SAOIRSE32

Sunday Life

Brown was a tot when his dad set alight his mum while he slept

By Ciaran McGuigan
13 November 2005

Brown’s mother Irene on her wedding day

A MAN accused of the cut-throat murder of teenagers David McIlwaine and Andrew Robb has a grim family secret - his father murdered his mother 25 years ago.

Alleged killer Steven Leslie Brown was just a tot when his love-cheat father Noel Brown was jailed for life for murdering his wife, Irene.

He poured petrol over her and turned her into a human fireball as she slept in the family’s Craigavon home, while two-month-old Steven was sleeping just feet away in the same room.

The baby escaped relatively unhurt, but Irene Brown (23), died from her horrific injuries two months later in hospital.

Steven Leslie Brown, now 25, appeared at Armagh Magistrate’s last week accused of the murdering David McIlwaine (18) and Andrew Robb (19). Brown, who wore a Chelsea top for the hearing, denied the charges.

It’s the second time that Brown, of Castle Place, Castlecaufield, has been accused of the murders.

He was previously charged under the name Steven Revels, the name he adopted after being taken into care following the brutal murder of his mother and the jailing of his father.

He spent almost a year on remand after being arrested just days after the gruesome double murder in February 2000.

Revels, as he was then known, was bailed just before Christmas that year and the charges suddenly withdrawn two months later.

Last Friday, he was remanded back into custody again.

The teenagers were stabbed to death after leaving a nightclub at Tandragee and being abducted by a number of men.

Their bodies were dumped at the side of a country road after they had had their throats cut.

Appearing in court surrounded by armed police, Brown spoke only to confirm his name.

Detective chief inspector Tim Hanley told the court that when charged Brown had replied: “Not guilty.”

His lawyer, Richard Monteith, told the court his client would be seeking bail in the High Court, recalling that he had done the same when he faced the same charges five years ago.

Brown was arrested last Monday, just days after a £10,000 reward was offered in an appeal for fresh information on the Crimewatch UK programme.

lA second man appeared in court yesterday charged with the Tandragee double murder. Mark Robert Burcombe (25), from Ballynahinch Road, Lisburn, was remanded in custody when he appeared at Banbridge Magistrates Court.

BreakingNews.ie

13/11/2005 - 17:30:33

The North’s two largest loyalist paramilitary groups were tonight urged to declare a definitive end to criminal and paramilitary activity.

Democratic Unionist MP Jeffrey Donaldson issued the call to the Ulster Volunteer Force and the Ulster Defence Association after the UDA signalled in a Remembrance Day statement it wanted talks with the British government on its future.

In a statement read to around 800 loyalists at a Remembrance Day event on the outskirts of Belfast, including a colour party in full paramilitary attire, the UDA said it believed the Provisional IRA had been defeated.

The group also accused the British government of rebuffing at least three requests since June for meetings with Northern Ireland Secretary Peter Hain and attempts since January to have talks with Prime Minister Tony Blair.

“How can the attention and pressure be redirected for loyalism to make the next move ?” the UDA’s statement said.

“We have always been willing to discuss the future. We wish to make our position absolutely clear that over a two-month period we have consulted our entire membership.

“On behalf of the Inner Council the message must go out today that at this time the UDA has a clear understanding on the future.

“We are open-minded and waiting on contact.”

While nationalist SDLP Assembly member Alex Attwood insisted the UDA must prove itself not just through word but deed, Ulster Unionist leader Sir Reg Empey and the DUP’s Mr Donaldson said it was a potentially significant statement.

Mr Donaldson, who is the MP for Lagan Valley, said: “We welcome the engagement within the UDA about taking a different direction.

“We want to encourage that debate because it is clear people in Northern Ireland really want peace to prevail and the paramilitaries to cease all of their activities.

“But let us be clear that includes criminal as well as terrorist activities.

“In terms of the loyalist paramilitary groups, we would urge the UDA and the UVF to follow on from the recent move made by the Loyalist Volunteer Force and make a definitive statement about their future intentions.

“This should include clarification about what they intend to do about weapons decommissioning as well as ending their criminal and terrorist activities.”

Last month the Loyalist Volunteer Force, the organisation formed by renegade loyalist Billy Wright, announced it was standing down following the completion of IRA disarmament in September.

The move also followed the ending of a feud between the group and the Ulster Volunteer Force out of which it split in 1996.

The bloody feud claimed four lives in Belfast during the summer.

Progressive Unionist leader David Ervine, whose party is linked to the Ulster Volunteer Force and Red Hand Commando, also revealed that both groups have been engaged in an internal debate on their future.

The East Belfast Assembly member said the debate began months before the IRA declared in July it was ending its armed campaign.

In its last report to the British and Irish governments, ceasefire watchdog The Independent Monitoring Commission said the UDA was involved in violent and other serious crime and remained an active threat to the rule of law in the North.

Its October 19 report accused the organisation of dealing in drugs, carrying out robberies and sectarian petrol bomb attacks.

It also attributed the murder of Stephen Nelson who died in March from injuries sustained in a vicious assault outside a nightclub in Newtownabbey last year to the UDA.

In October, former UDA brigadier Jim Gray was gunned down outside his father’s home in east Belfast after being released on bail on money laundering charges.

Another senior figure, Andre Shoukri appeared before Belfast magistrates yesterday on money laundering, blackmail and intimidation charges.

BBC

Bishop Patrick Walsh paid tribute to two priests

A service of dedication to two priests killed during the Troubles has been held during the opening of a new Catholic church in west Belfast.

Corpus christi, in the Ballymurphy area, was built in partnership with the Fold Housing Association.

Father Hugh Mullan was shot in 1971 and Father Noel Fitzpatrick in 1972. Both were giving the last rites to injured people during violent disturbances.

Bishop Patrick Walsh said it was important to remember them.

“The people still remember them, there’s a plaque in the new church to them.

“I think it’s very important to realise that our priests, they live with the people no matter what the conditions are,” Bishop Walsh said.

“Those two priests, like all the other priests, lived with the people.

“When they were called out on that sad mission on that night they went out and they themselves were shot dead, so I think it’s very important we remember them.”

The priests were based at Corpus Christi at the time of their deaths.

Both died during exchanges of gunfire and the details of their deaths were disputed, although local people blamed British soldiers.

