Adams support for bringing the killers of Robert McCartney to justice, and argues that the only way that can be done is if people help bring them publicly and accountably before the courts.

There was no justice about stabbings, beatings with rods and kickings that resulted in one 33-year-old man dying and another being gravely injured, with savage cuts to his neck and body. Naturally, people would want the culprits caught, but the IRA men involved are relying on fear preventing witnesses coming forward.

There could hardly be a more graphic illustration of how putting power in the hands of unprincipled people can bring a community down, if it yields to such pressure. Those who sympathise with victims' families, in their plight, must show it by facing down the intimidators and helping to bring them before the courts.

Mr Adams has given the word that the republican movement regards the Belfast murder, in the wake of a Bloody Sunday commemoration, as an unpardonable crime. That should be enough for anyone to supply a vital clue that would result in a fitting punishment.

Mick Fealty @ 06:00 PM | Comments (11)

Moral torpor of the western left?
If you've not come across it before, Dissent magazine rarely fails to impress at least in some of its parts, if not the whole. This Quarter has an interesting piece from Norman Geras on the political reductionism of the left that has largely remained unchanged in the wake of 9/11.

His premise begins "from a short essay by Paul Berman entitled "A Friendly Drink in Time of War, which appeared in the Winter 2004 issue of Dissent, in which Berman offers six reasons why many on the left didn't see things his way over the war in Iraq, which he supported":

Abbreviating them, and also adding a seventh to the six that he enumerates (it appears toward the end of his argument, though he doesn't include it as an "official" item with its own number), I set out those reasons: (1) George W. Bush; (2) the United States as being responsible for all the problems of the world; (3) support for anything construable as being anticolonial; (4) cultural relativism; (5) hostility to Israel; (6) a failure to take anti-Semitism seriously; and (7) lack of any genuine grasp of, or feeling for, the meaning of extreme forms of evil and oppression.

Mick Fealty @ 05:25 PM | Comments (6)

Finucane: covering up for murder...
The IRA was not the only party last week being accused of orchestrating a cover up. Michael Finucane wrote in the Guardian on how he experienced an establishment "now fighting to keep the secrets about murders like that of Pat Finucane".

Mick Fealty @ 05:04 PM | Comments (3)

IRA, policing and criminal justice
There are a lot of accusations flying about at the moment. According to the Examiner the full force of the IRA is now being used to intimidate witnesses. In place of a lack of common agreement on a policing service, focus may be shifting to the precise nature of Sinn Fein's objections to current policing and criminal arrangements in Northern Ireland.

Mick Fealty @ 04:13 PM | Comments (2)

Irish has been loser in North South clash
Daily Ireland argues that the Irish language has suffered by having had Foras na Gaeilge tied to the ill starred Belfast Agreement, and not least by being twinned with development of Ulster-Scots. It highlights the fact that it has not been in a position to publish an annual report since 1999.

Mick Fealty @ 03:44 PM | Comments (21)

IRA orchestrated covering riots in Markets
Mark Durkan has raised the political stakes by suggesting that the IRA orchestrated riots in the Markets area in order to cover a clean up operation after the McCartney murder and prevent the PSNI from carrying out a house to house search operation.

Indeed he goes futher, in suggesting that at the time, Sinn Fein also provided political cover for the riots themselves:

"There are contrived riots which are then covered by Sinn Fein spokespersons who arrive to condemn the police. Mr McCartney's killers are being protected by their position in the IRA and some have worked as bodyguards for Sinn Fein politicians."

Mick Fealty @ 03:32 PM | Comments (24)

Why the IRA will not return to war?
Despite the long held certainty amongst most commentators, P O'Neill's statement the week before last that all bets were off, has created a nervous frisson amongst some. John O'Sullivan over at the National Review Online quotes three reasons why the IRA is unlikely to go back to war.

First, public opinion in Northern Ireland — Catholic as well as Protestant — is determined to keep the present peace. Neither community would tolerate any resumption of terrorism. Both would support a ruthless campaign of official repression if the IRA started bombing again.

Second, the IRA itself is still dangerous, but it is no longer a hard-edged guerrilla force. It is a rich, fat, lazy, middle-aged mafia raking in millions of dollars from the rackets. If London and Dublin continue to turn a blind eye to control of the Catholic ghettoes — as they have done to date — its present leadership will not wish to put its highly agreeable lifestyle at risk.

Third, in the post-9/11 world, Washington and the entire West would support the British and Irish governments in a crackdown on IRA terrorism. And with even Libya anxious to be back in the international community, the IRA would be without friends internationally.

Mick Fealty @ 03:26 PM | Comments (0)

IRA has been around for too long
Anthony McIntyre received some flak last night for suggesting that some of IRA volunteers accused of having been involved in the Northern Bank raid would never consider committing any non-political crime. However, Alex Kane in his Newletter column last week questions both this image of the honest volunteer and, more fundamentally, the political seriousness of their organisation.

By Alex Kane

The usually pithy P.O'Neill had a moment of unusual verbosity last week, when he delivered a very long, whingeing, self-justifying round-robin; and then, when he didn't hear knees knocking, or the sound of us wetting our pants, responded with a bitchy little two-line instruction to take him seriously. Picture a balaclava-clad Cruella de Ville and you get the true measure of this fascist. We are being threatened by a comic book prat, who hides behind a mask, praying desperately that the shadow of the gunman and the ghost of things past will be enough to make us dance to his one note tune.

Mr. O'Neill's statements have tended to require the political equivalent of the Rosetta Stone to enable journalists and governments to make sense of the hieroglyphics which pass for the thought processes of armed republicanism. In the early days of the fondly remembered peace process many happy hours could be spent parsing and interpreting the statements, to take from them exactly what you wanted to take from them. Not the latest ones, though, which are a stolid combination of threat, self-pity, semantic codswallop and downright lies.

All of which suggests that Mr. O'Neill is a worried man. His first statement, ten days ago, was written more for the "volunteers" and Sinn Fein’s core vote, than for the general public. The problem, of course, is that the IRA has little or nothing to show for the past thirty-five years. It is no closer to a united Ireland than it was in 1970. Northern Ireland is more firmly entrenched as an integral part of the United Kingdom, with Articles 2 and 3 gone and partition secure. The best that Sinn Fein can hope for is a power-sharing deal involving Ian Paisley as First Minister!

As if that wasn't bad enough, Mr. O'Neill has discovered that his views no longer carry the same sort of weight outside the ranks of the psychotic faithful. And, let's face it, a terrorist organization which doesn’t scare people anymore, is a terrorist organization which should consider giving up and pushing off. No wonder O'Neill had to issue his reminder that "they haven't gone away, you know."

Yet the reality is that while the IRA may still be here, there is nowhere for it to go. Oh yes, it certainly has enough explosives, weapons and volunteers to kickstart the campaign, but to what purpose? It's not going to bring a united Ireland. It's not going to bully unionists into abandoning their beliefs, or the Union. And, after the past seven years, when first the UUP, and then the DUP, moderated and moved towards inclusive government, the IRA cannot seriously believe that a UK government would become an active persuader for disengagement.

Also, whatever the most hardline of the myth-drenched volunteers may believe, there is no desire in the republican heartlands for a return to the bad old days. They don't want to see the fortified bases, the watch-towers, the helicopters and increasing numbers of troops. They don't want to live in fear of loyalist retaliation, or of another generation of their children being caught up in a war that they know can't be won. Whatever the IRA may think, the vast majority of republicans now know that there is no "nation once again" on the other side of the bunker.

But the IRA, now reduced to a hardcore gang of bank robbers, smugglers, counterfeiters, drug dealers and neighbourhood bullies, still hopes to scare us and scare the British and Irish governments. This is the toughest political and moral test that either Blair or Ahern will face. The consequences of further appeasement (namely, a meaningless fine today, followed by the promise of new negotiations tomorrow) would be catastrophic for the Agreement, for public confidence and for any hope of delivering a lasting and stable democratic settlement.

The IRA has been around for too long. It has been given every reasonable opportunity to go of its own accord, but has refused to take it. The full power of the British and Irish states must now be deployed to effect a regime change which will remove Mr. O'Neill and his thuggish comrades once and for all. They have to learn that their day isn't coming.

First published in the Newsletter on Saturday 12th February 2005

Mick Fealty @ 03:01 PM | Comments (2)

Twenty Years On
Twenty years ago Steve Bruce, Professor of sociology at Aberdeen University, published “No Pope of Rome”, the first serious social-science study of sectarianism in Scotland. In the Scotsman he looks at how things stand today - Beware the myths that tarnish 'sectarian' Scots - and concludes that “the best parallel for the experience of the Irish Catholic community in Scotland was not the enduring conflict of Northern Ireland but the successful integration found in the United States.”

Ambrose Uprichard @ 12:33 AM | Comments (11)

February 14, 2005

Funding
Despite the organisers designing a multi-coloured Shamrock logo, Belfast Council refuses St Pat's funding on the grounds that it is not inclusive enough. Multi-coloured shamrock ? Forget the issue of inclusivity, such a cliché, IMO, merits refusal of funding on grounds of taste.

Belfast City Council has voted not to grant £30,000 to this year's St Patrick's Day parade in the city.

Councillors decided on Monday not to overturn an earlier decision to refuse grant aid.

Unionist councillors said that while efforts were being made to make the event more inclusive, not enough been done for the council to endorse it.

One of the organisers, Conor Maskey, said they had done all they could to make sure no offence was caused.

"We as a committee designed an official logo, a multi-coloured shamrock, which would not be offensive to anybody," he said.

"We tried to look at all the issues relating to St Patrick's Day. This might not have been good enough for some people."

However, Ulster Unionist councillor Chris McGimpsey said the event was not yet inclusive enough.

"They have yet to prove that they can produce an all-inclusive carnival which would be supported by and could be bought into by both sections of our community," he said.

"Until that happens, I don't think we are in a position to formally fund the St Patrick's Day carnival.

"It happens anyway, but they are looking for us to fund it and endorse it, and we cannot yet do that."

Ambrose Uprichard @ 11:24 PM | Comments (98)

Finally ...
It took time and it took a lot of pressure but better late than never : Adams urges people to help PSNI on McCartney case

Sinn Féin president Gerry Adams has urged anyone who knew about a brutal pub brawl murder in Belfast to pass that information on.

The West Belfast MP also launched a scathing attack on those who carried out the stabbing of Robert McCartney and stressed that his party supported the victim’s family in their search for justice.

Even though no one has yet been charged with Belfast man Robert McCartney’s stabbing, the identities of his killers is widely known.

After senior party representative Gerry Kelly visited the 33-year-old forklift driver’s grieving family, his sister Paula claimed republicans had frightened witnesses into silence.

“There are allegations that Robert McCartney was killed by republicans,” he said.

“I want to make it absolutely clear that no one involved acted as a republican or on behalf of republicans.

“I repudiate this brutal killing in the strongest terms possible.”

He added: “No one has any right, as has been claimed, to prevent anyone from helping the McCartney family.

“People with reservations about assisting the PSNI should give any information they might have either to the family, a solicitor or any other authoritative or reputable person or body.”

Ambrose Uprichard @ 09:59 PM | Comments (70)

Where Is My Public Servant?
The BBC reports on a new website that aims to engage young people with politics, or at least with politicians (although I think it's been online for a while) - Where Is My Public Servant? or WIMPS - An..erm.. unfortunate acronym.. but there you go.

Some teething troubles are apparent - the email system for contacting representatives seems clumsy and there are no links to individual politician's websites - even where they do exist.

More worrying is the events list

Upcoming events listed include -

Judas Priest & Special Guests The Scorpions?!

and

Rod Stewart?!?

Erm.. which young people is the site aimed at again?

pete baker @ 02:45 PM | Comments (12)

SDLP's 'uncomplicated message'
In its editorial today the Irish Times gives its take on the SDLP's conference message, SDLP offers alternative, and suggests the opportunity exists for the party to regain lost ground - This is the first occasion in many years when the SDLP has been in a position to offer a simple and uncomplicated message to the electorate.

The Irish Times Editorial in full -

A political strategy designed to capture the high moral ground and to challenge Sinn Féin in the coming local government and Westminster elections in Northern Ireland was outlined by the SDLP leader, Mr Mark Durkan, at the party's annual conference in Derry at the weekend.

The approach to the nationalist electorate will be simple and blunt: if they want law and order to operate in the North and an inclusive approach to a political settlement, they must vote for the SDLP.

There were few punches pulled as the party leadership rounded on Sinn Féin for failing to live up to its political commitments and to operate in a way consistent with the terms of the Belfast Agreement. The £26.5 million Northern Bank robbery was the catalyst for the new departure, but the continuing paramilitary and criminal activity of the IRA was the bedrock upon which the anger and frustration of delegates was built.

The debates pointed to a recovery in confidence as election candidates assessed their future prospects in the light of Sinn Féin's failure to convince the IRA to go away. This was an opportunity, they felt, to regain the allegiance of those moderate nationalists who had switched votes in an attempt to encourage republicans to engage in democratic politics.

In simplifying its message, the party was careful to avoid any suggestion that it would be prepared to enter a Northern Ireland Executive from which Sinn Féin was excluded. As the chief architect of the Belfast Agreement - and the inclusive approach that it represents - the SDLP recognised the danger of allowing Sinn Féin to present itself as an injured, discriminated-against party within the nationalist community.

Attempts by the Sinn Féin leader, Mr Gerry Adams, to deflect attention from IRA activity by blaming the two governments and other parties for the breakdown in political trust, were rejected as self-serving and arrogant, requiring a punitive response from the electorate. As Mr Durkan and his senior colleagues argued: so long as republicans were allowed to believe they could operate outside of the law, the potential of the Belfast Agreement would remain unfulfilled.

In that regard, the SDLP leader was particularly critical of Sinn Féin for failing to negotiate in the national interest and for placing the interests of the party before all else. Sinn Féin had, he said, abandoned its earlier ambition for an Ireland of equals.

This is the first occasion in many years when the SDLP has been in a position to offer a simple and uncomplicated message to the electorate. Rather than reward Sinn Féin for failing to deliver on its promises, nationalists should place their trust in the SDLP which was working to create a peaceful, inclusive society. With cross party support from Dublin and a growing impatience amongst Northern nationalists, the message may help to turn the tide in the coming elections.

pete baker @ 02:10 PM | Comments (37)

Durkan goes on the offensive?
Daily Ireland today gives some of the best coverage of the SDLP's weekend conference. Unfortunately not much has made it online, but it does cover Durkan's keynote on the issue of law and order:

"The fact is Sinn Féin have benefited from the way this process has been managed. Over the past number of years, there has been a very exclusive process where the governments have concentrated on Sinn Féin on one hand and the leading unionist party on the other".

Mr Durkan laid down the gauntlet to Sinn Féin ahead of the Westminister elections, when he will contest SDLP veteran John Hume's Foyle seat.

"People are getting a bit sick of hearing Sinn Féin resort to keep quoting their mandate in relation to any question they are asked about IRA crime and ongoing activity. Sinn Féin are quoting those votes as though that somehow denies or dismisses or excuses those sorts of crimes.

"The nationalists who gave Sinn Féin the vote did so because they thought it was going to reinforce the process. They didn’t do so to justify or indulge criminality. It annoys many nationalists when they hear people like the DUP saying that the problem is that the nationalist community are prepared to vote to indulge paramilitarism and crime".

Mick Fealty @ 12:20 PM | Comments (38)

McCartney killing an absolute disgrace!
Henry McDonald's article on the killing of Robert McCartney and it's apparent cover-up made the UK edition of the Observer, whilst Suzanne Breen's has several pieces in the Sunday Tribune on the subject. Morning Ireland this morning ran a powerful and extensive interview with his sister Paula.

Update: Details of the killings here, and here.

Shockingly, the reports suggest that there were 72 witnesses to the killing in MaGennis's. No one called an Ambulance. There appears to have been a return to the bar to cover any forensic evidence. And the surviving victim has a 24 hour armed guard by his hospital bed.

She is clear that the IRA did not sanction the killing. However, she also argues that "for the safety of us all, it's psychopathic behaviour and there's no code. But it has to be acknowledged that their members carried this out".

According to McCartney, Sinn Fein, the party her brother had voted for, were "dismissive of the matter".

She concludes:

"If it hadn't been Robert, it would have been somebody else, and who is it going to be next. This is what people have to realise about what we're dealing with here.

"We want them [the witnesses] to be brave and stand up for justice, which is what we thought the thirty years was all about. They have to stand up to these people and take their area back.

"This is an unprecidented situation. We're not interested in the politics of it all. We just want justice for my brother. My brother's sons are left without a father, one of the best fathers there would have been. It's an absolute disgrace".

Mick Fealty @ 12:04 PM | Comments (87)

Annus Horribilis continues
The annus horribilus for the Republican Movement continues. The IRA continues to be attacked from within the nationalist community. Henry McDonald reported in The Observer yesterday, Grieving sisters square up to IRA , that "a staunchly republican district of Belfast may be about to turn in Provos who killed a young father".

The Irish News reports in Sister blames IRA for protecting killers :"The victim’s sister Paula accused the organisation of attempting to protect a senior republican allegedly involved in the murder.

She told the Sunday Tribune newspaper: “The IRA was involved in a clean-up operation in the bar so there would be no forensic evidence. The IRA threatened eye-witnesses.

“The IRA visited the local community centre and ordered people not to talk to the police and media, not even to talk to each other, about the murder.

“This raises very serious questions for Sinn Fein.” "

John Kelly has weighed in from Maghera with a powerful letter, also in the Irish News (q.v.) in which he asks “For an increasing and questioning voice of concern within the nationalist/republican communities throughout the north of Ireland the questions most frequently being asked are: Have we exchanged a fascist and sectarian orange jackboot for an increasingly fascist and totalitarian green jackboot?

“Have we exchanged a sectarian RUC Special Branch for the special branch of a militia that imposes its ‘law and order’ behind a balaclava, a balaclava that brings fear and death into our communities?”

‘Law and order’ from behind a balaclava (subs only):

Letters:

From John Kelly, Maghera, Co Derry

I write in support of Gerard Quinn’s courageous and compelling letter (February 11). His plea that justice is not denied following the murder of his cousin Robert McCartney was both dignified and calmly reasoned.

