SAOIRSE32

Sunday Life

By Stephen Breen
10 July 2005

THIS is the former Ulster footballer, who has just launched a special appeal for his dying son.

Dave Waterman, who starred for Northern Ireland’s under-21 team, is hoping to buy a £32,000 respite caravan for families affected by cancer.

And, the soccer player, whose son Oakley (6), has only six weeks to live, hopes the province’s fans will dig deep into their pockets for his appeal.

The former Portsmouth and Oxford United defender, now playing for Weymouth, lives near Portsmouth, and has been staying in the caravan during his son’s treatment.

But, he now wants to buy it for other families, and name it after his son.

Brave Oakley contracted rhabdomyosarcoma, which caused a tumour in his pelvis, in 2002, and has since undergone a series of operations in his battle with the disease.

But, doctors now say his condition cannot be cured, and with time running out, the Ulster man wants to help other families.

Said the footballer: “We hope to raise as much money as possible, and we would welcome support from the people of Northern Ireland.

“In the past few weeks we’ve spent time with Oakley living in a holiday caravan near Bognor, in Sussex, and the new surroundings have given him a tremendous boost and really pepped him up.

“Oakley has told us his wish is for us to buy the caravan to bring some joy to other children and families in similar situations.

“We want to name the caravan after Oakley, and set it up as a charity, but the problem we’ve got, is that it can take up to three months to go through the proper procedure, and we’ve only got a matter of weeks.

“Instead, we plan to raise as much money as possible in Oakley’s name, and transfer the cash to the charity once we get the go ahead.”

He added that he and his wife, Lorraine, are drawing strength through the way brave Oakley is coping.

“Oakley has been brilliant. He gets pain now and again, but he has been really brave.

“He thinks he’ll get the chance to play football every day in Heaven, and meet some of his friends again, who he got to know in hospital, before they died.

Anyone who wants to support the appeal can send cheques, payable to Oakley Waterman, to Church Farm Holiday Village, Pagham, Chichester, Sussex, PO21 4NR, or call the Echo on 01305 830995.

sbreen@belfasttelegraph.co.uk

Sunday Business Post

By Vincent Browne
10 July 2005

Three months ago, local doctors in Fallujah, Iraq, reported that more than 800 civilians had been killed in a concerted American and British military assault on the city.

That estimate is now thought to have been too high and the reported civilian death toll is put at something over 600.

Half of the dead are reported to have been children.

The major assault on the town took place before women and children were allowed to leave.

I refer to this, not to suggest that a crime against humanity provides any justification for the slaughter of more than 50 civilians in London last Thursday morning, nor to suggest that the Fallujah massacre was the motivation for the London attack. I don’t believe it was.

Rather my point is that condemnations of the slaughter of innocent civilians should apply to the slaughter of all innocent civilians.

Tony Blair’s condemnations of the London killings is a piece of awful hypocrisy, given his complicity in what happened in Fallujah.

But, of course, Blair’s hypocrisy does not stop there.

He bears culpability for the deaths of thousands of people, including the killings of British and American soldiers in Iraq, because of his complicity in the unlawful invasion of that country on the basis of a deceit.

Blair and his ally George Bush have no credibility in condemning any killings. He and Bush invite ridicule in promising retribution for the London killings. Indeed, more than ridicule, they invite retribution on themselves.

As was the case during the Northern Troubles, comment that might be regarded as justifying atrocity is censored.

Anything other than outright, unqualified condemnation of particular atrocities is demanded, uncluttered by reference to other atrocities.

Breakers of this code are classified as sneaking regarders of terrorism, as well as facing the usual taunts of anti-Americanism.

In saying that I regard the London killings as crimes against humanity, unjustified by any cause, I feel that, to some degree, I am capitulating to this intellectual terrorism, even though that is my conviction.

That ‘ terrorism’ word causes me difficulty. How is it terrorism to set off small bombs on a London underground train and not terrorism to drop massive bombs from aeroplanes over cities and towns? Are the people in the towns and cities being bombed any less terrorised than the passengers in the London trains? Is it morally OK to massacre civilians from the air and a crime against humanity to massacre civilians in far smaller numbers on the ground?

In the last week, the killing of well over 100 people in the Democratic Republic of Congo has been reported. Almost certainly, many more were killed. Since 1998, millions of people have died in that country because of war.

My point is not that the former colonial powers are to blame for those deaths (although there is some basis for attributing responsibility to them), nor that the Americans who supported a dictator there for decades were responsible (although that, too, was a contributory factor).

Nor am I saying that the United Nations or the western powers - or the west in general - is to blame for failing to intervene to resolve the conflict (although there are elements of truth to that as well).

My point is that the war in that country was made possible by massive shipments of arms into the region from Britain, the US and other countries - including Israel, some of the Balkan states, Ukraine and the Czech Republic.

Those shipments could have been prevented, had there been the will to do so. Were those who ordered or facilitated or permitted those shipments terrorists?

The panoply of world leaders on stage in Gleneagles over the last few days contained several mass murderers. For a start, of course, there was George Bush and Tony Blair. Also Vladimir Putin.

To be fair to Putin, he had a good point when he said last Thursday that the west clung to “double standards in the assessment of bloody crimes’‘.

He was referring to the way Europe and the United States regard attacks by Chechens on civilian targets in Russia as part of a local separatist struggle, rather than terrorism.

But how can the butcher of Grozny complain about terrorism, the mass murderer of thousands in Chechnya complain about double standards?

It is also hard to take a French president complaining about terrorism.

France armed, supplied and then protected the genocidal Hutu regime in Rwanda before and during the genocide in 1994, and then intervened, saving the mass killers from retribution and justice!

And our own crowd - couldn’t they just shut up?

