Lift the Siege of Gaza

Sept 28th 09
Lift the Siege of Gaza

The water front in Gaza City is very inviting. The blue waters are set against blue skies and high temperatures. In April, when I spent two days in the region meeting political leaders, business people, health workers and citizens, I watched as people walked along the beach, some jogged, children played and fishermen braved Israeli gunboats to fish in the waters off-shore.

But the gun boats are not the only danger in the waters off Gaza.

The Mediterranean Sea presents a grave health risk to the citizens of Gaza and of Israel.

Each day between 13 and 21 million gallons of raw sewage or partially treated waste are pumped into the Mediterranean because of the inability of Gaza treatment plants and storage pools to deal with the demands place don them.

The Israeli siege means that the parts essential for repairs to the sewage and water treatment plants are not available and work on an internationally funded multi-million dollar waste treatment plant for northern Gaza has halted.

So, raw sewage floods into the Mediterranean out of Gaza and some of it finds its way into Israeli waters.

A July report by the World Health Organisation on the quality of Gaza’s seawater reported that seawater samples collected from April to June were found to be polluted with faecal bacteria.

WHO has warned that no one should be swimming within 2,000 metres of any sewage discharge pipes but life for Gazans means that many children play in waters only metres from such pipes.

In addition fish caught in the contaminated waters is widely distributed and poses a serious threat to human health.

Last week the UN and the international agencies, whose Herculean efforts sustain the bare essentials for Gazans, appealed to Israel to relax the siege to allow parts in to Gaza to repair the water and sewage system.

There has been no positive response from Israel.

Moreover, the overall situation in Gaza continues to deteriorate with each day.

Six months ago, when a Sinn Fein delegation visited Gaza the extent of the devastation wrought by Israel’s siege and its military assault during last December and January, was everywhere around us in the empty shells of bombed buildings.

One and a half million people – the population of the north – are cramped into a land area the size of County Louth. One million are refugees and dependent on aid. 60% are under 25. High levels of poverty and chronic unemployment are endemic. There is infrequent access to water and power, with the UN saying that around 60% of the population receive water only occasionally. Thousands have no housing and live in tents or the rubble of bombed buildings.

Billions of dollars were pledged for a rebuilding programme. The Israeli government has blocked this. Construction materials are prevented from entering Gaza by the Israeli government.



A Bombed ice-cream factory in Gaza

Many schools and hospitals were destroyed or damaged in the Israeli attack and people are dying from curable and treatable diseases because essential live-saving equipment is prevented from going to Gaza.

Last month United Nations Relief and Works Agency – UNRWA - the UN agency with responsibility for looking after Palestinian refugees, launched its Gaza Ramadan Appeal for $181 million to provide food, job creation and help to repair homes, schools and health facilities.

But UNRWA knows that the problems faced by the people of Gaza requires more than money raised by appeals of this kind. In its statement UNRWA said:

‘A generous response to this appeal will immediately mitigate the downward spiral of destitution and hopelessness facing many refugees as Ramadan approaches. However, this destitution and hopelessness can, and will only be, curtailed by lifting the siege on Gaza, opening borders in both directions, and allowing the freedom of movement of people.’

Ramadan is now over but the humanitarian crisis in Gaza is not and will not be until the siege of that region by Israel is ended.



Me with the Aontroim team in the Falls Park last week as they trained for Sunday's game

Aontroim Abú!!!

On a completely different note readers will recall that last week this blog spent a very enjoyable Sunday at the All Ireland Football Final. This Sunday I successfully managed my schedule long enough to attend the Women’s Football Final.

I was especially looking forward to cheering on the Aontroim Women’s team.

Aontroim only began fielding teams in women’s football 6 years ago and in that time the sport has gone from strength to strength, with Aontroim winning the Ulster titles at all age groups.

On Sunday the team played its heart out and did Aontroim proud by becoming the All-Ireland champions.

Comhghairdeas to all concerned – the team, the management, the trainers and everyone who helped Aontroim achieve this.

Croke Park And All That

September 25th 09

Croke Park And All That.


I spent Sunday at the All Ireland Football Final. Regular readers will recall that I was also at the Hurling Final. So I am twice blessed by these experiences. My intention is to get to the Women’s Football Final next week as well. So I will be thrice blessed. Aontroim is in the Junior Final. That’s a brilliant achievement and I commend everyone involved. Very well done indeed to the players and management.

