by Henk Ruyssenaars - Foreign Press Foundation
Sunday, Jul 3 2005, 6:27pm
fpf@chello.nl
They are the problem, not a part of the solution.
Urging the G8 leaders to do more to help Africa, is like begging the same people for mercy who represent the inhuman systems. And nothing was said aloud about the origins of poverty, stopping the illegal wars or the taking of the African oil: again cheating Africa out of trillions.
03 July 2005 19:54
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Up to 1,000 people from north Mayo have protested in Castlebar over the ongoing detention of five men who denied Shell employees access to their lands.
It is the latest in a series of protests over the imprisonment of the men who are objecting to the laying of the high-pressure pipeline across their land.
Members of the men’s families and a number of local TDs also took part in the protest.
This afternoon’s rally was organised by Independent Mayo TD, Dr Jerry Cowley.
He said the ‘mood of abhorrence’ at the jailing of the five men was growing nationwide and Shell must compromise on its plan for the pipeline and the onshore terminal, on health and safety grounds.
Shell Ireland has denied that the pipeline presents a hazard to the north Mayo area and has said it has no intention of suspending its work on the Corrib gas project, or of withdrawing from Mayo.
The men are due back in the High Court again on Wednesday when an attempt will be made to have them released from prison.
Five TDs have visited the men at Cloverhill Prison in Dublin, where they were sent on Wednesday.
The men told the TDs there was no question of them abandoning their opposition to the pipeline being laid on their land.
By Jarlath Kearney
3 JULY 2005
The Central Authorisation Bureau sounds more like a call-centre queuing system than the busy hub of Special Branch intelligence-gathering activity in the North.
However, Daily Ireland can reveal that the bureau is at the heart of Special Branch’s ongoing activities.
As the clearing house for all Special Branch surveillance, the bureau receives and approves applications for intelligence-gathering operations.
Significant evidence emerged on Wednesday that the British government’s intelligence agencies are still targeting pro-Good Friday Agreement republicans.
Prominent Derry republican Andrew McCartney stumbled across an intrusive and sophisticated listening device that had been expertly built into the ceiling of his kitchen.
Pointing to the distress of his wife and children at the invasion, Mr McCartney challenged those responsible for the bugging device to own up publicly and explain themselves.
One port of call for Mr McCartney’s legal advisers could be the Central Authorisation Bureau.
When questioned last year by the Andersonstown News about the role of the bureau and the associated Performance and Standards Unit within the Crime Operations Department, a senior PSNI spokesperson answered in general terms: “These units are responsible for overseeing performance of the department against relevant targets in the policing plan and the various reports discussed at the Policing Board.”
However, Daily Ireland can today specify the detailed responsibilities of both PSNI branches.
The bureau governs all matters relating to the PSNI’s compliance with the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act of 2000.
All applications under the Act within the PSNI for directed surveillance against individuals, premises or groups are also siphoned through the bureau. Some of these applications can be approved by a senior PSNI detective.
Surveillance that includes telephone tapping, house bugging and vehicle tracking must be personally authorised by the secretary of state through a signed warrant.
The bureau is also directly responsible to the statutory surveillance commissioner appointed by the British government, with respect to all matters of “intrusive surveillance and covert methods” instigated by the PSNI.
The role of the Performance and Standards Unit involves advising current Assistant Chief Constable Sam Kinkaid and his senior deputies.
The unit audits key standards in terms of compliance with the 2000 Act and the conduct of the PSNI’s forensic strategy.
The unit also co-ordinates and oversees the implementation of the generic National Intelligence Model, as well as implementing other intelligence procedures.
The National Intelligence Model process borrows heavily from the tasking and co-ordinating groups that were established between the RUC Special Branch and other intelligence-gathering agencies in the North during the 1980s.
The development of modern analytical and technological techniques means the process is now also being applied at district level in relation to ordinary low-level crime.
The PSNI has not yet admitted whether it was responsible for planting the bug in Mr McCartney’s home. Nor has the British government elaborated on the issue. It remains highly likely that the Special Branch tasking and co-ordinating group had knowledge of the operation.
One thing is certain — the surveillance operation on Mr McCartney’s home follows a sustained pattern of similar activity by the PSNI/RUC and other British intelligence agencies uncovered since the 1998 Good Friday Agreement.