What credibility does our government have in condemning terrorism when we facilitated - and continue to facilitate - the infliction of terror on the people of Iraq by allowing American warplanes to pit-stop at Shannon?

Is it impossible to be against all killings: against the London killings, the Fallujah killings, the other Iraqi killings, the African killings, the Afghan killings, the Chechnya killings, the Moscow killings, the Twin Towers killings, the Madrid killings?

Is it impossible to regard as crimes against humanity what the Germans did in World War II and in the Holocaust, what the Japanese did during that war in Asia, what the Americans did at Hiroshima and Nagasaki, what the British did at Dresden, what Stalin did to the kulaks in Russia, what Mao did in China?

Is it possible to be against all terrorism and all mass murder and not be classified as a sneaking-regarder of terrorism and mass murder?

sbpost@iol.ie

Sunday Business Post

By Barry O’Kelly and Pat Leahy
10 July 2005

Michael McDowell

The almost certain introduction of ID cards in Britain following the London bombings is likely to lead to their introduction here, according to government sources.

The Sunday Business Post understands that government officials are involved in “ongoing discussions’‘ with their counterparts in London about British plans for ID cards.

“We are watching events closely in Britain, and our understanding is that the ID cards will now go ahead over there,” said one informed political source.

“This will have huge implications for Ireland. We have a common travel area and a land border between the two jurisdictions, so we will have no alternative but to follow suit.

“We are monitoring the situation very, very closely.”

Even before the Tube and bus bombings last Thursday, Minister for Justice Michael McDowell had given several indications that identity cards were likely to be introduced in Ireland.

In response to questions from The Sunday Business Post, the Department of Justice said that, while McDowell was “personally not in favour of identity cards, he reluctantly accepts that we may need to introduce them if the UK does’‘.

At a recent meeting of the Oireachtas Justice Committee, McDowell also indicated that identity cards might become inevitable in this jurisdiction. “If ID cards were introduced in Britain, we would be forced to examine the situation,” the minister told the committee.

“There are all kinds of obvious implications, like the North-South dimension. Will Irish citizens be required or have to carry ID cards if they cross the border?

“These are serious matters, and issues such as whether the nationalist population in Northern Ireland want to have British ID cards, whether the Irish state would provide them with alternative cards and whether the two systems would be integrated are ones where considerable discussion and thinking have yet to be done.”

The minister said he was considering the issue.

Meanwhile, more than 50 Islamic extremists with links to al-Qaeda and fundamentalist Iraqi groups have been identified by the Garda Siochána. These activists and another 200 supporters are under increased surveillance following the London bombings.

The Garda Middle East Section has been overhauled in the last year, with a dedicated unit now operating with specialist skills, including a working knowledge of Arabic dialects.

The unit is believed to have received additional support from officers in the National Surveillance Unit and the Garda Immigration Bureau.

Gardai are believed to be carrying out blanket surveillance on a group of around 20 militants with links to the fugitive Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the Jordanian radical behind many of the suicide attacks in Iraq.

Activists with links to other senior figures in al-Qaeda are also being watched.

Sunday Life

10 July 2005

A FORMER Belfast republican and his two children, who face deportation from the United States, are hoping for a reprieve.

At a recent hearing in New Jersey District Court, Malachy McAllister (pictured) was told he will learn his fate within 60 days.

US immigration is barring an application for refugee status because the 47-year-old has a criminal record.

The former INLA man was jailed for three years in 1982 for attempted murder, but insists he has completely turned his back on terrorism, and has built a successful construction business in New Jersey.

He and his family were forced to flee Ulster in 1988 after a gun attack on his home by a Red Hand Commando gang.

Malachy believes a death threat from the loyalist terror group still hangs over him.

He’s made a comfortable life for himself and his family in America.

Carol Russell, a US campaigner to keep the McAllisters in the States, said Malachy and his two kids, Nicola (18) and Sean Ryan (17), are hopeful they will be allowed to stay.

Legislation governing immigrants has been tightened since the events of September 11, which has impacted on the family’s application for refugee status.

Said Carol: “The panel of three judges had a good sense of all Malachy had endured in Belfast during the 70s and 80s.

“They also remarked how the incidents during his years in a foreign land had little bearing on the national security of post 9/11 America.

“The real concern now are the US laws, which have since been enacted, and the broad definition of ‘terrorism’ included in those laws.

“Sometimes, even the most compassionate judge cannot go against federal law.

“It was emphasised throughout the hearing that the US Attorney General has the most discretion in such cases and that he can or cannot exercise that.”

A number of members of the American Congress are now writing to the chief law officer asking that he use his power to defer deportation.

Sunday Life

10 July 2005

Andre Shoukri

A CONTROVERSIAL application for a pub entertainment licence has been turned down - because police believe the bar is under the ‘control’ of Andre Shoukri’s north Belfast UDA mob.

The decision by the city council - the licensing authority - was last night welcomed by many residents living in the shadow of Bonaparte’s Brasserie and Ale House on the Cavehill Road.

There was widespread concern over the application and police had held talks with householders, local politicians and community groups.

One member of the Cavehill Residents’ Action Group had earlier told the council’s health and environmental committee that a number of householders had even considered selling up.

A police inspector told the same meeting that police were of the belief that the bar was under the control of a paramilitary organisation.

Police have been cracking down on pub licensing applications, particularly those they suspect are being used by paramilitaries, but fronted legally.

They stepped in to ensure the closure of the notorious Network Club in Belfast’s North Street after it was taken over by loyalists linked to Shoukri.

According to police, there has been an increase recently in the number of complaints about Bonaparte’s.

On one occasion last month, they required additional back up when a “significant number” of patrons were found drinking outside with loud music coming from within.