I missed out on the Camogie. My own fault. I was in Dublin that day and I was very tempted to steal away from the Lisbon referendum campaign. I am sorry to say I resisted that particular temptation and I am the lesser for it. Life is too hectic but that’s no excuse. I should have gone.

The football was mighty. Ard Mhacha Minors had a deserved victory. It wasn’t a great game. That’s not a complaint or a criticism. Merely an observation. I rarely criticise players. Unless they are indisciplined, dirty, unwilling to do their best or cynical they have my unconditional support and admiration.

So if the minor game was a bit flat that is because, in my humble opinion, both teams seemed to be overwhelmed by the occasion. And who could blame them for that? Certainly not this poor blogger. In the end Ard Mhacha won because at the end they lifted their game and overcame a brave Maigh Eo side. Fair play to them all.

Being in Croke Park on an All Ireland day is the only place to be. I always feel moved and humbled and lucky and privileged to get a ticket. I went first away back in 1960 when I was a wee lad. My uncle Paddy took me along with some of his pals. It was a great day out. It still is. An Dún won that year and all the way home we sang ‘The cups going over the border, the border, the border’. I didn’t even know what the border was. But it was the start of my love affair with Croker and Dublin.
Now there is a new stadium. It is a great sporting space. Modern and 21 century. But the passions are as old as Cú Chulainn.

The Hurling Final was a joy. The Cats were magic and Tipp were magnificent. The pace, movement, skills, emotion, drama and sheer unadulterated courage on display at that All Ireland is almost indescribable. Even thinking about it makes me want to cry. With pride. I am in awe of our hurlers.

Football is a different game. We used to joke that football was only to keep hurlers fit. But that’s not fair. Hurling is my first and undying love but football is a very fine game indeed. And so it was on Sunday. A lesson in tactics and skill. And courage and drama as well. It wasn’t that Corcaigh weren’t good enough. It’s just that Ciarraí were too good, too clever.

They wouldn’t let Corcaigh play in the second half. That’s why they have won thirty six All Irelands.

So it’s great to say I was there. The crowds, the banter, the noise. The colour, the atmosphere, the comradarie, the music. The fierce joy and patriotism and Irishness of it all.

Our Anna was with us this year. She is only eleven weeks old.
Like me she will never forget her first visit to Croker. Neither will her Daddy.

So see you there next week for the Women’s Football Final. Aontroim Abú!!!

Birds of a Feather

September 21st 09

Birds of a feather


‘Do you think many people nowadays know how to pluck a chicken?’

Your man does that sometimes. He just comes right out with a question and let’s it stand there naked, on its own, completely out of context and without any relationship whatsoever to the conversation up to this point. When pressed about this he says it’s because he has an active mind.

‘Do you think many people nowadays know how to plant a chicken?’

He gazed into the bottom of his glass as he waited for an answer and was unmoved when I chortled loudly.

‘What do you mean? Plant a chicken?’

‘I mean pluck a chicken. You know that. You should listen to what I mean; not to what I say’.

I emptied my glass slowly.

‘You always know a good pint of Guinness by the way the top goes right to the bottom of the glass’ I said, ‘Look at the rings’.

Your man looked at me for a long slow minute.

‘You can tell its age by counting rings’ he observed, ‘like a tree. And your pint is nearly as old. It’s your round. You’re a very slow drinker’.

He motioned to the barman to pull us another two pints.

‘Now’ he continued ‘about the chickens? I reckon that there are very few people nowadays able to pluck a chicken. In fact it may even be that there are people who don’t know that chickens need plucked. Most people only know chickens when they come served on a plate or when they see them naked and footless and headless and featherless, a little bundle of white flesh and bone on a supermarket shelf’.

Our pints arrived, black as night with their collars of yellow cream exact and as inviting as could be.

‘It seems a pity to spoil that by drinking it’ I said.

‘It’s as pretty as a picture’.

‘Slainte’. Your man said, gulping appreciatively at his pint.

I sipped gently at mine, trying hard not to destroy the collar.

‘The chickens’ he continued, ‘you haven’t answered my question about the plucking chickens’.

‘I don’t intend to’. I answered evenly. ‘How would I know how many people can pluck chickens?’

‘You cud guess! You cud enter into the spirit of things. This is a serious question. It’s about what we as a people have grown into. And your lack of response proves my point. You wud rather see how long you can stretch your pint. You don’t care any more about the important things’.