Sunday Life

13 November 2005

Fitzgerald and Thatcher

THE Anglo-Irish Agreement is 20 years old this Tuesday.

It was the historic pact signed by Margaret Thatcher and Garrett Fitzgerald at Hillsborough Castle on November 15, 1985 that plunged Northern Ireland into turmoil.

Unionists, who had not be consulted, reacted with shock, anger and humiliation to the deal which gave Dublin a say in Northern Ireland affairs.

“Ulster Says No” became the rallying cry as 100,000 people converged on Belfast City Hall to show their anger.

DUP leader the Rev Ian Paisley declared Mrs Thatcher a “wicked, treacherous, lying woman” [**for once, he was right].

Ulster Unionist deputy leader Harold McCusker memorably described how he felt “like a dog standing in the cold outside the gates of Hillsborough Castle” while Mrs Thatcher “sold my birthright”.

The SDLP were happy but republicans also cried “sell-out”.

Sinn Fein leader Gerry Adams said: “The formal recognition of the partition of Ireland is a disaster for the nationalist cause, and far outweighs the powerless consultative role given to Dublin.”

Here is a timeline of key events in the follow up to the signing of the pact on November 15:

November 15: Tory Treasury Minister Ian Gow resigns in protest. He was murdered by the IRA in 1990.

November 18: Senator Mary Robinson, a future Irish President, resigned from the Irish Labour Party (Fitzgerald’s coalition partners) over the lack of consultation before the AIA was signed.

Novomber 20: Secretary of State Tom King was physically attacked by loyalist protesters as he arrived for a function at Belfast City Hall.

November 23: 100,000 unionists gather in Belfast city centre for the massive ‘Ulster Says No’ rally addressed by unionist leaders.

December 11: 38 RUC officers are injured in clashes with unionist protesters at the first meeting of the new A-I Secretariat at Maryfield.

December 17: All 15 unionist MPs resign their seats in protest against the AIA.

March 3, 1986: Unionists attempt to repeat the 1974 Loyalist Workers’ Strike with a ‘Day of Action’. But while many Protestants supported the strike action, which caused chaos, there was also a lot of intimidation with masked loyalists setting up barricades. The day ended with loyalist riots. There were 237 reported cases of intimidation, 57 arrests and 47 RUC officers injured.

Later in the year, it emerged that 150 RUC families had been forced to move as a result of loyalist intimidation.

But the Government stood firm, and with no power-sharing executive to bring down, the widespread unionist protests fizzled out.

The AIA ushered in a long period of political stalemate, but it was a key moment in relations between Dublin and London and laid the ground for the Good Friday Agreement of 1999.

::: u.tv :::

Irish prime minister Bertie Ahern was today accused of double standards after he ruled out ever having Sinn Fein as a coalition partner in Dublin.

SUNDAY 13/11/2005 18:17:27
By:Press Association

Democratic Unionist MP Nigel Dodds warned the Taoiseach not to expect his party to stomach in Northern Ireland what he would not accept in the Irish Republic.

In comments to the Sunday Independent newspaper in Dublin, Mr Ahern said he would lead his party, Fianna Fail into Opposition rather than consider going into a coalition government with Sinn Fein.

“Even a radical overhaul of Sinn Fein economic policy would have little real credibility after 35 years of Marxism,” the Taoiseach said.

“I believe Sinn Fein are agents of poverty and disadvantage. I believe the very notion of Sinn Fein in government would lead to a flight of investment, which is untenable in a small open economy.

“For the good of the country, we cannot accept those policies in government. A practical republican programme delivering real benefits for ordinary people would be impossible with Sinn Fein in government.

“In such circumstances, I would lead my party into Opposition rather than contemplate coalition with Sinn Fein or an arrangement for their support in government.”

With unionists facing pressure to resume power-sharing in Northern Ireland featuring Sinn Fein, the DUP said Mr Ahern`s comments were another example of double standards by the Irish Government.

“Bertie Ahern has ruled out in categorical terms any prospect of Sinn Fein in government,” the North Belfast MP said.

“Is it too much to expect that double standards will not apply once again ?

“Unionists have learned that consistency and morality long ago ceased to be the benchmarks of this political process as far as the (British and Irish) governments are concerned.

“I have little doubt that the same Bertie Ahern will be at the forefront of pressure from Dublin on unionists to accept what they will not.”

Mr Dodds noted the Irish government had already ruled out an early prison release for the IRA killers of Irish policeman, Garda Jerry McCabe.

He contrasted this with the situation north of the border where IRA and loyalist killers had been released from jail early under the Good Friday Agreement and other terror suspects who had gone on-the-run were being offered under new legislation the chance to return to Northern Ireland knowing they would never be arrested or serve a prison sentence.

He continued: “Now that Dublin is facing up to the reality of what it means to have Sinn Fein in government, let there be no further double-talk from Dublin or London.

“Unionists in Northern Ireland will not be pushed over as they were when (former UUP leader David) Trimble negotiated for them.

“Nor will the DUP accept second class standards for the people of this province.”

Mr Ahern was also criticised by Sir Reg Empey who claimed his remarks would only irritate the unionist community.

“I would suspect these comments were made by Bertie Ahern out of the realisation that Sinn Fein is sniffing at his heels electorally in the Irish Republic,” the Ulster Unionist leader said.

“Everybody expects Sinn Fein to improve its position in the Irish Parliament at the next General Election and they would expect that improvement to be largely at Fianna Fail`s expense.

“However to people in Northern Ireland his comments smack of double standards and it will only fuel unionist annoyance.

“People are entitled to ask why should we be told to go into government with Sinn Fein when the Irish government won`t contemplate doing the same?

“Remember Bertie Ahern and Fianna Fail describe themselves as republicans. They have a lot more in common with Sinn Fein than we do and yet we are told Fianna Fail will not go into government with Sinn Fein but expects unionists to do so in Northern Ireland.”

IOL

13/11/2005 - 16:08:49

The Rev Ian Paisley was challenged today to stop hiding behind rhetoric and show real political leadership by sharing power with Sinn Féin.

At a republican commemoration south of the Irish border, Sinn Féin’s chief negotiator Martin McGuinness claimed during talks last year that the British and Irish governments told his party Mr Paisley said the only obstacle to a return to power-sharing was weapons.

