SAOIRSE32

Daily Ireland

Police leave after raiding Sinn Fein office at Stormont

The only detailed account about Operation Torsion is contained in a book by the BBC’s Security Editor Brian Rowan.
Although he first exposed the existence of Operation Torsion in BBC news reports on November 12, 2002, Mr Rowan printed a much more detailed version in his book, An Armed Peace, which was published in September 2003.
According to Brian Rowan, the raids on October 4, 2002, took place only after Special Branch tapped phones, installed listening and tracking devices, engaged in widespread surveillance, relied upon the role of an agent, covertly broke into unidentified private premises, and even handled, removed and replaced evidence – supposedly central to the prosecutions.
Despite all of the defendants now being declared innocent and with the allegation of a so-called ‘Stormont spy-ring’ in tatters, the information revealed by Brian Rowan about Special Branch’s activities leaves many unanswered questions.
Mr Rowan’s version of Operation Torsion suggested that a plan was hatched by the PSNI after the apparent burglary at Castlereagh Special Branch offices on St Patrick’s Day, 2002.
According to Mr Rowan, within days of the apparent Castlereagh burglary, the so-called “security assessment” shifted emphasis from investigating the “inside job” theory to focussing on blaming the IRA’s alleged ‘Director of Intelligence’.
Mr Rowan referred to this figure as a “West Belfast man with a big republican reputation”. After this person was arrested amid widespread allegations of media leaks, along with five others on March 30, 2002 – the PSNI released him without charge. Republicans called the arrests a “propaganda exercise” and a “fishing expedition”. One man was subsequently convicted on unrelated charges.
Mr Rowan alleged that Operation Torsion was then conceived by the PSNI and subsequently managed by Belfast Special Branch Head, Chief Superintendent Bill Lowry, who allowed it to “breathe” in the hope that “the IRA Director of Intelligence would walk into his surveillance net”.
“Seven months before the public revelations of alleged IRA intelligence-gathering inside Castle Buildings, the Special Branch had been embarrassed by all that had happened inside Castlereagh. But Operation Torsion had allowed Lowry an opportunity to return the serve on the IRA and he did so, he claims, against the wishes of the British security services,” Mr Rowan wrote.
With confirmation yesterday that the remaining defendants have been found not guilty, significant questions still remain about Operation Torsion.

RTE

09 December 2005 17:10

Gardaí investigating the discovery of an explosive device in a car on the M50 motorway in Dublin last night believe it may be linked to a campaign by the Continuity IRA against drug dealers in Dublin city.

The bomb was discovered when gardaí stopped and searched the vehicle travelling northbound near the West Link Toll Plaza shortly after 10pm.

When gardaí confronted the driver of the car, he jumped out and warned them that there was a bomb in the car and that it was primed.

An Army Explosives Ordance Disposal team was called in following the discovery of the device and a controlled explosion was carried out.

A 24-year-old man was arrested at the scene while a 56-year-old man was arrested later in Ronanstown. Both men were being held at Clondalkin Garda Station.

A section of the motorway between the Blanchardstown and Palmerstown exits was closed for four hours while the operation was continuing.

Staff unaware of operation: NTR director

The managing director of National Toll Roads, Kyran Hurley, said tollbooth staff did not know in advance about last night’s garda operation at the West Link Toll Plaza.

There were ten staff manning the plaza at the time of the incident.

However, speaking on RTÉ Radio’s Morning Ireland, Mr Hurley said staff are used to incidents at a minor level in the lanes and are trained in how to handle these incidents.

He said there was no undue concern amongst staff at that incident, and the evacuation of staff happened in accordance with a normal fire drill exercise.

BreakingNews.ie

09/12/2005 - 16:57:07

Tens of thousands of employees today turned out to protest in solidarity with Irish Ferries workers who are fighting attempts by the company to replace them with cheaper foreign labour.

Gardaí put the number of marchers in central Dublin at around 40,000, while Congress President Peter McLoone said 80,000 to 100,000 had turned up, with people still leaving Parnell Square as the first groups reached the end of the march at Merrion Square.

Thousands also turned out for marches across the country for the national day of protest.

Union leaders called on the Government to protect the Irish people from a race to the bottom in wages, which they said was happening as a result of increasing numbers of foreign workers being employed at below the going rates.

But the march, led by a Congress banner which read ’Equal Rights for All Workers’, was not against migrant workers, they insisted.

Mr McLoone said: “This is a day of national protest in support of the workers at Irish Ferries, but also a demonstration that wants to send a very clear message to Government that we do not want a society that is founded on injustice, blackguardism, and the exploitation of workers.”