If justice delayed is justice denied then equally justice obstructed is justice denied.

The obstruction of justice and the covering up of an injustice by political or paramilitary groupings is no less acceptable than the obstruction of justice and the covering up of an injustice by government security agencies.

Equally, if the destruction of evidence by British securocrats to deny justice to those Irish citizens in whose murders they colluded is criminally reprehensible then the destruction of evidence by those who colluded in the murder of Robert McCartney is as criminally reprehensible.

Moreover, the cynical and despicable manipulation by political representatives of children as young as five years old to protest against and to obstruct an attempt to investigate the murder of Robert McCartney was an injustice that added to the injustice of his murder.

The murder of Robert McCartney had everything to do with civil law and nothing to do with political principles or the political process.

It was a crime and no-one had the right, whatever their political complexion, to threaten or discourage anyone from the community in which that murder was committed against cooperating in bringing justice to Robert McCartney, to his partner, to his fatherless children and to his mother, father and sisters.

For an increasing and questioning voice of concern within the nationalist/republican communities throughout the north of Ireland the questions most frequently being asked are:

• have we the nationalist/republican community exchanged a fascist and sectarian orange jackboot for an increasingly fascist and totalitarian green jackboot?

• have we the nationalist/republican community exchanged a sectarian RUC Special Branch for the special branch of a militia that imposes its 'law and order' behind a balaclava – a balaclava that brings fear, punishment and death into our communities?

I would ask those nationalist and republicans who have suspended their critical faculties in the pursuit of an electoral mandate to question whether that mandate can be used to justify actions and activities that not only offends the core values of republicanism but also offends the core values of Christian society.

I conclude by posing the same question Gerard Quinn posed in the last paragraph of his letter: How does murdering the innocent "protector" of a "respected family" in the local community build an Ireland of equals?

John Kelly, Maghera, Co Derry

Ambrose Uprichard @ 11:46 AM | Comments (19)

Disbandment: debate rather than a split
Interesting piece from Paul Colgan in the Sunday Business Post which uses some authorative sources to argue that in the internal discussions within the Republican movement, unilateral disbandment is a workable option. Tommy McKearney: "There is a recognition in the leadership of the need to part ways with the old-style armed struggle republicanism".

Mick Fealty @ 10:48 AM | Comments (1)

Moscow Times
From a slightly unusual source for this site - Russia is fed up with fingers being pointed at it's behaviour in Chechnya and has retaliated by saying, at a meeting of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, OSCE, in Vienna that "a fact-finding mission should look into the "disproportionate" use of force by police and soldiers in Northern Ireland" - Protest Over N. Ireland Angers U.K.

Ambrose Uprichard @ 12:05 AM | Comments (8)

February 13, 2005

Autism
Autism is a subject close to my heart as I have a close relative with Asperger's Syndrome. Ashleigh Wallace had an article in the Belfast Telegraph, Corrie star Keith's autism education plea highlighting the need for better educational facilities for autistic children in Northern Ireland.

Keith is Patron of SPEAC, Special Provision for Education for Autistic Children - a local charity , and was helping with fund-raising. Publicity and support for SPEAC is always welcome, but it's worth pointing out the article was a little misleading.
"I realised there was a massive problem in Northern Ireland, yet there was no ABA facility here and there was no-one educating these parents about ABA.

Since 2001 Dr Mickey Keenan of the University of Ulster and the charity PEAT have been associated with parent training at Kilrea's pre-school group based at STARS at Kilrea Health Centre*. PEAT have been offering training to parents across Northern Ireland for some seven years and I can recommend this book Parents' Education as Autism Therapists, edited by Edited by Mickey Keenan, Ken P. Kerr and Karola Dillenburger.

STARS - 028 295 42345, project leader Lesley Dickson.

Ambrose Uprichard @ 10:17 PM | Comments (2)

Father Reid, Adams and the Basques
Spanish El Mundo reports on Father Alec Reid’s involvement in the Basque country and claims he has organised a visit by Gerry Adams to the area. (Apologies, the report is in Spanish but an earlier English language blog referring to the story has been deleted)

Mark McGregor @ 07:16 PM | Comments (1)

B to the E on its way
A new beer from Budweiser, laced with caffeine and herbal stimulants is on its way across the Atlantic. The drink, called 'B to the E' is being marketed as the "beer with something extra". Currently, it is only available in the USA.

With happy hours already banned in Ireland and due to be banned in the UK after the Office of Fair Trading gave permission to local authorities to do so earlier this month, to help reduce binge drinking, is the introduction of yet another stimulant-based drink really necessary?

Especially, considering many fear such drinks carry major health risks with them as fatigue is the body's way of saying it's had enough to drink and it's obviously dangerous to continue to try to fool your body that you're not as drunk as you really are.

George Burns @ 02:12 PM | Comments (4)

East West split
The Family Resources Survey Urban Rural Report (2002/3) has been published. It provides an overview of many differences in lifestyle between the East/West, Rural/Urban.

Some points from the report.

Weekly household income Urban East £461, Urban West £419, Rural West £454, Rural East £542.

The Urban West also had the highest proportion of households in receipt of Income Support (including those receiving Minimum Income Guarantee) at 26 percent, compared to only ten percent in the Rural East.

The Urban West and the Rural West shared the highest proportion (23 percent of each) who earned 60 percent below the median income after housing costs.

The Urban West also had the largest range when comparing the proportions of those who earned 50 percent to 70 percent below the GB mean income after housing costs, ranging from 15 to 35 percent respectively.

The Rural East reported the highest proportion of males in all types of employment (71 percent)whilst the Urban West reported the lowest proportion (at 62 percent).

The highest proportion of females in all types of employment was recorded in the Urban East (58 percent), and the lowest
proportion was found in the BMUA (50 percent).

Mark McGregor @ 12:21 PM | Comments (0)

February 12, 2005

Green Card system for immigrants
Hot on the heels of Great Britain's announcement of a five-year plan to shift the entire UK work permit system for migrants to one based on points, the Irish government has announced plans for a "green card" system to replace the current one. At the moment skilled workers may bring their families to Ireland under a work visa or authorisation scheme, which is renewable every two years. Others receive a 12-month permit. So far, unlike in Britain where all long-term immigrants will have to learn English, there has been no mention of immigrants to Ireland needing to pass an English or Irish language test to be allowed stay in the country long-term.

Under the plan, persons who are unlikely to become a burden on the state can apply for a green card. Those who hold a green card for five years or more will be able to apply for Irish citizenship.

The legislation is expected to include 50,000 euro fines or five years in prison for employers found guilty of breaches of labour law.

Unions and immigrant groups have criticised the plan for not going far enough, especially as there are no immediate plans to change the current system where employers hold the migrant's work permit, a system former President Mary Robinson has described as "bonded servitude".

Only 37,000 work permits were issued in 2004 as opposed to 47,500 in 2003 although this is partially due to the 60,000+ Eastern Europeans who have made their home here since the expansion of the EU last May.

Currently, 300 cases of employer abuse of working immigrants are being investigated by Government inspectors.

George Burns @ 01:29 PM | Comments (16)

Voluntary coalition or exclusion?
SDLP leader Mark Durkan claims that Downing Street pressurised his party "very strongly in the direction of voluntary coalition or exclusion, call it what you will" in January. Sinn Féin chief negotiator Martin McGuinness said Mr Durkan’s comments were designed to make his party relevant ahead of forthcoming Westminster and local government elections.

The government’s position is that it has to explore all the options being put forward by the various parties,” a Downing Street spokesman said.

“That does not mean it has decided on a particular one option.”

George Burns @ 01:15 PM | Comments (1)

Adams has lost the run of himself
Alex Attwood must have least enviable job in Northern Irish politics, running against Gerry Adams in the next Westminster election. This current crisis has given him some good headline copy, but considering his robust performance on Hearts and Minds the other night he may privately be wishing he was standing against Gerry Kelly instead!

Mick Fealty @ 01:13 PM | Comments (53)

'We don't go around picking up people off the streets'
As Mick has noted, the bombast level appears to be stuck at 11. But the Taioseach wasn't slow in responding to the 'come and get us' demand - "The one thing we don't do in our kind of politics is go around picking up people off the streets, that's other political people do that" - Ouch.

The Irish Times covers the same ground, Ahern ridicules claims by Adams on criminality

As Mr Adams said he wanted to meet the Taoiseach as soon as possible to try to calm the fevered political atmosphere, Mr Ahern went on the offensive to describe Sinn Féin's repeated denial of IRA involvement in the robbery and other crimes as "senseless".

A day after the Independent Monitoring Commission report led to renewed tensions between the Government and Sinn Féin, Mr Ahern dismissed Mr Adams's claim that he should arrest the Sinn Féin president for involvement in the robbery.

At a Fianna Fáil function in Naas, Co Kildare, he said the law of the land did not allow him to arrest anyone.

"I just want to get on with it. I think all of this thing is a little bit childish, a bit of nonsense. There are serous matters that have happened and it's no good people letting on that they didn't. That's silly," he said.

Mr Ahern said that the IRA's involvement in crimes set out in the IMC report was a matter of fact and had been corroborated by the Garda, the PSNI and the British government.

"They've happened. We knew they've happened. And all we want to do is get to the end of it and get on with implementing the Good Friday agreement," he said.

"Letting on that the other cigarettes weren't taken, or that the drink wasn't taken, or the petrol wasn't taken, or the punishment beatings didn't happen, sure that's kind of childish stuff and, I mean, all we were stating were facts."

Even more pointed was the quote attributed to a spokesman for the Taoiseach in this UTV report -

"Anybody familiar with the rule of law in this country would know well that the Taoiseach has no power to direct the arrest of anyone."[my emphasis]

And so it continues, with Adams calling for "clear the air talks", and, in this RTE report claiming that the issue at the heart of the current problem was - "Sinn Féin's radical political alternative".. although.. wasn't that radical alternative what Bertie was referring to?

Meanwhile, those questions haven't gone away you know

pete baker @ 11:40 AM | Comments (49)

Adams: come and arrest us!
On Thursday evening Gerry Adams travelled down to Leinster House to put on a show of defiance outside (shades of the SF delegation's photo op outside the gates of Stormont). He called on the Taoiseach to have him and Martin McGuinness arrested if he had evidence of their wrongdoing.

Adams told Daily Ireland:

I feel a particular sense of betrayal by the Taoiseach. I think the Taoiseach has crossed the line, and the line that he has crossed - and I took legal advice on this - was to accuse Martin McGuinness and I of conspiracy to rob and of withholding information. I feel particularly angry about that.

It also carries a picture of the Sinn Fein protests that cut off traffic temporarily that same evening.

Mick Fealty @ 11:22 AM | Comments (42)

Rip off Ulster?
Northern Ireland's banks face the charge from the Office of Fair Trading that they collude through lack of any serious competition in overcharging personal customers.

Mick Fealty @ 09:20 AM | Comments (4)

Nemo me impune lacessit
Just in case ? Interesting news about the Black Watch from the Courier, Belfast is next for battalion.

" THE NEXT base for Black Watch soldiers and their families will be Belfast.

A Ministry of Defence spokesperson confirmed that the battalion will take up residence in Northern Ireland for two years when its current stay at Warminster, Wiltshire, ends.

She explained, “When they finish at Warminster they will start a two-year residential posting in Belfast at the end of this year. This is not a six-month tour of duty. They will not be operative there and in effect it is the same as being anywhere else in the country.” "

Ambrose Uprichard @ 03:17 AM | Comments (2)

Good blogging requires quality writing...
Norman Geras gave a marvellous interview on BBC Radio 4 this afternoon explaining, in the most understated way, how blogging works (sound file)! There's also decent piece on Irish poet Brendan Kennelly later in the programme, which underwrites the idea that langauge is most powerful when ego is at its least.

Mick Fealty @ 12:49 AM | Comments (2)

February 11, 2005

Is blogging journalism?
Here's a story we've had pointed out to us by several readers, thinking that Slugger may have been the target. But we're fairly sure that Slugger is not the blogger that Anderstonstown News columnist Squinter had in mind:

"The National Union of Journalists thinks it's time that journalists were subjected to regulation in the same way that lawyers and accountants are.

As it stands, anybody at all can call themselves a journalist.
Squinter, who's been covering community centres and irish dancing festivals for close on 20 years for the right to put the word hack on his passport, had to laugh when watching the tv the other night to see one notorious internet blogger described in a caption as "commentator and journalist".

(What's a blogger? Well, anyone who keeps their own "web-log" is a blogger and what they do is make totally unsubstantiated and deeply libellous claims about people they don't like and invite their friends to write in doing the same. And if the object of their ire is republicans, then they'll be writing columns and doing tv interviews quicker than you can say "Log on!")"

For a wider view of what bloggers do, try this cheat sheet from Silicon.com.

Mick Fealty @ 02:25 PM | Comments (87)

Orangemen march south
Orangemen are due to march through Cork city centre as part of this years Saint Patrick`s Day festival. The trip south may be eligible for funding through the new Lagan to the Lee partnership initiative. This might ruffle a few feathers considering the Belfast Saint Patrick`s Festival was recently refused funding from Belfast City Council.

Aughavey @ 01:07 PM | Comments (77)

Orde: Sinn Fein can join Policing Board tomorrow
Today, Hugh Orde gives Sharon O'Neill an interview focused on recent events (subs needed). The Bank raid and its consequences are in the foreground> He remains resolute on bringing the robbers to justice, but would welcome Sinn Fein onto the Policing Board: "If Sinn Fein don't want to join, go and ask them why. They can join tomorrow as far as I am concerned".

On sharing evidence in public he says:

We cannot share intelligence and evidence which will eventually, if we are successful, end up as the main prosecution case. No chief would do that. What is different here is no chief would come under the sort of pressure I came under for many weeks to attribute the crime.

I did not come rushing out to say 'it was X, despite the pressure and despite the personal attacks on me for not doing that. However, it became operationally necessary, which was when I did stand up and say what I said.

It was operationally necessary for a number of reasons. One is it seems to have been forgotten there are some very real victims in this crime. People need to be reminded that this was a very brutal crime. Families were abducted, terrified, intimidation and threatened.

"Point two was it was impossible for my investigating officer, because of the 'headless chickens' running around trying to make political capital out of this, to get proper appeals into the press and proper information out to the public.

So it was getting in the way of the investigation, which was the other reason I decided it was necessary to do it [a press conference]. If people seriously think I was going to make such a statement without being 99.9 recurring per cent certain of my facts, then they must be mad. This is a career-threatening statement if it was wrong.

In terms of convincing people, be they from both sides of the divide, then they have to judge me on whether they trust me or not.

Mick Fealty @ 08:47 AM | Comments (43)

Flags and Emblems to be banned?
The Newsletter has got wind of a proposal in the forthcoming report based the widespread A Shared Future consultation, for "the removal of the likes of Ulster and Union Flags and loyalist emblems from major roads and interface areas". A sensible calming measure, or (dare I say it) political correctness gone mad?

Mick Fealty @ 08:38 AM | Comments (45)

Wouldn`t it be interesting.....
...if one (preferably all) of the Loyalist groupings were progressive enough to take the initiative to visually and transparently decommissioned their weapons? Would it not be the ultimate "body slam" to the Provisional movement? Not to mention ironic?

Aughavey @ 01:15 AM | Comments (15)

February 10, 2005

End of Red Card period...
I didn't take a note of the precise date he was red carded but I guess that Troubled Times' (though not that of his alter ego) sin bin period is now up. Welcome back!

Mick Fealty @ 08:32 PM | Comments (4)

Mostly Harmless
You'd be forgiven for thinking that most of our politicians here hadn't noticed, but, as today's Guardian Life section reminds us, revolutionary scientific ideas have repeatedly rocked the foundations on which our hubris is built - (those of a nervous disposition should look away now) we ain't the centre of the universe or, alternatively, "Humans are just little specks of sentience on an accidental planet in a corner of the cosmos" - in other words, "Mostly Harmless".

Despite the opening paragraphs of the article, the more interesting, and thoughtful, contributions come from those focusing on the human experience: in particular, IMHO, psychologist Steven Pinker, and neuroscientist Nancy Rothwell who suggests, "The previous revolutions haven't necessarily made our place less significant. We are just discovering the complexity of the natural world."

It's worth reading through the, in many cases highly speculative, responses from "the world's top scientists" to the question of "What comes next?".

As a primer, here are the "Three lessons in humility", as described by Tim Radford at the end of the article.

Three lessons in humility

Science has a way of painting God out of the picture, and putting humankind in its place. Nicolas Copernicus launched the Copernican revolution in about 1530: Galileo continued it; Isaac Newton completed it more than a century later. It began innocently, when Copernicus tried to make a timetable for the positions of the planets. The calculations added up best if he assumed that the sun was the centre of the universe and that the Earth, like Mars, Venus and Jupiter, was just another planet. This upset the Ptolemaic scheme, which for more than a thousand years placed the Earth at the centre. Christian theology also had the Earth at the centre. So Copernicus offended both the Catholic Church (which listed his book as banned until 1835) and the reformer Martin Luther. Cosmologists now talk of the Copernican principle, which is that there is nothing special about planet Earth, in space or time. Humans are just little specks of sentience on an accidental planet in a corner of the cosmos.

The Darwinian revolution, too, was a 100-year story, and it began long before Darwin. Religious orthodoxy called for a young universe, specially created with its present inhabitants. But miners, canal engineers and natural philosophers kept finding puzzling evidence of creatures that existed long before human history.

Geologists such as Hutton and Lyell proposed an ancient Earth, subject to continuous change. Charles Darwin (and Alfred Russel Wallace, quite independently) went a stage further: life itself was ancient, and subject to continuous change, in which random mutations in inheritance were selected or dismissed by the pressures of the environment. This, too, shocked some churchmen. But humans now see themselves as just another evolutionary by-product, cousin to the apes.

The clinching proof of this has been in the DNA revolution, launched 50 years ago. Where did these mutations happen and how were they transmitted? In 1953, James Watson and Francis Crick began to crack the riddle. They revealed the structure of a long molecule, detectable in almost every living cell, which spelled out the genetic code. Comparison of DNA in living humans provides clues to ancestral kinships. It also confirms that all life is linked to one last universal common ancestor.

