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Belfast Telegraph

By Claire Regan
03 November 2005

A hoax bomb alert which forced thousands of delegates to evacuate one of the biggest conferences ever held in Belfast could endanger new investment, the Secretary of State warned last night.

Peter Hain spoke of his concerns after the British Council of Shopping Centres (BCSC) event was forced to abandon the Waterfront Hall when the telephoned alert was made at about 11.15am yesterday. Around 2,000 delegates were evacuated to the nearby St George’s Market.

“I told the conference on Tuesday Belfast is the best place in Europe in which to invest,” Mr Hain said.

“We have the potential to benefit from multi-million pound investment and those who threaten investment are trying to kill jobs and are enemies of everyone working for a better future.”

The three day event, the largest private sector conference ever held in Belfast, relocated to the Ulster Hall where Senator George Mitchell presented the final keynote address.

The alert was cleared by 4pm. A police spokeswoman confirmed nothing was found.

BCSC conference chairman, Martyn Chase, said: “We carried on as normal. We have had a wonderful welcome and a great conference.”

Despite these assurances, deputy SDLP leader, Dr Alasdair McDonnell, said he also fears the alert will have a lasting impact.

“All the positive potential that this conference held for Belfast and its future economic and tourism development has been put at risk as, once again, our old problems came back to haunt us,” he said.

“To see delegates herded out of the Waterfront and onto the streets because of a bomb scare was disheartening to say the least. This is not the image of Belfast, and indeed of Northern Ireland, that we wanted delegates to take away with them.

“But the stark reality is that this is exactly what will happen. The one memory that will stand out in the mind of those 2,000 people is their conference being interrupted by a bomb scare.”

Belfast Telegraph

By Michael McHugh in Poyntzpass
03 November 2005

Memories are still raw in the Co Armagh village of Poyntzpass seven years after two LVF gunmen burst into the Railway Bar and shot dead life-long friends Damien Trainor and Philip Allen.

Ballymoney DUP member Gary Blair has called for the killers, Stephen McClean and Noel McCready, to be released following the LVF’s announcement to stand down at the weekend.

Mr Blair is a former prisoner who was released under the Good Friday Agreement after being jailed over the loyalist murder of a Sinn Fein election candidate.

His suggestion has been met with horror and opposition in Poyntzpass and beyond.

Bernadette Cavanagh, the owner of the Railway Bar, was working the night the shooting happened, said she had vivid memories of the carnage.

“You try to let it die but it is just something which you don’t forget about. I would be opposed to them getting out of prison, I could never forgive them for what they did for no reason to two neighbours,” Ms Canavan added.

The victims were Catholic and Protestant friends.

A cousin of Mr Allen, who was in the village at the time of the shooting, said: “Those two, McCready and McClean, got out of prison under the Agreement and got their chance and I think they should now serve their time.”

BreakingNews.ie

03/11/2005 - 09:22:30

President George Bush’s officials would be making a mistake if they place any restrictions on Gerry Adams’ ability to speak at fundraising events in the US, Washington was warned today.

Sinn Fein chief negotiator Martin McGuinness expressed concern at newspaper reports quoting US State Department sources as saying there could be a visa restriction on the Sinn Féin leader, who is due to visit New York later this month for an annual fundraising dinner.

The Mid Ulster MP said Mr Adams would pull out of the visit if restrictions were placed on him addressing the events.

And he also warned that Irish republicans would resist any attempt by the Bush administration to link the visa conditions with Sinn Féin’s refusal to endorse the North’s system of policing.

Mr McGuinness said: “These fundraising events allow supporters of Irish unity to contribute to Sinn Féin’s political programme to achieve this through peaceful and democratic activity.

“Such support is entirely legitimate and indeed necessary in demonstrating that politics works.

“The US has played a pivotal role in the creation and evolution of the peace process.

“An even-handed approach has been the hallmark of success in this. All parties have been treated equally.

“However, any heavy-handed attempt by the State Department to try and dictate Sinn Féin policy on policing is misguided and will do nothing to help in the resolution of this key issue.”

Sinn Fein is the only one of the four largest parties in the North to refuse its seats on boards designed to hold the Police Service of Northern Ireland accountable.

Despite Government, rival nationalist SDLP and Catholic bishops’ support for policing, the party has insisted police reforms in the North do not go far enough.

They want policing and justice powers to be transferred out of British government hands to a new devolved ministry at Stormont.