He said the day of protest had received messages of support from the international trade union movement including the TUC and the Latvian trade union conference, and he gave a special welcome to Ryanair pilots who had turned out to march in their uniforms.

The general secretary of Congress – which called for the demonstration – David Begg said the protesters had a fundamental message to deliver.

“There is a threshold of decency below which the Irish people will not accept anyone being dragged, no matter where they come from,” he said.

“Any person who has not spent the last six months on Mars must know that in every part of this country there’s exploitation.”

Mr Begg said the dispute at Irish Ferries was leading the country in a race to the bottom, which would have a devastating impact on Irish society as a whole.

And he said the rest of Europe was watching closely events in Ireland, because what was happening in the state was also occurring in other countries such as Sweden and Finland.

SIPTU general president Jack O’Connor criticised the Government for using what he described as the rhetoric of social partnership at home, while obstructing measures to protect Irish workers on the European stage.

Although the march, supported by all the unions under the Congress banner, addressed the broader question of employees’ rights, the focus remained on the Irish Ferries workers who are protesting at the company’s attempts to replace 543 workers with foreign agency staff.

The meeting in Merrion Square at the end of the march was addressed by negotiators from Siptu – the union representing the protesting seafarers - Patricia King and Paul Smyth, who called on the Government to prevent the re-flagging of Irish Ferries vessels to avoid Irish labour laws.

The centre of Dublin ground to a halt for the duration of the march, with services on public transport suspended so workers could join the protest.

BBC

Michael McKevitt sought to discredit a vital witness

Former Real IRA leader Michael McKevitt has failed to have his conviction overturned in the Irish Republic’s Court of Criminal Appeal.

McKevitt was sentenced to 20 years in 2003 for directing terrorism and membership of an illegal organisation.

His lawyers had sought to have his conviction quashed by challenging the credibility of David Rupert, the main prosecution witness.

Mr Rupert was a secret agent for the FBI and the British secret service.

Explosion

McKevitt, 54, from Blackrock, County Louth, was the first person to be convicted in the Republic for the offence which was introduced after the 1998 Real IRA bomb attack in Omagh.

The explosion claimed the lives of 29 people, including a woman pregnant with twins.

He also received a six years concurrent prison sentence for membership of an illegal organisation which the court said was the Real IRA.

Mr Rupert was reported to have infiltrated the Real IRA and attended Real IRA Army Council meetings where McKevitt was present.

BBC

The first person to be charged in connection with the Northern Bank robbery has been released on bail.

Dominic McEvoy, 23, from Mullandra Park in Kilcoo, faces two counts of false imprisonment and one of robbery in connection with the £26.5m raid.

Mr McEvoy was granted High Court bail on condition that he report to police twice daily and does not leave Northern Ireland.

Two south Down businessmen each provided sureties of £50,000.

Employee

Earlier this month Mr McEvoy’s lawyer said his client had been prevented from making a bail application “because the authorites were withholding vital information”.

Mr McEvoy was charged after his DNA was allegedly found at the Loughinisland home of a bank employee who had been held hostage.

The robbery at the bank’s Northern Ireland headquarters at Donegall Square West in central Belfast, took place just before Christmas last year.

Of the 11 people questioned to date in connection with the robbery, three have appeared in court.

BBC

Denis Donaldson said the charges were “politically motivated”

A man cleared of charges linked to an alleged IRA spy ring at Stormont has said he was arrested in a campaign to save David Trimble’s political career.

Sinn Fein’s Denis Donaldson, son-in-law Ciaran Kearney along with William Mackessy had a total of seven charges against them dropped on Thursday.

Mr Donaldson said his charges were dropped due to the prosecution’s “self interest”. He may now sue the police.

He said there was no spy ring and the charges were “politically-inspired”.

“There was no spy ring at Stormont. There never was,” he said.

“The fact that the media was here on the morning that our offices (at Stormont) was raided testifies to that.

“It was part of a Save Dave (Trimble) campaign initially and it was also designed to bring down the (power-sharing) institutions, which it did.”

Mr Donaldson was speaking as he and the other two men returned to Stormont in the company of leading Sinn Fein officials, including party leader Gerry Adams.

The three were arrested following a police raid on Sinn Fein’s offices at Parliament Buildings on 4 October 2002, when documents and computer discs were seized.