Science has exposed the machinery of creation, and taught humans a lesson in humility. None of this, however, yet explains why the universe began, or how and why life started in the first place, seemingly only on one planet.

Tim Radford

pete baker @ 04:11 PM | Comments (12)

"Cannot be regarded as committed to non-violence"
Given the conclusion reached by the IMC, in their most recent report - "Sinn Féin cannot be regarded as committed to non-violence and exclusively peaceful and democratic means so long as its links to PIRA remain as they are and PIRA continues to be engaged in violence or other crime" - it's difficult to see how the report's recommendations can be viewed as anything other than wholly inadequate.

That quote in context (page 7-8, paragraphs 13-14) -

In our first report, published by the two Governments in April 2004, we said that it was difficult to be precise about the relationship between Sinn Féin and the PIRA or about the PIRA’s decision-making processes but we summarised what we believed to be the situation in these words:

“– Some members, including some senior members, of Sinn Féin are also members, including, in some cases, senior members of PIRA.

– Sinn Féin, particularly through its senior members, is in a position to exercise considerable influence on PIRA’s major policy decisions, even if it is not in a position actually to determine what policies or operational strategies the PIRA will adopt. We believe that decisions of the republican movement as a whole about these matters lie more with the leadership of PIRA than with Sinn Féin.

– Within the PIRA some decisions follow a process of consultation with the membership initiated by the leadership”.

We went on to conclude that Sinn Féin had to bear its responsibility for the continuation by PIRA of illegal paramilitary activity and had to recognise the implications of being in this position.

We draw the same conclusion about the responsibility of Sinn Féin in relation to the recent series of abductions and robberies. In our view Sinn Féin must bear its share of responsibility for all the incidents. Some of its senior members, who are also senior members of PIRA, were involved in sanctioning the series of robberies. Sinn Féin cannot be regarded as committed to non-violence and exclusively peaceful and democratic means so long as its links to PIRA remain as they are and PIRA continues to be engaged in violence or other crime. Although we note Sinn Féin has said it is opposed to criminality of any kind it appears at times to have its own definition of what constitutes a crime. We do not believe the party has sufficiently discharged its responsibility to exert all possible influence to prevent illegal activities on the part of PIRA.[my emphasis]

As the IMC report acknowledges (page 9 paragraphs 20-21) -

If the Northern Ireland Assembly was now sitting we would be recommending the implementation of the full range of measures listed in paragraph 12, including exclusion from office. We say this recognising that this would have implications for the running of the Executive and the Assembly.

And, so, their recommendation is -

...in the light of the provisions of the legislation we have decided to recommend that the Secretary of State should consider exercising the powers he has in the absence of the Assembly to implement the measures which are presently applicable, namely the financial ones.

with a hint at possible further financial penalties for others to implement -

It has also been suggested that Sinn Féin should not continue to receive public money from other sources if they are denied it in the context of the Northern Ireland Assembly. However, this is outside the measures available to us to recommend.

pete baker @ 01:52 PM | Comments (41)

Attacks on SF should be resisted in court
Father Des Wilson believes that there is a feeding frenzy focused on Sinn Fein. He identifies four groups (subs needed) he believes should be going to the courts "in rage over the undemocratic treatment they are getting".

One is the Sinn Féin party which is being ruthlessly attacked. Another is those who are not members of that party but vote for Sinn Féin and are being denied their most basic democratic rights. A third is other political parties, especially the SDLP, who, if London and Dublin succeed in destroying Sinn Féin, will be their next target. And a fourth, those who are not members of Sinn Féin, who do not vote for Sinn Féin, have no sympathy with Sinn Féin policies, but have some regard for saving what progress we have made as Europeans towards democratic government.

All these four groups should be united in protest against one of the most vicious attacks on basic democratic principles we have seen since the dictators. We should also be proceeding with our best lawyers into the courts with a view to reaching the European courts as quickly and as effectively as possible.

Mick Fealty @ 01:47 PM | Comments (56)

IMC report published
The IMC report is now available online(pdf file) accompanied by a statement from Paul Murphy.

The BBC reports that, as expected, the IMC states that -

"In our view, Sinn Fein must bear its share of responsibility for the incidents," said the commission.

"Some of its senior members, who are also members of PIRA (Provisional IRA), were involved in sanctioning the series of robberies."

"Although we note Sinn Fein has said it is opposed to criminality of any kind, it appears at times to have its own definition of what constitutes a crime."

The commission said it would have recommended the party's exclusion from office if the assembly was still sitting.

In the absence of devolution, Secretary of State Paul Murphy should consider imposing financial penalties, it said.

It does not specify exactly what those measures should be.

N.B. Further posts fisking the IMC report will undoubtedly follow.

Quick Update

The concluding paragraph of the IMC report is worth noting -

The leadership and rank and file of Sinn Féin need to make the choice between continued association with and support for PIRA criminality and the path of an exclusively democratic political party. The real issue is not the expression of condemnation through the imposition of particular penalties. It is that the ending of all illegal activity by PIRA and indeed by all paramilitary groups is fully and permanently addressed. Only in that way can trust be restored and the objective set us in Article 3 – which we believe all law abiding people share – thereby advanced. Until this happens it is hard to see how further useful progress can be made.

Article 3 of the International Agreement says:
“The objective of the Commission is to carry out [its functions] with a view to promoting the transition to a peaceful society and stable and inclusive devolved government in Northern Ireland”.

pete baker @ 12:07 PM | Comments (24)

Report released
The report in full UTV carries a Press Association report Senior Sinn Fein members 'sanctioned £26.5m bank raid'

"Senior members of Sinn Fein sanctioned the £26.5 million Northern Bank robbery in Belfast, a new report claimed today.
By:Press Association

They were also part of the IRA leadership which gave the go-ahead for three other raids last year which resulted in the theft of more than £3 million worth of goods, the Independent Monitoring Commission said.

Police investigating the December bank heist are continuing searches in Beragh, near Omagh in Co Tyrone.

The commission, which monitors paramilitary activity, did not identify Sinn Fein members in senior positions in the IRA.

But its report, which recommended financial penalties against Sinn Fein, said the party now faced a stark choice over the future direction of republicanism.

"In our view Sinn Fein must bear its share of responsibility for all of the incidents," the IMC said.

"Some of its senior members, who are also senior members of the Provisional IRA, were involved in sanctioning the series of robberies."

During the political fall-out following the bank robbery, which effectively wrecked any hopes of restoring power sharing at Stormont soon, Irish Premier Bertie Ahern enraged Sinn Fein leader Gerry Adams with his claim that party negotiators must have known about the robbery plans during talks last year on a political settlement.

The four-member IMC said today: "Sinn Fein cannot be regarded as committed to non-violence and exclusively peaceful and democratic means so long as its links to PIRA remain as they are and PIRA continues to be engaged in violence and other crime."

The report continued: "The leadership and rank and file of Sinn Fein need to make a choice between continued association with and support for Provisional IRA criminality and the path of an exclusively democratic political party."

The Northern Bank robbery had the same characteristics as a series of heists last year involving the Provisionals, the IMC`s report said.

The commission said the IRA was responsible for:
A raid on the Makro cash and carry outlet in Dunmurry on the outskirts of west Belfast which resulted in around £1 million-worth of goods being taken on May 23 last year;

The abduction of people and theft of goods from an Iceland supermarket in Strabane on September 26;

The kidnapping of people and stealing of cigarettes with a market value of £2 million from a bonded delivery vehicle in Belfast on October 2.

The IRA has consistently denied Northern Ireland chief constable Hugh Orde`s assertion that it carried out the heist.

Sinn Fein`s Martin McGuinness also claimed he asked the IRA directly if it was responsible and accepted the denial.

The IMC said today it regretted Sinn Fein had rejected an invitation to discuss Mr McGuinness`s comments.

The commission insisted the Provisional IRA had gained very significant resources through a series of robberies.

"Violence or the threat of violence has been a feature of all these incidents," the report said.

The commission also warned republicans that if an Assembly had been sitting in Northern Ireland, it could have recommended the exclusion of Sinn Fein from devolved ministries.

Police investigating the bank robbery raided republican homes in Belfast around Christmas.

The inquiry has been switched to west Tyrone where new searches were being carried out today with no sign of the missing money nor the van used. No arrests have been made."

Ambrose Uprichard @ 12:04 PM | Comments (30)

Overwhelming support for Dáil motion
As RTE, somewhat briefly, notes - "Dáil deputies approved a motion last night calling on republicans to end criminality and paramilitarism and to commit themselves to arms decommissioning. The measure was supported by all the main parties."

The Irish Examiner has, as part of a report on the Whitehouse invitations, some more details on the debate

Mr McDowell, in a speech that referred to Des O’Malley’s “I stand by the Republic” speech, contended a tiny group of secret paramilitaries would not be allowed to usurp the rights and authority conferred by the Good Friday Agreement.

He refuted the claim that he was “unenthusiastic” about the peace process, saying he stood fully behind the Agreement.

He said the Government did not seek to exclude, marginalise or criminalise anybody, but Sinn Féin inflicted the situation on itself by extortion, punishment beatings, armed robbery, exiling under threat, murder and attempted murder.[my emphasis]

Sinn Fein’s Dáil leader Caoimhghín Ó Caoláin lashed the Fine Gael motion as “ham-fisted” and accused the party of failing to understand the complexities of the peace process.

“I wish to put on record our absolute refutation of all the false accusations of criminality made against our party,” he said

The motion was passed without going to a vote as not enough TDs opposed the measure, but Sinn Féin’s five TDs were supported in challenging the proposal by independent TDs Seamus Healy, Tony Gregory and Joe Higgins."

According to the Irish Times, there was one other TD in opposition to the motion, Finian McGrath (Independent, Dublin North Central), and the report quotes Sinn Féin's Caoimhghín Ó Caoláin opposing the motion, falling back on the overly-familiar accusation of "anti-republican" in his opposition to the motion -

"It is sad that so many in this House are so blinded by their anti-republican prejudice that they cannot acknowledge or understand the enormity of what the IRA was on the point of delivering at that time, including putting all arms beyond use by the end of 2004," he said.[my emphasis]

"Instead of building on that the governments allowed the agenda to be set by rejectionist unionism and thus created the impasse we have today."

The agreed motion was published yesterday in the Irish Times -

"That Dáil Éireann recognises the primacy of the Good Friday Agreement and the importance of both Governments continuing to protect and develop its achievements;

welcomes the progress made to date towards the full implementation of a broad range of commitments made in the Good Friday Agreement; welcomes the continuation of cross-party support in the House for the peace process;

reaffirms its view that this agreement must form the basis of a lasting settlement in Northern Ireland;

welcomes the progress represented by the proposals of the British and Irish Governments, published in December 2004, towards achieving a complete resolution of the key issues identified by the Taoiseach and Prime Minister Blair at Lancaster House in June 2004;

regrets that there was no agreement at that time in relation to two key issues, namely an end to all forms of paramilitary and criminal activity and decommissioning;

notes that all parties to the agreement undertook to pursue their political objectives by exclusively peaceful and democratic means, and that the agreement envisaged full decommissioning of all paramilitary arms within two years;

notes the damage which has been done to the peace process by ongoing criminality including the recent robbery of the Northern Bank in Belfast and the assessment of the Irish and British authorities that the Provisional IRA was responsible for these crimes;

notes that a report by the International Monitoring Commission regarding ongoing paramilitary and criminal activity will shortly be published;

emphasises that there can be no room in a genuine peace process after 10 years of engagement for threats of whatever kind; rejects recent comments by Sinn Féin spokespersons as to what constitutes criminality;[my emphasis]

underlines the need for a responsible and calm debate of the current difficulties in the peace process;

notes the clearly expressed views of the Irish people that all paramilitary activity and criminality be permanently brought to an end; believes that with a resolution of current difficulties the restoration of the devolved institutions and the full implementation of the Good Friday Agreement is achievable;

welcomes the continuing and valued support of the President of the United States; notes the determination of the two governments to maintain dialogue with all the Northern Ireland political parties; welcomes the Taoiseach's recent statement that the question regarding the early release of the murderers of Detective Garda Jerry McCabe was no longer on the table; and expresses its full support for the ongoing efforts of the two governments to bring to completion full implementation of the Good Friday Agreement."

pete baker @ 11:04 AM | Comments (2)

Eleven reasons to rob a bank?
Scott McMillan over at a Fistful of Euros has been watching recent developments from afar, and comes up with his own (Ocean's?) Eleven Reasons why the Republican movement might have backed the biggest bank robbery in British history. But remember, before you go in too hard on him, he's just asking!

Mick Fealty @ 10:24 AM | Comments (4)

Feeney: they think it's all over...
That's the verdict of Brian Feeney. The reason he cites is the collapse of what used to be pejoratively termed the pan nationalist front of Sinn Fein, the SDLP, the Irish government and supported from a distance by the US. The bank raid effectively killed off that consensus and has left Sinn Fein with no wider consensus to provide it with political cover for its unconventional relationship with the IRA.

He saves his punch until the end:

The unequivocal message Ahern delivered is that the continued existence of the IRA and progress towards democratic politics are mutually exclusive. Furthermore, he holds the political leadership of the republican movement responsible for delivering an end to the IRA and will no longer buy the nonsense of being unable to placate the 'hard men'.That explains the note of consternation in the long IRA statement. The governments have changed the basis of the peace process and only the Taoiseach could do it. He told them the game's up. Put it another way. They think it's all over – it is now.

Mick Fealty @ 09:53 AM | Comments (11)

Wedding Bells
Clarence House has announced Charles and Camilla to marry . It will be interesting to see the reaction at home and abroad. If the heir to the throne is to marry a divorced woman, should the Royal position in respect to the Anglican church be reassessed? And is it not time to reassess the exclusion of Roman Catholics ?

Ambrose Uprichard @ 09:47 AM | Comments (61)

IMC report due today...
The IMC report, due out today is expected to name the IRA as cheif suspects. According to the Irish Times however it's likely the British government will hold fire on its reaction. Meanwhile, police have resumed raids, this time around Beragh in the heart of Tyrone.

Mick Fealty @ 09:27 AM | Comments (1)

Three Headline Apologies.
Breaking News reports that Myers apologises for single mothers column. Will those so quick to accept Mary McAleese's apology be as forgiving of Myers? Will there be a rash of letters from supporters saying that he too was only speaking the truth ? Was there more behind the criticism than that particular incident? Should the apologies from McAleese, Blair and Myers be the end of these three matters? Are the media - including blog sites - desperate for things to discuss other than that blooming bank robbery ?

Ambrose Uprichard @ 09:14 AM | Comments (10)

The mobbing of Myers?
A nod to Richard as an new exponent of extreme Irish bloggery.

Mick Fealty @ 12:28 AM | Comments (1)

February 09, 2005

"Stand down the Army"
Broom of Anger with some thoughts on the women left behind after the killing of their sons. She calls for the 'Army' (IRA), once seen by many nationalists as the only protectors of their communities, to be stood down.

Mick Fealty @ 05:47 PM | Comments (4)

Apologies and the historical narrative
Danny Morrison argues that apologies are sometimes welcome and can have their place in averting to instances of past injustice. But he believes there are certain political facts that cannot be wished away or apologised for.

He takes as an example:

...there will never be a ‘proper apology’ for the British conquest of Ireland - which has bequeathed us our current difficulties. Nor will unionist leaders properly apologise for unionism’s systemic mistreatment of nationalists under Stormont, or for their many apologias for state violence which in turn helped fuel the IRA campaign.

But he also suggests there are some things that politicians are unlikely ever to be caught apologising for:

To repent, to repudiate the legitimacy of one’s past is to risk invalidating the legitimacy of one’s current position. To surrender the historical narrative to the enemy is to weaken one’s position and surrender political opportunity to the enemy.

Mick Fealty @ 05:27 PM | Comments (23)

IRA must accept common playing field
Steven King calls for all books to be open: in particular he wants a debate about the status of the IRA's Green Book, in terms of what it means for members of the wider Republican Movement:

...can there ever again be a negotiation aimed at restoring Stormont where unionists maintain a diplomatic silence about issues like the status of the IRA Green Book?

In negotiation after negotiation, the other participants have preferred to treat republican ideology as an acceptable private fetish.

What Gerry Adams thought about an obscure and complex period of Irish history didn't seem to matter in the wider scheme of things.

Yet in the last month it has become very clear that the Republican Movement's self-perception has consequences that matter a great deal to the rest of us.

The failure to secure an IRA commitment last December to the Agreement - rather than to the 1919 Democratic Programme of the First Dail – was brushed aside at the time as nit-picking.

The consequence? The Northern raid.

Mick Fealty @ 05:21 PM | Comments (1)

IRA has no chance of winning
Malachi O'Doherty believes that in moving away from the sackcloth and ashes planned for it by Ian Paisley, it is moving into an even deeper dilemma:

...the IRA loses either way. If it does not go back to war at the next reversal, then its bluff will have been called. If it goes into the next two years and more of likely stalemate without raising a threat, then it will have been neutered. From the point of view of many, this will be proof of the success of the peace process. From the perspective of republicans it will be proof of its failure.

Mick Fealty @ 05:00 PM | Comments (1)

Feelings run high in Short Strand
Hard to tell how to gauge the significance of such local tragedies, but Angelique Chrisafis found some strong feelings bubbling just under the surface the funeral of Robert McCartney, the man stabbed to death recently outside Magennis's near the Markets.

The past week has seen an unprecedented turning point in local attitudes towards the IRA. More than 600 people gathered for a candlelight street vigil in defiance of Mr McCartney's killers. Residents in the Short Strand, which has suffered decades of sectarian violence, would once not have challenged the standing of the IRA, seen as defenders of the community. But some said the vigil was a sign of the growing unease at the criminal activities of what one person called a "Goodfellas" gang of IRA "peacetime" paramilitaries. People complained of IRA punishment beatings, racketeering, intimidation and sexual violence over recent years.

In an area with its own republican murals, once unthinkable graffiti appeared on one wall last week: "PIRA [Provisional IRA] scum out".