The council’s environmental health officer reported that officers within the noise pollution unit had responded to complaints about loud noise and discovered that music in the form of a karaoke was being provided and a DJ’s voice had been audible on the Cavehill Road.

The applicant said she had made various attempts to meet with residents to address their concerns.

The council rejected the application on the grounds that the applicant was not a fit person to hold such a licence and also ruled that to grant it “would be likely to impact adversely on the residential amenity of the area”.

Danny Morrison

**Posted to the forum last year by Seadog - see article following this for current news

Ten years after, a village is reborn with quiet dignity
The Independent 18/06/04

Six Catholics were shot dead in Loughinisland, Co Down, in June 1994.
Their loyalist killers were never caught.

David McKittrick reports on a community moving on

click to view - Loughinisland village - photo from >>here

It was an errand of mercy which probably saved Hugh O’Toole’s life when the gunmen burst into his pub: he was in Romania, helping out as a volunteer worker to build an orphanage.

The loyalist gunmen showed no mercy in carrying out their attack, 10 years ago on 18 June 1994, repeatedly firing automatic weapons into the backs of their victims.

Today on the anniversary, the question in Loughinisland, and Northern Ireland as a whole, is how to honour the dead while at the same time striving to leave the worst of the past behind.

The six men killed that night, all Catholics, included the oldest victim of the Troubles, Barney Green. Aged 87, pipe-smoking Barney had been designated, in the paramilitary vernacular of the day, a “legitimate target”.

He was in his good suit, complete with waistcoat, because there was a big football match on the television: Ireland were playing in the World Cup. Barney was having his usual, a bottle of stout and a Bushmills whiskey, when 10 bullets hit him.

The gunmen had chosen their target with much care but without compassion, for it was all part of a sectarian numbers game. Since republicans had killed some loyalists in Belfast, tribal imperative decreed that Catholics should die in reprisal.

The security forces were on the alert in Belfast, so the gunmen went out of town and wreaked their vengeance on a Catholic country pub. Loughinisland’s status as an obscure and peaceful place was its undoing, since nobody dreamt it needed protection.

Its reputation as a place that had escaped the Troubles ended that night as the bullets ripped through O’Toole’s pub. One minute the customers were cheering on Ireland: the next they were cut down, their blood mingling on the floor.

The shock and horror at the attack was all the greater because, at the time, the Troubles seemed to be tailing off and there was great hope in the air.

One peacemaker, who at the time was deeply involved in working towards a loyalist ceasefire, today describes Loughinisland as one of the worst days of his life, both because of the death toll and because it seemed to signal the end of the fledgling peace process.

“We were so close to a ceasefire,” he recalled, “and then that happened. It was horrific, a difficult, fearful time. To be honest about it, for a moment I feared we’d lost all hope - I thought, that’s it, gone.

“But then it quickly became clear that loyalist paramilitary leaders were prepared to continue with the process, no matter how awful the backdrop. They went on to declare a ceasefire, which has been of immense value.”

And so the process faltered, but did not collapse. In the decade since then, it has seen many high and low points, and some of the hope has been replaced by disillusion. One thing is certain: the process has saved many lives.

Within a few months both republican and loyalist groups declared ceasefires, opening a new phase in Northern Ireland’s history; but it was too late for Loughinisland. Today Hugh O’Toole, now approaching 60, stands in the same bar, reluctantly reliving much of the nightmare and its long aftermath.

His pub, the only one in the village, is so small that it feels as much like a house as a bar. Like Loughinisland itself, it is an unassuming place with no airs and graces.

Hugh himself is a quiet man in this exceptionally reticent community. “You never forget,” he said with a sigh. “You go in through the door every morning, it’s there. People just try and get on with their life, but they never forget. They keep on thinking. Sure nobody could ever recover from that.”

Reminders are everywhere. Hugh’s son, who was in the bar, was shot in the body and legs: “Ah, he’s fairly good,” said Hugh. “Still has a bullet in his side - too dangerous to remove, they reckon.”

Other people who were injured that night still frequent the bar, as well as relatives of the dead. It remains the centre of the village. “People still congregate here,” said Hugh. “It was people’s wish to keep the place open. They reckoned the village would be dead without it.”

Do they talk about what happened? “Occasionally it will come up in conversation, but mostly people keep their own thoughts to themselves. It’s in their heart - they all suffer in their own heart, they keep it private.”

This is the most beautiful of villages, and the most modest. It is associated with a massacre but it also has a huge achievement to its name, for against all odds it has kept bitterness at bay.

“Relations with our Protestant neighbours were always good,” according to a local woman. “I do firmly believe that after the shootings that was further strengthened - Protestants showed very strong support and solidarity. A greater bond built up.”

All agree on this point: the Catholic village and nearby Protestant areas got on well both before the shooting and afterwards. Hugh O’Toole points to tickets behind his bar for an interdenominational carol service, observing: “It’s still a very good mixed clientele come into the bar, all walks of life.”

The lack of bitterness is reflected in the memorial of polished granite in the village graveyard, facing towards the mountains of Mourne. Listing the names of the six dead, its inscription reads that they “died tragically”. It conveys discreet dignity. The local councillor Patsy Toman commented: “We could have said they were murdered, but instead we said it was in loving memory. We think it’s beautiful in its simplicity, it’s perfect. These were solid people and it’s a solid memorial.”

There is regret among some in the village that no one was ever charged with the killings.

“That would help things,” said Hugh O’Toole. “Somebody must be running about with a very guilty conscience. You’d like to see somebody held accountable.”

Mr Toman agreed. “It disappoints me to this day that nobody was ever brought to book. At the graves on Christmas morning I see the orphans and the widows standing around them. I feel we need a closing but nobody wants to be in the glare of television, we’re not looking for worldwide publicity.”