• On April 27, 1998, less than three weeks after the signing of the Agreement, Sinn Féin placed two bugs on public display. The listening devices had been uncovered in previous weeks at the home of a relative of the senior Sinn Féin negotiator Gerry Kelly. They had been built into first-floor support beams with microphones spreading across two downstairs rooms.
• On June 8, 1998, a large amount of British spy equipment was recovered on farmland in the Cornonagh area of south Armagh. Cameras and microphones triggered by infrared sensors, powered by a large battery pack and operated via satellite transmitters were found camouflaged in grass on a main road junction.
• On December 8, 1999, Sinn Féin president Gerry Adams displayed a sophisticated tracking and listening device. The bug had been built into a car that Mr Adams and his colleague Martin McGuinness had used during negotiations. The then secretary of state Mo Mowlam admitted publicly on July 24, 2000 that she had authorised the operation.
• In March 2000, several long-range microphones, batteries and transmitters were uncovered. They had been trained on St Jarlath’s church in Blackwatertown, Co Armagh.
• Six months later, on September 1, 2000, a chambermaid at Belfast’s Europa Hotel stumbled on a listening device secreted in a room used by members of General John de Chastelain’s Independent International Commission on Decommissioning.
• On May 7, 2001 a British army surveillance operation was disrupted in Belfast. Local people found high-powered cameras built into the Black Mountain and trained on republican areas of west Belfast.
• In October 2002, it emerged that a major bugging operation by Special Branch had been ongoing for several months. The operation was codenamed Torsion and precipitated the collapse of the Stormont assembly. It has been detailed by BBC security editor Brian Rowan. Mr Rowan has alleged that Operation Torsion involved widespread surveillance, electronic bugging and house break-ins at the homes of republicans in west Belfast.
• In April 2003, a journalist published the written transcripts of conversations involving Sinn Féin chief negotiator Martin McGuinness. It emerged that a Special Branch operation, codenamed Narcotic, had involved the bugging of Mr McGuinness’ home telephone since 1997. Key conversations with British secretary of state Mo Mowlam, Downing Street chief of staff Jonathan Powell and Sinn Féin president Gerry Adams were tapped and published.
• In September last year, two bugging operations were uncovered in west Belfast. On September 6, a listening device that had been secreted in the attic of an Andersonstown flat was found. A part-time member of Gerry Adams’ staff was the target of the bug.
• One week later, on September 13, Sinn Féin put on display a listening device measuring five feet (1.52 metres) long. The device had two microphones and had been built into first-floor timber beams at the party’s Connolly House offices in Andersonstown.
In January 2005, it was reported that Eliza Manningham-Buller, the head of MI5, had admitted to a private session of Britain’s parliamentary intelligence and security committee that her organisation had planted the Connolly House bug.
The listening device discovered in Andrew McCartney’s home this week was clearly there for some time. This means that British intelligence agencies have been listening to every private conversation in the McCartney home.
The question now is whether the Policing Board will take effective action to hold the PSNI to account in relation to the affair. It is notable that the board cannot contemporaneously scrutinise any existing operational activities of Special Branch, including — it is believed — gaining access to the authorisation records held by the Central Authorisation Bureau.
In this regard, the impotent position of the Policing Board contrasts with the key role of Northern secretary of state Peter Hain. In personally signing surveillance warrants for the PSNI, the secretary of state — a politician and government minister — plays an active role in ongoing PSNI Special Branch operations. Last year, Policing Board vice-chairman Denis Bradley conceded that Sinn Féin’s Gerry Kelly should not join the board if the PSNI Special Branch was engaged in continued surveillance operations against him for political reasons.
With MI5 now destined to seize formal control of intelligence-gathering in the North, and British politicians continuing to sign Special Branch warrants, there is little evidence of locally elected politicians making the intelligence agencies thoroughly accountable or publicly transparent.
While that remains the case, there are still strong prospects of more cases emerging that are similar to that of Andrew McCartney.
In the context of ongoing efforts by the republican leadership to bolster the peace process, strong questions will now be raised about British Prime Minister Tony Blair’s capacity or willingness to finally end the culture of political policing fostered by his agencies in the North.