The Mid Ulster MP told republicans at Edentubber, Co Louth now that the IRA had completed disarmament, the Democratic Unionist leader had no excuse to refuse to share power.

“Last year the two governments made it clear to Sinn Féin during a number of meetings that Ian Paisley had indicated to them that the only obstacle to a return to the power-sharing institutions was the issue of arms,” he said.

“The IRA have decisively dealt with that issue. It is no longer an issue for the process.

“Is Ian Paisley now going to step up to the mark ? Is Ian Paisley going to follow through on what he said to the two governments last year ?”

In September, the Independent International Commission on Decommissioning reported the IRA had completed disarmament in the presence of two witnesses, Methodist minister, the Rev Harold Good and Catholic priest, Father Alec Reid.

The IRA also declared in a statement in July that all units had been ordered to dump arms and end their armed campaign.

But unionists have responded sceptically to the moves, criticising the choice of independent witnesses and the failure to produce photographic or video evidence that the IRA’s arsenal had been destroyed.

The DUP, in particular, has insisted the British government will need to address a number of confidence building measures for unionists before they will even contemplate reviving devolution.

Following a positive report from the Independent Monitoring Commission in October that the IRA was moving in the right direction, officials in London and Dublin are pinning their hopes on another positive report from the paramilitary watchdog in January.

As Sinn Féin prepared to launch a document tomorrow on the cost to people in Northern Ireland of direct rule from Westminster, Mr McGuinness said the DUP had blocked a return to devolution for far too long.

“We need to get the political institutions back up and running,” he said.

“Week by week the direct rule administration is taking decisions based not on the needs or requirements of the people but on fiscal considerations in the British Treasury.

“Are the DUP content to sit back and watch this happen ? Or are they finally going to stop hiding behind rhetoric and show real political leadership?”

::: u.tv :::

Northern Ireland’s largest loyalist paramilitary group, the Ulster Defence Association, is willing to discuss its future with the British government, a statement from the organisation indicated today.

SUNDAY 13/11/2005 14:08:11
By:Press Association

In a statement read by leading loyalist Tommy Kirkham at a Remembrance Day ceremony in the Rathcoole area on the outskirts of Belfast, the organisation said it had consulted its entire membership over a two month period about the way forward.

However, it criticised the British government for failing to engage despite requests for meetings with Prime Minister Tony Blair and the Northern Ireland Secretary.

Claiming the IRA had been defeated, the statement said: “The Ulster Defence Association/Ulster Freedom Fighters remain intact.

“No better time now, undefeated as we are, to look to the future but equally so, we must remember the lessons of the past.

“At this moment in time UDA remains the only group to meet the decommissioning body. We remain the only group engaging with the International Monitoring Commission.

“And yet despite our protests of engagement, the government refuse to discuss progress in a meaningful and lasting way.

“Since June this year we have requested three meetings with the Northern Ireland Secretary of State.

“Since January 2004 we have requested meetings with Prime Minister Tony Blair.

“How can the attention and pressure be redirected for loyalism to make the next move? We have always been willing to discuss the future.

“We wish to make our position absolutely clear that over a two month period we have consulted our entire membership.

“On behalf of the Inner Council the message must go out today that at this time the UDA has a clear understanding on the future.

“We are open minded and waiting on contact.”

More than 800 loyalists heard the UDA statement which was read out on the housing estate where South Antrim UDA Brigadier John Gregg lived before he was gunned down in a loyalist feud.

A colour party of 16 masked men in combat gear representing different units of the South Antrim brigade led the Remembrance Day procession.

Wreathes were laid on behalf of the organisation in memory of its members who had been killed during the Troubles and also those who had died in the British army in conflicts around the world.

A statement was read on behalf of the Ulster Freedom Fighters and Ulster Defence Association in Northern Ireland, Scotland and other parts of the UK.

Mr Kirkham said loyalists had reasons to celebrate a victory over the Provisional IRA.

“After all, the Republican Movement have signed up to the principle of consent, they have agreed to the removal of Articles Two and Three from the (Irish) Republic`s constitution.

“Martin McGuinness and Barbara Brown (Sinn Fein`s Bairbre de Brun) sat in Stormont under the Union Flag as ministers of the Assembly and more recently, the Provisional IRA have according to General John de Chastelain surrendered all their weapons.”

During the service of remembrance a bagpiper played a lament as poppy wreathes and other floral tributes were laid on the ground.

The national anthem was also played before the colour party carrying UDA flags emblazoned with the names of units in South East Antrim such as Monkstown, Shore Road and Antrim, dispersed.

Commenting on the statement, Ulster Unionist Assembly member Fred Cobain said he hoped the UDA was serious about engaging with the Government.

The North Belfast MLA also urged ministers to grab the opportunity of talks with paramilitary groups if they were serious.

“I am glad from a community point of view that paramilitaries are going to seriously engage with the Government about how to move forward,” the UUP Policing Board member said.

“It is a good idea which should be welcomed by everybody.
“I hope if the paramilitaries are serious that Government takes the opportunity to deal with them as it is the last piece of the puzzle.”

Irish Independent

LARA BRADLEY

A SIMPLE food supplement may hold the key to preventing heart attacks, Dublin-based researchers have discovered. UCD scientists have found a dietary supplement can effectively clear blocked arteries in a fortnight.

Dr Orina Belton and PhD student Sinead Toomey have shown that if mice with atherosclerosis are given conjugated linoleic acid (CLA) in amounts equivalent to one per cent of their diet, the plaques in their arteries disappear after just two weeks.

Atherosclerosis or blocked arteries, is the main cause of heart attack and stroke, and accounts for 50 per cent of deaths in Western societies.

CLA is an essential fatty acid commonly taken in supplement form as a weight-loss aid. It occurs naturally in dairy products and beef, but not in significant enough quantities to reduce plaque in the arteries. In fact, the saturated fats in these foods can do the reverse and contribute to blocked arteries.

Dr Belton’s study found that CLA works by encouraging cells that accumulate in the plaques to self-destruct. The results suggest that atherosclerosis may soon be treated with a simple “functional food” supplement.

Dr Belton said: “CLA is going to be like fish oils in a few years. Everyone will be taking it. Other studies have found it has anti-cancer activity and a positive effect on diabetes.”