There is a desire for justice in Loughinisland, but there is no public clamour from its people for high-profile actions. There are still many tears, people admit, but they flow behind closed doors, a deeply personal grief.

The question arises: how can a village which suffered so much rise above rancour? How can it absorb all that hatred and venom and refrain from responding with hatred of its own? Where do such people find such strength?

Nine children lost their fathers in O’Toole’s that night. Patsy Toman looked out over the hedgerows, bursting now with lush June profusion, as he recalled: “I went into the bar. It was horrific, and what could we do? It was just complete slaughter.”

A fleet of ambulances to ferry the injured to hospital was followed by a fleet of hearses to carry away the dead. Some who rushed to the scene were hugely relieved to find that their relatives had not been in the pub, but others arrived to discover that relatives had been shot.

Patsy Toman had to tell many of them the dreaded news: “There was awful anguish, people going hysterical. I can still hear the screams of those people when they were told their nearest and dearest was dead.”

Marie Byrne lost her husband, Eamon, who earlier that night had taken her out for a meal to celebrate the birth of their youngest son six weeks earlier. Eamon, described as a real family man who lived for his wife and boys, was shot six times in the back.

Mrs Byrne’s brother Patrick O’Hare was also killed, his father cradling his head as he lay on the floor of the pub. The wife of another victim, Adrian Rogan, kept asking a priest: “What am I to say to the children?”

The same priest comforted Ann Jenkinson, a psychiatric nurse whose husband, Malcolm, was killed. After saying a decade of the Rosary, Ann said to him: “Father, would you please say a prayer for those who killed him?”

As locals tell it, the sheer shock lasted for a year or two, but people tried their best to get on with their lives. “There was a lot of prayer,” one man said. “We’re very strong that way, very strong. We didn’t deserve this, but we took it on the chin.”

Today the Loughinisland orphans and widows are treated with much compassion, a local man explaining: “The families are looked at with great sympathy in the parish, they’re special people in the parish. It’s a fondness.”

Barney Green is remembered as a very gentle character, a great conversationalist who, according to a neighbour, “could talk about any subject, loved telling old stories and could have sung a bit of an old song now and then.”

This oldest victim of the Troubles was, a policeman said, “gunned down in a way that would have been cruel for a dog.”

Barney’s nephew Dan McCreanor died with him in the bar. Patsy Toman draws a veil about what exactly he witnessed in the pub that night, but he described one poignant image: “The way they were lying Barney seemed to have his arm around Dan. You’d almost think he was saying, ‘Look, it’ll be all right.’ ”

Hugh O’Toole had just arrived in Romania when the news of the massacre reached him, and immediately returned home. He said: “It really hit me at Stansted airport and on the newsstands was a photograph of Barney. That’s when it really sank in.”

When Hugh O’Toole arrived home he said: “This has destroyed me.” But it didn’t, for he reopened the bar. He has since been back to Romania four times. “It gives you a bit of a lift if you’re doing something good for somebody else.”

A group of Loughinisland men are off to Romania again in a few weeks’ time. Much of the work they do out there involves fixing up orphanages: it is not only the orphans of Loughinisland they care for, but those of Romania as well.

Today, Hugh’s wish is for peace and stability and for political progress to strengthen Northern Ireland’s imperfect peace. The politicians, he said, need to push a lot harder, “make things move a lot better than they are doing, start getting something done.”

A great sadness lies over his village, and will continue to do so for at least a generation. Yet after all the bloodshed and the bereavement, Hugh O’Toole still has the faith in the future to say, without a trace of irony and with characteristic Loughinisland lack of bitterness, “It’s a great wee country.”

O’TOOLE’S BAR AND ITS VICTIMS

Adrian Rogan
The 34-year-old scrap metal contractor was married with two children. He had called at the bar to collect a football ticket.

Eamon Byrne
A married man, aged 34, with four children, he had gone to the bar with his brother-in-law, Patrick O’Hare, to watch a football match.

Patrick O’Hare
The 35-year-old single man was shot several times in the thigh and abdomen. His father survived the attack.

Malcolm Jenkinson
The 53-year-old building contractor was married with three children.
He died from bullet wounds to the abdomen.

Daniel McCreanor
A single farmer aged 59, he was shot as he sat drinking with his uncle, Barney Green, and died from a bullet wound to the chest.

Barney Green
The oldest victim of the Troubles, aged 87. He had been involved in farming and the building trade.

Sunday Life

10 July 2005

ENHANCED forensic techniques are to be used in a bid to catch the killer gang responsible for the last major massacre of the Troubles, Sunday Life can reveal.

Cops called in to re-examine the UVF murders of six Catholics in the Co Down village of Loughinisland 11 years ago have been asked to use advances in DNA technology to help track down the killers.

Evidence gathered in the immediate aftermath of the 1994 atrocity at the Heights Bar is to be re-examined, at the request of the Police Ombudsman, Nuala O’Loan.

Sources close to Mrs O’Loan’s office said police have been asked to look in particular at forensic samples which were gathered at the time.

There is no suggestion of an imminent breakthrough in the investigation, and security sources have hinted it may be one of the cases that has to be referred to the forthcoming ‘cold cases’ review.

The move to re-examine forensics was prompted after former South Down SDLP MLA Eamonn O’Neill personally delivered a dossier to Mrs O’Loan on behalf of relatives of the six men killed.

There has been concern that RUC investigators at the time did not follow up a letter purportedly written by someone who was a witness to the planning of the massacre.

However, if there is any chance of a breakthrough, it will come from matching DNA samples taken from tests on the rifles and balaclavas used in the killings, which were found buried in a field near Saintfield.