BIG INTERVIEW: Dedication to democracy
BY Anne Cadwallader
3 JULY 2005
You could, at first sight, mistake her for a nun. A slight, very slight, shy figure dressed in grey polyester with a headscarf wrapped around her neck.
In a way, you would be right because, although Elaheh Azimfar is Muslim, she has dedicated her entire life to a cause she clearly believes in with a religious zeal.
It shows in her eyes, in her self-containment, in her bewilderment when you ask why she decided to give up a career, marriage and motherhood for the cause of women in Iran.
It is easy, of course, to dismiss those with a political allegiance to an unfamiliar cause as somehow slightly odd. In Azimfar’s case, however, when you consider what and who she is up against, it would seem almost insane not to take the path she has taken.
Since the ayatollahs took over, 120,000 political prisoners have been executed in Iran, some publicly. Hanging by a rope from a building crane is the preferred method. In one month alone in 1988, 30,000 were executed.
In the last week, there have been ten public hangings. Pregnant women and children have been stoned to death.
——————
by Jarlath Kearney
3 JULY 2005
The North’s Prison Service yesterday banned any copies of Daily Ireland from entering Maghaberry prison in Lisburn, Co Antrim.
The embargo was introduced on the same day that the newspaper exposed the Prison Service’s pivotal involvement in the circumstances leading to the reimprisonment of republican Seán Kelly.
After prison sources reported the ban to Daily Ireland, the paper raised the matter directly with the Prison Service.
It emerged that the Maghaberry regime had tried to ban the paper, ostensibly because of the size of Mr Kelly’s photograph that appeared on yesterday’s front page.
It is understood that a formal complaint was entered to the prison authorities on the basis that another morning daily newspaper was allowed inside the prison even though it had published a similar-sized colour photograph of Mr Kelly.
A Prison Service spokesperson last night told Daily Ireland: “One copy of Daily Ireland was not issued in the prison today because it contained a pass-size colour photograph of a serving prisoner.”
The spokesperson said that, since it had been discovered that another paper with a similar photograph had been allowed into the prison, Daily Ireland would be retrieved from the property box and given to the relevant prisoner last night.
The campaign to free Mr Kelly gathers steam today with white-line pickets all over Belfast, beginning at 2pm.
3 JULY 2005
The main witness in the Robert McCartney murder case has been involved in a prison clash with the men accused of murdering the father of two and attempting to murder him.
Brendan Devine was placed in Maghaberry prison’s Special Supervision Unit (SSU) at the beginning of the week after a heated exchange with Terence Davison and Jim McCormick.
Self-confessed drug-addict Devine was sentenced to five years in jail eight days ago after pleading guilty to robbery.
Davison was charged on June 4 with murdering Mr McCartney, while McCormick was charged with attempting to murder Devine. The pair were remanded in custody. A spokesperson for the Prison Service said it would not comment on individual cases, but refused to deny the prisoners had clashed.
A prison source told Daily Ireland the trio made threats against each other during a heated verbal exchange.
He said: “The inmates were expecting something like this when Devine was put in Maghaberry last week.
“When he saw Davison and McCormick he completely lost his cool.
“He started shouting at them and they were shouting back.
“No one was backing down and the guards took Devine down to the SSU.
“It’s for his own protection as well as that of the other prisoners.”
Mr McCartney was murdered outside Magennis’s pub in Belfast city centre on January 31.
During the brawl, Devine had his throat cut and was stabbed a number of times in the chest and stomach.
He survived the attack and has since provided a number of statements to the PSNI.
As well as giving evidence in the McCartney murder trial, Devine will appear in court later this year on two other unrelated charges.
The 31-year-old faces a number of serious motoring charges, as well as being accused of playing a central role in a vicious assault on a nightclub bouncer in 2003.
Devine’s co-accused in the assault case is Hugh McCormick, the brother of Jim McCormick, the man accused of attempting to murder Devine.
**Via News Hound
by Ciarán Barnes
c.barnes@dailyireland.com
Loyalist paramilitaries have been responsible for 14 separate paramilitary attacks over the last month.
Between June 1 and 30, members of both the Ulster Defence Association and the Ulster Volunteer Force have carried out numerous knee-cappings, beatings and petrol and paint bomb attacks.
Almost half of their victims have been Protestant and the incidents have been spread across the North.