Mr McGuinness said: “Sinn Féin knows what we have to do on policing. Our position is very clear.

“The British government also knows what it has to do on policing. It has given a series of commitments on this.

“The upcoming period will provide ample opportunities to establish whether these commitments have been honoured.

“President Bush’s special envoy Mitchell Reiss knows this and he and the State Department have been fully briefed on our party’s position.

“If Gerry Adams has restrictions imposed on his visa, this means you would have the ludicrous and unsustainable situation where he is allowed to travel to the US, but he would be banned from attending the fundraising event, which will go ahead in any event.

“If Gerry Adams is banned from addressing US citizens at fundraising events next week, he will not travel to the United States. Of course, he and others in the Sinn Féin leadership will continue to engage with US opinion and he will travel there as part of that engagement in the time ahead.”

Mr McGuinness said that if the US Government adopted the policy, it would play into the hands of anti-Good Friday Agreement unionists and also cause deep anger among Irish-American supporters of the peace process.

It would also be out of step with the British government’s approach to Sinn Féin, he argued.

“There is no ban on Gerry Adams attending fundraising events in Britain,” the Mid Ulster MP said.

“Inevitably, such a wholly negative approach by the US would have serious political repercussions and would be used by anti-Agreement unionists, including the DUP, to undermine the progress that has been made this year and damage the hopes for progress in the months ahead.

“It is important that this matter is resolved as speedily as possible.”

BBC

Millions were taken from the vaults of the Northern Bank last December

Two more men have been arrested by police investigating last year’s £26.5m Northern Bank robbery in Belfast.

A 40-year-old man was arrested in Dungannon and a 43-year-old in Coalisland, both in County Tyrone.

Police are also carrying out more searches in Kilcoo, County Down, in connection with the robbery.

Two men in their 20s arrested in the village on Tuesday are still being questioned, as is a 30-year-old man arrested in Belfast on Wednesday.

The road between Castlewellan and Newry at Kilcoo is blocked by burnt out cars after protests on Wednesday night.

A number of protesters blocked the road.

Kilcoo is a strongly republican village close to Castlewellan.

The stepfather of one of the men arrested on Tuesday said police arrived just as his stepson came home from work at about 2310 GMT.

Police have been carrying out a series of searches

He said his stepson laughed when police told him he was being arrested in connection with the Northern Bank robbery.

The house was searched and it is understood documents, mobile phones, a passport and computer equipment were taken away.

Sinn Fein assembly member for South Down Willie Clarke said the two men arrested are locals and were not members of his party.

Mr Clarke also accused the police of being heavy-handed during the operation.

Police on both sides of the Irish border have blamed the IRA for the robbery. The IRA has denied this.

The robbery happened at the bank’s headquarters in Donegall Square West in the city centre in December 2004.

Nobody has been charged with the raid.

Some money seized in County Cork last February was linked to the robbery, but virtually all of the missing millions is still unrecovered.

Last March, the Northern Bank replaced all its £10, £20, £50 and £100 notes with new notes carrying a different logo.

Irish Independent

**See >>this article about the project

A GROUP of Irish builders on a charity project in South Africa faced a cruel setback yesterday when gales damaged more than half the houses they built.

Over 70pc of the work carried out by the builders - as part of the Niall Mellon Project - was damaged or destroyed by the massive winds.

As the volunteer builders arrived on site they were faced with scenes of complete destruction.

“It was terrible arriving today and seeing all the damage. Some of the houses are half knocked, some are completely ruined,” said one worker.

Since beginning work on the houses on Saturday morning almost 60 houses had been built. But now with more than half of their work damaged the teams must begin again and hope that they will be able to catch up.

“It takes a team of ten, two days to build and roof a house. This is definitely a huge setback,” the worker stated.

The volunteers were told of the destruction early yesterday morning by Niall Mellon as they were being bussed out to the work site.

The gales in the area are renowned for blowing up with little warning. Despite having secured the buildings the strength of the gales makes it almost impossible to ensure the half-finished houses can withstand them.

The team of 200 men arrived in Cape Town on Friday and began work on Saturday morning.

A further 500 men were due to take over in a week’s time to insert electricity, plumbing and plaster the homes.

Now the entire project has been hit by the damage which will affect the number of houses ready for the second team to finish.

The charity organisation, dedicated to building houses for poverty stricken people living in South Africa had volunteer builders, electricians, plumbers and plasterers working to house some of the 12,000 people currently working in hut dwellings.

Caroline Crawford