SAOIRSE32

BBC

The area’s residents lived in tiny terraced houses

A bit of old Belfast has come to light with archaeologists excavating in the Cathedral quarter before development begins on a former industrial site.

Part of the old 17th and 18th century town was exposed.

Although it is little more than the outline of brick walls, it has given an insight into the city’s past.

It is thought about 1,000 people lived in what was a squalid area, most of them with just a room and a small yard to their name.

Office buildings and a printing press used to cover the lot at Talbot Street.

The site has thrown up few artifacts. One of them was a well preserved shoe found stuck in the mud.

Also uncovered was a 17th century toilet - little more than a barrel buried in the ground.

Archaeologist Colin Dunlop said that little of the very old part of Belfast has been excavated because buildings have been put up on top of the sites.

A shoe was one of the few artifacts uncovered

“Basically we’re looking at old Belfast. Sort of the 18th century - whenever this area was a very poor part of the town.

“There were several thousand people living in this very small area, in small terraced housing,” he said.

The excavation had to be done quickly before building on the site gets under way.

The developer who is funding the archaeologists is enthusiastic about the find and wants to ensure something remains when the new buildings go up.

Mark Finlay of Barnabas Ventures said: “We found a lot of the old cobbles, floors and streets and so forth.

“It would be nice if we could create a carpet entrance into the building using some of those old materials.”

Sinn Féin

Published: 10 February, 2006

This weekend marks the 30th Anniversary of the death of Republican PoW Frank Stagg on Hunger Strike in Wakefield Prison. A series of events will be taking place to mark this important republican event.

On Saturday republicans will assemble outside Wakefield Prison for a short commemoration which will be addressed by former Republican PoW Roseana Browne.

On Sunday former Hunger Striker and Republican prisoner Gerry Kelly will speak at a commemoration at Frank Stagg’s graveside in Ballina, County Mayo at 11.30am

Also on Sunday in Belfast a mural on Dunville Street marking the 30th Anniversary of Frank Stagg’s death and the 25th Anniversary of the 1981 Hunger Strike will be unveiled by Sinn Féin Councillor and former political prisoner Paul Butler at 3pm.

On Monday at 11am in the Edinburgh Suite in the Europa Hotel in Belfast , Sinn Féin President Gerry Adams will be joined by other Sinn Fein leaders along with former Hunger Strikers from Long Kesh, Armagh and English Jails to launch the programme of events to commemorate the 25th Anniversary of the 1981 Hunger Strike when 10 republicans POWs lost their lives. A exhibition will be on display and the media are invited to attend.

Speaking today in advance of these events former IRA O/C in Long Kesh Brendan McFarlane said:

“This year marks the 25th Anniversary of the 1981 Hunger Strike when ten of our comrades died confronting British attempts to criminalise us and the entire republican struggle. We will also in the coming year remember with pride Frank Stagg and Michael Gaughan who died on Hunger Strike in the 1970s in British prisons.

“The National Hunger Strike Commemoration Committee has put together a series of events, commemorations and debates throughout the island and beyond as we remember the events of 1981 and the British government policy which led to them.

“Republicans are rightly proud of the sacrifices made in the past and in particular in the prison struggle. We are also looking to the future and are as determined now as we were 25 years ago to press ahead in the coming years to deliver on our republican objectives and goals of Irish unity and independence.” ENDS

Irish Times

10 February 2006

Gardaí will send a file to the Director of Public Prosecutions next week following their investigation into the alleged laundering of almost £5 million which they believe was part of the £26.5 million stolen in the Northern Bank raid in December 2004, writes Barry Roche, Southern Correspondent.

According to Garda sources, the file arising out of Operation Phoenix is virtually complete and will be forwarded to the DPP next week for a decision on what charges are to follow as a result of an intensive 12-month-long investigation.

The detailed file comprises a lengthy covering report of more than 100 pages as well as almost 200 Garda statements and a further 200 civilian statements in what is believed to be one of the most exhaustive investigations conducted by An Garda Síochána.

Up to 100 gardaí, including many from the Criminal Assets Bureau, the Special Detective Unit, Crime and Security, the Garda Bureau of Fraud Investigation and the Garda Computer Analysis Unit were involved in the operation at various stages.

The lengthy investigation also involved forensic experts from the Garda Technical Bureau as well as local officers from Cork city, Cork west divisions as well as local officers in other parts of the country who were involved in follow-up operations to the initial raids.

According to Garda sources, the extensive file is likely to receive lengthy consideration by the DPP and could lead to a number of people being charged with both membership of an illegal organisation and with money-laundering offences.

Garda sources say they are hopeful that the file will lead to charges being brought for money laundering but point out that for such charges to be successful, a clear link must be made with the original offence, namely the Northern Bank raid.

Following the case of a 41-year-old man convicted in Dublin Circuit Criminal Court in 1999 of money-laundering, the Court of Criminal Appeal ruled in 2002 that the State must clearly prove beyond reasonable doubt that the money at issue in such cases is the proceeds of crime.

Details of the investigation first came to light on February 17th, 2005 when officers from Cab, backed up by local detectives, raided the home of a financial adviser in Farran, Co Cork, and recovered £2.4 million which they believe are proceeds of the Northern Bank raid.

Gardaí believe that the £2.4 million seized in Farran was part of a £4.9 million share of the Northern Bank raid proceeds sent to Cork by the Provisional IRA for laundering through a series of schemes operated on its behalf and for its benefit.

Officers believe that the financial adviser had already dispersed about £1 million through a variety of outlets prior to the Garda raid, including an estimated £230,000 to a well-known republican activist living in the Cork Harbour area.

This republican had also collected a further £1.5 million from the financial adviser for further dispersal but when news of the Garda raid in Farran broke at around lunch-hour on February 17th, 2005, this activist gave the money to another man for safe-keeping.