Mick Fealty @ 04:47 PM | Comments (13)

McGuinness: Irish naive on resuscitation of process?
Martin McGuinness argues that because the IMC was an add on to the Belfast Agreement its conclusions on the existence and extent of IRA criminal activity can be set aside. He also sets aside the wider perception that Sinn Fein walked away from the deal over the relatively trivial issue of photographic verification of decommissioning, and lays the blame at the feet of the DUP.

...in conjunction with the DUP's refusal to do a deal this side of a British general election there seems to be a belief within the Irish government that they have the luxury to attack Sinn Fein now and some sort of deal will be resurrected after the British election.

Mick Fealty @ 03:18 PM | Comments (3)

Glossary: what is Whataboutery?
Familiar to anyone who's followed public debate on Northern Ireland. Some define it as the often multiple blaming and finger pointing that goes on between communities in conflict. Political differences are marked by powerful emotional (often tribal) reactions as opposed to creative conflict over policy and issues. It's beginning to be known well beyond the bounds of Northern Ireland.

Some years back the BBC quoted Cardinal Cahal Daly as having described Whataboutery as "the commonest form of moral evasion in Ireland today", referring to how both communities use the terrible burden of past events to lay obstacles in the way of peace.

Evasion may not be the intention but it is the obvious effect. It occurs when individuals are confronted with a difficult or uncomfortable question. The respondent retrenches his/her position and rejigs the question, being careful to pick open a sore point on the part of questioner's 'tribe'. He/she then fires the original query back at the inquirer.

Historical subjects can be the worst. Rational perspective disappears and opponents are forced to assume moral responsibility for their community's past sins. The substance of the issue is foregone for an emotional power play that comprises the solipsistic concerns of the participants, with little regard for fact or quality of argument.

Mick Fealty @ 03:05 PM | Comments (12)

Slugger Glossary...
I thought it might be useful to begin to compile a glossary of terms that are either in common use on Slugger, or accurately describe what happens here. Rules of play are likely to be included, as well as things like the Godwin Rule on the emergence of the subject of Nazis in any given thread.

I hope it will prove useful to those who are joining us for the first time, and help the rest of us to frame a vigourous and postive discourse on the site. None of the descriptions are set in stone, and will be subject to improvement and correction from readers. The first entry will be on its way shortly!

Mick Fealty @ 02:57 PM | Comments (12)

Ahern: what Sinn Fein need to do...
Broom of Anger has snipped an interesting section of the Dail debate yesterday, in which the Taoiseach lays out the conditions for the beginning of any resumption of the devolved institutions in Northern Ireland.

After re-iterating the importance of the principle of inclusion, he gave an idea of the metrics required from the Republican movement to come back into the large tent it had so lately deserted:

...there is no possibility whatsoever of making progress on the peace and confidence that leads to an inclusive working executive and administration in Northern Ireland under the terms of the Good Friday Agreement unless the Sinn Féin leadership comes back to both the Irish Government and the British Government, as requested, to give us answers about the three areas on which we asked for answers, that is, paramilitarism in all its effects and particularly the issues of decommissioning and criminality. I do not think, even if we get answers, we will be able to move fast, but we certainly cannot move in the short term without those answers.

Mick Fealty @ 02:00 PM | Comments (4)

Myers in trouble
It was only a matter of time before a journalist as outspoken as Kevin Myers trod on more toes than he could manage and it looks like his reference in an Irishman's Diary in the Irish Times Tuesday (subs needed) to single parents as "mothers of bastards" could be the toe too far, especially as this was the edition being sent free to Ireland's schools. He even manages to resurrect the term "unmarried mothers" from its grave.

Myers was reacting to comments by Dr Ed Walsh that children brought up by a single parent do not fare as well in society as children with two-parent families.

"And how many girls, and we're talking largely about teenagers here, conciously embark upon a career of mothering bastards because it seems a good way of getting money and accomodation from the State? Ah. You don't like the term bastard? No, I didn't think you would. In the welfare-land of Euphemisia, what is the correct term for the offspring of unmarried mothers?

He continues, using the acronym "MoB":

"And how do MoB's cope when their male bastards (in the literal sense) become metaphorical bastards in adolescence? How does a woman assert her will over a sour, aggressive, uncommunicative boy? Well she usually doesn't - a study of the parental backgrounds of gang members in London and New York - where they are ahead of us on these matters - will tell you. Mob members usually stressed out Mobs for mothers and absent FoBs for dads."

Mr. Myers neglects to mention that he has his facts all wrong as today nearly a third of children in the Irish Republic are born outside of marriage, and only 1 in 8 of those to women aged 19 or under.

Compounding his inaccurate "largely teenagers" comment is his implication that the parents of a third of Ireland's children born in 2004 are the social equivalent of New York gang members, who apparently know all about children outside of marriage .

That's before taking into account that only 1.2% of unmarried mothers are under the age of 16 according to second quarter 2004 CSO figures.

George Burns @ 12:08 PM | Comments (100)

If you're not on the list, you're not coming in.
Well, it wasn't too difficult to foresee, but as suggested yesterday, the Irish Examiner and the Irish Independent are reporting today that the US administration have decided not to invite SF to the Whitehouse St Patrick's Day event.. oh.. and no invites either for any other political parties.. Irish Government representatives only.

The Irish Independent sums up the reasons behind the decision -

President Bush has decided to bar the republicans because they have been linked to the Northern Bank robbery and other IRA crime.

But he has listened to appeals that Sinn Fein should not be singled out for exclusion and the ban will now also apply to all the North's political parties, including the SDLP, the DUP and the Ulster Unionists.

The harder stance of the White House was signalled in the Dail yesterday by Taoiseach Bertie Ahern. He said the decision had already been taken by the US Government. He did not spell out precisely what that decision involves but it emerged last night that there will be a much-curtailed series of events involving only representatives of the Irish Government.

So, rather than allow SF to 'play the victim card' all the parties will be equally victimised.. Hmmm.. It will be interesting to see how the various parties respond to that one - although you should already be able to see what the official line on this one will be - "much-curtailed series of events due to other considerations..", perhaps?

Keep writing guys.. What a lovely bowl.. My, what a lovely bowl.. Gosh, what a lovely bowl..

Update

According to the BBC, quoting their US sources, the decision has not yet been made.. though it's difficult to see them choosing any other option.

pete baker @ 11:24 AM | Comments (48)

A Very Old Private Army
While today's Dail debates a motion calling for "complete IRA decommissioning and an end to all paramilitary and criminal activity" by the republican movement, 50 years ago the Seanad was dealing with a motion highlighting what Dr. Sheehy Skeffington called the then Government's failure "to take any active steps to stop in the Republic of Ireland open recruiting, drilling and the possession of arms by private military organisations". If it all seems quite familiar, that's because it is.

Skeffington began by citing Taoiseach John A. Costello's comments in a Dail debate a year earlier in 1954 where he said:

“They cannot profess loyalty to the democratic institutions of the State and, at the same time, applaud minority groups which defy those institutions by word and by deed.”

Costello went on to say:
“It is laid down in the Constitution that: ‘War shall not be declared and the State shall not participate in any war save with the assent of Dáil Éireann.’ The right to raise and maintain military or armed forces is vested exclusively in the Oireachtas, and the Constitution expressly forbids the raising or maintaining, for any purpose whatsoever, of any armed force other than the forces raised and maintained by the Oireachtas.”

Skeffington, however, pointed out that a year after the Taoiseach made these remarks that "there could be no mention of a practical step, no mention of further action. The clauses in the Constitution which the Taoiseach quoted are most apposite, and yet I suggest that, despite the fact that he quoted them and made clear his stand on that point—he referred to them a year ago—despite that fact, to-day in this Republic of ours those clauses of our Constitution are being openly defied. I am not happy that last year's appeal, good though it was, has had a useful result in practice...

"It will be seen that the appeal of the Taoiseach last year, and his reference to the Constitution, have had no result at all; and those clauses of our Constitution are being openly defied, and have been equally openly defied since his last statement.

The Taoiseach in this year's statement said: “Our attitude requires to be stated repeatedly.” To that I should like to put a question mark. I should like to ask why?

I should like to try and ascertain why it is that the Government's attitude has to be stated so repeatedly? I should like to suggest that one reason why it has to be stated and restated is that the Government's attitude is not always easy to guess at from its actions, and so it has frequently to be reformulated since sometimes it cannot easily be guessed....

"Again, at column 1343, the Taoiseach said in a simple and effective phrase:—

“The very mark of a civilised State is that the guns are all under lock and key...”

To that I would say: “Excellent!” but I feel entitled, as a public representative, to ask when is the Government going to put these guns under lock and key?"

Skeffington went on to address possible measures against the IRA:

"I have, in all sincerity, every sympathy with the Government and with the Taoiseach in the present circumstances, and I would certainly share his detestation of repressive measures. But when it is his opinion that the time has come when reasoned arguments are not listened to, when the deaf ear is turned to them, and when things continue as if no reasoned argument had been put, then I am afraid measures of repression will have to be introduced by us to stop the bearing of arms, drilling and recruiting of private armies in this part of the country.

"It is my belief that the Taoiseach, who is not in an easy position, is quite fundamentally and entirely a man of peace, but he now recognises that his appeals have failed. He recognises that in the statement that he made, and which I have just quoted, and I would ask him what, then, are the Government waiting for?

"Are they waiting for another act of armed violence? Are they waiting for an act of armed violence in this part of the country? I suggest that such a pause, such an interval, is merely an interval which allows those armed forces to grow stronger, and will render them more difficult to deal with, when eventually the Government decides to deal with them."

Full motion here.

George Burns @ 10:40 AM | Comments (0)

February 08, 2005

Scary incoherence of the Republican movement?
Vincent Browne is no more certain of what's gone on within the Republican movement over the last few months than anyone else in the media, but he manages link a chain of (what are for him) scary thoughts:

Having known Adams for many years, and having met him recently, I do not believe that he knew in advance of the Belfast bank robbery.

What is scary is that he may not know even now whether the IRA did it or not - and for a person who was so dominant within the movement for so long to be in such a position suggests that he is no longer the influence he was.

What is more scary is the prospect of the IRA going back to war, this time with a €38 million war chest (if they did indeed do the bank job).

If that happens, they will not fool around with the old brigade rifles and Semtex: there will be more devastating stuff, with more devastating consequences in terms of human life, destruction and political fallout.

A week ago, certainly two months ago, the idea of an IRA return to violence was unthinkable. It is no longer. And if that happens all bets on all sorts of things are off.

Mick Fealty @ 09:13 PM | Comments (20)

Language attempts to divide and separate IRA
Daily Ireland's editorial today attempts to meet head what it considers a slur on the name of the IRA. It argues that the electoral rise of Sinn Féin emerged directly from the campaign for political statusa that begat the hunger strikes and the election of one of their number as a Westminster MP, one Bobby Sands.

It believes that the IRA is being forced to divide all of its activities into good and evil:

Those republican prisoners released under the terms of the Good Friday Agreement weren’t all in jail because they took part in setpiece military battles. What madness would it have been to suggest that some IRA actions were legitimate and some were crimes?

It also believes that:

...that is exactly what is being attempted today with the flat insistence that no progress is possible until IRA 'criminality' is stopped – and in the current lexicon of Dublin and London, 'criminality' means everything that the IRA does.

Mick Fealty @ 09:01 PM | Comments (8)

Catholics in police double their numbers
Declan O'Loan gave a briefing yesterday on the impressive rise in the numbers of Catholics who've joined the police since the signing of the Belfast Agreement.

Mick Fealty @ 08:57 PM | Comments (16)

Time for SF to show political maturity?
Sorry I've been away most of today. John Fay over at Newshound was earning his money today with an excellent round up of more analysis of the only story in Northern Ireland for the last month. Ferugs Finlay has an excellent piece in the Examiner, which examines Sinn Fein's impressive (and seemingly impregnable) electoral mandate.

HOwever, he believes in attacking the integrity of the Republic's government Sinn Fein is simply propagandising its way out of a difficult situation:

...on the RTÉ News on Sunday, I heard Gerry Adams saying that the only reason the Government had decided to attack Sinn Féin over the Northern Bank robbery and the issue of criminality was because they wanted to hide their own embarrassment over the Ray Burke affair. I don't carry any torch for the present Government, but it is simply not true to say that they decided to use Sinn Féin criminality as a diversion to try to mask the publicity surrounding the jailing of Ray Burke. Gerry Adams knows that he is making the crudest of propaganda points when he says that.

He also argues that in continuing remain effectly outside the constraints of either state's criminal justice system, it leaves itself open to many charges:

For as long as the republican movement feels that it alone will decide what constitutes criminality, and what doesn't, and for as long as they feel free to dismiss any and all criticism on that basis, they have no-one to blame but themselves for the criticism they get. They seem to have entirely forgotten the Proclamation of Independence by which they claim to set so much store. The call to arms in that document ends by calling on republicans to ensure that "no one who serves that cause will dishonour it by cowardice, inhumanity, or rapine."

With the maturing of the peace process (at least eleven years old this summer), he believes it is time for Sinn Fein acquire some political maturity of its own:

In a real sense, and not a derogatory one, this is a time for growing up on their part. We are years past the ceasefire, years past the Good Friday Agreement. But the maturing of the process hasn't been accompanied by the maturing of all its elements. If they care about the process, if they really believe in their own mandate, the republican movement will get away now from the carping criticism and the bullying behaviour. It's their peace process as much as anyone else's.

Mick Fealty @ 08:43 PM | Comments (7)

Be careful out there?!?
Whether it's Shrove Tuesday, Pancake Tuesday, Mardi Gras (if you're really lucky), or even, as those clever ad people used to tell us, Jif Lemon Day, in your household - Eat (and drink) up!! - meanwhile the BBC helpfully point us to the RoSPA warning of the dangers of pancake tossing... What can you say?

pete baker @ 04:24 PM | Comments (0)

'It's a decision for the US administration'
The Irish Minister for Foreign Affairs, Dermot Ahern, will be in Washington tomorrow, but before he left Ireland he talked about some of the available options(RealPlayer req.) he would be discussing with the US adminstration. The media chose which line they preferred to highlight, RTE saying the Government would urge no exclusion from the St Pat's party, while Irish Times picks up the official line, The question of inviting Sinn Féin leaders to the White House on St Patrick's Day is strictly a matter for "President Bush and his team"

The Irish Times gives us a schedule for further news and a quote from an offical spokesman for the Minister -

At a working lunch in Washington tomorrow, Mr Ahern will brief Dr Reiss about the Government's position on the crisis in the peace process and the two men will review the latest developments. They will hold a press conference afterwards.

As special envoy, Dr Reiss was heavily involved in attempts at the end of last year to bring about agreement between Sinn Féin and the Democratic Unionist Party. He is moving from his position as director of policy planning at the US State Department back into academic life but will remain as special envoy for the time being.

On the issue of inviting Sinn Féin leaders to the traditional White House reception on St Patrick's Day, a spokesman for the Minister said, "Who gets invited to the White House is entirely a matter for President Bush and his team".

At the weekend though, the Washignton Post carried this editorial (free reg. req.) on the decision facing President Bush -

....

The most important point about the affair, though, is that the governments of Britain and Ireland, which have historically been at odds over Northern Ireland, appear to be in unanimity. The British prime minister, Tony Blair, has stated that he has seen the police evidence on the robbery and believes it is accurate. The Irish prime minister, Bertie Ahearn, has gone further, stating that he believes some of Sinn Fein's elected officials knew about this robbery and several others in advance. That means they knew about them even while they were conducting disarmament negotiations and even while they spoke with American negotiators, including President Bush, who made a telephone to the protagonists before Christmas.

If nothing else, this news should be enough to destroy any remaining American sentimentality about the IRA, an organization that appears to have successfully transformed itself into not a democratic political party but rather an organized crime syndicate. Although it has become traditional for the U.S. president to hold a reception for Northern Irish politicians on St. Patrick's Day, Mr. Bush should think hard about whether he wants to have bosses of that syndicate in the White House next month.

There is a clear alternative to invitations going out to all and sundry, or to everyone but Sinn Féin, and that is to host only the Irish Government representatives at the Whitehouse event - an option that may not be the cause of celebration among the President's speechwriters, but it may be the best option for the US administration to chose.

pete baker @ 01:13 PM | Comments (21)

Irish Opposition calls on IRA to abandon violence
Irish opposition parties will today seek all-party support for a private member's motion in Dail "calling on the Republican movement to abandon all violence and fully embrace democracy". The motion should be debated tonight from 7 GMT tonight. You can follow it online: try logging on here. Question Time today (2.30 GMT) and leader's questions (4.15 GMT) may also provide good value!

Sean Farren welcomes the opportunity to open the issue in the Dail chamber:

This debate is timely. In the Dáil chamber are members of parties whose leaders in the past chose to travel the road that Sinn Féin must now also travel, the road to undiluted democracy.

As democrats the leaders of those parties knew that democracy and paramilitary organisations operating outside the law are incompatible. The criminal activities of the IRA and loyalist paramilitaries clearly demonstrate that those organisations now simply want to operate as criminal gangs pursuing their own selfish interests.

There is no vestige of patriotism in what they do. They have defied the democratically expressed wishes of the people in whose names they have claimed to act. They have bombed, robbed and murdered against the wishes of the Irish people.

Irish democratic political parties cannot allow such mafia type organisations to continue. The Northern Bank raid was but another in a long list of criminal acts which included other recent incidents to which a blind eye has been turned: the Makro raid, the Gallagher and Jonesboro robberies.

Those who carried out the Northern Bank raid showed no respect for working people, no respect for families and no respect for the Good Friday Agreement. When the people of Ireland voted for the Good Friday Agreement, they voted for paramilitaries to go quietly into retirement. They did not vote for armed robberies to fund the luxury lifestyles that many are carving out for themselves.

That raid has dealt a real blow to the Good Friday Agreement and to the peace process. Critically it has damaged any confidence that what the IRA says about its commitment to the peace process means is trustworthy.

Democrats cannot allow this situation to persist. The Good Friday Agreement offers the best framework for political progress. The two governments must act decisively to map out a way forward based on the principles of the Good Friday Agreement, not on the failed and so-called Comprehensive Agreement of last December.

Delaying developments until after the forthcoming general election means delaying developments indefinitely. Worse, it means once again allowing our future to be determined by faceless and ruthless gangsters.

