Gerry Adams’ ‘delinquent’ story on the Cahill case?

UPDATED Alleged ‘abuse’ victim Maíria Cahill took to Twitter to reject a statement issued by Gerry Adams via the Sinn Féin website. Adams was reacting to allegations made on BBC Northern Ireland’s Spotlight: In his statement Adams said: In the Spotlight programme, broadcast last night, Mairia Cahill made an accusation relating to a meeting with myself. I totally refute the allegations Mairia made about our conversation. I met Mairia in good faith, at the behest of her cousin and my …

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Jonathan Powell: The Lessons of Northern Ireland

Following the launch of his new book ‘Talking to Terrorists,” former Chief of Staff to Prime Minister, Tony Blair, Jonathan Powell, writes exclusively for Slugger about the lessions he learned from his time working on the Northern Ireland peace process The Northern Ireland negotiations were the most difficult and frustrating challenge I faced in my life, but also, at least in retrospect, my most important and satisfying achievement. Since leaving government I have set up an NGO, Inter Mediate, to …

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UPDATED: Spotlight investigation to explore republican treatment of ‘abuse’ victim

BBC NI’s Spotlight programme tonight investigates the republican movement’s handling of sexual abuse allegations against a suspected IRA member. Maíria Cahill has waived her right to anonymity to tell how the republican movement responded to her allegations by first investigating them, then burying them and imposing a code of silence to protect the movement. She is from one of the republican movement’s most famous families. Her great uncle was Joe Cahill, one of the founders of the Provisional IRA and …

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UPDATED: Victim claims IRA and Sinn Fein members assigned to deal with her rape allegations internally

And on Tuesday night Spotlight according to today’s Sunday Independent is on a controversial case of a young woman who makes specific allegations against a named member of the IRA. According to the report a case was prepared against the man concerned but he was acquitted when seemingly at the last minute no evidence was offered at his trial. We’ll have to watch the programme for the actual detail, but the matter is already a subject of some political controversy: Last year, after the jailing of Gerry Adams’ brother …

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Derrylin to host hunger strike commemoration

The 2014 National Hunger Strike Commemoration has been announced to be in Derrylin Co. Fermanagh this year complete with buses to the event. Diane Woods the niece of local IRA murder victims Thomas and Emily Bullock told the Belfast Telegraph she felt sick at the prospect. From the Belfast Telegraph: A gang of up to six masked men carried out the brutal attack on Mr and Mrs Bullock. They arrived at the isolated farmhouse in Aghalane just outside Derrylin at …

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QUB Student’s Union show signs of “Old Guard” mentality

Queen’s University Students’ Union from the 1970s until at least the mid 1990s suffered from extremely divided student politics. It even reached the stage that the Northern Bank was excluded from Freshers’ Fair; whilst assorted IRA members were made honorary life members and a number of members of the executive went on after graduation to gaol for IRA terrorist offences.(one popped back up again recently as a Deputy Headteacher) Bizarrely they also voted to ban Nestle products from the Students’ …

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Victims of Gadaffi’s arms imports to the IRA shouldn’t get their hopes up

This is one of the most acute problems of Northern Ireland today- politicians raising hopes for victims that stand little or no chance of being fulfilled. As an anti-cynic I’m prepared to believe that David Cameron’s meeting with a DUP delegation over reviving compensation claims against Libya disclosed in the Sunday Telegraph wasn’t just a clumsy diversion effort from the Adams arrest (wrong constituency and timing ).At least it got Peter Robinson into Downing St, a rare occurrence these days.   It reads like …

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Did the ‘UDA Night’ at Sandy Row spark the “IRA Night” in Whiterock?

After no some little searching, here’s the only reference I can find to the UDA event at Sandy Row Community Centre in An Phoblacht. Interestingly it carries a quote from a Sinn Fein councillor: Laganbank Sinn Féin Councillor Deirdre Hargey has called for a full investigation into the incident. She also noted that as a council building it is open to all sections of the community and being associated with such incidents will only keep people away. Mark Moloney notes… A …

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Reliance on the Boston tapes would be a long term mistake

I have no particular sympathy for this frail 77 year old grandfather. There may indeed be short term gains in bringing the case to court. The reliability of the Boston tapes as evidence will be tested. Will corroboration in any form be produced? If the tapes are regarded as sufficient in this case what are the implications of the others referred to, including Gerry Adams? Like lots  of other people I have copious extracts from the tapes and an account …

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Bell’s arrest may put new pressure on Adams and produce new cracks in omerta

