SAOIRSE32

IrishExaminer.com

More children show photos on net

28 December 2004
By Louise Hogan

MORE Irish children are displaying their photographs on the internet which can lead to strangers discovering their location, an expert has warned.
Rachel O’Connell of the University of Central Lancashire said children needed to use more “critical reasoning” when considering giving anyone their picture or passing out contact details.

Ms O’Connell, who is working on a new internet site websafecrackers.com to ensure children form a more “critical reasoning” when using technology, said the latest development involved children uploading pictures onto the internet from their mobile phones.

“It is going to become a much bigger issue as the ease with which people can send photos from their phones to immediately be published on the net carries a risk,” said Ms O’Connell, who also worked to establish world-renowned Irish database COPINE to help identify children in abuse pictures on the internet. The concern about cyber stalking and online grooming by paedophiles has grown rapidly with the onslaught of the internet and mobile phone technologies.

Ms O’Connell, who is the director of the Cyberspace Research Unit at the university, said there had been a strong safety campaign in Britain, and similarly in Ireland, emphasising the dangers of giving out personal information like phone numbers.

The website consultant said that out of a group of 11-year-old children surveyed this year, there was a decline in the number of children giving out their personal information.

“However, there was an increase of around 6% reported in children giving out their photos. A key message to get across is that a photo is like an identity; if you can see the picture, you can see the kid,” she said, with many children receive camera phones for Christmas.

“For example they may unwittingly be giving out location information when they send a photograph of yourself and a friend, as a bus might be passing and it might say an area, or there might be a street name.”

She warned that adults with a sexual interest in children can look at the portfolios for chat rooms, that often contain pictures, to judge if they might want to contact them.

Ms O’Connell, who is working on the website project with Microsoft, said young adults need to consider who is receiving the picture and what kind of information it contains. “It is not only users out there with really bad intent. People can take a picture, modify it so the person has a big nose, and use it to bully. We need to make sure they are aware of such an issue and what can be implemented to measure the risk.”

Young people adapted quickly to new technologies, such as bluetooth which allows people pass information via mobiles over short distances.

“The whole ethos of websafecrackers is to educate and increase the critical reasoning scenario of children,” said Ms O’Connell.

IrishExaminer.com

Christmas in prison for youth with brain damage

28 December 2004
By Jim Morahan

A BRAIN-DAMAGED teenager is spending Christmas behind prison bars because there is no other place for him.
The 18-year-old with a history of heroin abuse has been before the High Court 32 times.

The plight of the boy - called John to protect his identity - highlights the failure here to provide specialised units for such severely disturbed young people.

Campaigning Jesuit priest Fr Peter McVerry has described the case as “absolutely appalling” and said it highlighted the lack of adolescent psychiatric facilities in Ireland.

From Dublin’s inner city, the teenager is being held in Cloverhill Prison in relation to assault charges.

The boy has suicidal tendencies and is incapable of independent living. Attempts to house him in an apartment with a care worker’s support had to be abandoned.

His solicitor, Sarah Molloy, said a place in a therapeutic centre in England had been identified “which will be best able to meet his needs”.

Ms Molloy said she had written to the health board asking them whether they would fund the placement in England.

“I believe it’s the only place that can cater for his needs, because it has an element of security as well as therapeutic care,” she said.

Ms Molloy said she had also written to the TDs in the boy’s constituency; Tánaiste Mary Harney as Health Minister, Junior Health Minister Brian Lenihan and Justice Minister Michael McDowell.

Earlier last year Mr Lenihan promised in the Dáil that support for John would be ongoing irrespective of his age.

Social workers have been involved with John since he was a baby. The second of six siblings in a single parent family, he grew up in a three-bedroomed flat in the inner city.

His mother, who had a history of depression and alcohol abuse, could not cope and the children were taken into care.

John first began to display difficult and disturbing behaviour when he was five years old.

At a young age he became suddenly and inexplicably violent. His parents discovered he had been sexually abused by a relative.

On the night of October 3, 2000, John sustained serious brain injuries when he was a front seat passenger in a stolen car that crashed. Since then, he has been under constant watch after repeated attempts to kill himself as a result of anxiety over being jailed.

online.ie

SF to mark centenary with recruitment drive

online.ie
2004-12-28 09:50:02+00

Sinn Féin will use centenary celebrations next year to embark on a major recruitment drive on both sides of the border, it emerged today.

The party is planning rallies, concerts, exhibitions and leadership tours across Ireland throughout 2005 as well as events in Britain, Europe, Australia and other parts of the world.

South Down Assembly member Caitríona Ruane, a member of the party committee responsible for the celebrations, said: “This is a huge undertaking for us.

“The last six months have been spent preparing for the centenary celebrations.

“A programme will be launched in January which will include events like a special women’s conference in Newry in February and a massive centenary celebration in Dublin’s City West Hotel which holds around 2,500 people.