I considered that. Maybe he was right. But I couldn’t concede that. When it comes right down to it everything is relative. A good pint is important as well.

‘How many people cud pull a good pint of Guinness?,’ I challenged him, ‘Any sucker cud pluck a chicken’.

‘In the old days yes. We were more self sufficient then. Before the Celtic Tiger. Before the Troubles. Not now’. Your man said plaintively.

‘I don’t like the way people call it the Troubles’. I reflected, ‘It was more than that.’

Your man ignored me.

‘My granny kept chickens out in the backyard’, he continued. ‘In the coalhole’, he added.

‘What did they do with it?’ I asked.

‘They ate it. No sell by dates in them days. No best before …’

‘It cudnt’ve been very nice’. I mused. ‘All black and all’.

‘Your pints all black and all so it is and your delighted with it’. He looked at me angrily. ‘They washed the chicken’.

‘After plucking it of course’.

‘Of course’ he said.

‘In those days people knew how to do things like that. Nowadays even the farmers don’t have chickens. They don’t even grow spuds. We import cabbages and spuds. Imagine. In Ireland’.

‘Ninety per cent of the Ash wood used in hurling sticks comes from Poland’. I volunteered.

‘You’re having me on’, he said.

‘Nope’

‘Well then it’s worse than I thought’.

He looked at me tearfully and finished his pint.

‘Whose round is it?’ he asked.

‘Yours’ I said.

‘You sure?’

‘Yup’.

I placed my empty glass beside his.

‘You finished that very fast’, he said.

‘When I don’t keep up with you, you complain and when I do you complain as well’.

‘It’s the way you have me’, he shot back.

Two more pints arrived. We gazed at them contemplatively. After a long languid silence your man turned his gaze dolefully towards me.

‘How do you pluck a chicken?’ I asked him

‘Well …’ he said. ‘You ……………………..’

Delay on Transfer cannot go on indefinitely

September 17th 09



No to Lisbon in Cork

Delay on transfer cannot go on indefinitely

This blog spent Wednesday afternoon in Dublin and Leinster House. The government was unveiling its proposals to bail out its banking and developer friends. NAMA is the name of the game.

On Thursday I was in Cork. Preparations for a victory against Kerry’s footballer are well afoot, if a little premature.

It should be a thrilling encounter but no one knows – and that’s the great thing about it – no one knows if the kingdom or the rebel county will prevail.

I’m not fully recovered from the hurling final but all being well Sunday will see me in the Hogan Stand. The hurling was awesome.

The Lisbon Treaty is less so but that’s another story.

The response from people on the streets of Cork suggests many are still equally opposed to Lisbon. The referendum is only two weeks off so there’s a lot of work to be done.

While in Cork City me and Richard joined a picket of workers who have been treated shamefully by the Coca Cola company.

In a scenario similar to Visteon, 120 workers – some with 40 years service – have been sacked by company bosses who want to outsource the jobs at lower wages.

They are for the Labour Relations Commission on Friday. Even this was resisted by Coca Cola.

It’s bad enough that companies are paying off workers because of the recession – it’s a disgrace that a very profitable enterprise like Coca Cola is leading the race to the bottom.



Meeting Coca Cola Workers in Cork

Meantime the DUP is still footering about over how it will conduct itself in the Executive in the north. Elements in the party are still resisting equality for all citizens and partnership in government.

Martin McGuinness was in Downing Street this week trying to get the First Minister to honour his obligations, particularly on the issue of the transfer of policing and justice powers from London to Belfast.

The delay in the transfer of these powers cannot go on indefinitely. This is a crucial issue of concern for every citizen. It is not about creating another crisis.

It is about communities who are deeply anxious about public safety issues.

This is about families who want to be sure about safety in their homes, secure and safe in public places and who want to know that if they fall foul of criminals that they can have confidence that the perpetrators will be pursued and a transparent system of accountable justice is in place to deal with the perpetrators in a fair and just way.

We can’t have that while the British retain control of policing and justice powers.

We can only have that if there is a local Minister and all of the other mechanisms in place.

There is a real sense that this issue has gone on too long.

The DUP agreed a process with Sinn Féin. It was widely publicised at the time. I like to think that Peter Robinson is a man of integrity and I look to him to keep to the agreement he made.

The British government clearly has a responsibility to honour its obligations under the St. Andrew’s and other commitments which they gave in relation to financing and funding.