At the beginning of the month, loyalists burned two cars in east Belfast and daubed sectarian slogans on a house in the Whincroft Road area of the city.
On June 6, a 27-year-old Protestant was hospitalised after being beaten by men carrying iron bars in a paramilitary-style attack in Ballyclare, Co Antrim.
The following day in Coleraine, Co Derry, loyalists were responsible for a series of petrol bomb attacks on the homes and cars of nationalists. A list of names of suspected republicans was posted on walls throughout the town.
After a three day break, loyalist paramilitary activity made the news again on June 10 when a gang beat a 52-year-old woman with baseball bats in Ballymoney, Co Antrim. Her attackers told her she had 24 hours to leave the country.
On June 16, loyalists gave another baseball bat beating to a man in Bangor, Co Down, before going on the rampage over June 17 - 19 - the weekend of the controversial Tour of the North Orange Order march through north Belfast.
After clashing with nationalists as the parade passed the Ardoyne shops, loyalists waited until nightfall to attack homes and cars in the Whitewell area of north Belfast.
The next day, June 18, homes on the edge of the Catholic Liogniel estate were paint bombed.
Two days later, three homes in the Whitewell area were destroyed in an arson attack when loyalists set fire to oil tanks at the back of the properties.
On June 23, in another arson attack, loyalists attempted to burn down St John’s Church in Portadown, Co Armagh.
The relatively quite Co Antrim seaside town of Carrickfergus was the scene for widespread loyalist violence on June 27.
Rival mobs attacked each other with meat cleavers and bricks. Four men were injured in paramilitary-style attacks during the fights and a crossbow bolt was fired at the PSNI who were called to the scene.
The next day loyalists in Bangor carried out a second paramilitary-style attack in a month in the town, shooting a 17-year-old in the knees.
June 29 saw the east Belfast home of Protestants Roisin Orr and Ryan Robinson petrol bombed by loyalists because Ms Orr has an ‘Irish sounding’ surname.
On the same night, a Catholic woman’s home in the village of Ahoghill, Co Antrim, was targeted in a paint bomb attack.
After reviewing the list of loyalist attacks for the past month, SDLP North Belfast Assemblyman Alban Magennis said there has been an unacceptable level of violence.
He said: “Loyalist violence has been endemic post-Good Friday Agreement. Unfortunately, it remains a feature of the present political situation in the North.
“There should be no acceptance of it as there is no acceptable level of violence.
“The public should never become accustomed to it as it is totally unacceptable.”
by James Cogan Sunday, Jul 3 2005, 10:26am
international / anti-war / news report
On June 24, Yasser Salihee, an Iraqi special correspondent for the news agency Knight Ridder, was killed by a single bullet to the head as he approached a checkpoint that had been thrown up near his home in western Baghdad by US and Iraqi troops. It is believed that the shot was fired by an American sniper. According to eyewitnesses, no warning shots were fired.
The US military has announced it is conducting an investigation into Salihee’s killing. Knight Ridder has already declared, however, that “there’s no reason to think that the shooting had anything to do with his reporting work”. In fact, his last assignment gives reason to suspect that it was.
—————–
03 July 2005 11:26
A police patrol was attacked by up to 40 youths after helping to treat a woman who had collapsed in her Belfast home.
The armed Land Rover was taken out of service following the incident in the Glenalina area of west Belfast at around 8.30pm yesterday.
Police said the gang, who were aged between ten and 15, hurled stones, bricks and other missiles at the vehicle.
The officers were returning to the New Barnsley station after they had helped to resuscitate a 50-year-old woman who had collapsed unconscious in her kitchen.
No one was injured in the incident.
Posted by Terry
‘Refinery construction site picketed, fishermen prepare to blockade ‘the things’, and roadside vigil ends in victory.’
Great article. >>Read it
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I’m still laughing…For those of you who followed Bono’s case, this will give you a giggle. Let me know if you want to download this lovely Bono pic as wallpaper 
click to view
IT’S stupid when you think about it. You go to all that effort down the years to make yourself look taller. And then in one fell swoop, you make yourself look really, really small. And petty. Not that you wouldn’t sympathise with Bono about his hat.
I have this image in my head of this small little fellah in a hat, and then someone grabs it off his head from behind and the big boys start throwing it around between each other and the little fellah is there, jumping up and down trying to grab it back, with tears of frustration burning his eyes as he begs them to give back his hat.