There are two main chemical forms of CLA, isomers c9-t11 and t10-c12. The type used in Dr Belton’s research was an 80 per cent pure concentration of 9-11. The CLA in health food shops is a blend of different forms of CLA but Dr Belton feels patients concerned about blocked arteries should go ahead and take the supplements that are now available.

She said: “We haven’t yet gone into the side effects but since it is found naturally, I wouldn’t expect we will find any.” But the Health Research Board, who funded the study, has advised caution. A spokesman said: “Each isomer seems to have different metabolic effects and the picture is complicated by contradictory findings. The supplements sold in health stores are usually an unspecified mix and people with diabetes should use them with caution or under monitoring.”

Irish Independent

LYNNE KELLEHER

THE work of a troubled scientist over 200 years ago is now used to make magical special effects in movies such as Tomb Raider and The Matrix.

The life of Sir William Rowan Hamilton, dubbed the Irish Einstein, whose genius was coupled with bouts of depression, could have come straight from the script of the Oscar-winning film A Beautiful Mind about the brilliant mathematician John Nash.

The findings of the19th-century Dublin mathematician, who has also been compared to Isaac Newton, are now used in such 21st-century gadgets as iPods and PlayStation games and even space travel.

Dr Fiacre O Cairbre from Maynooth College said Hamilton’s work is vital to today’s computer-generated world. He said: “Lara Croft in Tomb Raider was created using his mathematics.”

Today’s entertainment industry uses Hamilton’s mathematics in a fundamental way. “A lot of computer graphic programmes and computer games use his quaternions [which are an extension to complex numbers],” said Dr O Cairbre. “They are very significant in all sorts of computer imaging.”

In RTE’s Leargas documentary tomorrow night, it is revealed that his discovery of quaternions played an important role in the inventions of X-rays, radio, television and modern toys. The maths genius and physicist was internationally recognised while alive but the full impact of his work has yet to be realised, according to David Gross, Nobel Prize Winner for Physics in 2004. He said: “The sign of real fame in science is when you become an adjective. Real fame is when you look yourself up in the dictionary and you’ve become a word. ‘Hamiltonian’ is a word that is used everywhere. He had long-range ideas which became useful many centuries later.” The child prodigy spent most of his life suffering from depression and alcoholism brought on by his eccentric nature and a life-long frustrated love for Catherine Disney. Hamilton met the love of his life at Summerhill House in Co Meath when he was just 19 but was left heartbroken when she was married off to an older and richer man. He spent much of his life mourning her and only met her again on her deathbed when she wrote to him professing her love.

Hamilton’s ‘eureka moment’ happened at Brougham Bridge in Cabra when the mathematical formula for quaternions came to him in a flash of inspiration and he etched it with a pen-knife into the bridge in case he forgot it.

A plaque was unveiled on the spot in 1958 by fellow mathematician and fan Eamon de Valera to commemorate the event.

“Sir William Rowan Hamilton: The Irish Einstein” will be shown on RTE One tomorrow at 7.30pm

BBC

Stephen Restorick was 23 when he was killed

The mother of the last British soldier murdered in Northern Ireland has criticised the Ministry of Defence’s policy on memorials.

Rita Restorick said it was unacceptable that the MoD refused to pay for plaques at trees at the National Memorial Arboretum in Lichfield, Staffordshire.

Mrs Restorick’s son Stephen was shot dead in County Armagh in 1997.

Speaking after a special NI service at the arboretum, she said she felt some bitterness over the issue.

“I feel anger specifically towards our MoD, who refuse to buy the plaques to put at each tree,” Mrs Restorick said.

“A small sum that would only be £72,000 to put a plaque at each tree, but the families themselves are expected to provide them.

“Little things like that cause me bitterness, I accept what happened to Stephen.”

Mrs Restorick was speaking on BBC Radio Ulster’s Sunday Sequence programme.

Lance Bombardier Stephen Restorick, 23, was shot by a sniper while manning a checkpoint in Bessbrook in February 1997.

Sunday Life

By Stephen Breen
13 November 2005

Gina Adair

OUSTED terror boss Johnny ‘Mad Dog’ Adair last night denied that he has split from his cancer-stricken wife.

The former UDA man denied newspaper reports that he had betrayed Gina with a 42-year-old check-out assistant from Troon.

Adair, who claims to be living in both Troon and Bolton for security reasons, said he was “still in love” with his wife.

The Shankill exile has also hired an agent and claims to be in negotiations for a film about his life.

He also claims that he made a secret visit to Northern Ireland on Friday night to meet supporters.

Adair told Sunday Life: “These rumours are a load of nonsense. I’m not living with a woman in Troon.

“I have to move around for security reasons and Gina has decided to keep the house in Bolton. I’m sick of these rumours.

“I have a lot of supporters, but I also don’t know who this woman is.”

In reference to the IRA’s decision to hand over its weapons, Adair told us that his war “was over”.

He added: “I am intending to pursue legitimate business, but can’t tell you any more for security reasons.”

Sunday Life

Finucane’s killer to appeal sentence

By Alan Murray
13 November 2005

FORMER UFF terrorist Ken Barrett - who confessed to the murder of Belfast solicitor Pat Finucane - will argue for his early release next month.

Barrett is set to go before the Sentence Review Commissioners - just 15 months after he was handed a life sentence for the 1989 murder.

The sentence came with the recommendation that he serve a minimum 22 years behind bars.

But Barrett will argue that he qualifies for early release from prison under the terms of the Good Friday Agreement.

He is currently being held in isolation at Maghaberry jail after being transferred from Belmarsh Prison in England in February this year.

In March, the Sentence Review Commissioners said in a letter that Barrett may be considered a danger to the public and could became involved again in “acts of terrorism”.

Barrett transferred to Maghaberry after he was told that he did not qualify for the early release scheme available to prisoners convicted of terrorist offences committed before 1998.

But his solicitor, Joe Rice, said his client did not accept that he was a danger to the public - or that he was not eligible to benefit from the early release scheme under the Agreement.

Said Mr Rice: “The offences for which he pleaded guilty relate to a period in the late 1980s and early 1990s and we are totally oblivious to the evidential basis to the reasons given which form the basis of this negative preliminary indication.”

Now Barrett will appeal the decision before commissioners on December 9.

The Stevens team, which investigated the Finucane murder and allegations of collusion, is still seeking evidence to mount further trials.

And some loyalists have alleged that despite his confessions, Barrett was not one of the two gunmen who murdered solicitior Pat Finucane.