So this blog looks to Peter to do the right thing by the people he represents and by the wider society here in the north eastern part of the island.

He cannot allow party concerns around Jim Allister to hold up progress on this matter. Jim Allister lost the election. The vast majority of people voted overwhelmingly for partnership government.

There clearly are elements within the DUP who are not for partnership and equality. Sinn Féin has to be patient but there is also a need to be assertive and determined to ensure the implementation of all of these issues.

This can’t go on indefinitely. There has to be delivery. Republicans are not into setting up deadlines or worrying about who blinks first; this issue is more important than all of that.

It’s about people’s right’s rights. Just like the Lisbon Treaty debate or the need to campaign against NAMA.

There must be truth and equality for all victims

September 14th 09

There must be Truth and Equality for all Victims

The DUP brought forward a motion in the Assembly on Monday which asked the Assembly to “support the case being taken by the victims of IRA terrorism to claim compensation from the Libyan Government who supplied arms and semtex explosives to the IRA; and further calls on the UK government to apply diplomatic pressure on Libya to pay this compensation.”

Sinn Féin opposed the motion, and in the debate in the chamber we set out our reasons for doing so.

These are my remarks:

“Sinn Féin will be opposing this motion.

It is our view it is unfair and partisan.

Let me say for the record that Sinn Féin is not opposed to any victims campaign lobbying any government, anywhere in the world, for compensation.

Let me also say that I am mindful of the suffering of those families who lost loved ones or who were injured as a result of IRA actions.

I believe that it is part of the responsibility of republicans to acknowledge this and to do all that we can to build a better society for all the people of this island.

I also believe others need to do the same.

So it would have been better if the members putting this motion had consulted with the other parties to bring forward a motion which could unite us rather than divide us and which would have reflected the suffering of all victims.

This motion suggests that there is a hierarchy of victims. That is wrong.

The only way that political parties in particular and society in general can deal properly with all of these issues is on the basis of equality of treatment for all.

This motion falls therefore at this first and most important hurdle.

It is understandable that some victims and their families can be entirely focused upon those who are responsible for their loss.

That is their right.

But we who are in political leadership should be about representing all citizens and all victims.

Many of those who have suffered most are also among the most magnanimous and forgiving of our people.

We in this Assembly should follow their example.

This motion calls upon the British government to apply diplomatic pressure on Libya.

The movers of the motion must surely appreciate the inappropriateness the hypocrisy of any British government making or supporting such a demand of any other government given the London government’s long history of involvement in violence in Ireland.

This includes the killing of citizens from Derry to Ballymurphy, from Newry to the Shankill and on many other occasions.

It includes directing, arming, training, and providing information to unionist death squads which led to the deaths of citizens.

It includes numerous cover ups, including revelations recently about Loughlinisland.

Remember taxpayers money, what greater scandal, was used to finance all these killings.

Is this not a matter of concern for the DUP? Or the other parties here?

Let me give you one brief example.

In the summer of 1985, and with the full knowledge of British intelligence, a British agent Brian Nelson was sent to apartheid South Africa to get weapons.

To finance the trip the UDA, the UVF and Ulster Resistance – which was established by the DUP - carried out a bank robbery on the Northern Bank in Portadown, which netted £325,000.

This was then used to purchase a shipment of arms.

In the three years after the South African shipment arrived here unionist paramilitaries killed 224 citizens and wounded countless hundreds more.

So, while I understand why our friends in the DUP are moved to bring forward today’s motion, I put it to them that no unionist leader has ever acknowledged the role of the state or political unionism in formenting and sponsoring conflict in our country.

The rejection of the Eames-Bradley Commission’s proposal for a Recognition Payment is yet another example of this. And I was very disappointed to hear the member from Lagan Valley restate this today. His remarks reinforced the misguided notion that one set of families of victims can designated as unworthy or of some lesser value than any other set of families.

The issue of state killings and of collusion – which was an administrative practice and part of the British Government’s strategy –has to be dealt with.

That British government’s refusal to co-operate with inquiries, to hand over files, its suppression of reports from Stalker/Sampson to Stevens are all evidence of an unwillingness to end the cover-ups and to take responsibility for their actions.

Exorcising the role of the British state in promoting and prolonging conflict in our country, and in the killing of citizens, is in no one’s interest – especially the families – and should not be any part of the business of this Assembly.

So there are big challenges for us all if we are to deal properly with these issues.

I continue to hope that our unionist friends will rise to these challenges.