Gardaí estimate they have recovered or located all but approximately £200,000 of the £3.4 million that is recoverable.

During the investigation 11 people were arrested.

An Phoblacht

**This article appeared in An Phoblacht on 11 February 1999

St Valentine’s Day marks the 10th anniversary of the murder of Sinn Fein councillor John Davey, a life long republican and active member of Magherafelt District Council.

In 1987 William McCrea as MP for Mid-Ulster used `parliamentary privilege’ and named John as “an active IRA terrorist'’, turning his life and that of his family into a turmoil that is currently being experienced by those named by Ian Paisley two weeks ago.

John’s life and that of so many of his fellow republicans was a constant round of arrests, internment and harassment.

He was interned in the 50s for three years and on 15 August 1969 he was arrested with several others and interned in Crumlin Road jail.

Two weeks later, in a meeting with James Callaghan, the then British Home Secretary, John’s wife, Mary, told Callaghan that the Special Powers Act was being used only against nationalists and that her husband’s detention was unlawful. That night John and the others were released.

“Twenty years later, in September 1989, eight months after John was murdered,'’ says Mary, “James Chichester Clark, now Lord Moyola, admitted in a radio interview that he was wrong to have them arrested'’.

In 1971, John was home alone with his five year old daughter Maria. John was lifted and Maria was taken by the British army to a local RUC barracks and kept for several hours, separated from her father, who was again interned.

Mrs Davey recalls: “later that summer, a priest, introducing himself as Fr Wallace from Ballymena, called and asked me if he could speak to Maria about her detention. He produced a tape recorder and took some photographs and said he would send me copies. I never heard from him again but some time later during the Clockwork Orange affair I saw the `priest’s’ photograph in the Belfast Telegraph. It was Colin Wallace who worked for British Military Intelligence'’.

While interned on the Maidstone, and in Long Kesh, John was subjected to beatings and torture at the hands of the RUC and British Army. In October he was severely beaten in Long Kesh and transferred to Musgrave Park Hospital with serious eye and knee injuries from which he never fully recovered. In May 1972 he took part in a hunger strike to improve conditions for the internees.

After his release at the end of 1973 John was constantly arrested and harassed. In June 1977 he and his 15 year old son Eugene were spreadeagled against the side of the house for four hours before being arrested. John was charged with having information likely to be useful to `terrorists’. The `information’, as Mary found out later, when she was herself arrested, was a geography project which Eugene was doing for school which showed a street map of Maghera including the RUC barracks.

The charges were dropped when Eugene’s teacher testified that there were 23 other copies of the map, one for each pupil in the class.

John was elected as a Sinn Fein councillor to Magherafelt council in May 1985. During the first meeting a Sinn Fein vice-chair was elected and a riot developed. A unionist hit John over the head with a chair. Ever the stoic, he remarked, “I’ve had worse'’.

Mary Davey recalls that “after McCrea named John in Westminster ours became a life of anticipation'’.

The anticipation was well founded when on 9 February Milltown killer Michael Stone tried to shoot John, but John managed to get out of his car and escape over fields with Stone in pursuit firing at him.

Dismayed at his failure Stone targeted John’s brother-in-law Joseph O’Kane. The booby trap he laid, however, blinded a nephew of Joe’s wife in one eye. Neither man has republican connections.

A year later John was shot dead as he returned from a council meeting. He was in his own laneway 50 yards from home.

His family believe that crown forces personnel were involved in the killing.

“I heard the shots,'’ recounted Mary, “and a few moments later I heard a family friend, shouting for me to get an ambulance. When we went to the car we found that it was parked with the handbrake on. John would only have stopped if he had seen uniformed men on the lane, certainly not for masked men'’.

The Davey family still struggle to come to terms with their grief. They know that the sorrow and loss that they feel is as real as that of other families who have lost someone in the last 30 years, but their grief is not recognised.

“I counselled my children myself. What we really needed was practical assistance and a recognition of our loss.

“Willie McCrea abused his parliamentary privilege when he named John in the House of Commons. He signed John’s death warrant. As a man of God he should know the eighth Commandment - Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbour'’.

Mary Davey continues to hope that the peace process will work, for the sake of her family and the memory of her husband. John’s legacy lives on. He was succeeded in his council seat by his daughter Pauline and the young activists whom he took under his wing and gave the benefit of his knowledge have matured and continue to provide fresh leadership in South Derry.

Daily Ireland

By Connla Young
10/02/2006

Republicans from across Counties Derry and Antrim will gather this weekend to mark the 17th anniversary of the murder of Sinn Féin councillor John Davey.
The veteran republican was murdered in the lane way of his home at Gulladuff, Co Derry, on St Valentine’s Day, 1989 as he returned home from a monthly meeting of Magherafelt District Council.
The Ulster Volunteer Force later claimed responsibility for his murder.
Magherafelt Sinn Féin councillor Sean McPeake said there was collusion between Mr Davy’s killers and the security forces.
“John Davey was a well-respected public representative whose murder was a result of collusion between unionist paramilitaries and the British security services. The people who controlled and directed the loyalist death squad that murdered John are the same British securocrats who last week provided the information to write the IMC report. Their war against republicans has not ended.
“The British government have a duty and an obligation to get their house in order. They need to bring these anti-peace process elements to heel if progress is to be made in the coming period and they need to come clean on their role in the conflict here and begin to provide answers for this family and the hundreds of other families who suffered at their hands.”
Members of Magherafelt District Council recently voted to erect a plaque at the council’s headquarters in memory of John Davey and council colleague Bernard O’Hagan who was also murdered by loyalists.
Sunday’s commemorative event which will be addressed by Sinn Féin MLA for West Tyrone, Barry McElduff, starts at 2.30pm at St Mary’s Churchyard, Lavey.