Police raided Sinn Fein offices at Stormont

The arrests led to the power-sharing executive at Stormont being suspended, after the DUP and Ulster Unionists, led at that time by Mr Trimble, threatened to collapse the executive with resignations.

Mr Donaldson, who was Sinn Fein’s head of administration at Stormont, and Mr Kearney were subsequently accused of having documents likely to be of use to terrorists.

Mr Mackessy was charged with collecting information on the security forces.

However, at an unlisted hearing at Belfast Crown Court, the three were told all charges were being dropped after the prosecution offered no evidence “in the public interest”.

Mr Donaldson said they were now consulting legal representatives about what course of action they could follow in connnection with the arrests.

Sinn Fein leader Gerry Adams said the collapse of the case once again underlined the need to “face up” to elements within the PSNI who, he claimed, were opposed to political progress.

He said: “The raid on this building, the raid on the Sinn Fein offices, was conducted in a glare of publicity.

‘No comment’

“I think that has very clearly become a pattern, a pattern of political policing.

“Our certain view, and we said this at the time, is that there are elements within the Special Branch, within the old RUC, some of whom are active today in the PSNI, who continue to be at war with Irish republicans, who are opposed to the peace process.”

The Public Prosecution Service said it would be making no further statement in relation to the decision to drop the charges.

A spokesman would not respond to allegations that the service had bowed to political pressure.

He would not clarify what it regarded as the nature of the public interest which led to the charges being dropped.

BreakingNews

09/12/2005 - 12:03:07

A Sinn Féin official who had charges dropped against him over a republican spy ring at Stormont claimed today that police arrested him as part of a campaign to save David Trimble’s political career.

Denis Donaldson, who with Ciaran Kearney and William Mackessy had charges dropped at Belfast Crown Court yesterday, said he was not surprised at the decision to drop the case against them.

“I wasn’t surprised because we weren’t guilty,” said Mr Donaldson, Sinn Féin’s head of administration at Stormont at the time of the arrests in 2002.

“There was no spy ring at Stormont. There never was.

“What it all added up to was politically-inspired charges which should never have been brought.

“The fact that the media was here on the morning that our offices (at Stormont) was raided testifies to that.

“It was part of a Save Dave (Trimble) campaign initially and it was also designed to bring down the (power-sharing) institutions, which it did.”

Mr Donaldson, 55, of Altnamonagh Crescent in West Belfast, and his son-in-law Mr Kearney, 34, of Commedagh Drive, were charged with having information which was likely to be of use to terrorists.

Civil servant William Mackessy, 47, from Wolfend Way in North Belfast, was also charged.

But in a dramatic development yesterday, the prosecutor told Belfast Crown Court that it was withdrawing all evidence against the men and a prosecution was no longer in the public interest.

With no evidence against them, Mr Justice Hart ruled that all three should be found not guilty.

Mr Donaldson, Mr Kearney and Mr Mackessy joined Sinn Féin MPs Gerry Adams and Martin McGuinness at Stormont today and were also joined by East Derry Assembly member Francie Brolly who was released last week after being questioned by the Police Service of Northern Ireland about a triple IRA car bomb attack on the village of Claudy which killed nine people.

BreakingNews.ie

09/12/2005 - 07:46:53

The Court of Criminal Appeal is due to deliver judgement today on Michael McKevitt’s challenge to his conviction for leading the Real IRA.

The 54-year-old, from Blackrock, Co Louth, was jailed for 20 years by the non-jury Special Criminal Court in August 2003 after being found guilty of directing the activities of an illegal organisation.

His appeal centres on the reliability of evidence given by the chief prosecution witness, FBI agent David Rupert, who claimed he infiltrated the Real IRA.

Mr McKevitt’s lawyers have argued that his testimony cannot be trusted because he was a lifelong criminal who had been paid by around €2m by the US and British intelligence agencies.

BBC

Two men are being questioned following the discovery of a suspected dissident republican bomb in a car near Dublin.

The device was found about 2230 GMT on Thursday when Irish police stopped a car at the Westlink toll plaza of the M50 motorway surrounding the city.

A controlled explosion was carried out on the lunchbox-type device which included a timer and metal components. Police later confirmed it was a bomb.

A man was arrested at the scene and a second man was arrested on Friday.

It is understood the vehicle was stopped as part of an ongoing garda operation, involving the Special Branch and members of the elite Emergency Response Unit.

The bomb had been hidden in a baby seat in the car.

BBC Northern Ireland’s Dublin correspondent, Shane Harrison, said: “Security sources say that they believe the device found in the car was constructed by the Continuity IRA.