The forthcoming debate must emphasize these messages and indicate that a watershed has been reached and that further temporizing with paramilitary and criminal activity will no longer be tolerated.

Mick Fealty @ 08:46 AM | Comments (12)

Was the IRA statement just a hissy fit?
It's clear the IRA's second statement last week took most people by surprise, seemingly none moreso than Brian Rowan at the time, whose uncustomary loss for words brought to mind for some the night he broke news of the Canary Wharf bombing, which broke the IRA's first official ceasefire of the peace process era. Here he asks, if the IRA does not intend going back to war, what was it all about?

Mick Fealty @ 08:30 AM | Comments (17)

Irish to discuss IMC report
For various reasons I won't be around Slugger much today. The main news is the Cabinet meeting on the subject of the IMC report in Dublin, which is expected to confirm the suspicions that the IRA was the organisation behind the Northern Bank robbery. However, they are expected to call for no sanctions to be applied to Sinn Fein. Publication is expected on Thursday.

Mick Fealty @ 08:25 AM | Comments (1)

February 07, 2005

Civic power of blogging...
There was interesting piece on the back of the FT today on how bloggers are starting to shake up corporate America. It charts how one blog entry has led to a major lawsuit against the second largest mobile network, Verizon Wireless. It remains to be seen where blogging is going to cause the first serious disruption in Ireland and the UK.

The key was communication, which effectively bypassed the companies customer care and PR departments:

Hundreds of disgruntled Verizon Wireless customers took to the blogosphere to trade stories, swap hints about ways to adapt their phones and tell of their efforts to make the carrier correct the problem.

Blogging Microsoft employee, Robert Scobie, "it's the new world and you want to be part of the conversation", while Mike Masnick, CEO of Techdirt notes, "Companies that don't recognise this are going to get bitten".

Companies (and political parties), take note! When blogging here hits a critical mass, it may not be possible to hide behind the corporate gloss.

Mick Fealty @ 06:34 PM | Comments (0)

Bank opens free account...
NORTHERN Bank customers thinking of making big withdrawals in future won't face potential charges. But hold on... there's a another 'super complaint' coming, with the threat of financial penalties for closing an account without prior notice..!

Belfast Gonzo @ 06:13 PM | Comments (3)

Sinn Fein caught napping by reaction?
In the Sunday Independent, Anthony McInytre argues that the Sinn Fein leadership was caught napping by Bertie Ahern's decision to go on the offensive in the wake of Hugh Orde's public statement.

He believes however that the key part of Ahern's strategy was:

Ahern's masterstroke lay not in accusing the IRA but in unambiguously placing Sinn Fein leaders at the heart of the decision-making processes within the IRA. In doing so he has signalled that the party's leaders will publicly carry the can for any actions engaged in by their own militia. The legal fictions have been dissolved. No longer will institutional power inflict the myth on society that the Sinn Fein leadership goes to the IRA, that the two are somehow separate entities.

Potentially, this imposes a degree of constraint on the party leadership's room for manoeuvre. To the extent that it organises, sanctions, or ordains violence, there will no longer be an official cloak behind which it can absolve itself of responsibility. Strategically using the process to undermine the peace as an aid to its own expansionism now comes with a health warning. Sinn Fein exposure to the Republic's electorate and Corporate Irish America will lack the glamour of yesteryear.

However, he argues that none of this will change the party's current strjectroy:

Sinn Fein, while peeved that the veils of the peace process have been stripped away, calculates that it can withstand the hurricane. It has journeyed here before and knows the terrain well. Experience has equipped it with the necessary hide to sit out the storm. The current proclivity of London and Dublin to hold on to the peace process, despite the vituperative tone of their discourse, will assure Sinn Fein that the current mutual standoff does not preclude some mutual embrace.

The governments are right to refrain from recommending sanctions against the party. Arbitrarily punishing the electorate forthe democratic choices that it makes subverts the very democracy that those advocating sanctions ostensibly promote.

But the insistence, by Dublin in particular, that the US administration should not bin Sinn Fein's invitation to the St Patrick's Day festivities at the White House will be interpreted as an indication that processing will at some point be back on track. Sinn Fein leaders could hardly scream 'discrimination' were they to be treated like all other convicted felons who seek access to the US.

Mick Fealty @ 03:22 PM | Comments (187)

Too easy to simplify the past
Historian and author of The Transformation of Ireland 1900-2000, Diarmaid Ferriter, writing in the Irish Times, argues that present-day political sensibilities should not be the basis for demanding apologies from contemporary politicians for the perceived sins of their political ancestors - Apologies for past not the answer

While his focus is on the recent comments by Irish President Mary McAleese, he is less interested in the more publicised remarks than the question of to what extent she, as current President, should be asked to take responsibility for decisions made by Eamon De Valera in the 1940s -

Apologies for past not the answer Diarmaid Ferriter

Should contemporary politicians have to apologise for the perceived sins of their political ancestors, or is it the case that those demanding the apologies are simplifying the past in order to satisfy present-day political sensibilities?

The furore created by President McAleese's comments on the Holocaust and sectarianism in de Northern Ireland diverted attention from two other issues that were raised as she travelled to Auschwitz. The first was whether or not she should make amends for Eamon de Valera's visit to the German ambassador, Edouard Hempel, to express condolences on behalf of the Irish people following the suicide of Hitler in May 1945. The second was if there was an onus on her to express shame at our failure to adequately respond to the humanitarian crisis, created by Hitler's Germany, by not allowing more Jewish refugees into Ireland.

De Valera acknowledged in private that he could have made himself unavailable in May 1945 to avoid expressing such condolences. He knew that what he was doing would be criticised, but he went ahead anyway, on the grounds that Ireland retained diplomatic relations with Germany and that it was correct protocol. It may have been perceived as foolhardy, but for him, it was a logical act, and the ability to act independently went to the core of his political project during the 1930s and 1940s.

Although it is true that the horrors of the Nazi Holocaust were beginning to emerge, it is also the case that the lifting of the ferocious censorship that had operated in Ireland since 1939 would not make Irish people or their politicians experts on foreign atrocities overnight. There was much that was not known, not only about the Holocaust, but also about Ireland's neutrality, and its various contradictions.

It is easy, 60 years after the event, to suggest, even demand, that a public apology should be made by Ireland's current head of state. President McAleese did suggest Ireland should be ashamed it did not take in more Jewish refugees, but fudged the question about de Valera's condolences by maintaining it was impossible to find an apology "to blot out that period of human history". A more honest and fitting reply would have been to simply state that it was not for her to apologise for de Valera's actions 60 years ago. She would have been criticised for this too, but at least, in doing this, she would not have been taking the easy way out, just as de Valera did not choose the easy option in May 1945.

It is difficult to define accurately Irish people's relationship with neutrality in the 1940s. During his victory broadcast at the end of the war, Churchill attacked the Irish position, and if the public reaction to de Valera's dignified response is anything to go by, there was a sense that neutrality was seen as something to be cherished and defended as the ultimate expression of Irish independence. But it is also the case that the Irish contribution to the allied war effort, directly and indirectly, was immense. Thousands of Irish born people served in the Allied forces and the immigrant Irish made a vast contribution to the British wartime economy and health services.

Churchill's denunciation was also disingenuous given MI5's own account of its Irish activities. As revealed by historian Eunan O'Halpin, MI5 was more than happy for Ireland, as a neutral country, to have diplomatic relations with Germany, because it enabled British intelligence to monitor closely the German legation as a result of the "friendly and unofficial channel for co-operation" with Irish army intelligence.

One would imagine, given de Valera's visit to Hempel, that the Irish Jewish community would feel more aggrieved than anyone else. But de Valera was regarded as a friend of the Jewish community. State papers released last month reveal how, in the mid 1960s, the Irish Jewish community funded the planting of a forest of 10,000 trees in Israel in honour of de Valera, who only agreed to this tribute provided the fundraising received no publicity. In a letter to the committee that organised this honour, he expressed thanks, but added: "I feel I did nothing for the Jewish community except to express the general goodwill of our people towards them and what the Constitution demands."

In all this, it can be seen that contradictions abound. The lifting of censorship, the benefit of hindsight, and decades of research, have all combined to ensure that most of us now have a certain view of the morality and immorality of various decisions made during the second World War. But we should not be seeking easy answers to the dilemmas of a previous generation or reading history backwards by imposing contemporary certainties on our interpretation of the events of 60 years ago. If we do believe we should learn from history, we should be ensuring that in our response to contemporary ethnic cleansing, refugee crises and military neutrality, we leave no doubt as to where we stand.[my emphasis]

© The Irish Times

pete baker @ 01:43 PM | Comments (2)

Remembrance: but not for victim and perpetrator
Gregory Campbell MP spoke at an event in Pilots Row recently, Bogside during the Bloody Sunday commemoration weekend. He took the occasion as an opportunity to express his party's objection to Sinn Fein's proposals for a Day Of Reflection.

By Gregory Campbell

Throughout the 1980's I tried to get Nationalists to hear what it was Unionists were saying and what our views were. There were no takers.

In 1995, today is in fact the tenth anniversary, I spoke in this building to a predominantly Nationalist/Republican audience. That was before the Belfast Agreement and before it was fashionable for unionists to speak in surroundings like this.

This week we found out that the Saville Inquiry has cost £154million so far. The 2 policemen who were murdered (one Protestant and one Roman Catholic) three days before Bloody Sunday less than a mile from where the march would start have never had an Inquiry into their deaths and the part played in it by the Government of the Irish Republic in financing those who murdered them.

How should people remember those who have died in past generations as well as the present? People are perfectly entitled to remember and organise remembrance events for relatives or friends who have died during the killing campaign of the past 35 years. This is the case whether they were innocent victims or guilty perpetrators.

Let me be as clear as I possibly can be however, so that there is no room for doubt, misinterpretation or ambiguity. Neither I nor the community I represent will give support to any remembrance mechanism whereby the murderers are treated the same as the murdered.

In the present era there is a tendency for many to try and eradicate the distinction between those who plan to take innocent life and those who suffer as a result of those plans being carried out.

Remembrance Day events across the UK (and more recently in the Irish Republic) are solemn, dignified and deeply moving for all those who attend. There is no attempt to equate the SS with the Allies during the Second World War for example, but neither is there any distinction among the innocent.

ALL the innocent dead should be remembered. In the more recent murder campaign of the last 35 years carried out by the IRA and other terrorist groups, each innocent victim whatever their background, religion, or political outlook, if they were innocent they can and should be remembered.

To attempt to say (as some do) that those who were engaged in murder or attempted murder and then were killed themselves, can be remembered in the same ceremony, in the same way is preposterous.

If the Mayor of New York was to organise a memorial day for the victims of September 11th and was to say that the day would include reference to, and acknowledgement of, the Al Quaieda personnel who flew the aircraft into the World Trade Centre as well as those innocents who died, he would quite rightly be regarded as a parasite and the event as grotesque and obscene.

I do not know how the Royal British Legion (for example) would respond to offers from people to help expand the type of ceremony that is held each year for innocent victims on Remembrance Day.

I know that without exception the opinion I have had expressed to me on the theme of some form of 'Reflection' or event that does not distinguish between perpetrator and victim is doomed to failure as was the most recent example here in Londonderry and the other centres across Northern Ireland."

Mick Fealty @ 11:24 AM | Comments (72)

Tribune: fading star of the British left?
Interesting snippet on the fading fortunes of Tribune magazine and left leaning publications in general from Nick Greenslade at the Observer.

Having the Labour government in power actually seems to have damaged the intellectual base of the left in Britain, judging by the popular sales of its magazines:

The circulation of the New Statesman might stand at a relatively healthy 25,000, but in the Sixties it was selling 94,000. Meanwhile, Red Pepper, launched to much fanfare 10 years ago, has failed to establish itself beyond a ghetto of environmental and social activists. Contrast this with the Spectator, where weekly sales have reached 65,000. And who would bet against that growing after the columns of free publicity provided by the sexual shenanigans of its staff and the improbable cult of Boris?

Mick Fealty @ 11:14 AM | Comments (4)

Further progress requires honesty
Former editor of the BBC's Today programme, and now a regular columnist at the Spectator, Rod Liddle, says the one thing required from Gerry Adams and Sinn Fein is honesty. He makes an unfavourable comparison with Al-Qaeda:

...the main difference between these twin threats to our peaceful existence is in IRA/ Sinn Fein’s disingenuousness, the century of lies. The peace process would be easier to pursue and we would be more inclined to forgive the decades of murder, the IRA/Nazi alliance in the second world war, the bombs and the shootings and the beatings and the robberies, if they would simply come clean.

We know we have to negotiate, much as it may stick in the craw to do so. We know that a peace process or Stormont without IRA/Sinn Fein is a singularly pointless exercise. It grieves us to admit this but it is true.

We know, too, that Ulster is a historical anomaly and that we share some of the blame for the bloodshed, for the earlier unjust treatment of Catholic Ulstermen and for human rights abuses. We are even aware that there has been movement — too little movement, undoubtedly — from Sinn Fein towards a semblance of civilised behaviour.

Now, all we need is a bit of honesty and less of the flouncing off, stage left. As an international statesman, Gerry, do you think you can manage that?

Mick Fealty @ 11:07 AM | Comments (31)

Nationalism's residual prejudices against Unionists
Alex Kane believes that in her comparison between Northern Irish some Protestants and Nazis, President Mary McAleese let slip a thought that's harboured in many a Nationalist's chest: that they despise Unionists more than armed Republicans.

I think it was George Bernard Shaw, who, on hearing a very frank outburst from an actress, commented; "her slip is showing." In President Mary McAleese's case, it was her Freudian slip which was on display last week. Her comments were unwise, historically inaccurate and un-Presidential, and it is no surprise that she caused offence to so many within the pro-Union community.

Now, had it all been a mere slip of the tongue, I think that a gracious and genuine apology would have brought the matter to a close. But I don't think it was a slip of the tongue. What she said was certainly crass and her choice of platform inappropriate; an apology was required and subsequently delivered, albeit one which smacked of spin-doctor manufacture. Yet the impression remains, in my mind at least, that she strayed because she really does believe that Protestants are taught to hate Roman Catholics.

And that impression was confirmed by the reaction of local nationalists to her comments. Neither Sinn Fein nor the SDLP believed that she needed to apologise. The Irish News was full of letters from readers who expressed a similar view. Most of the non-unionists who contacted Talk Back agreed with her. In other words, it is hard to avoid the conclusion that Roman Catholics/Nationalists really do believe that they are hated by Protestants/Unionists.

This may explain why Sinn Fein, the political wing of an armed and still active terrorist machine, has continued to increase its vote so substantially. Right across Northern Ireland, from the poorest parts of South Armagh, to the leafy suburbs of the Malone Road, Sinn Fein candidates have been piling up the votes and winning council, Assembly, Westminster and European seats. They have beaten the SDLP into second place and are well positioned to finish them off in a few months time.

All of which begs one question: why would educated, articulate, professional and generally successful middle-class Roman Catholics desert the SDLP in favour of a political party which has excused and endorsed a campaign of terror and murder against Protestants? And the question has even more relevance when you consider that the political fronts of Loyalist terror have never made the same electoral breakthrough within the unionist community.

Or, let's put it another way: if it is true, as President McAleese hints, that Roman Catholics believe we hate them, is it also true that they carry a psychological baggage which enables them to endorse a machine which has terrorised those of us who believe in the United Kingdom? Let's face it, irrespective of what the IRA does, or how slippery Messrs Adams and McGuinness have proved to be, yet another swathe of the nationalist vote rows in behind them.

That being the case, it is hard to see how we will ever get the present so-called Agreement, let alone any alternative to it, up and running. The SDLP seems prepared to provide political cover for Sinn Fein, in yet another indication that their core vote would rather run with the gunmen than rally around the democrats. Again, it is hard to avoid the conclusion that "moderate" nationalists hate unionists more than they hate armed republicanism. How very depressing.

I was not taught to hate, and today, as an adult and an atheist, I have no political hang-ups about Protestantism or Roman Catholicism. But I have to admit that experience has taught me to doubt the political motives and sincerity of the "other community." In my opinion, Northern Ireland is a less trusting and more polarised place than it was in April 1998.

President McAleese was wholly wrong in her effort to draw parallels between Nazism and Unionism. Nevertheless, she has succeeded in turning over a stone and revealing a dark and very unpleasant facet of the nationalist psyche. It isn't just IRA disingenuousness which has made it so difficult to deliver a democratic settlement. The President's apology is meaningless, for it is as offensive as her original comments. Beam and mote, Mary. Beam and mote.

First published in the Newsletter, Saturday 5th February 2005

Mick Fealty @ 10:40 AM | Comments (293)

February 06, 2005

Be careful what you wish for
Following yesterday's undiplomatic outburst by Sinn Féin's Gerry Adams - "They [the two governments] need to take their heads out of their asses for a start" - RTE reported that the Minister of State, Brian Lenihan (responding with appropriate sensitivity) said Sinn Féin is milking the peace process for political gain and that the Government's patience is running out.

Speaking on RTÉ, he said the Taoiseach would not break off talks, despite what he called recent improper threats from the IRA.

He said Sinn Féin took their line from the Army Council and not from the people who gave them a mandate.

Hmm.. Sounds like a clear enough view.

pete baker @ 05:41 PM | Comments (1)

The world is now a very different place
Following his comments on Morning Ireland, journalist and author Ed Moloney expanded on his analysis in Saturday's Irish Times, and set the scene for the decision that must now be made by the Irish and British governments - This may well be the time to call the IRA's bluff, but are Tony Blair and Bertie Ahern made of the right stuff?

Ed Moloney's article in full -

War and Peace

And so the dance, the tiresome shuffle resumes. Having kicked its peace-process partners in the teeth with December's Northern Bank raid - just one of several such blows last year, according to the Taoiseach - the IRA and Sinn Féin leadership don the mantle of victimhood in protest at being blamed, withdraw their decommissioning offer and retreat to sulk.

By this stage, counting the number of times P. O'Neill has stormed out of Gen de Chastelain's office in protest at this or that slight in recent years is probably a task beyond most people, but on each occasion events have followed almost exactly the same pattern. Alarmed by the turn of events the governments behave like spurned lovers. At first they utter angry words, but then they pursue Sinn Féin and the IRA with the political equivalent of flowers and chocolates, offering yet more concessions to coax them back into the process.