RTÉ

10 February 2006 16:15

Police in Northern Ireland have renewed their appeal for information on the murder of a teenager in an unprovoked attack in Belfast six months ago.

Police renew appeal over Devlin murder15-year-old Thomas Devlin was fatally stabbed as he and two friends walked home from a shop in the Somerton Road area of north Belfast, where they had gone to buy sweets.

Police immediately focused their investigation on two men who were seen in the area with a dog at the time of the murder, and these men remain the prime suspects in their investigation.

The officer in charge of the inquiry remains convinced that key witnesses who were in the area at the time have still not come forward.

He has also appealed to the families and friends of the two main suspects to come forward, in a bid to bring about justice.

Eight men have been arrested since August and in excess of 20 searches have been carried out but police still lack the crucial evidence needed to bring charges.

Irish Examiner

By Harry McGee, Political Editor
10 February 2006

THE tribunal investigating the murder of two senior RUC officers in 1989 will commence its first public sittings in early March.
The Smithwick Tribunal yesterday placed advertisements in newspapers asking potential witnesses to contact it.

The inquiry will examine suggestions that members of the Garda Síochána or other State employees colluded in the fatal shooting of RUC Chief Superintendent Harry Breen and his colleague, Superintendent Robert Buchanan. Both were killed in an IRA ambush near the border between Louth and South Armagh on March 20, 1989, as they returned from a meeting with senior gardaí in Dundalk. The IRA unit which carried out the murders was aware of the route the two men took. Allegations of collusion have been made by at least two journalists.

This case was one of six collusion cases investigated by retired Canadian judge Peter Cory arising out of inter-governmental talks in Weston Park in 2003. He recommended a full inquiry.

The sole member of the tribunal is Judge Peter Smithwick the retired President of the District Court.

Hearings will begin in the King’s Inns in Dublin on March 3.

Irish Examiner

By Cormac O’Keeffe
10/02/06

GARDAÍ are investigating whether the Continuity IRA carried out a pipe bomb attack on a man in north Dublin on Wednesday evening.

Security sources initially thought the dissident republican group might have supplied the bomb to a criminal gang as part of a new ‘consultancy’ business it was developing. But some gardaí yesterday indicated the CIRA might have been directly involved in the bombing as part of its growing extortion campaign.

The paramilitary outfit - although quite small in number - has been increasingly active in the last year and a half, particularly in certain pockets in Dublin, as well as in Limerick.

The blast on Wednesday occurred outside the house of John Ward in Coolock as both he and other individual were moving a car.

The pipe bomb - contained in a thermos flask - fell off the boot of the car onto the ground, breaking apart.

The men heard the device ticking and ran for safety.

Army bomb experts said the bomb exploded, but failed to detonate fully.

The pipe bomb was packed with nails and shotgun pellets but they were not dispersed.

The interior of the bomb did explode but the bulk of the blast was embedded in the car. Neither the owner of the house nor his friend were injured.

Gardaí at Coolock are investigating a number of theories into the reasons behind the bomb attack.

They are being assisted by the Special Detective Unit - which investigates paramilitary activity.

Army bomb experts and officers from military intelligence are also involved.

The army experts are examining the contents of the bomb and its design in the hope of pinpointing which group might have manufactured it.

The renegade group was involved in two pipe bomb incidents in Dublin towards the end of last year.

Last December, a bomb was discovered in a car on the M50 motorway as it was due to be delivered to a criminal target.

Last November, a sophisticated hoax bomb was found on the driveway of a drug abuser in Blanchardstown, west Dublin.

The bomb was linked to the CIRA after someone from the group rang media warning of “extreme measures” as part of a new anti-drug campaign.

The previous January, the CIRA was believed to have been behind a pipe bomb in Belcamp Crescent, Coolock, a short distance from the scene of Wednesday’s explosion.

There have been a similar number of pipe bomb incidents linked with the Continuity IRA in Limerick in recent years.

Garda sources said there were “little nests” of CIRA activists in Dublin, with about eight in the west of the city and around a similar number in north Dublin.

Belfast Telegraph

Eamonn McCann
09 February 2006

Anyone who doubts postal workers’ claims that Royal Mail management is characterised by offensive arrogance should ponder the statement issued on Tuesday in relation to the Belfast dispute.

Explaining why letters had been hand-delivered to four representatives of the Communication Workers’ Union (CWU) threatening them with legal action, the spokeswoman declared: “Letters were sent… to say… that there is no clear evidence showing a real will to get people back to work and a number of options are being considered, including taking injunctions out against them personally.”

Not only were the union representatives being required to dissociate themselves from the strike, the four were being told they’d be held personally responsible for the stoppage and might be pursued through the courts for Royal Mail’s losses if they failed to “get people back to work”.

The role ascribed to the union was not of representing its members but of policing its members on management’s behalf.

Royal Mail didn’t actually demand that CWU officials use whips to herd postal workers in penitential procession through Belfast city centre and back into Tomb Street. But give them time. Why stop now when they’ve got away with so much?

Yesterday morning, one BBC presenter, having completed an interview in which the commercial boss of Royal Mail was allowed, unchallenged, to deliver a propaganda barrage against the postal workers, signed off by gratuitously reminding listeners that the strike was “illegal”.

But it is not illegal, if we are to give the word its normal meaning. The strikers are not breaking the law.

It is true - presumably the point the BBC presenter was making - that they haven’t jumped through the hoops designed by the Thatcher Government to neuter the trade union movement and left in place by New Labour and so cannot invoke the protection of the law.

It’s understandable that Royal Mail management should take every opportunity to dub the stoppage “illegal.” But journalists ought not to substitute management-speak for facts.