As for the SDLP?

That party’s refusal to sign a petition of concern today is yet another illustration of its short sightedness and lack of vision.

There is no NAMA for working families

September 14th 09

There is no NAMA for working families

The National (mar dhea) Assets Management Agency is the central plank of the Irish governments proposed strategy to tackle the economic crisis. It will be put to the Dáil in Leinster House on Wednesday.

Many people do not understand how it is supposed to work. So, I asked a friend of mine, Joanne, to explain NAMA –to me. This is what she said.

“Irish banks have a cash flow problem. During the boom, they lent out money to developers that they didn't really have. This money was credit on paper allowed by the European Central Bank. Now the developers can't pay it back because they can't sell the apartments, houses, offices or other developments they were building, or in some cases can't even finish their projects because the banks won’t lend them any more to continue work.

According to the government NAMA is about cleaning up the banks. It's being set up like a parallel bank. Banks can transfer over the loans they think won't be repaid, or are having trouble getting repaid, to NAMA. The Government hopes this will let the banks get back to normal, i.e. they will still have the interest on credit cards, mortgages and business loans coming in and they can use this money to start lending again.”

To this blog’s primitive mind this is another example of crony capitalism – with the taxpayer picking up the bill.

To use a basic example which Joanne offered up: Joe, the banker, has lent Mick, the developer, €200,000 to build a house that Mick wants to sell for a sizeable profit at €300,000.

Mick has built the house but can't sell it, and even if he could, he wouldn't get €300,000 for it because the housing market has collapsed. He'd be lucky if he got €100,000 for it.

So he can't pay Joe back.

Meantime, Mary has come to Joe and asked for a lend of €50.

Joe won’t lend Mary any money because he's waiting on his loan, with interest, back from Mick.

So Joe gives his buddy in NAMA a ring and asks NAMA will it take on Mick's loan and give the bank the €200,000 it lent to Mick, because at least then he'll have his original money back.

The sane thing for NAMA to do here is tell Joe that he and Mick took a mad gamble with that loan, given that house prices were on the verge of collapsing and that Mick should sell the house for what he can get and Joe should take what he can get.

Instead, NAMA says no problem - even though he's not sure Mick will ever pay him back. NAMA makes one condition. It won't give Joe the whole €200,000 because he knows houses will never sell for that much this year. But they might sell for a bit more in the future (yeah right), so he'll give Joe €180,000.

NAMA doesn't really care after all, because he’s using someone else’s money anyway; it's the taxpayers – stoopid!

NAMA says its interested in Mary getting the loan too. But both NAMA and Joe know that he’s not keen on lending Mary the loan because he just got stung by Mick and isn't sure he wants to take the risk again.

Unless NAMA promises to keep picking up the tab...

So, NAMA will help the bankers and the developers and ensure that they get most if not all of the money they speculated but with no guarantee that it will encourage the banks to lend money again.

In reality it’s another example of the government helping out its buddies.

So for those confused by it all, here’s eight reasons to say no to NAMA:

• Economists say NAMA will cost each man, woman and child in the state €15,000 (€60-€70 billion)
• The government has done nothing to help families and businesses facing reposession, negative equity and economic hardship. They have to pay their bills, while taxes are raised and public spending is cut. There is no NAMA for working families.
• NAMA pays more for developers’ loans than they are worth and lets them pay it back at their leisure.
• NAMA relies on banks to act in ‘good faith’ when giving information about the bad loans.
• The loans these developers were given inflated house prices - we’re being made to pay twice.
• NAMA will give taxpayers’ money to developers to finish projects and even force a purchase of land in the developers way.
• Finance Minister Brian Lenihan gets the power to overturn ‘independent’ valuation of developers’ loans made by NAMA and the power to pay more if he so decides.
• There is no guarantee that banks will lend even after NAMA clears their bank sheets.
What is to be done?

It will cost money to sort out the banks and the bad loans, but nationalisation would deal with the developers, kick out the corrupt management, get banks lending again, protect homeowners and businesses, and entail the least pain for the taxpayer. But that wouldn’t be crony capitalism would it? It would be fair.

World Suicide Prevention Day

A section of the large number of people who attended Thursday mornings rally at the City Hall

September 10 09 World Suicide Prevention Day

Thursday was a beautiful morning in Belfast. Families bereaved through suicide had organised a ‘Walk of the darkness’ event at Belfast City Hall to raise awareness around suicide and suicide prevention.