With the accommodating but sadly abused David Trimble on hand to assist, negotiations are renewed only to end in disappointment or another incident in Colombia, Castlereagh, Kelly's Cellars in Belfast, or elsewhere sparking another crisis; and so the dreary waltz drifts on, repeating itself endlessly. It has been like Groundhog Day but with a touch of menace.

All this has been enormously to Sinn Féin's benefit. Victimhood reaps nationalist votes, the governments are made to look like weak fools, unionism is divided, the Provisionals are rewarded for moving slightly closer to the peaceful politics they supposedly signed fully up to many years before and still the IRA survives, ready to be traded, but never delivered, over and over again. The Provisionals even have a name for all this - the Tactical Use of Armed Struggle, or TUAS.

It is a brilliant stratagem and to its architects, Gerry Adams and the clever people in his think tank must go the plaudits. Better than anyone else they realise it works so well because the British and Irish governments both fear that the IRA, if sufficiently provoked, will return to war and the peace process will become history.

That's why the decommissioning offer has now been withdrawn.

This peace process is partly modelled on the Cold War diplomacy of the 1960s in which either the US or the Soviet Union would make a unilateral concession knowing that the other would have to reciprocate or look bad to the rest of the world. It worked and saved the planet from nuclear destruction.

This week's move by the IRA is designed to signal that our own process might be in reverse gear; that if the British and Irish governments react with an equivalent response, so may the IRA, and bit by bit we could fall back into the abyss.

To add teeth to the implied threat, the IRA statement announcing the move was full of angry language, making reference to the ceasefire breakdown of 1996 and including promises not to remain "quiescent" and "to protect to the best of our ability the rights of republicans", a hint at the possible use of violence. That was followed by a warning not to "underestimate the seriousness of the situation", while at a Belfast press conference the Sinn Féin president, Gerry Adams refused to discuss the stability of the cessation, thereby implying that it might not hold. The overall message, albeit unspoken, is unmistakable.

THIS SORT OF sabre-rattling has worked time and again, but strangely, few people question whether the assumption behind this stratagem, that the IRA can go back to war in a meaningful way, has much basis now. It is perhaps beyond time for the governments to take a long, hard look at this issue and, if appropriate, to adjust their own strategy accordingly.

To begin with, this particular crisis has been surrounded with speculation about divisions within the leadership of the IRA and rumours that the organisation's "hard men" have been enraged both by the decommissioning demands of the DUP leader, Rev Ian Paisley and the eagerness of both governments to blame the IRA for a robbery they say they did not commit. The impression has gained ground that Gerry Adams and Martin McGuinness are on the defensive and may lose control of the IRA.

The known facts suggest that such an assertion is highly doubtful. The key body in the IRA is its seven-man army council which determines the organisation's policy, including whether or not to call off ceasefires. In IRA ranks, the army council is regarded as the real government of Ireland, the inheritors of the all-Ireland mandate bestowed on the Second Dáil of 1921 and its authority is questioned at peril. He who controls the army council controls the IRA.

From what is known about the army council's current makeup, the Adams-McGuinness faction hold at very least a comfortable five to two majority. Three of the five are associated with Sinn Féin and the other two are Belfast IRA men who earned their places by proving their loyalty to Adams. Of the two who are not known for their enthusiasm for politics (they hail, unsurprisingly, from South Armagh) one, who is also the chief of staff, has a track record of siding with, or at least not opposing the Adams-McGuinness group when pushed into a corner. If the IRA was to go back to war it would not be because the Adams-McGuinness bloc had been outvoted or overwhelmed - although we would be encouraged to think that - but because they supported such a move.

Figures associated with the Adams-McGuinness group have controlled the army council since the late 1970s and this has meant that key posts elsewhere in the IRA have been filled with people chosen for their loyalty to the leadership as much as anything else. The post of Northern commander has been crucial in this respect, for he appoints local commanders in the IRA's most important theatre. Throughout the 1980s and 1990s, when the peace process was revving up, that post was held by a figure synonymous with the process and the result was that when a split happened, in 1997, all but a handful of IRA members in the North, where it mattered, stayed loyal.

That split, and the ceasefire breakdown which preceded it, happened because the Adams-McGuinness leadership had failed to secure control of one key IRA body, the executive, an advisory body elected by the rank and file which also chooses army council members. In the mid-1990s the executive was dominated by the IRA quartermaster general, Michael McKevitt and by the director of engineering, a Dubliner, who led a revolt against the Adams peace strategy which brought a brief renewal of violence but failed in its primary aim of ousting the Adams-McGuinness leadership. That led them to depart to found the Real IRA.

The Real IRA's strongest support came from Southern units of the Provisional IRA but the failure to garner support in the North, along with the disastrous Omagh bombing and an associated quarrel with potential allies in the other dissident grouping, the Continuity IRA, sidelined the dissidents and took enormous pressure off Adams and McGuinness. Since then the current IRA leadership has taken pains to ensure that the executive's make-up is such that no repeat rebellion is possible.

IN THE YEARS since the departure of the dissidents, the IRA and Sinn Féin leadership have taken their organisations in directions that not long before would have been dismissed as unthinkable and judged certain to provoke bloody feuds.

The principle of consent, the defiance of which defined the post-1921 IRA, has been embedded by the twin referendums of 1998; Sinn Féin has taken seats at Stormont, the parliament the IRA bombed out of existence in 1972, and party luminaries have occupied Cabinet posts under the Crown.

Acceptance of the North's policing system is on the agenda, while the IRA has done that which we were told it would never do and began, however unsatisfactorily, to decommission its weapons. Vast swathes of ideological ground have been abandoned without a peep of protest from the grassroots nor a hint of rebellion or division. The conclusion is inescapable: those who direct the Provisionals' political policy also exercise complete control of the military strategy. Talk of splits should be accompanied by generous servings of salt.

Nobody doubts that the IRA can go back to violence and could explode bombs and shoot people. This is what PSNI Chief Constable Hugh Orde means when he says the IRA has the capacity for violence. But that is not the real question. What really matters is whether the IRA has the ability to sustain a lengthy and effective campaign of violence of sufficient intensity to change or influence British and Irish government policy. Otherwise there seems little point in abandoning the peace process.

Here, the track record of the last 30 or so years strongly suggests that the IRA would face a dismal future if it did return to violence. Ever since the Treaty negotiations of 1921 it has been axiomatic in IRA thinking that ceasefires weaken and sap fighting ability. Volunteers relax their guard, public expectations of peace rise as toleration of violence declines while activists get rusty and lose their passion for the fight. Michael Collins understood that and it is one reason he agreed to sign Lloyd George's accord.

The Provisionals have learned all this the hard way during these Troubles. There have been four ceasefires since 1969 and the lesson from the three that broke down is that each time the IRA was weaker or at greater disadvantage afterwards than when they went in to ceasefire.

The first and shortest ceasefire in 1972 was resisted by those who now lead the IRA for precisely those reasons and even though they succeeded in returning to violence, the IRA lost valuable no-go areas in Belfast and Derry shortly afterwards. In 1975 there was a longer ceasefire which so enervated the IRA that the British were able to criminalise it and came close to securing a military victory. The 1994 ceasefire collapsed after 18 months with the spectacular bombing of Canary Wharf but the campaign that followed quickly degenerated, in the memorable words of one RUC officer, into "a pathetic, grubby little war" in which the principal casualty was the IRA's credibility as a fighting force.

The current ceasefire has lasted seven-and-a-half years, much longer than any previous cessation, and the IRA's pool of activists is as many years older, as well as being thicker around the midriff and greyer at the temples. Not only must their physical ability to wage war once again be questioned but also their enthusiasm for it. They and their families have got happily accustomed to living without the constant threat of sudden death or lengthy imprisonment while the communities from which they sprang have likewise grown fond of normality and are unlikely to welcome a return to the bad old days. To be sure the IRA still takes in new recruits, but these are ceasefire soldiers and past experience shows that ceasefire soldiers disappear like snow off a ditch in spring when war starts again.

TO ALL THIS must be added the considerable political price Sinn Féin would pay if hostilities were renewed. The party's political growth in the North was fuelled by Catholic voters who switched from the SDLP to Sinn Féin to encourage the move to peace. Abandoning the peace process might well reverse that. In the South, Sinn Féin's growth has been assisted in no small measure by the fact that many of its new supporters have no knowledge or memory of the daily atrocities and funerals that constituted life in the Ireland of the 1970s and 1980s. But start the killing again and that will certainly change.

The world is also a very different place than it was in 1996.

For one thing, 9/11 happened and there is no doubting American and Irish-American hostility to terrorism of any stripe. If the IRA went back to war not only would Gerry Adams and Martin McGuinness be denied entry to the US and the clout and dollars that come with it but they would be consigned to a pantheon of villainy alongside people such as Osama Bin Laden. Not a happy prospect for people who have grown used to swanning around Congress and Fifth Avenue.

The renewal of violence in 1996 made the point well: the IRA can start the war again, but sustaining it is a different matter. It would be the same now, except exponentially worse. Should the IRA defy common sense and go back to violence the most sensible response from the governments might be to eschew concessions and let events take their course, sure in the knowledge that demonstrating its own impotency to itself might be the cure the IRA needs.

The problem with this is that up to now both the British and Irish governments have behaved not just as if the IRA can return to effective warfare but as if it has a thermonuclear device secreted somewhere in the sewers of London. This may well be the time to call the IRA's bluff, but are Tony Blair and Bertie Ahern made of the right stuff?

© The Irish Times

Ed Moloney is author of A Secret History of the IRA

pete baker @ 05:02 PM | Comments (2)

IRA losing the Blame Game?
Well that's what the media seems to think, pretty much across the board, they believe that after seven years of drawing everyone else into the Good Friday Agreement, it has simply walked out of it.

Mick Fealty @ 11:15 AM | Comments (5)

What is the IRA here for?
Interesting analysis from Chris Thornton in the Irish Independent, in which he argues that the Bank Raid was a tipping point in the relationship between Sinn Fein, the IRA and the two governments. He doesn't believe it will affect the party's onward and upward trajectory in the short term, but the raid and the IRA's criminal activities will remain centre stage in any future negotiations. He notes (via a quotation from Slugger) too that on this occasion, the IRA seems to have been the last actor to realise that all bets were off.

He notes a tragic incident in Tyrone the day before the robbery of the Northern Bank:

It's obscured now by piles of Northern Bank notes, but it happened. A bleak weekend in December produced one of those little glimmers of hope to which people in Northern Ireland cling.

Patrick McGrath, a 75-year-old former postmaster, had been smothered after a break-in at his home in Coalisland, Co Tyrone. His elderly sister had been beaten, the town was scandalised and their MP had something to say about it.

Martin McGuinness, chief negotiator for Sinn Fein and acknowledged IRA leader, said he was "shocked... that individuals in our society are so devoid of feelings that they can find subjecting our senior citizens to this brutality acceptable". Anyone with information about the murder, he added, should talk to whatever authority he thought appropriate.

Thornton notes that, "in a confirmed republican town like Coalisland it was decoded enough to see that cooperation with the police was okay".

Towards the end he examines reasons cited in the past of the positive role played by the IRA:

The argument used to be that the IRA was necessary to the peace process. Ronnie Flanagan, the former Chief Constable of the RUC and no friend of the Provos, used to say they provided discipline that the process needed by controlling weapons and people. Now, after a decade, that's changed.

In spite of P O'Neill's threatening tone, most republicans agree there will be no return to war. It would cripple Sinn Fein's growth and, anyway, the peace process was founded on the basis that the war couldn't be won.

Danny Morrison, Sinn Fein's former director of publicity, wrote in Daily Ireland that "the reason why a return to armed struggle would be foolhardy is because it would be a return to military stalemate".

He ends the piece with an awkward question for the Republican movement: "if it is incapable of waging war and incompatible with peace, what is the IRA there for?"

Mick Fealty @ 10:45 AM | Comments (12)

Governments scuttled IRA initiatives?
Meanwhile Sinn Fein appear to be attempting to squeeze whatever political capital they can out of what the Irish government claims is a crisis entirely of their own making.

The Irish Republic's top detectives, along with the Irish Defence Forces' military intelligence unit known as G2, told Ahern that, in the aftermath of the political talks breaking down, a minority in the IRA leadership believed the British should have been taught a lesson. However, instead of bombing Britain, potentially a political disaster in the post-9/11 world, the movement chose instead to execute a plan that was two years in the making - to pull off the biggest cash theft ever.

The operation involved operatives in West Belfast and South Armagh:

Irish government officials have absolutely no doubt that this robbery was sanctioned at the highest levels of the IRA. They point to a meeting in early December at a hotel just over the border between Northern Ireland and the Irish Republic involving top Belfast IRA commanders and their counterparts in South Armagh. They were so paranoid about being under human and electronic surveillance that the gathering broke up the meeting in the hotel bar, walked into the car park and resumed discussions in several vehicles they had travelled in to the venue. Given that it was a combination of Belfast and South Armagh IRA members who robbed the bank, the authorities in Dublin now believe that this meeting gave the green light for the heist to go ahead.

Mick Fealty @ 10:32 AM | Comments (4)

Return to 'war' political suicide?
The Guardian quotes liberally from Ed Moloney's analysis on Morning Ireland the other day. He relfects the thoughts of many, when he suggested that, "the hard core of activists are 10 years older than when the [ceasefire] process started. The will to fight has eroded. Politically the situation is very different." ".

However she also notes that its ongoing existence is dragging its political credentials through the mud:

In Northern Ireland's landscape of over 100 criminal gangs - many linked to loyalist and republican paramilitaries - the IRA is estimated by the media to receive between £5m and £8m a year from organised crime. It was blamed for the recent £1m robbery of a south Belfast cash and carry, and a £1m raid on a cigarette warehouse last year.

Mick Fealty @ 10:23 AM | Comments (1)

Questions
Tom McGurk asks difficult questions in an article, Sinn Fein must find a way, in the Sunday Business Post which greatly increased my respect for him. He neatly manages to both tie and distance SF to and from the IRA and has enough nationalist and republican orthodoxy in the article to allow himself to pursue questions that come close to heresy. Similar questions, less well crafted, will doubtless be written elsewhere, but in this case it won't be as easy to shrug them off as coming from a consistently hostile source.

"In the North too, a new generation of nationalists emerged with educational, economic and cultural strengths unlike anything known before. As the old oligarchic structure of unionist economic power was wiped away by free market forces, the new nationalist economic power utterly changed the social landscape of the Six Counties. The last thing the post-ceasefire nationalist generation in the North needs is a paramilitary army.

Following the ceasefire, this newly aspirational generation voted in unprecedented numbers for Sinn Féin.

They did this because their demands and expectations were matched by Sinn Féin’s harder political nose and they voted too - let's not forget it - to divert the republican movement's energies away from paramilitarism to politics. Ironically they voted for the war party in order to end the war. Above all, they voted because they wanted the share of political power that was the inevitable consequence of their new economic and cultural position.

The very serious question that Sinn Féin needs to ponder this weekend is whether their some 320,000 voters across the country fully appreciated the role the IRA would have in the discharge of their democratic franchise.

Of course. the political forces ranged against Sinn Féin were determined to trammel their political ambitions by tying them to the IRA, but do their voters accept this arrangement?

How can you have, at one end, a political party with 320,000 votes demanding political power and at the other end a secret, armed society exercising a political veto by virtue of their continuing existence?

The question this weekend is actually not who robbed the bank, but who runs the show lads? Is it the universally franchised, democratically elected members of parliament or the IRA army council with its more limited franchise? I don't know, but I would like to know. So too would the wider Irish political democratic constituency."

and :

"This is about the long march of the nationalists of the North out of the dark and into a new century to their full share of peaceful political and economic prosperity. Sinn Féin is the weapon they chose to carve out that share. Is Sinn Féin up to the hard choices now needed to deliver it?"

Ambrose Uprichard @ 01:35 AM | Comments (17)

February 05, 2005

Splat!
A rapid and unusually blunt response, No IRA conspiracy theory, from Paul Murphy to a piece by Niall Stanage in yesterday's Guardian in which the correspondent for the Sunday Business Post wrote that "The British and Irish governments have reason to undermine Sinn Féin"

No IRA conspiracy theory

Saturday February 5, 2005
The Guardian

As someone who has devoted several years to facilitating a political settlement in Northern Ireland, I find Niall Stanage's argument (Who gains from this breakdown? February 4) that the British and Irish governments are engaged in some conspiracy to blame the IRA, and thereby Sinn Féin, for the Northern Bank robbery bizarre.
Are Tony Blair and Bertie Ahern, who have devoted more time and energy to this process than any of their predecessors, really part of this conspiracy? Is it credible that Hugh Orde, the chief constable of the PSNI and the man who investigated the allegations of state collusion in the murder of Pat Finucane, is engaged in a plot to derail the peace process? Or that Garda Commissioner Conroy would lend his integrity to a charade?
In support of his conspiracy theory, Stanage asserts that almost all the charges relating to the alleged IRA "spy ring" in 2002 have been "quietly dropped". He is wrong. Three men face very serious charges.
I look forward to the time the Northern Bank case can be aired in court, but in the meantime neither we, nor the Irish and US governments, can simply pretend that we have not seen convincing evidence of Provisional IRA responsibility for the bank robbery. The ball is in Sinn Féin's court. The IRA put it there and until the issue of IRA activity and criminality is addressed we are unlikely to make real progress.
Paul Murphy MP
Secretary of state for Northern Ireland

Ambrose Uprichard @ 12:47 AM | Comments (59)

February 04, 2005

Sadness in family's difficult search for justice...
THE vigil held in memory of murder victim Robert McCartney was much larger than I expected, with well over 1,000 people in attendance. Clearly, Mr McCartney's death has caused tremendous hurt to the Short Strand community.

It was a short, dignified ceremony, and the family of the victim obviously have the support of a large section of the community in their area. There were a few politicians there, amongst them the Lord Mayor, Alliance's Tom Ekin, and his Deputy, Joe O'Donnell, of Sinn Fein.