Except, of course, this kind of thing doesn’t normally end up in the Four Courts.
You had to sympathise too with Bono’s weight problem. He himself likes to compare himself to Elvis in this respect. In fact, he’s just like the rest of us. But whereas we have to keep squeezing into the same clothes, Bono gets different sized pairs of the same trousers made, so that he doesn’t get depressed about his weight. “No, no Bono. You haven’t put on weight. These are exactly the same trousers you wore last week. You’re still fitting them perfectly. And my, aren’t you so tall?”
In fact, we know way too much about Bono’s pants now. For example, we know that his pants for The Joshua Tree tour were three-quarter lengths because he liked to tuck them into his boots and sometimes when he did, and then got sweaty, he chafed his legs.
The idea of Bono suffering from chafing, and maybe a bit of ire between his butt cheeks while performing, is not something we needed to know. Do you think he was using the wrong washing powder? Do you think Lola put a bit of Vaseline into his underpants before a gig as well? Or some talcum powder?
Is this chafing where he got the idea for The Unforgettable Fire? Was Drop the Debt originally Drop the Dettol (down my pants)?
We’ve also learned that Bono doesn’t apparently have the biggest dick in U2. And yes, I know, I know, he may not have the biggest dick in U2 but…
The pettiness only seemed to get worse as the case dragged on. With the former stylist apparently trying to take credit for putting Bono into Stetsons, U2’s lawyers produced a 20-second video clip of Bono out shopping with Barry Devlin from Horslips, in which they bought - you guessed it - a Stetson.
If U2 looked a bit like a large corporation run by middle-aged men in Croke Park last weekend, they cemented that image by bringing their might down on this woman over a hat and some pants. And if it seemed at times in Croke Park last weekend as if Bono has finally lost his sense of humour, then that was confirmed in the Four Courts with Bono seeming to be the only one not finding the whole thing ridiculous.
JODY CORCORAN
TAOISEACH Bertie Ahern has moved to convince anxious TDs that he is still a popular leader amid mounting concern in Fianna Fail that his name and face may now be an election liability.
Mr Ahern used a parliamentary party meeting last week to raise, for the first time, the booing and cat-calling of his name at a string of public events, most recently at a U2 concert last weekend.
At the meeting of TDs and senators, Mr Ahern sought to play down the issue, and claimed that only a small proportion of U2 concert-goers had booed him.
The Minister for Foreign Affairs, Dermot Ahern, subsequently accused those who had booed the Taoiseach of taking a “cheap shot”.
That the Taoiseach saw fit to address the booing issue has underlined the concern at a senior level in Fianna Fail that the phenomenon is more than just bad manners, and may possibly be symptomatic of Mr Ahern’s and the Government’s growing unpopularity.
Mr Ahern had to endure a similar bout of booing in 2003, at a time when opinion polls recorded his popularity at an all-time low. In October that year only 34 per cent of the electorate expressed satisfaction with him, with 60 per cent dissatisfied.
Around that time Mr Ahern was booed at the Special Olympics, and again at a football game between Dublin and Derry in Clones.
Other than at the U2 concert, the Taoiseach was also recently booed at the Ireland v Israel World Cup qualification game at Lansdowne Road, much of the embarrassment of FAI officials who are in discussions with the Government over future funding.
A senior Fianna Fail source, who attended last week’s parliamentary party meeting told the Sunday Independent : “Bertie used to be our greatest asset. Now some people are wondering whether his face on a poster will actually lose us votes.”
Mr Ahern’s popularity had bounced back to its customary 61 per cent last February, shortly after his declaration that he was a “socialist” and the Government began to present a more “caring” image.
However, in March his popularity was again on the decline, dropping five points to 56 per cent. If this decline becomes a trend, the alarm bells will begin to sound in the Fianna Fail party.
Perhaps because he is aware of this, Ahern last week tackled the issue head-on, when he raised the booing of his name in the context of the next general election.
He told colleagues that he was determined the Government would finish its term.
He reminded them that he had consulted them all individually, and asked that if any of them personally objected to the coalition continuing for another two years they should state as much. There were no objections.