“It may have been on its way to the west Dublin suburb of Blanchardstown for possible use in a criminal gang feud.

“It’s believed that some of the detectives involved in the operation may have been keeping an eye on suspected Continuity IRA extortion rackets in the west Dublin area.”

Both men who were arrested are being questioned at Clondalkin garda station.

They can be held for up to 72 hours before they are either charged or released.

BBC

MI6 has been shrouded in secrecy for most of its history

The secretive world of MI6 is to be revealed in an official “warts and all” history of the spy service.

Professor Keith Jeffery, of Queen’s University Belfast, has been given the job of examining files running from MI6’s founding in 1909 until 1949.

The historian said he had “complete access” for the book, to be finished by 2010 to mark MI6’s centenary.

Professor Christopher Andrew, of Corpus Christi College, Cambridge, is writing a parallel history of MI5, due in 2009.

MI6, or the Secret Intelligence Service (SIS), was not officially acknowledged to exist until just over a decade ago, but from 1 February next year Professor Jeffery will spend roughly four days a week for three years examining its files.

He said he had no idea how many documents he would have to work through, admitting the project was “exciting” and “intimidating”.

Unseen archive

“It’s a real privilege and a challenge to be allowed into an archive that is completely virgin - it’s a historian’s dream,” he said.

“On the other hand I have to be particularly careful since I am the only person who is going to be allowed to look at this, so I have to be sure to get it right.”

He added: “I have been given complete access to all of the relevant secret files for the period covered by the book, and the freedom to explore anything I find, although there are some necessary security constraints within which I will be working.”

The research will only go as far as 1949 to protect information still considered sensitive, and Professor Jeffery will not be allowed to write anything that could compromise the secrecy of MI6 operations, agents or staff.

But he said: “It will be as authoritative as possible - there are bound to be things they have done well and things they have done badly.

“It seems to me rather grown up of the organisation - it will be able to learn, and should have done already, from its mistakes as well as its successes.

“It will be warts and all.”

‘Progressive’

Professor Jeffery’s appointment was agreed by SIS head John Scarlett - known as C - and approved by Foreign Secretary Jack Straw.

Mr Straw said the commission “marks another progressive move by SIS, this time by producing an authoritative history which is intended to appeal both to professional historians and the general public”.

Earlier this year, MI6 launched a website to clarify its work and to make it easier for people to apply to join the service.

Professor Jeffery hopes his book will provide an outline history of the organisation, along with case studies to illustrate its changing aims and activities over the years.

“Intelligence organisations in wartime do what you expect them to do against enemies.

“In peacetime it’s a little bit more interesting, it seems to me - who you think are your enemies, and you may also be spying on who you think are your friends.”

He added: “I will be able to throw light on certain parts of history that have not had light shone on them before.”

RTE

08 December 2005 22:31

President Mary McAleese met Queen Elizabeth II in Hillsborough in Co Down today.

The President described as a ‘cordial, friendly chat’ with the monarch.

It was the first such meeting between a President and a British monarch to take place in Ireland.

Queen Elizabeth and her husband, the Duke of Edinburgh, arrived in Northern Ireland last night and undertook a series of engagements today.

Since she was elected President in 1997, Mrs McAleese has met the Queen on three occasions, twice in London and in 1998 at a ceremony in Belgium to officially open the Messines Peace Park.

BreakingNews.ie

08/12/2005 - 17:39:42

Northern Ireland Secretary Peter Hain faced demands tonight from the Rev Ian Paisley for a meeting over the dropping of charges against three men accused of operating a republican spy ring at Stormont.

In an unexpected move, prosecutors told Belfast Crown Court it was no longer in the public interest to pursue a case against Sinn Féin’s head of administration Denis Donaldson, his son-in-law Ciaran Kearney and civil servant William Mackessy.

The arrests of the three men led to the suspension of devolution in Northern Ireland in October 2002 by the British government and the reimposition of direct rule from Westminster which remains to this day.

While Sinn Féin claimed the dropping of charges showed allegations of a spy ring were concocted to bring down power sharing institutions, Mr Paisley alleged the decision was taken because it was politically expedient.

The Democratic Unionist leader said: “The right thinking people of Ulster will be totally flabbergasted at the decision taken to drop all prosecutions on the IRA spy ring at Stormont because after a three year delay it has been decided that it is not in the public interest.

“I have asked for an urgent meeting with the Secretary of State and hope to talk to the Prime Minister in the near future.”