Family groups, supported by activists on this issue, walked from several locations across the city, including the Shankill, Springhill, and Stormont.

At the City Hall ballons were released, songs were sang and poems were read reflecting the pain of relatives and their hope that through their actions they can save lives. It was a moving and emotional event held as the darkness gave way to the dawn.

Bobby Cosgrove of Survivors of Suicide from east Belfast, whose son died 21 years ago, revealed that this summer, between the beginning of July and the middle of August 30 people had taken their own lives in Belfast.

Suicide has taken a heavy toll in Ireland, north and south.

Figures in the south reveal that 424 people took their own lives in 2008. New figures show that in the north 282 suicides occurred last year. West and North Belfast each recorded the highest numbers with 22 deaths from suicide in the west of the City and 20 deaths from suicide in the north.

This means that suicide claimed 706 lives in Ireland last year – more than were killed in road accidents.

The impact on families and communities is devastating. The reality is that all sections and all generations of our society our affected, from the very young to the very old, and in rural and urban areas.

These shocking figures do not reveal the complete extent of this problem. Thousands more are admitted to hospitals every year as a result of self-harm and many cases go unreported.

A recent report in the south disclosed that there were 11,700 cases of deliberate self-harm presented at Accident and Emergency departments last year, with the biggest increase among men.

Despite this less money and fewer resources are allocated to tackling this issue.

There has been some progress in the north in recent years following the re-establishment of the political institutions.

The Department of Health in Belfast announced in April that it has allocated £6.7 million in this financial year for the implementation of the Suicide Prevention Strategy ‘Protect Life – A Shared Vision’, including £3.5 million for the very successful Lifeline service.

While there has also been some progress in the south it is clear that suicide awareness and prevention is not receiving the priority it demands. The government spends 10 times more money on road safety measures despite the fact that more people die as a result of suicide. The Irish government has also failed to live up to its commitments to reinvest money raised from the sale of land housing psychiatric hospitals into mental health.

Earlier this year an Oireachtas sub-committee report on this issue revealed that only 7 out of 33 recommendations it had made three years ago had been implemented.

What progress has been achieved is largely as a result of the unwavering determination of the bereaved families to highlight this issue and to demand change. Their strength in the face of this awful hurt is remarkable. They have been to the fore in helping others. They deserve not only our respect and praise; they deserve practical assistance and public investment.

They have been responsible for the establishment of a range of voluntary based organisations which have undoubtedly saved many lives.

They provide support for bereaved families, tackle the stigma of suicide which still exists, and have created safe and empathetic environments where those at risk can find help.

While suicide is now better understood than before, and it is accepted that suicide victims and survivors should be treated with compassion and care, the fact remains that only a tiny proportion of the budgets north and south are devoted to mental health.

Mental Health remains the Cinderella of the health services. And mental health treatment and services, especially those which are community-based, are still not taken seriously. This needs to be rectified.



Sinn Féin Councillor Charlene O Hara; Jennifer McCann MLA; Gerry Adams MP and Councillor Fre McCann MLA who attended Thursday mornings City Hall rally.

British stance hypocritical

September 7th 09

British stance hypocritical

The demand for compensation from the Libyan government for victims of IRA actions, in which it is claimed Libyan armaments were used, and the British government’s role in this, is the cause of some controversy. Interestingly little of this controversy has focused on the inappropriateness of any British government making or supporting such a demand of any other government, given Downing Street’s war crimes in Ireland.

I would certainly support compensation for all victims. This has to include the victims of British state violence and collusion.

On Monday morning I spoke to Downing Street and to the British Secretary of State Shaun Woodward about this. I told them there could be no hierarchy of victims; that all victims deserve compensation and that Mr. Brown’s position is totally inconsistent.

No one should be surprised by the hypocritical stance of successive British governments on this issue.

The role of the British state in killing citizens in Ireland in recent times is well documented.

Apart from killings by state forces British intelligence agencies also armed unionist paramilitaries, including Ulster Resistance, which was established by the DUP, and provided the information which led to countless deaths.

All of this was part of a British government directed strategy which has its roots in British involvement in other conflicts. The tactics employed in collusion were drawn from decades of British experience in fighting colonial wars elsewhere.

But it was the writings and work of Brigadier (later General Sir) Frank Kitson which refined its use in Ireland. Kitson was the British Army’s foremost expert on counter-insurgency.