Mr Ahern anticipated that there would be even more difficult times ahead for the Government, but he remains upbeat about Fianna Fail’s prospects in the next election.
Certainly, there was good news on the economic front last week with the ESRI predicting that the economy will continue to perform very well for the foreseeable future.
In its latest commentary, the ESRI says the strong house-building sector is helping and that Irish consumers are currently spending €100m more per week than they did last year. The Government will again attempt to keep the focus on its stewardship of the economy in the countdown to an election.
However, Fine Gael is resurgent, and its leader Enda Kenny is turning out to be seemingly capable, and also quite a popular figure.
In recent weeks, Mr Kenny has deliberately targeted what opinion polls have found to be a strong point for the Taoiseach - his handling of Northern Ireland.
In a letter to Mr Kenny last week, the Taoiseach said: “I have always made it clear that we would be maintaining contact with Sinn Fein. Not to have done so would, in my view, have been unwise.”
Mr Ahern confirmed he had met Gerry Adams “on an informal basis and at his request” in recent months and had also spoken to him on the telephone.
“I believe this contact was important - it would have been irresponsible for the Government not to remain in touch with developments and not to avail of all opportunities to emphasise the need for a clear and decisive statement from the IRA,” he said.
Mr Ahern was adamant that that there was nothing “secret” in relation to these meetings and contacts.
However, Mr Kenny remains “disappointed” that Mr Ahern has again refused to provide details of the extent and nature of his meetings and contacts. He also continues to describe the meetings as “secret”.
Mr Kenny said: “I believe it is inappropriate for you to engage in a series of meetings with Mr Adams without either ministers or officials present. You will recall that Mr Adams has claimed that during a similar private meeting prior to the finalisation of the Good Friday Agreement, you gave an undertaking that the murderers of Det Garda Jerry McCabe would be released if the negotiations were successful. The lessons of this episode should be learned.”
MAEVE SHEEHAN and JODY CORCORAN
THE US Government is furious with Ireland after a Palestinian terrorist sent here under an international accord skipped the country last year and turned up in Spain.
Jihad Jara, described as one of Israel’s most wanted men, was granted safe haven in Ireland under an international agreement to end the siege at the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem in 2002.
The Palestinian terrorist was supposed to be monitored by gardai while here but he managed to leave Ireland and travel to Spain for several weeks last year, the Sunday Independent can reveal.
Jara was picked up by Spanish authorities and forcibly returned to Ireland. Garda sources believe Jara was in Spain for less than a month, and say they have no evidence to suggest he was involved in terrorist activity.
However, US officials, including the CIA, are suspicious as to what he was doing in Spain.
The fact that the high-profile terrorist managed to leave Ireland in the first place will fuel international alarm. It may also prove deeply embarrassing to the Government and to security services here when an account of the story is broadcast on a major US television network - possibly next month.
Spain has been repeatedly targeted by Islamic terrorists. The country is currently waging its own war against militant Islamic extremists. One hundred and ninety-one people were murdered and 1,600 injured when four trains were bombed by Al-Queda-linked terrorists on March 11 last year. Last month, Spanish police broke up a suspected terrorist network that recruited suicide bombers for attacks on coalition forces in Iraq.
Although gardai maintain they were not obliged to keep Jara under round-the-clock surveillance it was understood that he was to be subject to close monitoring.
The extent of America’s disquiet over the Palestinian terrorist’s Spanish jaunt will be made clear in an influential US television investigation to be broadcast in the coming weeks.
The programme is expected to embarrass the government and the Gardai, who have sought to play down the presence of militant Islamic fundamentalists in Ireland.
NBC’s Dateline broadcasts to millions and will almost certainly put Ireland’s record on international terrorism under a global spotlight.
NBC assigned its top investigation team, headed by the multi-award-winning journalist, Lisa Myers, to probe the activities of Jara and other suspected terrorists in Ireland. Myers is renowned for her top-level intelligence contacts.
Myers’s reputation adds huge weight to the programme. Currently senior investigative correspondent with NBC News, Myers was the first to broadcast secret CIA surveillance footage of Osama Bin Laden. She has won numerous awards, including an Emmy for her reports on the federal funds being spent to rebuild Iraq.