The startling one-sidedness of coverage derives mainly from the fact that union officials have themselves been advised by lawyers that they mustn’t appear to express support for the stoppage lest they leave the union open to legal action.

As a result, news organisations achieve “balance” by giving management free rein and then providing space for a union spokesperson to stress that the union is urging its members to abandon the action to which management objects.

There is no direct expression of the viewpoint of the hundreds of workers who felt they had no option but to walk off the job.

Much was made of a Royal Mail suggestion that the strike was sparked when a worker from the Shankill was discovered noting the personal details, including the car registration number, of a manager.

These reports were set alongside quotes from a letter issued by a representative of a union involved in a battle for members with the CWU. The letter described the stoppage as “deeply sinister”.

Taken together, the implication of these reports was that a Royal Mail manager had been targeted for attack and that there had been paramilitary involvement in this targeting.

There is no truth in this. None whatsoever. But the untruthful suggestion has been seriously damaging to the strikers’ cause.

Those who reported the suggestion as if it had substance might now feel it appropriate to check the story. The diary is available for inspection.

Royal Mail management isn’t alone in Northern Ireland in believing that citizens must abandon all expectation of dignity the minute they walk into work.

Thatcher’s spoilt children, adopted and doted on by New Labour, acquire a half ounce of authority and dream of Mussolini.

The tendency is particularly marked in parts of the public sector being pared down and pummelled into shape for flogging off to private interests.

That’s what’s going on here.

Thatcher’s attitude to working class people who dared to stand up for themselves was most clearly expressed in her mobilisation of the propaganda and repressive resources of the State to defeat the miners in 1984-85.

The NUM was pursued for its assets, nationally and internationally. But, as far as I remember, the Tory Government never went so far as to deploy people with corkscrew souls under cover of darkness to deliver letters implicitly threatening to seize the possessions of individual union members.

But that happened in Belfast last Thursday evening.

What are we coming to? Are people to be left homeless because they refuse to allow themselves and their fellow workers to be treated like dirt?

How strange that this should happen, and scarcely a dicky-bird about it, in an area where political leaders never give over about defending their communities’ rights.

Incidentally, Hugh Smyth (PUP) and Michael Ferguson (SF) both made the point at Lanark Way on Tuesday that this had been the first time since 1932 that the Shankill and the Falls had come onto the streets together to make common cause.

You’d think every advocate of reconciliation etc. would be out cheering.

But too many would rather have the workers settle down separately than rise up together.

Personally, I take the opposite view.

Belfast Telegraph

By Chris Thornton
09 February 2006

Gerry Adams has confirmed that he will seek a fundraising visa from the US so he can seek donations while in Washington for St Patrick’s Day.

His announcement could herald another row with US authorities, who refused to give him a similar visa in November, prompting the Sinn Fein president to abandon a trip to America.

That refusal came as the State Department increased pressure on Sinn Fein to support the PSNI.

Mr Adams ended up addressing the November fundraiser by a satellite link.

Friends of Sinn Fein, the party’s American fundraising arm, say they will hold a cash-generating event in Washington on March 16 which Mr Adams would be expected to attend.

Belfast Telegraph

10 February 2006

Sinn Fein is calling on the Government to intervene in the postal crisis as the strike enters its eleventh day.

South Belfast MLA Alex Maskey is urging Trade Minister Angela Smith and Secretary of State Peter Hain to take action. Mr Maskey said that Sinn Fein supported the call for an independent inquiry into management procedures at Royal Mail.

“It is crucial that Angela Smith and Peter Hain both intervene in the interests of the local economy because, had we had a local Assembly, we as politicians would have expected speedy intervention.

“The community wants to see the dispute resolved as quickly as possible.

“We support the call for an independent inquiry into procedures and it is important that the community and business sectors along with political representatives unite in securing an equitable agreement.”

West Belfast DUP MLA Diane Dodds called on all sides to increase their efforts to resolve matters. Mrs Dodds said she has met with both the postal workers and Royal Mail and that a way forward must be found as a matter of urgency.

“The current position cannot continue indefinitely,” she said.

“Having spoken to the workers it is clear they don’t want to be in this situation. Royal Mail as a company cannot allow this dispute to escalate. Any failure to act immediately will only increase the consequences to industry and local communities.”

Newshound

(Jim Gibney, Irish News)

What do a failed politician, a former CIA man, a former British policeman and a former government official have in common?

They have joined the ranks of people and organisations hell-bent on wrecking the peace process.

What is even more galling about these ‘formers’ is they are being paid huge sums of taxpayers’ money.

Newspaper reports suggest they are paid £600 a day – a day that is, not a week. That is an incredible £3,000 a week; £144,000 a year.

And what are the hard-pressed taxpayers getting for the British government’s largesse? Two reports a year that amount to little more than a few thousand words each.

The latest band of peace wreckers is the misnamed ‘Independent Monitoring Commission’ (IMC) – there is nothing independent about them.

After last week they should be renamed the ‘Balderdice’ Commission after its chairperson Lord Alderdice. He produced balderdash in their report.

Like so much else about this body we are not told who writes the report, who researches its facts, who exactly provides the information which shapes the report.

We do know that the ‘Balderdice’ Commission relies primarily on British intelligence agencies and sources therein or thereabouts.

So we can rest easy because after all, the intelligence agencies are bursting at the seams with devotees of the peace process.

Incredible though it seems, the British and Irish governments have handed over the future well-being of an already besieged peace process to this quango.

It is an unelected, unaccountable and largely unwanted body which has become the willing tool for every securocrat, spook and spy who has an axe to grind against the peace process.

All they have to do is communicate to the IMC in some vague way a juicy piece of baseless information such as that which has caused the latest crisis in the peace process. Then just leave it to the IMC. They will do the rest.