Barrett, who was a police informer, is currently guarded around the clock at Maghaberry Prison by specially-trained guards - as is the UVF informer Mark Haddock.

There are fears that both men will be murdered by their former associates if they are placed in prison accommodation with other loyalists.

Said one prison source: “Nobody gets anywhere near them in that special segregation unit and usually there are four ‘riot squad’ officers right by their side during every minute of the day.

“They do not have visits in the visiting area because of there is an estimated risk to their lives and no chances are going to be taken with their security.”

Sunday Life

13 November 2005

THE Dublin and London governments are at loggerheads over the inquiry into the jail killing of LVF terror chief Billy Wright.

Dublin has told the NIO that it is opposed to any plans to hold the Wright probe under the terms of the 2005 Inquiries Act.

The move follows claims by Wright’s father David that the terms of the act would limit its scope into allegations of state collusion in his son’s murder by INLA gunmen at the Maze in December 1997.

Mr Wright wants no limits put on the inquiry.

It is understood that Irish Foreign Minister Dermot Ahern raised the issue of with Secretary of State Peter Hain during a meeting last month.

A source said: “Mr Ahern told Mr Hain of the concerns held by David Wright, his family and a number of human rights organisations in relation to the Inquiries Act.

“It was also made clear the Taoiseach and his ministers would continue to follow this issue carefully, in the same way it does the Finucane, Hamill and Nelson inquiries.”

Mr Wright met Mr Hain last month. Mr Hain said he had yet to decide whether to accede to a request by Lord Randall MacLean, the inquiry chairman, to use the 2005 Inquiries Act.

An NIO spokesman said last week that Mr Hain is still considering the request and hopes to make a decision shortly.

Sunday Life

By Alan Murray
13 November 2005

THE UDA leadership has been warned that the arrest of Andre Shoukri will hamper moves to disarm the group.

Shoukri - who appeared in court yesterday on a string of charges - is said to be the UDA’s north Belfast brigadier.

And it is understood the north Belfast unit has warned the UDA’s ruling inner council that the arrest of their leader will hold up plans to meet General John de Chastelain to discuss weapons decommissioning.

Shoukri himself and UPRG man Tommy Kirkham had been due to meet the retired Canadian general in the New Year, although the group has not given any commitment to dump its arm.

No one from the north Belfast brigade was prepared to comment.

But sources in other brigades say the leadership was given a message by the north Belfast unit on Thursday stating that the prospects of putting their weapons beyond use next year or in 2007 would be greatly hampered if Shoukri was charged.

“The message was that if Shoukri was nominated to meet the General and could be taken off the streets two weeks later, then the authorities are playing games which would have consequences. They are not happy at all about it and they are staying loyal to Shoukri,” said one source.

A west Belfast UDA source added: “They’re not threatening disruption, but they are discussing actions which they’re not telling the other brigades about. The phrase ‘actions speak louder than words’ is being bandied about, but they won’t say what that might mean.”

UDA figures will read out an agreed statement today at Remembrance Day events in their areas. Senior UDA sources said that the statement wouldn’t contain any dramatic proposals.

However, it is expected that a series of meetings will be taking place later this week with different figures who could help bring the largest loyalist terrorist group into the mainstream of politics.

“Shoukri’s arrest has complicated things internally, but everything should stay on course politically unless something else happens that throws in another mix,” one source said.

It is understood that the UDA statement will compliment the terror group’s membership on its “contribution” to the peace process and offer a commitment to engage in dialogue to make further political progress.

Sunday Life

By Ciaran McGuigan
13 November 2005

THE man behind this sinister Halloween mask (photo not available) is the new leader of the vicious UVF gang that battered to death former RAF signaller Raymond McCord jnr.

His name is Willie ‘Mr Muscles’ Young and he wore the evil-looking false face as he turned up at Laganside court complex to see the former Army boxing champion Trevor Gowdy give evidence against Young’s pal, Special Branch agent Mark Haddock.

Young was stripped of his mask by the court’s security staff, who were on high alert as Gowdy appeared in court to claim that former UVF commander Haddock had tried to hack him to death with hatchets.

And Young, a convicted blackmailer, was nearby when a death threat was delivered to McCord’s father after he turned up to watch the same trial.

A senior police officer pulled Raymond McCord snr out of Laganside’s court one last Wednesday to warn him of the threat against him from members of the Mount Vernon UVF - now under the control of Young.

The top cop warned that loyalists from north Belfast were planning to attack Mr McCord either INSIDE the court or as he left.

A police mobile support unit filled the court during the hearing, and security throughout the complex had been stepped up as cops feared attacks on both Mr McCord and Mr Gowdy.

Later, riot police had to prevent a gang of youths attacking Mr McCord as he left the court.

In a sickening twist, the latest threat received by Mr McCord came eight years to the day that his son Raymond jnr was beaten to death by a UVF gang, now being led by Young.

Raymond jnr, a former RAF man, was found dumped in a quarry in Ballyduff on Remembrance Sunday - November 9, 2007.

Said Mr McCord: “It was eight years to the day they murdered my son, and on that day there was no way that I was going to give into their threat.

“What Trevor Gowdy has done in standing up and not allowing himself to be intimidated showed great courage.

“I just wish more victims of the UVF had come along to support him.”

He added: “As for Willie Young, he should keep his mask on, as he’s better looking that way.”

A second death threat was delivered to Mr McCord’s home by police later the same night.

cmcguigan@belfasttelegraph.co.uk

Sunday Life

By Alan Murray
13 November 2005

THE LVF has a stockpile of almost 700 new firearms in concealed locations across Northern Ireland.

LVF leaders have boasted the group, which stood down at the beginning of this month, is “better kitted” than either the UVF and UDA gangs.

In addition to 700 new guns from eastern Europe, the LVF also claims to have over 200 older weapons dating back to Billy Wright’s leadership. But it says it is in no hurry to decommission its arsenal.

Senior figures in the group revealed its weapons stockpile as pressure mounts on the UVF and the UDA to follow its lead on disbandment.

Sunday Life understands that the LVF smuggled two major consignments of guns and two smaller caches into Ulster in recent years.

The most recent consignment of 300 guns is understood to have been smuggled into Warrenpoint harbour in April last year. The LVF claims the weapons arrived at the time police were making a fruitless search at a huge warehouse at Belfast docks.