What anger there is in the Short Strand at whoever killed Robert was replaced by sorrow for the vigil.

However, some people later expressed how unhappy they were at how the family have had to endure the innuendo that has surrounded Robert's death.

The family gathered in their Mountpottinger home afterwards, and as well-wishers called in, they seemed to appreciate the way that the community has rallied around them at this difficult time. The body is now in the family home. It wasn't expected to be returned until later, but since it has, the funeral can now go ahead on Tuesday.

The family has appealed for anyone with information on the murder to come forward. It will be interesting to see if the omerta holds, or if justice is allowed to proceed.

Belfast Gonzo @ 09:36 PM | Comments (13)

Adams sets out his stall...
AN extensive interview with Sinn Fein President Gerry Adams on the Last Word. Audio file here (about 35 minutes in). Mark Devenport will be exploring similar issues on BBC Radio Ulster's 'Inside Politics' tomorrow at 12.45pm with Anthony McIntyre and Prof Paul Bew of Queen's University, Belfast

The Last Word interview took place at 5pm Thursday: 3/2/2005

It's well worth listening to for a good overview of the Sinn Fein position.

And hopefully, the start and end of 'Inside Politics' on the BBC site won't be cut off this week!

Belfast Gonzo @ 09:03 PM | Comments (13)

Let the weekend begin!
For the second day in a row I'm tipping my hat to John of Irish Eagle fame for this piece of absolute genius. Guaranteed to put a smile on anyone's face - hey, it worked on me!

pete baker @ 06:12 PM | Comments (16)

'The time for indulgence is long over'
Today's Irish Times editorial would seem to sum up the prevailing mood of the Irish, British and, now, the US Government - "We share the view of the British and Irish Prime Ministers that the continuation of paramilitarism and associated criminality remains the central obstacle to a lasting and durable peace in Northern Ireland", US State Department spokesman.

Irish Times editorial -

The mask is slipping in the IRA's second statement. It is not clear whether republicans are just being sullen and petulant because Sinn Féin has to take responsibility for their actions or, more likely, the statement is intended as a sinister and nasty prelude to a threatened return to war and terrorism.

The IRA has raised the ante by warning the Government that it should not underestimate the seriousness of the current situation. That is certainly true. But the time for indulgence of the twin-track strategy, the Sinn Féin ballot box in the one hand and IRA gangsterism in the other, is long over.

The IRA has drawn attention to its threat not to "remain quiescent" in the future, even as the Independent Monitoring Commission reported on its activities. Its response has emanated from the perfectly reasonable request that Sinn Féin should act as a stand-alone political party, like all others in Dáil Éireann today, and that the IRA should go out of business.

After nearly 11 years of formal ceasefire, however, the republican leadership is clearly not prepared to abandon violence and criminal activity in favour of exclusively democratic politics. There are those within the IRA who are not prepared to accept that progress towards a united Ireland should take place on an agreed basis and within the framework of the Belfast Agreement. Are they now in the ascendant within the republican movement? If Sinn Féin now speaks for "ourselves", as Mr Gerry Adams said yesterday, what is going on within the IRA? What influence do he and Mr Martin McGuinness have to deliver the end of all criminal and paramilitary activity?

Mr Adams and Mr McGuinness were told by the Taoiseach last week to go away and reflect on the situation in the aftermath of the Northern Bank robbery and to come back when they were in a position to say the IRA would end its activities and leave the stage.

In the past, the IRA withdrew from talks with the Independent International Commission on Decommissioning when sanctions were imposed on Sinn Féin as a result of its paramilitary activity. The organisation reacted with aggression, intransigence and ambiguity to successive attempts by the two governments to bring an end to its paramilitary activity, punishment beatings and other criminal acts.

Time and time again, all parties in the Dáil have stretched their democratic constituency to make space for Sinn Féin at the negotiating table, even in the shadow of an active IRA. That situation can no longer be tolerated. Mr Ahern and Mr Blair have made clear that if Sinn Féin is to share power in either jurisdiction then republicans must unambiguously endorse the rules of democratic society. It is no good pointing the finger at the governments, the Progressive Democrats and the Democratic Unionist Party for Sinn Féin's discomfiture. The republican leadership can no longer parade as international statesmen while their lesser-known associates rob and kneecap without accountability.[my emphasis]

© The Irish Times

pete baker @ 04:42 PM | Comments (53)

The secret present of the IRA?
The journalist and author of The Secret History of The IRA, Ed Moloney, gave his considered opinion on recent developments on RTE's Morning Ireland(RealPlayer required) today - the 'sabre rattling' statements and the different realities compared to 10 years ago, including an end to the governments' "destructive" habit of 'turning a blind eye'. Most interestingly, though, he appears to suspect that there's been a familiar hand "manoeuvring" the IRA into a position where it now has to make a "tough choice". Updated

He acknowledged the complex reasons behind the decision to sanction the Northern Bank robbery, but wasn’t too concerned with the speculation on those reasons – “the thing has happened”.

However, when asked whether the IRA has a way out of its current difficult position, he referred to what he described as one of the “hidden motives” behind events -

“The SF leadership, Gerry Adams in particular, has very often used manoeuvring rather than straight-forward persuasion in order to get his people to a situation where they have to go and where he wants them to go.

And if you look at where the IRA is now, there really is only one way out for them, they can of course go back to war but, as I said, there are very negative and immediate consequences arising from that course of action. Or they can take the other road and start winding their operations up and to decommission in the way that is most likely to instil confidence on the part of unionism.

These are very tough choices. One has to wonder whether they would take these choices if they were faced with a direct choice. Clearly they didn’t in December. But now that they are in a position where they either have to do this or die politically. Then it’s in these circumstances that that may happen.”

(Transcribed from the audio file - If there are any inaccuracies let me know)

pete baker @ 12:54 PM | Comments (6)

February 03, 2005

IRA emphasise "seriousness" in second statement...
THE IRA has released a second statement, which seems to be a reaction to the political response to its previous statement, when politicians and police played down the threat of potential violence. The IRA said: "The two governments are trying to play down the importance of our statement because they are making a mess of the peace process. Do not underestimate the seriousness of the situation."

Belfast Gonzo @ 06:43 PM | Comments (186)

'What do you mean Pram and Toys'?
It seems someone's not happy with the portrayal of yesterday's IRA statement as a "tantrum" - RTE are reporting that a second 2-line IRA statement has been issued warning "Do not underestimate the seriousness of the current situation". So, just to clarify then - Was it a threat or not?

Update

According to the BBC report this new statement, clarifying yesterday's statement, reads:

The two governments are trying to play down the importance of our statement because they are making a mess of the peace process.

Do not underestimate the seriousness of the situation.

Hmmm... perhaps a little more time should have been spent drafting that original statement?... just a thought.

pete baker @ 06:36 PM | Comments (15)

What is the worth of a father, brother, husband, son?
WAS Robert McCartney's life worth less than £26 million? If you think the right to life is worth something more, you may wish to attend a vigil in his memory tomorrow evening.

McCartney's sister told the Belfast Telegraph:

Revealing the family circle has been left devastated by the killing of the 33-year-old father of two, Paula told the Belfast Telegraph: "We are gutted by what has happened.

"We, as a family, want to dispel the rumours his death was part of a knife culture or that it was a pub brawl.

"Robert was an innocent bystander. He was a peacemaker who would have tried to diffuse a row and we've heard that when it happened, Robert had his hands in the air."

Speaking from her Albertbridge Road home, she said: "It's very important the people who did this are caught or another family could lose out very quickly. They need to be taken off the streets."

She said she didn't want to comment on reports that republicans were linked to the murder. She said it was common knowledge who was involved.

Tomorrow's vigil is at the shop fronts on Mountpottinger Road at 5.45pm.

Belfast Gonzo @ 04:52 PM | Comments (72)

IMC hands over report to governments...
THE Independent Monitoring Commission has handed over its preliminary report on recent paramilitary/criminal activity - including the Northern Bank raid - to the British and Irish Governments today. No detail on the content.

Belfast Gonzo @ 04:41 PM | Comments (5)

Recreational rioting organised on web...
CHILDREN in Belfast are organising riots in internet chat rooms, according to the News Letter. The PSNI said they were monitoring several sites.

Belfast Gonzo @ 04:13 PM | Comments (6)

Pots and kettles..?
PATRICK Murphy believes that "Not only is there no longer a peace process nor a political process, there does not appear to be a common linguistic process." While the IRA doesn't view even its "wrong" acts as criminal, Murphy asks if the British and Irish Governments are really the best agencies to define the rule of law, given their track records of 'flexibility' when it comes to justice. A case of double standards all round?

Murphy writes:

But then IRA law, like British, Irish and US law, has a rather fluid quality these days.

Thus despite the divergence of language on what constitutes a crime, the three governments and the IRA have one thing in common. All four agree that a crime is what someone else commits, especially if that someone happens to be your political enemy. The worst you or your friends can do is a wrong, particularly when you have what is called a democratic mandate, available for application either instantly or in retrospect.

It is a view which may be inconsistent, it may be morally questionable and even plain wrong. But in all four cases it has been a winning formula at elections, which is why all four will continue to toy with the law. And only the victims and their families will really notice.

What a sad world we live in.

Belfast Gonzo @ 04:01 PM | Comments (0)

Quote of the week..
Rep. Jim Walsh, Chair of Friends of Ireland, after a meeting with Mitchel Reiss: "Every promise that Gerry Adams and Martin McGuinness has made to us they've kept."

Hat tip to Richard!

Mick Fealty @ 03:48 PM | Comments (10)

Abbey Theatre names new director
The attempted renaissance of the Abbey Theatre continues. Two new board members have been announced following the appointment of a new director Fiach MacConghail, who "will take on overall artistic and managerial responsibility for the theatre".

From the Irish Times

The board announced the appointment yesterday almost three months after recruitment began in the midst of a financial crisis. The new appointment is of "director", and the post explicitly includes management as well as artistic responsibility.

The appointment of Mr O'Donoghue's adviser to the position comes after the Arts Council insisted recently that work practices would have to change and a commitment would have to be made to replace the National Theatre Society with a new company if the Abbey was to receive the €2 million in extra funding announced before Christmas.

The current artistic director, Mr Ben Barnes, completes his term at the end of this year and Mr MacConghail will become director-designate from the beginning of May.

During the transition period Mr MacConghail will work "in collaboration with Mr Barnes and managing director Brian Jackson", the statement said.

The Guardian's Ireland correspondent, Angelique Chrisafis has a more expansion version of the new director's vision, and a point that other reports missed - he applied for the job before.

Mac Conghail, 40, is an independent theatre and film producer who has been arts adviser to the government throughout the recent Abbey crisis. He was beaten to the director's job by Barnes last time round. Now, though, he says he has a "clear approach" and is undaunted by the scale of the Abbey's problems.

He plans to begin with an overhaul of the Abbey's byzantine superstructure of a board and advisory council, which has been likened to an unruly group of backseat drivers. The antiquated management structure has not changed since Yeats's time,and is seen as the root of the modern theatre's problems. The Arts Council recently promised an extra €2m in funding, but only if work practices changed and a new company was formed to run the venue.

Mac Conghail says his "vision" revolves around new writing and new ways of making theatre, including physical and non-verbal work. Running Dublin's Project Arts centre in the 1990s taught him to respect an audience, he says, that "liked the shock of the new". He also promises to reach audiences beyond the traditional Irish middle class by investing in new writing and diverse programming in the style of the National Theatre in London, and by touring in Ireland.

He says he wants the Abbey to re-engage politically. "Irish society is no longer a homogenous, one-coloured, one-cultured nation. It is the fastest-changing society in the world. We have to look at different ways of making theatre, as a lot of theatres in Britain have done."

Here's hoping that he succeeds in his vision.

pete baker @ 03:07 PM | Comments (0)

What a.. erm.. lovely bowl
The eagled-eyed John Fay, at Irish Eagle, spotted this article in the New York Times, by Matthew Scully(free reg required) - "a former deputy director of speechwriting for President Bush" - that may help add some perspective to the ongoing debate about who will attend the annual St. Patrick's Day shindig at the Whitehouse this year.

Although the article is, primarily, about the task of drafting the US President's State of the Union address, he does mention some of the more dreaded chores that a deputy director of speechwriting for the President faces during the year -

Almost as dreaded as drafting a State of the Union, for example, are those yearly chores like writing remarks for the St. Patrick's Day visit by the prime minister of Ireland. How many different ways can you accept a bowl of shamrocks, or celebrate the sterling qualities of the noble Irish people?

How many different ways indeed.

pete baker @ 01:53 PM | Comments (2)

Return to war not an option
Danny Morrison, believes that with all the speculation around the identity of perpetrator of the December bank raid, some commentators have lost some perspective. He also argues that there is no return to out and out war by the IRA on the cards.

His reasoning is essentially practical:

The British government factors into its calculations and negotiations that the IRA cannot return to armed struggle without Sinn Féin paying a heavy price electorally. Undoubtedly, because there is a degree of association, Sinn Féin's vote would suffer. However, the reason why a return to armed struggle would be foolhardy is because it would be a return to a military stalemate.

Mick Fealty @ 01:29 PM | Comments (21)

IRA will never decommission weapons?
I just picked this snippet of a five year old article from Newsweek, from the Google ads on the side. It begins with a report from the Felons Club. Then, the impression was that the IRA will never decommission their weapons? In the time that's passed, despite three unquantified decommissioning events, there is still huge resistence to the state's (whether Irish or British) monopoly of force within Sinn Fein and the IRA.

Mick Fealty @ 12:52 PM | Comments (0)

Ireland and the holocaust...
The RealityCheckDotie blog says that the recent controversy over the President's remarks on the Irish parallels with the Nazi persecution of the Jews, glides over some deeply embarrassing realities of Ireland's own past self-conduct.

For instance:

The pogrom of Jews in Limerick in the early 1900's is known of, as is DeValera's refusal to take in Jews fleeing Nazi persecution. But it is not widely discussed. It too is often overlooked.

Mick Fealty @ 12:37 PM | Comments (7)

Political rather than government pressure
Suzanne Breen reports that the two governments will not want to be the agency that excludes Sinn Fein from any future arrangements. Instead it will be up to the party's local rivals to exert political pressure at the up and coming elections in May.

At the moment however, this appears to be unlikely:

Sinn Féin is unlikely to lose votes in May's Westminster elections. Indeed, it's poised to take at least one seat (Newry and Armagh) off the SDLP, and possibly two more, (Foyle and South Down), potentially leaving the SDLP with no Westminster representation. The worst scenario for Sinn Féin in the North is that it loses some second preferences from hardened SDLP voters in the council election, likely to be held on the same day as the Westminster contest.

The more telling contest is likely to be a litmus for the party's fortunes in the Republic:

The big test in the Republic will be the Meath by-election for John Bruton's old seat. Sinn Féin candidate Joe Reilly has long been expected to perform strongly. Sinn Féin sources are unconcerned by last month's Irish Times poll. At eleven per cent, the party's share of the vote has fallen only one per cent since the Northern Bank raid.

Mick Fealty @ 12:04 PM | Comments (16)

Changing for the better.
It's not ALL bad news. The Irish News (subs needed) gives us a breath of fresh air with this story - Camogie team train at home of Linfield.

Full Story:

THE unlikely event of a 2010 All-Ireland final being held at Windsor Park was suggested yesterday as it emerged that it has already hosted a camogie training session.

For years the home of Linfield football club was seen by many Catholics as an arena of sectarianism, which hosted an infamous derby match between Belfast Celtic and Linfield on St Stephen’s Day in 1948.

A pitch invasion by Linfield fans brought the match to a halt, with Celtic players being attacked and one having his leg broken. They never again played a competitive match in the Irish League, officially withdrawing in 1949.

Several years ago, Manchester United skipper and Republic of Ireland star Roy Keane also caused controversy when he referred to Linfield as a ‘Protestant’ club with bigoted supporters.

However, the 45-time Irish League winners, whose home lies on the edge of the loyalist Village area of south Belfast, were hailed yesterday as the “miracle” saviour of St Mary’s University camogie team. This Saturday the teacher training college side will face Queen’s University Belfast in the semi-final of the Purcell Cup.

St Mary’s coach and former Antrim senior camogie player Nell O’Neill said she wanted to give her players the best preparation for the match, as they usually train on gravel pitches in west Belfast.

“I said to the girls that I would get a grass pitch for them by Monday night,” she said.

Ms O’Neill began a desperate search for floodlit grass facilities but every place she tried was booked or unavailable.

“Then I got to the bottom of my list. I had tried everywhere,” she said.

“Linfield were the top team in soccer and I wondered whether they would lend us some help. My husband said that I was nuts.”

However, Ms O’Neill, who has coached the Falls Road side since the start of the academic year, was undeterred and phoned Linfield manager David Jeffrey.

Mr Jeffrey said yesterday that he had been only too happy to help.

“We were not only delighted, we were privileged. All they have to do is make sure that they go and win the final,” he said

Ms O’Neill said other people had been surprised by their new choice of training ground.

“A lot of people have said to me: ‘Windsor Park, are you mad?’ But I’m a sportswoman and I know in my heart and soul that David Jeffrey is a sportsman.”

The coach said camogie was a non-sectarian sport because there were no barriers to playing it and none of the girls on the team had any problems in training at Windsor Park.

She also joked that the stadium might even host an All-Ireland final within five years. But with St Mary’s linking up with Linfield, is there now a assistant coaching role in the pipeline for David Jeffrey?

“Oh, I don’t know about that,” she laughed.

Ambrose Uprichard @ 10:55 AM | Comments (9)

Handing the initiative to the IRA?
Brian Feeney believes the IMC is doomed. He notes at the outset that, "the Taoiseach has indicated the irrelevance of the commission by repeating inside and outside the Dail that he doesn't believe the it should impose sanctions on Sinn Féin".

Instead, he believes the next big question is where we go next. He suggests that nationalists should argue for:

For nationalists the only prospect of advancement of their aims is to beef up all-Ireland bodies, increase all-Ireland cooperation, get speaking rights in the Dail, establish northern representation in the Seanad, enhance the role of the British-Irish Inter-Governmental Council. All of that is already either agreed in fact or in principle.