You will find out how on page 20, paragraph 3.23 of their report: “We have since received reports not all PIRA’s weapons and ammunition were handed over for decommissioning in September. These reports are not able to indicate precisely what is the nature or volume of any remaining weapons…”

Riveting stuff. What intellectual rigour was at work to produce those two sentences? What test of accuracy did the IMC collective apply to the ‘received reports’?

What does it all mean? What does a ‘received report’ amount to? Was the message ‘received’ by phone, email, text, letter, in person? Did the IMC squad rendezvous at a secret midnight location in a smoked-filled room to ‘receive’? They are not revealing.

Maybe it is one of life’s mysteries. It just happens. Someone plants an idea in a commissioner’s head and before you know it is in the report. No questions asked. Well, none needed.

Contrast this vague, imprecise assertion with what actually occurred last September.

Under the careful scrutiny of five individuals, General de Chastelain, two of his team and two independent eye witnesses, Fr Alex Reid and Rev Harold Good, the IRA put all their weapons beyond use.

De Chastellain meticulously recorded as it happened what the five pairs of eyes witnessed.

He faced the world’s press and was cross-examined.

The British, Irish and US governments accepted de Chastelain’s report, confirming the IRA had put all their weapons beyond use.

By the way, de Chastelain heard the same report as the ‘Balderdice’ Commission which led them to claim the IRA withheld weapons. Didn’t amount to much, he concluded. Found that out after asking a few relevant questions.

But then if you have spent most of your life trying to defeat republicans and failing, you will find it hard to pass up an opportunity to put the boot into them.

That might just explain the motivation of the one-time leader of the Alliance Party, the one-time head of London’s anti-terrorist Special Branch and a man who was in the CIA for over 30 years.

For the British and Irish governments and other fans of the IMC, hoisted by your own petard comes to mind.

February 10, 2006
________________

This article appeared first in the February 9, 2006 edition of the Irish News.

Daily Ireland

10/02/2006

Prisoners on hunger strike to protest their indefinite jailing without trial by the US at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, are being strapped to chairs for hours a day and force-fed.
According to a report in Thursday’s New York Times, 25 special “restraint chairs” were recently shipped to Guantánamo for use against hunger striking prisoners who try to resist forced-feeding.
In a prepared statement, Lieutenant Colonel Jeremy M Martin, who is Guantánamo’s chief military spokesman, claimed the harsh measures had dramatically cut the number of striking prisoners - from 84 in December to only four this week. The nature of the camp – where the movements of any humanitarian and legal visitors are highly-restricted – makes independent verification of Martin’s statement very difficult.
News of the specialised restraint chairs at Guantánamo broke a day after the publication of a study showing that less than half of the more than 500 prisoners being held at Guantanamo committed any hostile act against the US. The report by Professor Mark Denbeaux of New Jersey’s Seton Hall University and attorney Joshua Denbeaux – who act as lawyers for some Guantánamo inmates – represents the first detailed analysis of prisoners’ backgrounds.
Based on official Defense Department data, the study shows that only 45 per cent of prisoners were deemed to have engaged in hostile action against the US or its coalition allies. Among the definitions of what constituted a hostile act, was fleeing from a camp that US jets and artillery were bombing.
The US has repeatedly rebuffed criticism of its actions at Guantánamo by saying that the inmates are the “the worst of the worst” of America’s enemies. However, the study found that just eight per cent were considered to be al-Qaida fighters. Among the rest of the prisoners, 40 per cent were considered to have no clear connection with al-Qaida, and 18 per cent had no affiliation with either the Taliban or al-Qaida. Most of the prisoners have been held for more than four years, and so far about ten have been charged with any offences related to crimes violating the laws of war.
The report also highlights how few of the prisoners were actually captured by US forces themselves. In total, US troops captured five per cent of the prisoners, while 86 per cent were captured by troops of the Northern Alliance in Afghanistan, or Pakistani troops. According to Defense Department records, the criteria for suspecting that someone might be an al-Qaida or Taliban operative included: having possession of rifles; having used a guest house; having possession of Casio wrist watches; and the wearing of olive drab clothing.
At the time when Pakistani soldiers and Northern Alliance troops were rounding up suspects for the US, America was offering huge bounties for any al-Qaida or Taliban suspects.
Thousands of flyers were circulated across Afghanistan promising vast riches and power to prospective bounty hunters.
“Get wealth and power beyond your dreams,” read one flyer. “You can receive millions of dollars for helping the Anti-Taliban Force catch al-Qaida and Taliban murderers.
“This is enough money to take care of your family, your village, your tribe for the rest of your life.”