The Loughinisland massacre has become known locally as the ‘forgotten’ tragedy of the Troubles, because no one was ever charged.

The six victims were murdered by a Belfast-based UVF gang as they watched a World Cup football game on TV in June 1994.

They included the oldest victim of the Troubles, Barney Green (87).

His 59-year-old nephew, Dan McCreanor, died beside him.

The youngest to die was 34-year-old Adrian Rogan.

Brothers-in-law Eamon Byrne and Patsy O’Hare, and Malcolm Jenkinson, were the other victims.

slnews@belfasttelegraph.co.uk

Sunday Life

Parent’s and sisters use maps in their mission to find missing Ulster woman

By Stephen Breen
10 July 2005

THE family of murdered Lisa Dorrian last night embarked on a series of searches in a desperate effort to find her body.

Lisa’s parents and sisters began their search at the caravan site, in Ballyhalbert, where the 25-year-old was last seen alive.

The family had Ordnance Survey maps and aerial photographs to assist them during their search along the Co Down coastline.

They were joined by a psychic from Newcastle, who has met the family on numerous occasions, and some close family friends.

The family intends to carry out the searches every weekend.

The search continued around the caravan park and surrounding area well into the evening.

Although cops have advised the Dorrian’s not to conduct their own searches, they are determined to continue, until Lisa’s body has been discovered.

Only a small group of people are participating in the searches at present, but the family have appealed to anyone with experience in the field of search and rescue to contact them.

The search comes after the family met with Assistant Chief Constable, Sam Kincaid, on Friday, to discuss the probe into Lisa’s killing.

It is believed he told the family that police know Lisa’s last movements, and the people she was with in the final hours of her life.

Lisa’s sister, Joanne, told Sunday Life: “The police have advised us against conducting our own searches for Lisa, but what else can we do - we’re desperate.

“We are not engaging in a mass search. We are simply getting together with a small group of people, to see if we can find my sister.

“It’s getting harder each day and we are willing to do anything or go anywhere if it would help us find Lisa. We just need her back, so we can properly grieve.

“We have already undertaken a number of searches, and we will continue to carry out some more. Lisa is out there somewhere, and it is our intention to find her.

“We would also welcome support from anyone who has helped search for people who have been missing to help us in any way they can.”

Sunday Life

By Alan Murray
10 July 2005

A FORMER Prison Service chief who was to be a key witness at the inquiry into the jail killing of LVF boss Billy Wright has died.

Martin Mogg was governor of the Maze at the time the loyalist terrorist was shot dead by INLA inmates in December 1997.

His passing means that his testimony about events leading up to Wright’s death won’t be heard.

As a result, his knowledge of crucial decisions made by the Prison Service, which brought LVF and INLA inmates together in one H Block, can’t be probed.

Mr Mogg was both governor of the Maze and the director of operations for the Prison Service when Wright was transferred to the jail and subsequently killed.

He was dubbed ‘Mr Barrowclough’ by prison officers, who likened his manner to the kindly character in comedy series Porridge.

It was Mogg who made the controversial decision to put the rival loyalist and republican factions in separate wings of H6.

It was suggested at the time that he believed he had secured a ‘gentlemen’s agreement’ from both the INLA and LVF that they wouldn’t attack each other if they were both housed in opposite wings of H6.

“Why Martin took that fateful operational decision, we will never fully know now,” said one ex-Maze officer.

“There was a documented report from Maghaberry, where (INLA murderer) Crip McWilliams had been held, stating that he had indicated that he wanted to go to the Maze to kill Billy Wright.

“You’d have thought that would have been enough to have prevented his transfer, but it didn’t.

“As director of operations, Martin Mogg approved that, and as number one Maze governor he also agreed to accept McWilliams into his jail, but we won’t hear from him in his own words why he took such a major gamble.”

Mr Mogg was memorably recorded on prison CCTV cameras playing on a bouncy castle with children of republican prisoners during a Christmas party in 1997, days before Wright’s murder. On the same day, IRA man Liam Averill walked out of the Maze dressed as a woman.

“Mr Barrowclough, as we called him, was a genuinely nice and very astute man,” said one prison officer.

“He’d been in Army Intelligence before joining the Prison Service, so he was no mug.

“His one weakness, though, was this very humane dimension which led him to see good in people rather than recognise the evil in some of the people we had to deal with.”

A spokesperson for the Prison Service said it was not aware if Mr Mogg had, before his death, prepared a comprehensive statement for the public inquiry into Wright’s death.

He was cremated at Roselawn last month.

Sunday Life

10 July 2005

TWO journalists facing legal action ordering them to hand over interview notes last night warned cops: “We’ll go to jail before we name our sources.”

The warning comes after senior members of the Stevens Inquiry team went to court last week in a bid to force David Lister, of The Times, and the Sunday World’s Hugh Jordan to hand over notes from interviews with UDA men.

The Recorder of Belfast, Judge Tom Burgess, threw out an application by police investigating the murder of Pat Finucane for the journalists to hand over notes and recordings made while researching their 2003 book Mad Dog: the Rise and Fall of Johnny Adair and C Company.

Judge Burgess told police they had applied to the wrong court.

However, Sunday Life understands that the police will now come back with another challenge for the material.

David Lister said: “We have no intention of disclosing to the police, or anyone else for that matter, who our source, or sources, were in this particular part of the book.”

The book contained a confession from a man identified as ‘Davy’, who claimed he was one of the two UDA gunmen who shot Mr Finucane at his Belfast home in 1989.

Cops are understood to have asked the two authors to supply them with the identity of ‘Davy’.

Sunday Life

Wee attack of stress, Jimbo?