The arrest  of Ivor  Bell in connection with the murder and disappearance of Jean McConville  is  I’m sure already releasing a  flood of speculation about new pressure on Gerry Adams and is perhaps the  most dramatic sign yet of a final  breach  between Sinn Fein and old comrades who are opposed to their current political strategy. The timing and the IRA status of the arrested man are all significant but it will take time for the exact significance to become …

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Rationale for the #ShinnersList: “Preferential treatment of IRA men regarding their potential criminal liability…”

On Facebook yesterday, I saw a query from an old schoolfriend (from P1, as it happens). He’s about as apolitical it is possible to be, but his curiosity was clearly piqued and he asked a question about how on earth the NIO managed to get all those letters out to the OTRs. The answer as we now know was via Sinn Fein. We’ll have to await the outcome of the Review to see just how rigorous the processes were. But …

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Hyde Park bombing suspect will not be prosecuted

The BBC are reporting that John Downey who was arrested and charged with killing four soldiers in the 1982 IRA Hyde Park bombing will not be prosecuted because he was given a guarantee he would not face trial. Downey was arrested in 2013 at Gatwick whilst en route to Greece. From the BBC: ..over the course of legal argument, he asked the Old Bailey to halt the prosecution – saying he had received a clear written assurance from the government …

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#Smithwick: are we back full circle to an untested allegation of ‘collusion’?

So, have the Buchanan and Breen families got any closer to the truth about how their loved ones died on 20th March 1989? After lengthy hearings in front of Judge Peter Smithwick, the substantial report yesterday included a full account of the IRA operation in which they died, supplied by the IRA itself (see pages 398-411). This included that they knew from surveillance that the car driven by the two RUC men was used by senior officers liaising with Dundalk, …

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Conviction of John Proctor’s murderer eloquent riposte to John Larkin’s proposals

Two weeks ago to almost universal revulsion Attorney General John Larkin proposed an effective amnesty for the crimes of the Troubles. Now the legal process has provided the most eloquent rebuttal to his suggestions. The facts of the murder of RUC reservist John Proctor were as loathsome as so many of the Troubles. Mr. Proctor had just left visiting his wife and newborn son in the Mid Ulster Hospital when he was murdered with an assault rifle by Seamus Martin …

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Henry Patterson on ‘Could Dublin have done more to stop the IRA’

Professor Henry Patterson had this interesting article in the Irish Times on Friday about the Irish government’s failure to tackle the Provisional IRA from 1970 onwards. Here I must declare an interest, Henry Patterson is my supervisor, but this is something I have written about myself. Patterson has recently written a book on this subject called Ireland’s Violent Frontier which looks at the border security policies of the British and Irish governments during the Troubles. In his book and in …

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Collusion: Whitey Bulger and the FBI’s international trade off for domestic information

Fascinating piece by Ed Moloney on Whitey Bulger, an Irish Boston gangster who was ‘turned’ by the FBI relatively early in his long career of domestic crime, was later allowed a little international sideline: In 1975, Bulger agreed to become an FBI informer and was largely left alone by the authorities, who were mostly interested in what he knew about rival Mafia gangs. In 1994, his FBI handler tipped him off about an impending indictment and he fled Boston. For …

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Caption Competition

Let’s see the captions! Brian SpencerBrian is a writer, artist, political cartoonist and legal blogger. Actively tweeting from @brianjohnspencr. More information here: http://www.brianjohnspencer.com/ www.brianjohnspencer.com/

An English Guinness?

This time of year is always interesting for the release of state papers under the thirty year rule. The release of these papers bring fresh light on a period of our past and often reveal tensions we thought were there as well as unearthing stories we didn’t even expect.The one story that struck me and made the front page of the Newsletter was the fact that the Guinness family considered moving the brand from Dublin to their English base. The …

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Finucane allegations – put up or shut up

  Ruth Dudley Edwards, quoted approvingly in the News Letter, has exposed the posthumous indictment of Pat Finucane in the Daily Telegraph that deeply offends the family and repels more than supporters of a public inquiry.  It’s important to say that the Prime Minister accepted the findings of the de Silva report following Stevens, that he was not a member of the IRA. I post her article because it is a valid part of public discourse however unpalatable to many …

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A new IRA emerges lashed together from the wreckage of the old…

The big news of the weekend? The convergence of a wide range of republican paramilitary groups into a new one called, erm, the IRA… So it hasn’t gone away you know… That’s the PR of it anyway. I suppose one might be tempted to say that it took them long enough to decide that the current spilts were killing any ‘credibility’ they might have had at representing a coherent idea never mind anything else. What it proves is that you …

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