He rationalised the use of the corruption of justice: ‘Everything done by a government and its agents in combating insurgency must be legitimate. But this does not mean that the government must work within exactly the same set of laws during an emergency as existed beforehand.’

In the early 1970’s the British killed Catholics and Protestants and carried out actions, including bombings, using surrogate groups.

The UDA, which remained a legal organisation for almost 20 years, and the UVF, carried out a campaign of killings against Catholics. They were supplied with information by the British intelligence agencies, including files, photographs and details of cars and movements.

One of the first people to be recruited by British intelligence was loyalist Brian Nelson a former British soldier. Two years later he was appointed the UDA’s Intelligence Officer in its West Belfast Brigade. Later in 1987 he became the UDA Senior Intelligence Officer. British intelligence helped him to update his intelligence files.

Nelson’s house and car were paid for by the British and he was given £200 a week expenses.

In the summer of 1985 Nelson was sent to apartheid South Africa.to get weapons.

To finance the trip the UDA, UVF and Ulster Resistance carried out a bank robbery on the Northern Bank in Portadown, which netted £325,000 which was then used to purchase a shipment of arms. It consisted of 200 AK47 automatic rifles, 90 Browning pistols, 500 fragmentation grenades, ammunition and 12 RPG rocket launchers.

Dick Wright, an agent for the South African arms manufacturer Armscor, offered armaments in return for missile parts or plans obtained from the huge military production plant at Shorts in East Belfast.

In October 1988 a model of the Javelin missile system was stolen from Shorts and a few months later a Blowpipe missile went missing.

In April 1989 three members of Ulster Resistance, Noel Little, James King and Samuel Quinn were arrested in Paris during a meeting with a South African Diplomat and an arms dealer.

In the three years after the South African shipment unionist paramilitaries killed 224 citizens and wounded countless scores more.

One of these was Pat Finucane, a human rights lawyer who was shot dead in February 1989 at his home in north Belfast.

In dealing with the issues of truth and victims all of these matters must be open to scrutiny. This blog has no problem with campaigns for governments to pay compensation. But that has to include the British government. Gordon Brown’s position is totally inconsistent but this is in keeping with London’s longstanding game playing on this important matter.

Another example of this is to be found in Shaun Woodward’s recent dismissal of the Eames/Bradley Commission proposal for an acknowledgement payment to all victims.

The fact is the British government is a player in all of these issues. It was one of the combatant forces in the conflict and is not and cannot be, or pretend to be, an objective or neutral referee.

Its position and Gordon Brown and Shaun Woodward’s stance flows from this reality.

Message in a Book.

4ú MEÁN FÓMHAIR. 2009.

MESSAGE IN A BOOK.


Regular readers will recall that in May I wrote about Big Marshall 'Mick' Mooney. Big Mick had just died of cancer. He and I shared many fine experiences and none more memorable than one of my doomed efforts, to escape from internment in Long Kesh on Christmas Eve 1973.

There were four of us on this occasion, myself, Big Mick, Toddler and Marty and we ended up in court before Diplock Judge Kelly. We had, among other things, the distinction of being on remand and interned and soon to be sentenced prisoners all at the one time.

I decided, as we sat in the dock at Belfast Court House and as Mr. Kelly was telling us what bad people we were for daring to try to escape from an internment camp in which we were being held without charge or trial or due process, to write a little note to another old comrade Dickie Glen' who was interned at the time.

I had a book which I was going to give him as a going away present and I scribbled in the flyleaf : “Dickie, I don’t know what the date is but Toddler, Mick and Martin are to my right, the Judge is to my front and I am on my behind. He is about to give us three years each and he looks very serious. I don’t think he likes me writing like this while he is summing up. Yahoo only eighteen months each. Yahoo, Yahoo!! Todller is crying his eyes out, Mick is thanking the Judge (a Mr. Kelly). Martin’s staunch. It’s time to go again back thru’ the Crum. Be good. Me”

And then it was back through the tunnel between Crumlin Road courthouse and on to Long Kesh where I found myself in Cage 11 along with Marshall, Toddler and other sentenced Republican prisoners.

The book was forgotten about. I don't know if Dickie ever got it and he, being in his dotage, can't recall either. The book was Peter McInerney’s biography of Peadar O Donnell, ‘Irish Social Rebel’ But the story doesn’t end there. Recently, I received from Louise Ferguson, wife of the late Mickey Ferguson MLA a photocopy of the inside cover of the book and the message I scribbled in late 1974.