By Stephen Breen
10 July 2005

SUSPECTED MI5 agent and top UDA man Jim Spence is recovering after suffering a heart attack.

Senior security sources told us the north Belfast loyalist suffered the mild attack at his luxury home last week. He was then rushed to hospital.

The crime boss, who is in his 40s, was later released following the scare.

Sources claim he plans to recover by spending the Twelfth holidays in sunny Bulgaria.

Spence, who has denied being the loyalist equivalent of IRA superspy ‘Stakeknife’, is known in loyalist circles as a playboy.

Along with his cronies, he regularly makes trips to cities in England and Scotland for boozy weekend parties.

But sources believe the stress of being labelled a top informer caused Spence to have the heart attack.

It is also understood he fears being the next senior loyalist to be expelled from the UDA, following the expulsion of Jim ‘Doris Day’ Gray.

Said a source: “The word is that Spence thought he was going to die when he had the heart attack - it really frightened him.

“He has been coming under a lot of pressure recently and the informer claims just won’t leave him in spite of the support he has received from the UDA leadership.

“A man of his age shouldn’t be having heart attacks and it looks like everything is getting to him. There’s all sorts of rumours flying around about Spence at the minute.

“He’s clearly under pressure and everything just seems to have taken its toll on his health at the minute.”

In a separate development, senior loyalist sources have claimed that ousted terror chief Johnny ‘Mad Dog’ Adair was back in the province last week.

It is understood Adair was spotted by undercover soldiers walking close to the home of a leading loyalist in north Belfast earlier this month.

Added a source: “Adair was driven to north Belfast in the early hours the other week and got out of the car.

“He was spotted by an undercover team close to the home of a senior loyalist and told to clear off, but he wasn’t questioned.

“He claims that he can come into Ulster without his enemies knowing and the word is that he is even planning on coming here for the Twelfth.”

Sunday Life

Cop out over hood attack

By Sinead McCavana
10 July 2005

A TERRIFIED Ulster woman claims police refused to come to her aid, when her home was being attacked by young hoods, including one who threatened to kill her.

Laurie Phillips, who lives on her own on the sprawling Ballybeen estate in Dundonald, said she called police at Castlereagh twice on Wednesday night, as missiles were being thrown at her house by hoods.

A police spokeswoman told Sunday Life: “Every call for assistance or report of a crime will receive a police response but that response will be an appropriate one and will be prioritised on the basis of its nature and the number of officers available.

“Local police patrol all areas of Castlereagh district and the Ballybeen estate is provided with the same service as any other part of the district.”

The front window in Ms Phillips Drumadoon Park home was smashed during the incident - the latest in a series of attacks perpetrated by the thugs who torment her.

Ms Phillips insists: “Police told me on two occasions that they had been directed not to go into Ballybeen - I couldn’t believe it.”

Responding to these claims, the police spokeswoman said: “The first call received was logged for attention of the community policing team and due to the nature of the second call, police attended the scene.”

But Ms Phillips says police only came out after a friend drove to Dundonald PSNI station.

“An officer there was very helpful and managed to get two police Landrovers to come out,” said the 46-year-old.

Ms Phillips said her house has been the target for hoods since one thug took a dislike to her daughter’s dog, after it barked at him.

“He threatened to rip its throat out,” she said.

“Since then every night they’re outside, sometimes wearing balaclavas.

“But, last year, I had the same thing and those attacks lasted for three months. It was the same young thug then and he brings these other thugs with him.

“They gather around the bonfire outside and throw stones, oranges, tools, wood with nails and anything else they can get their hands on. I don’t know where to turn.

“No-one should have to live like this.”

Sunday Life

Friends disunited?

By Alan Murray
10 July 2005

**See previous post concerning their ‘good will’ toward each other >>>here.

UDA leaders Jackie McDonald and Andre Shoukri had a blazing row last Monday - in the same building where they posed for a Sunday Life snapper three weeks ago.

The pair locked horns in a major shouting match after one of Shoukri’s men had one of his arms broken by one of McDonald’s commanders in Sandy Row.

Sources within the terror group say the argument was over a more serious matter - namely the mounting pressure Shoukri is under to respond to nationalist attacks in north Belfast.

Sunday Life understands the pair “agreed to differ” at the end of the row, and that could mean the UDA in north Belfast will be allowed to respond to nationalist attacks on parades or Protestants homes over the Twelfth.

One man, who was in the prisoners’ centre during the row, told us the argument was “hot and heavy” for over an hour.

“It was over something that arose during the last fortnight, not the beating. Most men in north Belfast accept that our man was messing about and had assaulted a couple of lads over there, including one who has cancer,” he said.

“Andre had a shouting match with one Sandy Row commander in the first visit, and in the second one on Monday he had a big row with Jackie - they were roaring at each other.”

Other sources say Shoukri told McDonald that he was finding it hard to restrain his men from responding to republican provocation.

“Jackie doesn’t really have any interface areas, a fact he acknowledged in the Sunday Life interview, and admitted that Andre did have problems in that area,” said one source.

“Jackie is telling us that there will be rewards for our restraint but the decisions of the Parades Commission don’t appear to reflect that and republicans are happy to see Protestants being attacked at Orange Parades,” he said.

While the two senior UDA men rowed fiercely over the issue for over an hour, they agreed not to leave until the matter had been resolved.

Sources insisted that there were still generally good working relations between both Shoukri and McDonald.

During the recent interview with Sunday Life both men denied that they were at loggerheads, or that the UDA was about to implode because of internal policy disagreements and continuing crime activities in north Belfast.

Neither of the two men were available for comment last week.