It appears the police knew an LVF arms shipment was on its way, but their intelligence was not completely accurate.

The LVF claims the 300 weapons included Scorpion pistols with silencers and were successfully secreted in the Mid-Ulster area. They also claimed another consignment of 275 weapons was secretly smuggled in, but refused to say if this came before or after the Warrenpoint operation.

DANNY MORRISON

In April 2003 the British and Irish governments published an annexe to their Joint Declaration which was to address the anomaly of people ‘on the run’ (OTRs) who cannot return to either jurisdiction for fear of prosecution for a political offence. Under the Belfast Agreement provision had already been made for the early release of political prisoners who belonged to organisations which were observing ceasefires.

Most if not all of those who are ‘on the run’ are republicans – for obvious reasons. No RUC officer had to go on the run for torturing and abusing those in custody. No RUC officer had to go on the run for shooting unarmed civilians. No British soldier had to go on the run for massacring civil rights marchers or killing kids with plastic bullets. The forces of the state were protected and often given anonymity. The British Attorney General protected them with Public Interest Immunity Certificates to curtail investigations and inquiries. The degree of systematic cover-up is immense: for example, Sir John Stevens could only publish 17 pages out of his 3000 page report on collusion.

The few soldiers or policemen who did face court were acquitted. There were exceptions and the few who were convicted, like Wright and Fisher, the murderers of Peter McBride, served derisory sentences and were then allowed back into the British army.

Unionist leaders throughout the conflict supported repression, the illegal use of state violence, and acted as cheerleaders and apologists for those who tortured, abused and killed, and made excuses for loyalist paramilitary violence when they weren’t standing shoulder-to-shoulder beside them.

Unionist leaders are frauds and hypocrites, attempting to occupy a notional moral high ground.

When they speak about the sense of outrage their community experienced when they saw republican prisoners, who were responsible for attacks on the RUC and British army, being given early release it was a sense of outrage which the nationalist community never experienced. As I said, those in the RUC and British army who killed our loved ones never went to jail in the first place.

‘On the runs’ fled the North for a variety of reasons. Some had been injured in conflict-related incidents. Some had been beaten in custody and feared a repetition. Some skipped bail because of the corruption in the courts and the many miscarriages of justice. Some fled because of the work of informers.

The Dublin government did all it could to apprehend, prosecute or extradite republican activists. A few people – such as Rita O’Hare and Owen Carron – before the few conscientious judges there were, eventually escaped extradition using the political exception clause or that they faced reprisal by state forces on their return. Others – like Gerry Tuite who escaped from Brixton Prison, and a number of the republicans who escaped from Crumlin Road Jail in June 1981 – were convicted under the Criminal Law Jurisdiction Act (CLJA) and served lengthy sentences in the South.

That many of those currently ‘on the run’ have not been pursued under the CLJA suggests that there is little or no evidence against them, yet they still fear malicious prosecution should they return to the North. A lot of them have settled down in the twenty-six counties, made homes, reared families.

Next week the British government is expected to publish legislation dealing with OTRs, and outlining a process by which republicans can return or visit their former homes in the North, as it promised within the context of ‘Acts of Completion’ by the IRA.

(Meanwhile, the Dublin government has set a very bad precedent and resiled from its 2003 commitments. It has stated that those suspected of involvement in the killing of Garda Jerry McCabe will not qualify under the OTR scheme, despite the fact that the courts have declared them as qualifying prisoners under the early release scheme that came out of the Belfast Agreement.)

The British legislation is expected to be based on the somewhat convoluted procedure outlined in the April 2003 Annexe on OTRs. Unionists have been aware of these proposals for years. Indeed, the DUP when they were allegedly prepared to go into Dublin with Sinn Fein last year knew that the agreement included a commitment to implement these proposals.

Now, however, the proposals are seen by unionists as another opportunity to delay political change and frame the conflict as one in which they exclusively were the victims. Thus republicans - more specifically, the OTRs who are the only people left to pick on - must show remorse and apologise.

In the scenario outlined in the 2003 proposals applicants would apply to an Eligibility Body which would have to satisfy itself that the person was a supporter of the peace process. Once someone had been declared eligible, he or she would be granted a certificate to show that they were free to return to the North without risk of arrest for questioning or charge.

Once a certificate had been granted, the matter would be passed to a non-jury Special Judicial Tribunal consisting of one senior judge. The Public Prosecution Service would be able to bring charges against any person whom the Eligibility Commission had declared eligible. The applicant would not be required to be present at the trial. He or she would be able to plead not guilty and could decide to instruct a defence to be mounted. The Special Judicial Tribunal would not have the power to remand in custody. In the event of conviction, the Special Judicial Tribunal would pass sentence, but the person convicted would immediately qualify for the early release scheme.

(It is all a bit of an expensive and time-wasting farce and with a bit of imagination could have been resolved more simply. It also undermines what is called ‘the cold case review’ of up to 1,800 unsolved killings throughout the conflict on which the British government is devoting £30million. That review, even with the benefit of applying modern forensic methods to old cases, is unlikely to produce much.)

Unionists have protested at the proposed legislation and seek to include confessions and ‘a public acknowledgement of guilt’ from OTR applicants as a precondition for eligibility. They are recruiting Tory MPs, Labour Party right-wingers and the Liberal Democrats to their cause, some of whom don’t give a damn about the effect reneging on a deal could have on the peace process and only see it as another opportunity for attacking Tony Blair who was humiliated in last week’s close vote in the House of Commons on the new terrorism bill.

However, opposition might also suit the British government.

Despite the many obstacles placed in their way, the campaigns and some of the inquiries for the truth about state violence have revealed the black nature of Britain’s dirty war and its collusion in the loyalist assassination campaign.

The only ones who can implicate British ministers in the dirty war are those in the intelligence services who reported to them. Were they ever to face the prospects of prosecution they would be sure to threaten to bring down with them their political masters. It is then that the British government will issue a comprehensive amnesty.

Not out of a sense of justice. Not for peace, reconciliation or as part of conflict resolution.

But to ensure that it has got away with murder.

Sunday Times

Liam Clarke
November 13, 2005

The DUP is set to snub a new round of exploratory talks due to start tomorrow with the British and Irish governments. The decision will put increased pressure on the governments to make concessions to unionists that match the amnesty being given to on-the-run terrorists.