According to government sources in Dublin, the programme-makers have claimed to Irish justice officials that Americans suspect Jara of continuing to direct terrorism while in Ireland. Sources said they cited senior figures in Bush’s administration as being unhappy with Ireland’s response to its concerns.
The claims have “perplexed” the Department of Justice. Michael McDowell, the Minister for Justice, was fully briefed by America’s top intelligence chiefs during a trip to New York with the Garda Commissioner in May. The two men met with the FBI, the CIA and representatives of the Attorney-General’s office.
A source said: “They discussed these very issues and there was no concern of any description. They discussed the matter of Islamic terrorism generally. They assured him that they were happy and mentioned the unprecedented levels of co-operation and exchange of information.”
The NBC team were in Dublin last month conducting interviews for the programme. Mr McDowell has declined to be interviewed on the grounds that he cannot discuss security issues in public. Garda Commissioner Noel Conroy has also declined to be interviewed.
The Sunday Independent has seen a statement issued to NBC by the Department of Justice.
The statement, which does not name Jara, says: “The person in question is an acknowledged Palestinian militant whom Ireland was asked to take in as part of a UN-brokered end to the siege at the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem. He is one of a number of Palestinian militants from the church siege who were accommodated in various EU countries at the request of the international community. Ireland accepted two such militants. Their behaviour is monitored appropriately and, in the case of the person in question, that monitoring has been intensified in the light of that person’s subsequent behaviour. The agreement did not allow for the placing of the persons concerned under detention. The visit by the person to Spain was not authorised or agreed by the relevant authorities and he was, therefore, compulsorily returned to this country.”
The statement went on to defend Ireland’s record in dealing with international terrorism, pointing to new legislation that provides for greater powers.
“We feel it is very important to point out that the vast majority of people of Islamic faith and culture living in Ireland are extremely law-abiding and do not have any terrorist ideation. The person cited by NBC is of known militant background and is closely monitored. A relatively small number of other people of like disposition who live in Ireland are subjected to close monitoring and ongoing investigation by the gardai.”
Jara was among 13 Palestinians deported by the Israelis as part of an international deal brokered to end the siege at the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem in 2002.
He was amongst 200 Palestinians - including 50 armed fighters - who entered and occupied the Church of the Nativity for 39 days. They were seeking refuge from an Israeli crackdown on suicide bombing. Israeli army snipers killed seven and wounded more than 40 people during the siege.
Following extensive negotiations, 13 of the most militant occupiers were deported out of Israel and others transferred to the Gaza Strip. Ireland was among several EU countries that agreed to provide safe haven for two Palestinian militants in order to help end the siege.
Two years ago, Jara, 33, went public to complain that the Irish government had failed to keep its promise of accommodating him. He claimed that he had to move out of government-allocated house he shared with fellow Palestinian deportee, Rami Kamel. He claimed to be living in a park since Kamel married an Irish woman. According to Muslim custom, Mr Jara said he could not remain in the house alone with a woman who was not a relative.
Is this special or what?
By Philip Sherwell in Washington
(Filed: 03/07/2005)
Peter Hain, the Northern Ireland Secretary, praised Sinn Fein’s leaders Gerry Adams and Martin McGuinness as “courageous” and “visionary” during meetings with prominent Irish-American politicians in America last week, The Sunday Telegraph has learned.
The remarks, made during his first trip to America since taking up the post, pleased Sinn Fein supporters in Washington and New York, but Unionist political leaders were infuriated when informed of his comments.
Mr Hain, who has been trying to play down the anti-Unionist and “troops out” views he espoused as a student activist in the 1970s, spoke enthusiastically about the former IRA commanders.
He spoke of the “courageous” role that Mr Adams and Mr McGuinness had played in the peace process over the past 10 years when he met Irish-American Congressmen and women on Capitol Hill. He singled out Mr Adams’s call in April for the IRA to abandon its armed struggle for particular praise.
In New York, Mr Hain struck a similar tone. In an interview with the Irish Voice newspaper, he said that Mr Adams had “shown vision and determination” and “a lot of political guts” for his “momentous statement”.
Mr Hain, who cut his political teeth in Britain as an anti-apartheid campaigner, also compared the situation in Northern Ireland to South Africa, his birthplace, under apartheid.