Sunday Life

LEADING Drumcree Orangeman Richard Monteith has been accused of hoarding hardcore porn - by the wife who claims he hit her

By Ciaran McGuigan
10 July 2005

THE wife of one of Ulster’s top lawyers was left badly-bruised as the couple’s marriage erupted into a violent clash.

Now cops are investigating allegations of assault against leading Portadown-based solicitor Richard Monteith made by his estranged wife, Rosmund Evans.

A furious Ms Evans told Sunday Life how a bust-up around the dinner table left her nursing a massive bruise on her face.

And Rosmund detailed how her two-year marriage to the leading Orangeman has descended into bitter acrimony at the couple’s luxury £2m home.

Rosmund - who has three children from a previous marriage - claims her husband:

• Kept a stash of pornographic magazines - including bondage mags - in the marital home

• Booted her and her 15-year-old daughter out of their home, leaving them to spend a week sleeping in a car

• Sacked her from his law firm

• Disconnected the cooker at their home

• Removed the kettle, toaster, cutlery and saucepans

• Sent lawyers’ letters instructing that he was removing furniture from Rosmund and her daughter’s bedroom

• Had oil turned off and the boiler locked, and

• Cut off the telephone on two separate occasions.

The couple’s relationship hit rock bottom last month, when cops were called to their listed 18th century mansion on the outskirts of Lurgan to investigate allegations of assault by Mr Monteith.

Said Rosmund: “My daughter and I were in the kitchen and we were both starting to make our tea.

“Then my estranged husband, Richard Monteith, and his mother entered the kitchen and started to unwrap plates of food.

“When I turned towards the table to get some place-mats, Richard started to grab them.

“Richard then threw one at me, striking me on the left side of the face. I said to my daughter: ‘He has assaulted me.’”

Rosmund later attended the on-call doctor at Craigavon Area Hospital for treatment for bruising to her face.

A police spokesman said last night: “We are aware of incidents, but we do not comment on ongoing investigations.”

That incident took place on June 10.

But the marriage had been on the slide just months after their wedding at Drumcree Church in May 2003.

And it was the lawyer’s fascination with hardcore adult pornography that doomed the relationship, according to his wife.

Added Rosmund: “When this (the break-up) kicked off, I went into his study and came across all this other stuff (pornography).

“But I would say that the marriage started to deteriorate about three months after we were married.

“He was not the man I thought he was at all.”

The couple each have Occupancy Orders for the marital home - a seven-bedroom mansion set in its own grounds at Beechpark, outside Lurgan - which previously belonged to Mr Monteith’s late father, Dermot.

The couple also own a home at Oak Grange in Waringstown.

Rosmund and her daughter were awarded their Occupancy Order at a court hearing on March 11.

Since that date, she claims to have suffered “mental, physical and verbal abuse” at the hands of her estranged husband.

Sunday Life has seen documents confirming that police are investigating alleged breaches of the Occupancy Order by Mr Monteith.

Said Rosmund: “He thinks he is above everybody.

“He thinks: ‘I have the money and I know the law, and I can do whatever I want to do.’

“I was mad marrying him. I was better off on my own, with my independence.”

Sunday Life made repeated attempts to contact Mr Monteith yesterday by phone, fax, email and text, but without response.

When a Sunday Life reporter attempted to speak to him near his home, he drove off without commenting.

(Additional reporting: Stephen Breen)

Sunday Life

By Ciaran McGuigan
10 July 2005

KINKY lawyer Richard Monteith will this morning don an Orange sash - rather than the fetish gear worn in the porno mags he likes - as he prepares to lead LOL 107 Ballygargan to the Hill at Drumcree.

At home, he will leave his estranged wife Rosmund Evans, who claims that he assaulted her and subjected her to a campaign of “mental, physical and verbal abuse” since their two-year marriage disintegrated earlier this year.

Rosmund has now branded him a “Jekyll and Hyde” figure, who puts on a public front that is very different from his porn-loving home life.

The legal eagle is no stranger to controversy, having hit the headlines numerous times before.

In 1999, he was convicted in connection to the Drumcree dispute the previous year.

Mr Monteith was fined for obstructing traffic after he and nine others chopped down a tree to block the Gilford Road in Lurgan during protests in July 1998.

And, in July 2000, he hit the headlines again after firing his legally-held firearm during a fracas in the grounds of Brownlow House - the Orange Order’s Lurgan HQ.

A local businessman was being attacked by a drunken mob following a Royal Black Preceptory demonstration, and Mr Monteith fired his personal protection weapon into the air to scatter the thugs.

He has also legally represented some of the province’s most notorious killers.

Among his clients was Robin ‘The Jackal’ Jackson, who was believed to have been involved in the 1974 Dublin and Monaghan bombings, and was the leader of a ruthless UVF gang operating in mid-Ulster that was behind numerous bombings and shootings.

He also represented convicted killer Clifford McKeown, who is currently serving life for the brutal murder of Catholic taxi-driver Michael McGoldrick at the height of the Drumcree dispute in 1996.

Other notorious cases he has been involved with included that of Norman Coopey, the loyalist killer of Catholic schoolboy James Morgan.

He also represented one of the men accused of killing Robert Hamill.

Mr Monteith was also involved in the case of Ulster Resistance members who were held on weapons charges in France.

More recently, he wrote to a number of newspapers threatening legal action after investigative journalist Steven Moore made startling revelations about leading DUP member Paul Berry’s private life.

The DUP last week suspended Mr Berry - an MLA for Newry and Armagh - pending an internal inquiry.

Daily Ireland

BY Anton McCabe

A former Shell worker yesterday spoke of why he had resigned in support of the Rossport Five.
Until last week, Fergus Sweeney was a security guard protecting Shell’s pipeline and terminal sites in Mayo. Now he is one of the protesters blockading the Bellanaboy terminal.
He walked out of his job last week in protest at the jailing of the Rossport Five.