“There will also be concerts featuring major artistes and events on a local level such as leadership tours, exhibitions and a series of murals throughout the 32 counties.

“We are organising events in England, Scotland and Wales. Gerry Adams is going to take part in an event in Europe and we are also planning events in the Middle East, Latin America and Africa.

“The ard fheis in March will be different to any of those we have had before. There will also be events in colleges and universities and the centenary will be the platform for a recruitment drive.”

Sinn Féin was founded in 1905 by Arthur Griffith.

However, after the 1916 Easter Rising in Dublin and the execution of republican rebel leaders, the party reorganised and grew in electoral strength under the leadership of Eamon de Valera and Michael Collins while the IRA engaged in guerilla warfare.

After partition, Sinn Féin focused on getting rid of the border and on reunification.

During the Troubles, the party split in 1970 over the issue of whether parliaments in Belfast and Dublin should be recognised by its members.

Opponents of the move walked out and formed their own organisation, Provisional Sinn Féin, in Dublin, with the Provisional IRA also emerging.

Those who remained formed the Official IRA and Official Sinn Féin which later mutated into the Workers’ Party which split in 1992.

In 1986, Provisional Sinn Féin suffered its own split at a conference in Dublin, with Ruairí Ó Brádaigh leading a faction out of the party after a majority of delegates backed a proposal that the party should sit in the Dáil if it won seats.

Mr Ó Brádaigh and his supporters formed Republican Sinn Féin.

Since the 1994 and 1997 IRA ceasefires, Sinn Féin has become the largest nationalist party in Northern Ireland, has taken seats in a Stormont Assembly and served in a power-sharing executive with unionists between 1999 and 2002.

The party has also grown significantly in the Irish Republic.

Sinn Féin now has two MEPs (one on either side of the border), 232 councillors throughout Ireland, 24 members of the Stormont Assembly, five TDs in the Dáil and four MPs.

Ms Ruane, a former director of the West Belfast Festival, said: “Our celebrations in 2005 will reflect how Sinn Féin has become the fastest-growing party in Ireland.

“We will involve activists across all layers of the party as well as others outside the party.

“Our centenary celebrations will focus on issues of huge importance to Ireland’s future such as equality, human rights and ethnic minorities.”

online.ie

Foreign Affairs Department: No Irish casualties confirmed

online.ie
2004-12-28 17:40:03+00

The Department of Foreign Affairs says it has no confirmation that any Irish people died in this week’s disaster.

The devastation caused by the tsunami in Asia is being described as hell on Earth.

Thousands of bodies are piling-up in countries on both sides of the Indian Ocean - some reports are now putting the death toll as high as fifty-thousand.

Seventeen Britons are among those killed.

A spokesperson says however that at least ten Irish people needed medical attention for injuries sustained when the tidal waves struck the region two days ago.

There is also concern about two Irish women in Southern Thailand who are missing. Thailand is among the worst affected nations.

A helpline number is still in place for those concerned about the whereabouts of family or friends in the regions.

It is (01) 408 2308.

Sunday Life

Real IRA to step up attacks

27 December 2004

THE Real IRA claims it is “braced as never before” to unleash a New Year campaign of terror.

The dissident republican group has attempted to justify its current firebombing campaign, with a warning that it is ready to step up the violence.

The group has been busily re-grouping and re-organising in south Down, Derry and Belfast - leading to firebomb attacks in the past week in Newry, Londonderry, Newtownabbey, Lisburn and Ballymena.

A spokesman for one of the most active Real IRA cells, based in south Down, said the attacks on shops are not intended to be attacks on the community “but on the North’s false economy and normalisation process”.

He said: “You can be sure of one thing - these attacks will continue.

“There appears to be a deliberate police policy of playing down our involvement in these attacks on the stores - despite the fact we have clearly claimed them using a codeword recognised by the media.

“Everyone should be aware that we are braced as never before to prevent the sell-out of our republican ideals of a united Ireland.”

The terror group claims its ranks are being swollen by mainstream republicans, disaffected by the terms of the deal, which the British and Irish governments were brokering with the DUP and Sinn Fein.

The Real IRA has refused to confirm it actively targeted a police officer in the mid-Down area who, according to security sources, was forced to leave his home, when the plot to kill him was exposed.

slnews@belfasttelegraph.co.uk

BBC

Incendiary device found in store

27 December 2004

Police in County Down have advised business key holders in Newry to thoroughly check their premises.

It follows the discovery of an incendiary-type device in a sports shop on Monday.

The device was discovered shortly after 1700 GMT in the pocket of a garment in the premises at the Old Creamery Retail Park at Monaghan Street.

Police evacuated people from the premises and Army technical experts were sent to the scene.

It follows a wave of fire bombings which have destroyed several businesses across Northern Ireland.

Dissident republicans have been linked to the latest wave of fire bombings.

Devices have been discovered in Lisburn, Newry, Antrim, Derry, Newtownabbey and Ballymena.