Dermot Ahern, the Irish foreign minister, and Peter Hain, the secretary of state for Northern Ireland, will chair the talks.

A Northern Ireland Office source said they are intended as a stock-taking exercise to identify ways to break the political log jam over devolution.

Sinn Fein and the Progressive Unionist Party, the political allies of the UVF, will attend tomorrow’s talks with the DUP and other parties invited to come in a fortnight’s time.

Nigel Dodds, the DUP MP for North Belfast, said: “This process is really for the optics, so we are not getting involved. They want journalists and commentators to get all excited and say it is the start of a process but we will not go along with that. For any process aimed at securing power-sharing devolution to start, there has to be an enabling environment in which unionist concerns are met.”

The DUP presented a 64-page shopping list of preconditions for progress to the British and Irish governments earlier this year.

It included marching rights for the loyal Orders, funding for Scots-Irish cultural events, and a redundancy package for the Royal Irish Regiment.

Dodds said that such issues needed to be resolved in order “to ensure that unionists have confidence and equality and their human rights are respected”. Discussion on political progress would have to wait until they are addressed. The DUP is currently trying to arrange a meeting with Bertie Ahern, the taoiseach, to raise these concerns, and it is also willing to meet Hain and Tony Blair to discuss this agenda.

Privately DUP leaders believe that their bargaining power is now near its maximum because the two governments are eager to engage them in political discussions. One leading DUP strategist said: “We are coming under pressure and this will increase into the new year, but it is when you are under pressure to do something that you can get what you want in return for moving.”

The British and Irish governments are eager to get movement from unionists and loyalists to match the standing down of the IRA and to move towards power-sharing devolution. Later today the UDA, the main loyalist paramilitary group, will issue a Remembrance Day statement reaffirming its ceasefire and pledging its commitment to finding a peaceful way forward.

The UDA met the Independent International Commission on Decommissioning last month but will not make any firm pledge to decommission in its statement. Instead it will speak of an internal consultation process aimed at bringing violence to an end.

The organisation says that it is waiting to see whether the standing down of the IRA will be effective or whether republican violence will resume.

Meanwhile Denis Bradley, the vice-chairman of the Northern Ireland Policing Board, used his platform as guest speaker at the SDLP’s annual conference to attack two central planks of the party’s policy.

He attacked the 50/50 Catholic/Protestant recruiting rules for the PSNI, and told the SDLP not to put too much emphasis on its worries over funding for restorative justice, which the party fears could result in paramilitaries policing working-class areas.

Bradley said that he was “not terribly fearful that Sinn Fein or any other republican organisation or loyalist group will try to control policing within their own areas”.

Sunday Independent

JODY CORCORAN

THE Taoiseach, Bertie Ahern, in a major policy announcement, has told the Sunday Independent that he would lead Fianna Fail into Opposition rather than contemplate coalition with Sinn Fein or an arrangement for their support in Government.

In a statement issued exclusively to this newspaper yesterday, Mr Ahern has gone further than ever before in categorically ruling out any form of arrangement between the party he leads and Sinn Fein.

The initial impact of the statement was to divide his current coalition partners, the Progressive Democrats.

Senator John Minihan welcomed the Taoiseach’s “blunt and direct comments” which, he said, would come as a “relief” not only to the Progressive Democrats, but also to the majority of the Irish people.

But Justice Minister Michael McDowell remained sceptical.

The Taoiseach’s statement said: “Even a radical overhaul of Sinn Fein economic policy would have little real credibility after 35 years of Marxism.

“I believe Sinn Fein are agents of poverty and disadvantage. I believe the very notion of Sinn Fein in Government would lead to a flight of investment, which is untenable in a small open economy.

“For the good of the country, we cannot accept those policies in Government. A practical Republican programme delivering real benefits for ordinary people would be impossible with Sinn Fein in Government.

“In such circumstances, I would lead my party into Opposition rather than contemplate coalition with Sinn Fein or an arrangement for their support in Government.

“Although there are other parties and individuals with whom Fianna Fail has significant policy differences - I believe the public concern relating to the potential economic damage of Sinn Fein’s policies in Government justifies this stance.”

Although Michael McDowell had been aware of the content of the statement, he still told the PDs’ 20th anniversary dinner in Dublin last night: “No matter what is said, Sinn Fein’s plan is to get the balance of power and to use it to control the next government. And if they have the seats,they will do it. Their ambition is power.”

Mr Ahern, however, can now be satisfied that he has removed a central plank of Mr McDowell’s election strategy, in effect, that a vote for Fianna Fail could lead toSinn Fein achieving power in Government.

Last night, Senator Minihan said there was growing unease in the country at the prospect of Fianna Fail taking Sinn Fein into government. A lot of this fear, he said, was as a result of comment, or lack of comment, from senior members of Fianna Fail in recent months.

“The Taoiseach has clarified this issue with this welcomed and reassuring statement. I and others will sleep better tonight now that this dark cloud hanging over Ireland’s future has been removed,” the Senator said.

But at the Burlington Hotel last night, Mr McDowell, who had earlier in the day been made aware of the Taoiseach’s statement, still told his party faithful: “There are few racing certainties in Irish politics. One of them is that neither Fianna Fail nor Fine Gael will win an overall majority.”The second is that no Government will be formed without one or other of them. The third is that the next coalition government will depend either on the Progressive Democrats or on a combination of Labour and the Greens, or on Sinn Fein to govern. It’s that simple,” the Justice Minister said.

He went on: “A rainbow coalition of Fine Gael, Labour, the Greens and Joe Higgins will bring Ireland to its economic knees. It would be a slump coalition in which Enda Kenny would play Stan Laurel to Pat Rabbitte’s Oliver Hardy - ‘another fine mess’ of the type we have had before.

“No matter what is said, Sinn Fein’s plan is to get the balance of power and to use it to control the next government. And if they have the seats, they will do it. Their ambition is power. And they would ruthlessly seek out a partner to that end - even if that involved a radical change of stance or personnel in that partner.”

Mr Ahern began his statement: “Fianna Fail will continue the implementation of its Republican Programme to deliver the goal envisaged in our Declaration of Independence - that Government be ‘based upon the people’s will, with equal rights and equal opportunity for every citizen’.