Daily Ireland

Murdered man’s family speaks

10/02/2006

Relatives of a west Belfast man who was brutally stabbed to death last week have received death threats, Daily Ireland can reveal.
PSNI detectives called to the Devlin family home in the Ballymurphy estate on Tuesday to warn them they are being targeted by a number of people.
Later that day, a group of men took over two empty houses in the area. This incident was linked to a series of petrol bomb attacks that followed the murder of 39-year-old Gerard Devlin.
The father of six was fatally wounded on Whitecliffe Parade on February 3. Four men from the same extended family have been charged with his murder.
In the days after the killing, a number of homes in Ballymurphy were damaged in petrol-bomb attacks.
Daily Ireland understands around 15 men took over two houses on Tuesday amid fears they would be targeted by arsonists.
They eventually left after being confronted by concerned members of the community.
This was after the PSNI had called to the Devlin home warning his relatives they were under threat.
Mr Devlin’s aunt, Bernadette O’Rawe, called on those behind the threats to leave the family alone to grieve in peace.
“The people making these threats are well-known. Why can’t they leave my family in peace? Can they not see we are grieving?”
Mr Devlin’s family still has no idea when his remains will be returned home. Lawyers for those charged with murdering him are insisting on a second autopsy being carried out on the body.
Two cousins, Paul Burns (23) from Dermott Hill Park and Francisco Notarantonio (18) from Whitecliffe Parade, appeared in Belfast Magistrates’ Court yesterday charged with murdering Mr Devlin.
The men are the nephews and cousins of Christopher Notarantonio and William Notarantonio who appeared in court earlier in the week charged with the same murder.
Mr Burns is charged with murdering Mr Devlin and of causing an affray. When charged the defendant replied: “Not guilty, I have given a full account of what happened.”
Mr Notarantonio is charged with murdering Gerard Devlin, the attempted murder of another man and causing an affray. When charged he replied: ”I have given a full account. I am sorry to hear that Gerard Devlin is dead.”
In court, Burns, dressed in a black suit, and Notarantonio, dressed in a navy jacket and dark trousers, looked at the floor during proceedings. The defendants spoke only to confirm that they understood the charges.
A PSNI Detective Inspector told the court that she could connect the accused to the charges.
The PSNI officer, when questioned by defence solicitor Aidan Deery agreed that the defendants had gone voluntarily to the PSNI and co-operated fully.
The men were remanded in custody to appear at the same court via video link on March 7.

Belfast Telegraph

By Chris Thornton
10 February 2006

A loyalist who took part in a notorious sectarian murder and kidnapped a priest - while serving in the RUC - has died after an illness.

PUP member William McCaughey, who was also jailed for a UVF gun and bomb attack on a pub and was linked to loyalist protests outside a Catholic church in Ballymena, died at his home in Lurgan on Wednesday.

McCaughey, who was the party’s North Antrim representative and a member of the PUP executive, was pictured during a protest outside Harryville wearing an Orange Order sash.

He later turned against the protests and helped clean up graffiti at the church. Shortly before his death he complained that unionist politicians had been responsible for luring young men into violence during the Troubles.

The 55-year-old is believed to have been diagnosed with cancer just over a year ago.

McCaughey was a member of the UVF and the RUC’s Special Patrol Group at the same time in the mid-Seventies.

In 1978 he was jailed for the murder of William Strathearn, a Catholic shopkeeper, in Ahoghill, Co Antrim, a year earlier. Ahoghill was McCaughey’s home village.

The killing became known as the ‘Good Samaritan murder’, because the UVF gang lured Strathearn, a 39-year-old shopkeeper and father-of-seven, to his front door at 2am by claiming they were seeking aspirin for a sick child. Strathearn was shot twice. He is believed to have been shot by Robin Jackson, the notorious loyalist known as the Jackal.

McCaughey admitted supplying the handgun used in the murder and driving Jackson to the scene. He also admitted shooting and wounding a customer leaving the Rock Bar near Keady, Co Armagh in 1976. A bomb was also left at the door of the pub, but it did not explode.

McCaughey carried out the attack with two other serving RUC officers, one of whom was on duty at the time. The two other policemen received suspended sentences.

It was later found that the guns used in the Rock Bar attack had also been used to murder Co Armagh brothers John, Brian and Anthony Reavey.

McCaughey was also jailed for kidnapping Ahoghill parish priest Father Hugh Murphy in June 1978 with another RUC officer. Fr Murphy, a former Royal Navy chaplain who held an OBE, was kidnapped in response to the IRA abduction of RUC Constable William Turbitt. Constable Turbitt was killed, but Fr Murphy was released.

McCaughey carried out the kidnapping less than two weeks before he went on trial on a bizarre theft charge.

Less than two months after murdering William Strathearn, McCaughey was alleged to have stolen two tables while acting as an RUC bodyguard for UUP MP John Taylor, now Lord Kilclooney. McCaughey and another policeman were accused of taking the tables from the home of Elsie Kelsey, the then mayor of Lisburn, while waiting for Taylor to leave a party.

The trial heard accusations and counter-accusations of drunkenness between the policemen and the partygoers. The jury failed to reach a verdict.

McCaughey was released from prison in 1994. He later joined the PUP, saying he supported the peace process and the Good Friday Agreement.

Belfast Telegraph

By Deborah McAleese
10 February 2006

Pressure is mounting on Ulster’s jewellers to ensure the diamonds they sell are “bloodshed” free.

With the sale of diamonds increasing in the run up to Valentine’s Day, Northern Ireland’s romantic shoppers have been urged to ensure that they purchase the perfect stone - one that has not been traded to fund armed conflict and civil war.

The horrifying affects of conflict diamonds will soon be highlighted in the Hollywood movie The Blood Diamond, starring Leonardo DiCaprio and Jennifer Connelly.

Set in Sierra Leone in 1999 DiCaprio plays a juggler specialised in blood diamonds - stones used to finance rebellions, privateers and terrorists.

Conflict diamonds are those sold in order to fund armed conflict and civil war. Warlords and rebel groups in countries including Angola, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Liberia and Sierra Leone have used billions of dollars of profits from the sale of diamonds from the mines they control to buy arms and fund devastating wars.

Director of the Northern Ireland Amnesty International branch, Patrick Corrigan, said: “Diamonds are a once in a lifetime purchase that people often choose as a token of love. I don’t believe people here want this special gift to be related to the pain and suffering of others.

“Despite some progress, we are still concerned that the local diamond industry is falling short in combating the trade in conflict diamonds. They must keep their promises to end this devastating trade.”

Diamonds mined in rebel-held areas in Cote d’Ivoire, a West African country in the midst of a volatile conflict, are currently reaching the international diamond market.

A new guide to help local shoppers chose the perfect stone has been published and explains that consumers can make a difference by insisting that the diamond industry keep the promises it has made to end the trade in conflict diamonds.

It recommends that shoppers ask retailers where the diamonds they sell come from and to see a copy of the company’s policy on conflict diamonds as well as a written guarantee from suppliers that shows the diamonds are conflict free.