Where was it all of these years? How did she get it? The intrepid RG set out to investigate.

It turns out that Patricia O Doherty, a friend of Mickey's, had the book in her home in Carrickmacross in County Monaghan.

Michael and Patricia’s husband Cahir had both been in the sentenced cages in the 1970’s. Patricia was regularly asked, like many other relatives, to bring books and magazines up on visits for the prisoners.

Previously, on another visit an over zealous and arrogant screw had challenged her after he discovered that one of the books she was sending in was a library book. She was taken into a side office and shouted at, at some length by this guardian of our library system.

Subsequently, Patricia carefully checked books to avoid repeating that experience. On this occasion when she was taking books in for Mickey they included the Peadar O Donnell one. She opened it and read my note. She didn’t know who it was for or who had written it and for a time she considered tearing it out and sending the book on into the prison. But she didn’t. She put the book to the side.

Patricia meant to show it to Michael Ferguson when he and Cahir were released but she never did. But when Mickey died she showed it to Louise. They figured out the note was mine and then sent a photocopy of it for me. I gave a belated copy to Dickie who had patently waited for 35 years for a note he never knew had been written to him.

So there you are.

As your man keeps telling me, its a funny old world. Incidently the drawing of Peadar O Donnell is not mine. It was part of the original publication. You will also have noted by now that I didn't get the book back. Neither did Dickie.

Ah so......

BACK TO PORRIDGE

31 Lunasa 2009.

Back to Porridge.

Children are back to school this week. Most of them anyway. Cynics tell me that usually makes for better weather. By that they mean drier weather.

‘Kids locked up in their classrooms and the sun is splitting the trees. That’s always the way of it!’

This blog wouldn’t count on that, not this year at any rate. But anyway wet or dry, windy or warm, isn’t it great that we are able to complain about it. I met a man once, an Irish man, not long after he was released from a long term of imprisonment in a French jail.

‘What was the main difference between gaol there and gaol in Ireland?’ I asked him.

‘Nobody complained about the weather’ he replied.

Your man never complains about the weather either. He probably has French blood. But then according to him, it never rains in pubs. And as he often observes, we are far better off than decenter people. Yahoooo!

So as the summer draws to a close there are lots of good things to look forward to. Kilkenny and Tipp in the Hurling Final. Will the Cats make it four in a row? And Corcaigh and Ciarrai in the football. Will the Kingdom win through again or will Corcaigh do to them what they did to Tír Éoghan?

The Lisbon Treaty referendum? Now there’s a thing. The losers get to call a replay? Same as they did on the Nice Treaty. This treaty is no different, not even a comma of a change, from the one the electorate rejected last time around. But the establishment never accepted that result. So in the hope that they can mount a better campaign this time the Yes camp get to have another go. Wouldn’t it be great if it was like this all the time? As the graffiti down the Falls Road in 1969 asserted ‘F… 1690. We want a replay.’

Ah so…....Politics is a funny old business. Funny peculiar. Labour and Fine Gael agree with the government on Lisbon. It’s a good deal they say. This blog cannot figure that out. Both these parties, and here I agree with them, protest that this is the government which has made a mess of every other deal. But miraculously and totally contrary to their record on every other issue they say the government got it right on Lisbon. Nonsense!

There is also a budget coming up. The target is obvious. It’s the least well off and the most disadvantaged. And that includes the half a million people who will be on the dole by Christmas. The McCarthy Report is designed to give the government political cover for further widespread cuts to public services. If the establishment has its way the social landscape will be transformed. For the worse. A bad government in Dublin rewarding its cronies in the financial institutions while targeting everyone else.

That’s what NAMA is about. It is about protecting the golden circle. Even before NAMA the state guaranteed the banks to the tune of 440 billion euros. Crony capitalism how are ye? All needs changed, changed utterly.

And the north? Choices to be made there also. Not just on the economy but on all the outstanding elements of the Good Friday and Saint Andrews Agreement. So there is a lot to be done in the autumn. On all fronts and across the island.

Looks like its back to porridge in more ways than one.

But this blog likes porridge. I have been eating muesli for the few months of summer. Made my own to start with and then graduated to supermarket brands. Funny old thing I ran out off it this morning. But there was a packet of oatmeal at the back of the cupboard. So it will be porridge again in the morning. Just what this blog needs to get through a winter of discontent.