“Practically that means: to attack child poverty; to focus on social inclusion and educational drop-out; to maintain low unemployment, as the main driver of inclusion; to ensure no forced emigration.

“To achieve those objectives requires a strong economy - delivering the wealth, which we will spread to empower the disadvantaged.

“With proposals such as increasing corporation tax to 17 per cent, Sinn Fein fiscal, economic and EU policies would deprive us of that wealth and surrender Irish workers to unemployment or emigration.”

Mr McDowell also said last night: “Every body that the Provisionals left on border roads or in shallow graves, with hands tied behind the back, with bullet wounds to the head, with marks of extensive torture to the limbs and trunk, still speak silently across time of the monstrous cruelty and evil of that movement. No amnesty will drown out those words.

“While the members of the Army Council whose sanction for each such murder was given may now attempt to pose as statesmen, they will never wash away their personal direct responsibility for those acts.

“In the bottoms of drawers across Northern Ireland are the tapes of confessions made by those victims to stop the torture and sent to their relative to justify their murder. Those taped voices speak more eloquently about the real values of Adams and McGuinness and the real nature of the Provisional movement than all the verbiage that we hear from the mouths of those gentlemen themselves,” he said.

Sunday Business Post

13 November 2005
By Tom McGurk

Image from 1916 Rising

Is it my imagination? Has, suddenly, a great historical goldrush broken out in Ireland? 1916 and all that; Michael Collins and what party he would have supported and, given the month that’s in it, the proper historical resting place for the thousands of poor Paddies who were cannon fodder in bygone imperial wars. All are back in the ring.

The British embassy has joined the historical jumble sale too. British Empire Medals, if you don’t mind, are being handed out to various well-known, popular but essentially harmless Irish citizens. Niall Quinn and the Corrs are the latest recipients.

Even now, one wonders if, for services way beyond the call of duty, the prospect of an ermine-clad Lord Kevin Myers (of late and great imperial sunsets) can be far away.

Sebastian Barry’s new novel A Long Long Way, shortlisted for the Booker Prize, has won plaudits. But for the temptation of nostalgia among the British judges, it would be recognised for what it essentially is – romantic historical fiction. The book concludes: “Maybe the helpful, acidic earth has eaten into the blackness and the quiet medal is clean and brown, showing, if only to the worms, its delicate design of a small crown, and a small harp.’’ Given the systematic imperial mass murder of millions across the world from 1914 to 1918, to which particular artistic worm’s eye view of such mind-boggling carnage are these sentimentalisms supposed to appeal?

Even the national broadcaster is at it these days, with a reporter embedded with the British invasion forces in Iraq and featuring, among other things, a series of fairly gormless interviews with some of the Irish mercenaries in the British army. I suppose that if some of these chaps get whacked by the natives, their relatives will be demanding all sorts of Irish state representation at their funerals.

Last week in Derry, the tricolour was carried at a remembrance parade apparently to symbolise the Irish and British war dead. That the men of that time men never gave allegiance to that flag, but rather to the green flag with the gold harp, seemed not to matter. But then the parade was the brainchild of former UDA leader Glen Barr - now in the state-funded peace business. That may go some way to explaining the confused historical iconography.

Maybe it’s because, with the Northern war over and the IRA off our backs, there is a perception that a window has opened on the past, and that it’s time to get your spoke in while there’s not too much background noise. Ironic, isn’t it, that over the last 30 years, when Irish historical legacies was being so bitterly contested against the background of the North’s dreary spires, the chattering classes largely kept mum? Or, even better, were ‘Section 31-ed’?

Even in Iveagh House, the midnight candles are burning over tomes on the Great War.

With Bertie having announced that the Easter parade is on again, and with the 90th anniversary looming, Dermot Ahern has had an historical politically-correct brainchild. As he wrote recently: “It is time to begin a national debate on the issues raised by both the Somme and 1916.”

I’m not quite sure where such a debate is supposed to lead us. One group was made up of casualties in an imperial war, the others were victims of an armed rebellion against imperialism. Of course, both were Irish, but that didn’t make any difference when Irish troops and rebels actually fought and killed each other in the Dublin streets in 1916. Is Dermot Ahern’s historical debate to lead us to conclude that, as citizens now of a sovereign Irish Republic, we owe both sides an equal debt? For example, should France equally remember the marquis and the soldiers who served Vichy?

It is not correct, either, that the Irish soldiers of the Great War have been shamefully forgotten. Far from being forgotten, they were actually most vividly remembered as the last Irish generation of cannon fodder for imperial ambitions, cruelly misled about Home Rule intentions and the freedom of other European small nations. Even more importantly, what was also not forgotten was the attempt to grab more Irish cannon fodder by conscription, opposition to which helped to turn the military histrionics of 1916 into Sinn Fein’s 1918 electoral victory.

As a sidebar, Dermot Ahern is also hoping to get the British government to grant pardons to the 26 Irish soldiers who were executed by the British army during World War I. Come to think of it, shouldn’t he also look for posthumous pardons for the 16 executed in Dublin in 1916?

The 26 men in khaki were among a much larger number shot at dawn for a variety of reasons including mutiny, refusing to obey orders and so on. Many, of course, were simply hapless, shell-shocked wrecks, victims of the military ethics of the Great War for Civilisation - as it was called on the campaign medals.

Come to think of it, given the number of imperial gongs available up at the British embassy for Irish citizens these days, one would have thought that Dermot Ahern was pushing at an open door.

But then my most truly subversive instincts lead me to believe the pardons will come through much closer to Easter next year. Timing is everything, as they say.

In Charles Townsend’s recent and excellent historical re-visitation of 1916, he reveals - among other fascinating facts - the origin of the famous green flag with the words ‘Irish Republic’ in gold emblazoned across it that flew above the GPO in 1916.

Apparently it began life as one of Countess Markievicz’s bed-spreads. The Rebel Countess, with her incorrigible predilection for amateur dramatics, did the gold leaf. Perhaps Con’s bed-spread is an appropriate icon for the searching historical moment in which we find ourselves - a bit of an Anglo Irish trousseau blowing in the historical winds above the rebel ramparts.

All of history is iconic and personalised, equally DIY and grandiloquent, but most of all it is a story told by the winners to the losers. Eighty-three years into our post-colonial history, how extraordinary that the debate about winners and losers is once more being reopened.