Belfast Telegraph

Hospital turns down move by tragedy family

By Nigel Gould
10 February 2006

A charity offered to pay for a specialist nurse for a heart condition that has become the biggest medical cause of sudden death in young people but Northern Ireland’s biggest hospital turned it down because it could not guarantee further funding, the Belfast Telegraph can reveal today.

Now Ulster families affected by cardiomyopathy - a disease of the heart muscle that is often inherited - are urging the Royal to reconsider its decision.

The Cardiomyopathy Association, a leading UK charity that supports families affected by the condition, said it had made available £40,000 for a two-year post at the Royal.

However, the hospital told the Belfast Telegraph that while it was very supportive of the introduction of such a service, it could not guarantee recurrent funding for such a post at this time.

But a spokeswoman stressed that the hospital would welcome further opportunities to discuss with the association “other options for our patients.”

Ulster couple Sam and Amanda Graham, who lost their daughter, 14-year-old Rebecca last July to hypertrophic cardiomyopathy - the biggest medical cause of sudden death in the under 35s - said a nurse specialist was important.

Rebecca, a pupil at Sullivan Upper School, in Holywood, experienced dizziness and fainting, symptoms of the condition from the age of 12 but was not diagnosed for a year.

Sam and Amanda, from Newtownards, said: “When Rebecca was alive we did not know enough about her condition or the different treatments available. We only found out the true situation after she had died.

“A nurse specialist would have had time to sit down with us to discuss the full implications of the condition and all the options open to her and been able to give us more support through this very difficult time.

“We think such a nurse would have been of great benefit to us. We were a family with no experience of hospitals and we were finding it difficult to come to terms with a condition we knew nothing about.”

In the Graham family, both Amanda (39), an executive officer at Dundonald Primary School, and Rebecca’s brother Matthew, who is 12, have been screened clear.

But Sam, a 41-year-old facilities manager at Sullivan Upper School, Holywood, has also been found to have the condition. He is on medication and since Rebecca’s death has had an internal defibrillator fitted. It will shock his heart back into life if it is in danger of stopping.

The Grahams said: “Rebecca was told her heart was not in danger of stopping. She just needed to avoid strenuous exercise, such as netball and rounders. But she died after feeling ill in bed one evening. We have since found out that other young people have died too when they are resting.”

The Cardiomyopathy Association said that since October it has been seeking a meeting with health chiefs at the Royal to discuss other options.

Chief executive of the Cardiomyopathy Association Robert Hall said: “We already fund a nurse specialist post at the Heart Hospital in London and one shared between the Western Infirmary, Glasgow, and the Royal Alexandra in Paisley.

“Both of our nurses do invaluable work helping families with cardiomyopathy. We want to extend this service to the Royal.”

Mr Hall will be in Belfast to address an information meeting tomorrow in the Park Plaza Hotel in Belfast which is being held by for families affected by cardiomyopathy in Ireland.

Irish Independent

Katherine Donnelly

FANCY googling the Book of Kells or all 65,000 pages of first US president George Washington’s diaries?

A new collaboration between Irish scientists and internet wizards Google may allow for web-based searches of handwritten documents in a way that has never been possible.

A joint Dublin City University (DCU)-based team has applied its internationally recognised expertise in video analysis to making images of handwriting searchable.

Research leader Professor Alan Smeaton said they “stumbled across” the possibility in the course of other research and approached Google, which has come up with funding for a year.

His colleague Dr Noel O’Connor said that with handwriting, which is at present not searchable, they were getting very good detection using the shape of a word - even though the writer always altered the way he or she wrote the same word each time.

The George Washington diaries and memoirs have, in fact, been made available for the research, which is being carried out in conjunction with two US universities.

“We’ve applied the approach to hundreds of pages of George Washington’s diaries and memoirs, getting very good results. For example, you can select the word ‘battle’ and find all the references to that word in Washington’s writings,” said Dr O’Connor.

Up to now, the kind of material they are hoping to open up on the web, has been kept behind closed doors, or is accessible for examination in digital libraries, at a slow and cumbersome one page at a time.

Prof Smeaton believes that the techniques being developed in this project could lead to handwritten manuscripts being available for searching in the giant Google index within a couple of years.

“As a company, Google moves very fast and if the techniques we are developing in this project are as good as early results indicate, we can expect to see Google take up the outputs,” he said.

Prof Smeaton said that libraries around the world were in the process of digitising their rare and historical manuscripts, so in the future, using this technology, Google search engines could make these manuscripts available and searchable worldwide.

The research is being carried out at the Adaptive Information Cluster (AIC), a Science Foundation Ireland multi-disciplinary research group involving DCU and UCD working in sensor science, software engineering, electronic engineering and computer science.

The team is also involved with the Dublin Institute of Advanced Studies in the Irish Script on Screen (ISOS) project - digitising old manuscripts written in the Irish language.

Thousands of images have been scanned with the intention also of making them searchable on the internet.

The system is based on “object detection” in video - detecting and identifying images of people or other objects in different video frames, even though there may be altered positions or angles, and applying this to differing slants or shapes of words in handwriting.

Irish Independent

The massive Canary Wharf explosion in February 1996 killed two people, injured dozens and caused £150m of damage in east London

By SUE CLOUGH
Fri, 26 Jun 1998

FOR more than a year the London Docklands bomber was an anonymous figure known to police as “the triple thumbprint man” because they were the only clues he left behind.

It was only when armed RUC officers hunting an alleged IRA gang arrested five men in an isolated farmhouse near Crossmagalen in Co Armagh that the thumbprints were matched to James McArdle.

McArdle, whose nose was broken during the police raid, was flown to London but refused to answer questions about the South Quay explosion.