He argues that Ahern should bypass Unionists and:

...start thinking of making aspects of the agreement other than the assembly and executive his priority, otherwise politics here will be static for the foreseeable future.

HOwever he also believes that:

In the meantime both governments have told Sinn Féin the ball is in its court, threby handing the initiative to the IRA. Brilliant.

Mick Fealty @ 10:46 AM | Comments (0)

IRA walks off an empty pitch...
Interesting discussion of last night’s IRA statement on Morning Ireland this morning. Tommie Gorman implied that the IRA’s withdrawal of its offer was something of a political non sequitur, in that there had been no political table since all other players had long since resiled from any deal with them.

Update: Martin McGuinness is asked if this is just another twist in the IRA and Sinn Fein's negotiation tactics (sound file)?

One section towards the end of the (in IRA terms) longish statement seemed to imply a renewed attempt to address criminality within its ranks:

We will not betray the courage of the hunger strikers either by tolerating criminality within our own ranks or false allegations of criminality against our organisation by petty politicians motivated by selfish interests.

An interesting description of the Taoiseach! From what Slugger hears from growing sections of the Taoiseach's own party, the feeling is mutual. In the absence of any clear statement, speculation is likely to continue about the internal state of play within the Republican movement.

Mick Fealty @ 09:33 AM | Comments (11)

February 02, 2005

Toys Pram out of the throwing
Re-arrange the above words to make a well known saying - 'IRA's patience tried to the limit' - I'm sure there'll be more on this tomorrow.

pete baker @ 09:28 PM | Comments (82)

Sinn Fein knew of plans if not detail
We were fairly sure that this issue was going to be a bit of a slow burner. The two police chiefs told the Taoiseach today: a number of operations that took place during 2004 - not just the Northern Bank robbery - were the work of the IRA, had sanction from the Army Council and would have been known to the political leadership of the IRA".

Indeed the Irish Independent plausibly claims that the raid took up to two years in planning, and that it is inconceivable that the leadership of Sinn Fein were not aware of an operation on such a massive scale.

The report points to a number of key factors that underlines the view that the IRA is the only organisation, political or criminal, with the capacity to have organised such a raid:

"� The kidnapping of a bank official from the heart of republican west Belfast.

� The theft of an unusual type of van, required to "clone" a similar vehicle known to regularly cross the Border, from a compound in Gwent in Wales.

� The secrecy surrounding the heist which left the security sources without any prior hint.

� The subsequent disappearance of the money and the van".

Mick Fealty @ 08:35 PM | Comments (12)

End of a blog...
THE BBC'S News science and technology writer Ivan Noble has been keeping an online diary of his battle against a malignant brain tumour. Sunday was his last entry.

Belfast Gonzo @ 08:00 PM | Comments (2)

'Myopic liberals in shock'
Steven King returns from Canada (BTW Congratulations Steven) to the Belfast Telegraph (ah well) with reaction to the launch of what ATN obviously hope will be their new flagship title, Daily Ireland. - he notes the expensive colour adverts paid for by NIO Departments [though no PSNI ads.. yet], and wonders if it will be more successful than Eddie Shah's little-lamented Today newspaper.

His first impressions -

The layout is similar and the prejudices about America and Israel are the same but, while The Independent is occasionally a little too understanding of Sinn Fein, Belfast's newest morning tabloid is unashamedly republican.

Readers did not need to wade through the buzzwordy editorial to gather that: the adjoining cartoon said it all.

Tony Blair is depicted showing off a portrait of Gerry Adams, replete with devilish horns, to Bertie Ahern and Michael McDowell. The caption was "…and, obviously, framed by experts…"

You pay your 50p and you takes your choice. Daily Ireland is dark, dark green, a comment the publisher, former Sinn Fein councillor Mairtin O Muelloir, will take as a compliment.

He does, though, find some points to praise -

...leaving to one side the tiresome ethos of the paper, Daily Ireland has its strong points. Like the crossword. And the weather report.

I jest. Daily Ireland is cleanly executed, very strong on sport - there is even a page on disabled sport - and has a useful business page. There is lots of use of colour too, although some of the skin tones look a little green: a production problem, not some bias in the printing press, it would seem.

Before tackling the funding controversy -

Reportedly, there have been demands for grants of up to £3m.

And, yes, you heard it right – this is a paper called Daily Ireland seeking money from the very Government it wants out of Ireland.

Already, hundreds of thousands of pounds of taxpayers' money has been thrown at the Andersonstown News Group which counts the North Belfast News, South Belfast News and La, the Irish language paper, as well as Daily Ireland, among its titles.

Mairtin O Muelloir, himself no fool, obviously takes Her Majesty's Government for one. And, based on past experience, he is right to do so.

...

If Daily Ireland were wholly funded from private sources, there could be no objection. But Tony Blair is in a different category. His machinations here have already had the effect of encouraging the growth of political parties at the ends of the spectrum.

He has a suggestion for the next political/business venture though -

VAT-free Sinn Fein washing powder?

pete baker @ 03:02 PM | Comments (37)

Bertie talks tough.. again
Speaking in the Dail, Taoiseach Bertie Ahern has stated that "a number of operations that took place during 2004 - not just the Northern Bank robbery - were the work of the IRA, had sanction from the Army Council and would have been known to the political leadership of the IRA", citing the security assessment by Garda Commissioner Noel Conroy and PSNI Chief Constable Hugh Orde. However, as RTE reports, he also accepted that, "that meant that Sinn Féin had been negotiating in bad faith during that period". Having accepted that assessment, as Taoiseach, how long he can wait for those answers remains to be seen.

pete baker @ 01:59 PM | Comments (37)

Secret Report.
Stephen Dempster claimed an exclusive in the Newsletter where he reveals that Dermott Nesbit, under the Freedom of Information Act, has obtained a copy of a report which concluded that “that employment discrimination between Protestants and Catholics no longer exists.” While the report has an obvious political significance this story surely begs the question as to why such an important finding was kept secret ? Jobs Bias Is In The Past

Ambrose Uprichard @ 12:58 PM | Comments (8)

The Irish in Gallipoli
A memorial to honour Irishmen who fought in the British Army during WWI is to be unveiled Thursday at the National War Memorial Gardens in Islandbridge. The Ledwidge plaque will feature Francis Ledwidge's poem "The Irish in Gallipoli" and will remember the estimated 50,000 Irish soldiers who died in the Great War. Like many of his countrymen, Ledwidge volunteered even though he was a nationalist: “I joined the British Army because she stood between Ireland and an enemy common to our civilisation and I would not have her say that she defended us while we did nothing.”

He returned to Ireland during 1916 to recover from an injury and left disillusioned following the execution of the leaders of the Easter Rebellion. In May 1916 he became depressed: "if someone were to tell me now that the Germans were coming in over our back wall, I wouldn’t lift a finger to stop them. They could come!"

He returned to the front and died in Flanders in 1917.

'The Irish in Gallipoli'

Where Aegean cliffs with bristling menace front
The Threatening splendour of that isley sea
Lighted by Troy's last shadow, where the first
Hero kept watch and the last Mystery
Shook with dark thunder. Hark! The battle brunt!
A nation speaks, old Silences are burst.

'Tis not for lust of glory, no new throne
This thunder and this lightning of our power
Wakens up frantic echoes, not for these
Our Cross with England's mingle, to be blown
At Mammon's threshold. We but war when war
Serves Liberty and Keeps a world at peace.

Who said that such an emprise could be vain?
Were they not one with Christ, who fought and died?
Let Ireland weep: but not for sorrow, weep
That by her sons a land is sanctified
For Christ arisen, and angels once again
Come back, like exile birds, and watch their sleep.

France, 24 February 1917.

He also wrote a poem about his comrade Thomas MacDonagh, who was executed by the British for his part in the 1916 Rising.

Thomas MacDonagh

He shall not hear the bittern cry
In the wild sky, where he is lain,
Nor voices of the sweeter birds
Above the wailing of the rain.

Nor shall he know when loud March blows
Thro' slanting snows her fanfare shrill,
Blowing to flame the golden cup
Of many an upset daffodil.

But when the Dark Cow leaves the moor,
And pastures poor with greedy weeds,
Perhaps he'll hear her low at morn
Lifting her horn in pleasant meads.

Not forgetting Seamus Heaney's poem: In Memoriam Francis Ledwidge

The bronze soldier hitches a bronze cape
That crumples stiffly in imagined wind
No matter how the real winds buff and sweep
His sudden hunkering run, forever craned

Over Flanders. Helmet and haversack,
The gun's firm slope from butt to bayonet,
The loyal, fallen names on the embossed plaque --
It all meant little to the worried pet

I was in nineteen forty-six or seven,
Gripping my Aunt Mary by the hand
Along the Portstewart prom, then round the crescent
To thread the Castle Walk out to the strand.

The pilot from Coleraine sailed to the coal-boat.
Courting couples rose out of the scooped dunes.
A farmer stripped to his studs and shiny waistcoat
Rolled the trousers down on his timid shins.

At night when coloured bulbs strung out the sea-front
Country voices rose from a cliff-top shelter
With news of a great litter - "we'll pet the runt!" -
And barbed wire that had torn a friesian's elder.

Francis Ledwidge, you courted at the seaside
Beyond Drogheda one Sunday afternoon.
Literary, sweet-talking, countrified,
You pedalled out the leafy road from Slane

Where you belonged, among the dolorous
And lovely: the May altar of wild flowers,
Easter water sprinkled in outhouses,
Mass-rocks and hill-top raths and raftered byres.

I think of you in your Tommy's uniform,
A haunted Catholic face, pallid and brave,
Ghosting the trenches with a bloom of hawthorn
Or silence cored from a Boyne passage-grave.

It's summer, nineteen-fifteen. I see the girl
My aunt was then, herding on the long acre.
Behind a low bush in the Dardanelles
You suck stones to make your dry mouth water.

It's nineteen-seventeen. She still herds cows,
But a big strafe puts the candles out in Ypres:
'My soul is by the Boyne, cutting new meadows...
My country wears her confirmation dress.'

'To be called a British soldier while my country
has no place among nations...' You were rent
By shrapnel six weeks later. 'I am sorry
That party politics should divide our tents.'

In you, our dead enigma, all the strains
Criss-cross in useless equilibrium
And as the wind tunes through this vigilant bronze
I hear again the sure confusing drum

You followed from Boyne water tot he Balkans
But miss the twilit note your flute should sound.
You were not keyed or pitched like these true-blue ones
Though all of you consort now underground.

George Burns @ 10:54 AM | Comments (25)

February 01, 2005

Scoop ?
The Belfast Telegraph seems to have a scoop - in it's story SF MLA Ruane fined over road tax they have the missing men in, of all places, Cambodia.

Ambrose Uprichard @ 09:14 PM | Comments (12)

Robinson: Scrutiny role for MLAs...
PETER Robinson appears to back my prediction that the Government is heading down the road of a scrutiny or consultative role for the Assembly.

Robinson said:

"The DUP is also adamant that genuine democrats should not be penalised for what others have done.

"My clear impression from today`s meeting is that the Government is looking at interim measures which fall short of devolving powers.

"That could mean some role where the Assembly scrutinise and advise.

"You could have a legislative Assembly, where in the absence of the executive and in the absence of a partner, namely the SDLP, to exclude Sinn Fein, Northern Ireland Office ministers would bring legislation to the Assembly for approval and there would be some form of scrutiny.

"Assembly members would also be able to initiate legislation on their own."

Belfast Gonzo @ 06:08 PM | Comments (18)

IRA activity only barrier to power sharing
Taoiseach Bertie Ahern and British PM Tony Blair say the only thing now holding up power sharing in Northern Ireland is "the continuing paramilitary activity and criminal activity of the IRA". Meanwhile, The British government should consider giving the Northern Ireland Assembly a role which just falls short of full blown devolution, according to Democratic Unionist deputy leader Peter Robinson, who says the British government is considering interim measures for the Assembly.

From Breakingnews.ie

Taoiseach Bertie Ahern and British Prime Minister Tony Blair today warned the IRA that it must give up all criminal activity if there was to be any return of power sharing in Northern Ireland.

Following talks in Downing Street the two men said the IRA’s continuing criminal and paramilitary activity was the sole remaining obstacle to a peace settlement in the North.

Mr Blair and Mr Ahern were briefed by Northern Ireland Chief Constable Hugh Orde and Garda Commissioner Noel Conroy on the £26.5m (€38m) Northern Bank raid.

They said they accepted the conclusion of both police forces that it was the work of the Provisional IRA.

“The obstacle now to a lasting and durable settlement in Northern Ireland is the continuing paramilitary activity and criminal activity of the IRA,” Mr Blair said.

“It has got to stop. It has got to stop in its entirety. There cannot be any compromise with that.

“If it is given up the process can move forward on an inclusive basis.”

His words were echoed by Mr Ahern who told reporters in No 10: “The reality of the situation is that until we have got an end to criminality we cannot win the trust and confidence of the collective parties to move forward.”

Mr Blair acknowledged that the bank raid may have been the result of divisions within the republican movement.

However, he said Sinn Féin and the IRA were now alone in not accepting that there must be a commitment to exclusively peaceful and democratic means if the process was to move forward.

He said the unionist community now accepted the principle of power sharing with nationalists provided they abandoned criminality and paramilitary activities.

“There cannot be any going back on that,” he said.

Mr Blair said he hoped there would be a period of "hard and difficult reflection" by the republican leadership.

“There is almost a simplicity about the present situation,” he said.

“There is no way forward by compromise, fudge, ambiguity on this issue any more.

“There is only one way forward. Everybody gets on to the democratic bus and goes forward on that track or not.”

Mr Ahern added: “The questions are very clear. They are very simple. If they (republicans) are prepared to engage and are prepared to move forward we can get on but we need that response back from them.”

George Burns @ 05:38 PM | Comments (23)

Unanswered questions
The ever resourceful BBC have found out how much the Leeds Castle talks cost - £250,000 (the cost of security operation, described as one of the largest ever undertaken by Kent police, is not included). Just prior to those talks, though, Tony Blair said this - "This is the chance - there's no point in us carrying on, continually having these meetings unless that will exists, and we'll find out next week if it really does." Time to ask the question again, The elements are clear - the question is, is the will clear? [updated links]

pete baker @ 04:48 PM | Comments (0)

False claims of NI apartheid system?
Fintan O'Toole considers (subs needed) Gerry Adams' remarks on what he claimed to be the Apartheid like conditions suffered by Northern Irish Catholics before 1969.

He begins by laying out the premise:

This could be dismissed as waffle, but it is deadly serious. It has a point. The denial of basic political and social rights to the majority of the South African population was so complete that it forced the African National Congress into an armed struggle. What Gerry Adams wants us to conclude is that the same is true of the situation of Catholics north of the Border. They were left with no choice but to engage in extreme violence and thus the IRA's campaign was inevitable and justified.

He accepts there were problems:

There was a thick strain of outright bigotry in the unionist ruling class, underpinned by a popular culture of sectarianism. Professional and managerial jobs were filled almost entirely by Protestants. Catholics had the most insecure of footholds on the shipbuilding and engineering industries, and were subject to sporadic bouts of vicious intimidation.

But he goes on to point out that discrimination in South Africa was required by law. Indeed he points out that "the Government of Ireland Act, explicitly prohibited discrimination on religious grounds".

He goes on to look at other aspects of South African Apartheid:

Were Catholics and Protestants prohibited from having sex with or marrying one another as blacks and whites were in South Africa? No. Twenty-five per cent of marriages in the Catholic diocese of Down and Connor (which includes Belfast) in 1971 were mixed.

Were Catholics denied proper schooling? No. The British taxpayer funded schools controlled by the Catholic church and free second-level schooling was provided for Catholics 20 years before it arrived in the Republic.

Were Catholics prohibited from attending university, as blacks were in South Africa? No. Even in 1959, there were 700 Catholics at Queen's , and working-class Catholics in Northern Ireland had far better access to third-level colleges than their counterparts in the Republic.

In total, he finds the comparison demeaning to the sufferings of black South Africa:

Putting the suffering of Catholics in Northern Ireland on the same level as that of blacks in South Africa is a hideous insult to the victims of apartheid. But it is also an eloquent expression of a pathological mentality that continues to stymie the peace process.

Mick Fealty @ 12:26 PM | Comments (289)

Last day: get out and vote...
Help Slugger win a Satin Pajama - or maybe two! We are currently ahead in the Best Political Blog; very narrowly trailing the excellent Perfect.co.uk in the UK competition; and out of in the single region/country category.

Today is the last day - so if you want to do something to help boost Slugger's profile across Europe (yes, that includes all of you guys in Brussels too), then give us your votes now!

Mick Fealty @ 11:58 AM | Comments (11)

Daily Ireland launches...
The Andersonstown News Group launch Daily Ireland with a tidy new tabloid design modelled partially on the viewspaper style of the English Independent. The paper's is clear and unambiguous Republican in outlook will no doubt be articulatly expressed by columnists, who will include Danny Morrison, Tom McGurk and Jude Collins. Contrary to a remark by Seamus McKee on on Good Morning Ulster, there are no Unionist columnists on the paper.

The paper's inaugural editorial does however welcome a piece written on behalf of the non-political One Small Step Campaign by its chair Trevor Ringland. Ringland, who was puzzled by the radio claim, happens a member of the Ulster Unionist party. However, he told Slugger he had not been invited by the paper to write the piece in his capacity as a politician.

Mick Fealty @ 11:40 AM | Comments (32)

Trouble at Republican mill?
Barney Rowan believes that although there is trouble within the IRA it is not on the scale reported at the weekend. He spoke to one insider: "I would have heard. "I've heard nothing. (Are there) internal problems? Yes. Splits? No. People leaving? Yes. Anger? Yes."

Mick Fealty @ 11:28 AM | Comments (3)

What answers do you expect Bertie?
Despite Taiosech Bertie Ahern's previous assertion that the SF leadership knew in advance about the Northern Bank robbery, he has restated his view that if the two governments 'froze Sinn Féin out' it would be counter-productive, preferring instead to say that he is still waiting on "answers to the questions [on ending criminal activity] they had posed to Sinn Fein leaders last week." - still preferring the "more benign" explanation, Bertie?

pete baker @ 10:48 AM | Comments (0)

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