>>READ ARTICLE

Daily Ireland

By Conor McMorrow

A woman was yesterday forced to leave the house where she was born and has lived for more than 50 years after a series of sectarian attacks on her home.
Kathleen McCaughey, a Catholic, left her home in Ahoghill, Co Antrim, after a threatening phone call was made to the Housing Executive saying that her house would be set on fire if she didn’t move out of the area.
On Thursday night, a number of youths entered Mrs McCaughey’s garden in the predominantly unionist Brookfield Gardens area playing a Lambeg drum and flutes.
The incidents were the latest in a wrath of sectarian abuse directed at Mrs McCaughey in her home since Easter.
“I have been getting abuse for the past few months but the final straw came when they started to threaten the Housing Executive as well,” she said.
“They started telling the Housing Executive that they would burn my house and all the houses attached to it, even the houses with children if I didn’t move out.
“I was born and reared in Ahoghill and I have lived in Brookfield all my life. I was so upset leaving the house that I had to get a doctor to come and attend to me.
“I had a lot of good neighbours in Ahoghill and it is only about six families that have been involved in the intimidation.
“None of the unionist politicians in the area did anything to stop these familes intimidating me.”
The Housing Executive have provided a new house for Mrs McCaughey and yesterday, she turned her back on the building she was born in to move to the nearby village of Portglenone.
She vowed that she would never move back to Ahoghill.
“My brother is also moving from Ahoghill to Portglenone because of intimidation.”
Philip McGuigan, SInn Féin MLA for North Antrim, said: “The sectarian abuse against Mrs McCaughey has been allowed to continue for so long without any unionist intervention. People that have responsibility in Ahoghill need to take a long look at the message they are sending out to Catholics in the area,” he said.
A Housing Executive spokesman said: “We can confirm that a resident in Ahoghill has been found alternative accommodation as a result of intimidation.”

BBC

Orangemen staged a verbal protest at the security barrier

The annual Orange Order parade at Drumcree, County Armagh, has passed off peacefully.

It followed a low key security operation to enforce a decision to bar Orangemen from passing down the mainly nationalist Garvaghy Road in Portadown.

In the last two years, the parade has passed off peacefully. But, in the past, there has been serious violence.

District Secretary David Jones said Portadown Orangemen felt “disgust and disappointment” at the ban.

He addressed the senior police officer on duty and said the resolve of Orangemen remained “as strong as ever”.

Mr Jones made the comments after several hundred Orangemen and women walked the short distance from Drumcree church to the security barrier.

After a brief religious service, the Orange lodges were addressed by the District Master, David Burrows, who criticised the Parades Commission ruling.

Mr Burrows said the protest would continue until Orangemen were once again allowed to follow their route.

“We are not going to walk away, we will continue to protest every Sunday until our rights are restored,” he said.

Orangemen and women walked to police lines at Drumcree

A major security operation has accompanied the march in recent years, but it was scaled down last year.

This year, a gate and several crush barriers blocked the road below the church and a light-weight barbed wire fence was strung across a nearby field.

Soldiers and police officers, who were not in riot gear, were at the barrier. However, there were fewer than in previous years.

The main part of the barrier remained opened throughout the Orange Order protest on Sunday, with only crush barriers preventing the marchers from moving forwards.

Police Land Rovers were parked at potential flashpoints, such as the top of the Garvaghy Road, and water cannon were on standby.

Chief Superintendent Drew Harris said he was satisfied with the way things had gone.

“This is the third year in which we have had little or no disorder,” he said.

He said the greatly reduced security operation was commensurate with how police had measured any threat of violence.

Mr Harris added: “It has been significantly scaled down and normal life in the whole of Portadown has been allowed to continue pretty much uninterrupted.”

The route along the Garvaghy Road was last used by the Orangemen in 1997.

Each July, the Portadown Orange Lodge attends a service at Drumcree church to commemorate the anniversary of the Battle of the Somme.

Since 1998, their homeward route has been blocked by the security forces, following a ruling by the Parades Commission.

The Parades Commission was set up in 1997 to make decisions on whether controversial parades should be restricted.

BBC

The owner of a north Belfast house targeted by arsonists said he believed the attack was sectarian.

Police said a window at the house on the Crumlin Road was broken shortly before 0400 BST.

A quantity of what was believed to have been petrol was poured in and ignited. At least one person was treated for the effects of breathing smoke.

Sinn Fein assembly member Gerry Kelly said the Catholic family were lucky to escape with their lives.

The Observer

Europe link as hunt for killers intensifies

Antony Barnett, David Rose, Jason Burke and Amelia Hill
Sunday July 10, 2005

Police believe that a team of at least four bombers using commercial high explosives with sophisticated timing devices mounted last week’s attacks in London, and fear they might yet strike again.

The details are the first to emerge from the massive investigation into the attack now under way and are based on a detailed examination of the exact timings of the explosions and early forensic analysis of the scenes of the four blasts. Police forces from across Europe will be involved and police sources said that links between the terrorists and the European continent were being actively pursued.

The death toll, which is expected to rise to at least 70, now stands at 49. Around 30 people are still thought missing, and recovery teams are continuing to pull bodies and evidence from a mangled train on the Piccadilly line between King’s Cross and Russell Square, 600m from the tunnel entrance.

Conditions for the salvage and rescue were extreme, with temperatures reaching 60 degrees centigrade, said Deputy Chief Constable Andy Trotter of the British Transport Police. Around 70 people remain in serious condition in hospital, out of 350 who have been treated in all. A total of 700 are believed to have been hurt in the attacks.

>>Read on