Mr Donaldson, 55, and his 34-year-old son-in-law, Mr Kearney had been accused of having documents of use to terrorists.

A third man, 47-year-old civil servant William Mackessy, was charged with collecting information on the security forces.

The Police Service of Northern Ireland was criticised by Sinn Féin at the time of the arrests for carrying out a high profile raid on their offices at Stormont.

In a statement, the PSNI today said it noted and understood the reasons given by the Public Prosecution Service for the withdrawal of charges and it believed the three men were entitled to the presumption of innocence.

The police insisted the Provisional IRA was actively involved in the systematic gathering of information and targeting of individuals.

“Police investigated that activity and a police operation led to the recovery of thousands of sensitive documents which had been removed from government offices,” the statement said.

“A large number of people were subsequently warned about threats to them.

“That police investigation has concluded. There are no further lines of inquiry and no individuals are being sought by the police.”

The Northern Ireland Office said the dropping of the charges was solely a matter for the prosecutors but it noted the PSNI’s insistence that the IRA was involved in intelligence gathering and that documents were recovered.

“It is also a matter of record that it was the actions of paramilitaries in gathering and removing these documents and the damage that was done to political confidences as a result that led to the suspension of the Northern Ireland Assembly,” the NIO said.

“The Government is determined that confidence will be rebuilt and that devolved Government in Northern Ireland will be restored. It will continue to work tirelessly to achieve that goal.”

A statement issued through Mr Donaldson and Mr Mackessy’s solicitors, Madden and Finucane, said their clients were victims of a plot by elements within the police to subvert the peace process.

Mr Kearney’s solicitors, Kevin Winters and Co, said: “There can be no suggestion that Mr Kearney is technically not guilty. He was and remains completely innocent of any allegation.

“The case, such as it was, and the so-called ‘evidence’ to justify it remains unchanged from October 2002.

“This case achieved its political aim and the prosecution today closed it but there remains some major concerns which will be pursued in another forum.”

Sinn Féin president Gerry Adams, who will hold a press conference with the men tomorrow at Stormont, claimed the operation which led to their arrests was the most blatant example of political policing.

The West Belfast MP said: “Faceless securocrats subverted the democratic wishes of the electorate north and south who voted for the Good Friday Agreement.

“The collapse of this case should now focus attention on to the Special Branch and those responsible for planning, carrying out and authorising this entire operation.”

BBC ON THIS DAY

9 December 1973

The accord ends nine months of diplomacy

Tripartite talks on Northern Ireland have ended in an historic agreement to set up a Council of Ireland.

British Prime Minister Edward Heath, Irish premier Liam Cosgrave, and representatives of the Ulster Unionist Party, the Social Democratic and Labour Party and the Alliance Party of Northern Ireland, signed the agreement at Sunningdale, Berkshire.

Under the accord, a “Council of Ireland” will be made up of a board of ministers, and a Consultative Assembly.

The “Council of Ministers”, which will have executive, harmonising and consultative roles, will consist of seven members from the Northern Ireland Executive and seven from the Irish government.

And the Consultative Assembly will be made up of 30 members from the Northern Ireland Assembly and an equal number from the Dáil.

The assembly will have advisory and review functions.

The Council of Ireland is aimed at giving the Republic jurisdiction over issues of joint concern with the north.

This will curb criticism the power-sharing executive body, founded last month, gave the Dáil no powers north of the border.

Today’s announcement at the Civil Service Staff College at Sunningdale, where the conference has been held, ends four days of tense deliberation.

Power-sharing

But the road to today’s agreement started in March when Secretary of State William Whitelaw sought an end to IRA violence.

London proposed an 80-member assembly - with unionist and nationalist representation - to take over the affairs of state.

Elections held shortly afterwards resulted in the power-sharing executive established and this announcement is an extension of this.

The Council of Ireland is expected to be set up and active from the beginning of next year.

The agreement is expected to enrage anti-power sharing parties who were excluded from the talks.

A Border Poll in March established popular support for remaining in the UK rather than joining the Republic.

In Context

The Executive took over the government of Northern Ireland on 1 January 1974.

There was disagreement between parties in the Assembly and the role of the Council of Ireland was not made clear.

Hardliners such as the Democratic Unionists’ Ian Paisley, saw the deal as a sell-out.

The majority of Ulster Unionists agreed and an Ulster Workers’ Council strike crippled power supplies and the delivery of goods.

Loyalist paramilitaries became involved in enforcing blockades and eventually UUP members of the power-sharing body resigned.

The institutions collapsed and London imposed direct rule.