Mr Hain’s controversial remarks were made as the tense marching season begins in Northern Ireland, the Assembly remains suspended and political life appears even more polarised after the successes in last month’s general election for Sinn Fein and the Democratic Unionist Party led by Ian Paisley.
Peter Robinson, the deputy leader of the DUP, was scathing about Mr Hain’s comments. “They bring into sharp focus the background of the Secretary of State and his predisposition to the republican movement,” he said. “He might consider he knows a lot about South Africa but he’s demonstrating very vividly how little he knows about Northern Ireland.”
A Northern Ireland Office spokeswoman said: “The Secretary of State’s meetings in Washington were private.
“But he has in the past referred to the journey that Sinn Fein has taken the republican movement over the last 10 years to engage in the democratic process and which he has rightly described as courageous.”
She said that the comparison to South Africa referred to the hope that two polarised parties could reach a deal.
CAIN: Chronology of the Conflict 1995
Monday 3 July 1995
Clegg Released
Lee Clegg, a paratrooper with the British Army, was released from prison on the orders of Patrick Mayhew, then Secretary of State for Northern Ireland. Clegg had received a life sentence and been imprisoned in June 1993 for the murder of Karen Reilly (18), a Catholic civilian, on 30 September 1990. The decision to release Clegg sparked serious rioting in Nationalist areas of Northern Ireland. [Rioting continued for a second night. Clegg was accepted back into the British Army and later promoted.] Sinn Féin (SF) and representatives of Loyalist paramilitaries called for the immediate release of all political prisoners. Breidge Gadd, then Chief Probation Officer for Northern Ireland, resigned from the Life Sentence Review Board in protest at the decision. John Bruton, then Taoiseach (Irish Prime Minister), said that he expected the British authorities to apply the same rules “to other similar prisoner cases”.
3 JULY 1971
Jim Morrison, the lead singer of American rock group The Doors has died in Paris aged 27.
He was found in a bathtub at his apartment at 17 Rue Beautraillis by his girlfriend, Pamela Courson.
A doctor’s report stated the cause of death was heart failure aggravated by heavy drinking.
The rest of the band - keyboardist Ray Manzarek, guitarist Robbie Krieger and drummer John Densmore - are currently in the United States.
Morrison, also known as the Lizard King, was born in Florida in 1943, the son of a US Navy admiral.
He formed The Doors with Ray Manzarek in 1965 in Los Angeles.
Morrison had come up with the name after reading Aldous Huxley’s account of drug experiences, The Doors Of Perception.
The group became the first popular “new wave” band. Their first album, The Doors, released by Elektra Records in 1967, was a number one hit in the US, though only just scraped into the British charts.
Their following albums, Strange Days and Waiting For The Sun, provided further American hits and, in Hello I love You, a British number 15.
Arrested for lewd behaviour
But with its ever growing fame, the band lost some of its credibility in the rock underground.
Morrison’s behaviour, fuelled by drink and drugs, became more outrageous and in 1969 he was arrested for “indecent exposure, lewd conduct and public intoxication” after a concert in Miami’s Dinner Key auditorium.
Though some of the charges were later dropped, the scandal made it hard for the band to perform live for some time.
Morrison used the crisis as a spur to creativity and produced one of the group’s most critically acclaimed albums, Morrison Hotel, in 1970.
Over the past year he has made clear he wanted to drop music altogether to become a writer.
He has already published two volumes of poetry, The Lords and The New Creatures, and planned to begin a literary career once his contractual obligations to Elektra were fulfilled.
Morrison interview clip (Real Player, audio)
In Context
click to view - photo from here
Jim Morrison is buried at Père Lachaise cemetery in Paris, where his grave has become a shrine for successive generations of fans.
In 1991, the 20th anniversary of his death, the cemetery had to hire extra security after police used tear gas to disperse rowdy fans.
Since Morrison’s death his records have never been out of print and Hollywood, too, has found The Doors music attractive.
The End was used in Francis Ford Coppola’s Apocalypse Now, and in 1991 Oliver Stone helped cement the Morrison legend with his film biography The Doors, starring Val Kilmer. The film created a whole new generation of fans.
The three surviving members of the group released a new album, Doors Box Set, in 1997. It included three CDs of previously unreleased songs.
'So venceremos, beidh bua againn eigin lá eigin. Sealadaigh abú.'
--Bobby Sands
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