“Until then he had been the triple thumb print man, but afterwards we were able to match 14 palm and fingerprints,'’ said Commander John Grieve, head of the anti-terrorist branch.

Police had no prior intelligence of the bomb made up of over a ton of homemade explosives.

Four days after the blast, and in response to police appeals for help, an inquisitive lorry driver, Arthur Ward, reported seeing an unfamiliar lorry and trailer parked in River Road, Barking, nine miles from Docklands, on the day of the explosion.

He had stopped to look because he was “nosey'’.

He was the 199th of the 850 people who rang the anti-terrorist hotline and provided what Cdr Grieve described as “the golden nugget'’ of information. “There is no better example of what we are about than this case, of the public helping us. The hotline worked.'’

The site at River Road was “like a quarter-mile rubbish tip, and officers crawled on their hands and knees picking up every bit of paper'’. Because they were not sure what they were looking for every filthy, rain-sodden scrap had to be examined.

In an old tyre were tachograph records and a trucking magazine bearing the first thumbprint.

Nearby were discarded pieces of false number plates. On a trailer and ramps abandoned by the bombing team, forensic experts discovered traces of explosives commonly used by the IRA and paint scrapings which finally led to the lorry being identified as a former British Gas vehicle.

From the tachograph records its route through England from Northern Ireland and Scotland was traced and CCTV footage unearthed most of its journey south.

McArdle’s second and third thumbprints were found on an ashtray at a truck stop in Carlisle where he stayed under a false name, and on a ferry ticket stub at Stranraer bought on a dummy run the month before.

Callers to the hotline also reported sightings of the lorry as it made its way to River Road with its deadly cargo. It was there the bomb was primed just hours before it was taken to South Quay by two men, McArdle almost certainly the driver.

Once it was in place with its two-hour time clock ticking away, “inaccurate and wholly inadequate warnings'’ were given to agencies using recognised IRA codewords.

The same codeword has been used since a warning of a bomb at Victoria in 1991. It exploded, killing one person, because of the vagueness of the message about its location.

The word was again used in coded warnings of the Baltic Exchange bomb, which gave the location as the Stock Exchange; Paddington Station when the bomb exploded outside the police station; and the Grand National, which proved to be a false alarm.

The South Quay bomb was already in place when the first of five calls, again using the same word, came at 5.38pm, warning of a massive bomb at South Quay station.

It was little short of a miracle that more people were not killed and injured when it exploded at rush hour, scattering debris for hundreds of yards and leaving a crater 33ft wide and 10ft deep.

After the coded warnings, the lorry was spotted by Pc Roger Degraff. He was just about to try the handle of the door when some sixth sense stopped him.

It saved his life because police believe, from a piece of debris the size of a 50p piece, that a mercury tilt switch anti-handling device was in place ready to detonate the bomb at the slightest touch.

Pc Degraff went to warn Inam Bashir and his assistant John Jeffries. They told him they were just shutting the shop. But moments later the bomb exploded, killing both men. Pc Degraff was knocked to the ground and suffered cuts and bruises.

Others sustained a variety of injuries. Barbara Osei needed 300 stitches and has lost the site of one eye. Zauoi Berezag, who was with his family in a car near the blast, still suffers memory loss and his 17-year-old son’s eardrums were perforated. Another man needs constant care because his injuries have reduced him to a child-like state.

McArdle admitted driving the lorry to southern England but said he had no idea it contained a bomb. He did it as a favour for a man he called The Boss, whom he refused to name for fear of reprisals.

Cross-examined by John Bevan QC, he admitted being an IRA supporter but claimed he did not agree with violence.

Police, who have liaised closely with the RUC and gardai, are continuing the hunt for other members of the highly trained bombing team, thought to number four or five men. The families of his two victims remain grief-stricken. Mr Bashir’s father died of a heart attack months after his son, and Mr Jeffries’s father, with whom he lived, is said to have become a recluse.

Out of respect for the families’ wishes police are not releasing video footage of the explosion.

Cdr Grieve said: “It is essentially a film of murder and we think it would be in bad taste. Our first duty is to support the victims and their families.

“They are two extremely nice, quiet, ordinary south London families who just don’t understand why two people can go to work during the ceasefire and not come home again.'’

(Daily Telegraph, London)

BBC ON THIS DAY

Story appearing 10 February 1996

The IRA has admitted planting the bomb that exploded in the Docklands area of London last night.

One man was found dead by police sifting through the wreckage today and another person has been reported missing.

Five of the 39 casualties - including three police officers - remain in hospital, one of them in a critical condition.

The bombing marks the end of a 17-month IRA ceasefire during which Irish, British and American leaders worked for a political solution to the troubles in Northern Ireland.

They have all condemned the attacks.

‘Dark shadow of doubt’

The leader of the political wing of the IRA - Sinn Fein - Gerry Adams has spoken of the need to continue the peace process.

British Prime Minister John Major said there was now “a dark shadow of doubt” where optimism had existed.

His statement continued: “The IRA once again callously threatens the desire for peace. They will not be allowed to prevail.

The half-tonne bomb was left in a small lorry about 80 yards from South Quay Station on the Docklands Light Railway, in the regenerated commercial district.

It exploded at 1902 GMT after coded warnings were telephoned to Dublin and Belfast media 90 minutes earlier.

The IRA has said “regrettable injuries” could have been avoided if police had responded promptly to “clear and specific warnings”.

Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police Sir Paul Condon said: “It would be unfair to describe this as a failure of security. It was a failure of humanity.”

Firemen worked throughout the night to clear up the devastation as a six-storey building collapsed and surrounding office blocks had their windows blown out.

Immediate damage is estimated at £85 million in a blast felt in Canary Wharf Tower - the tallest building in Europe - a quarter of a mile away.

A second explosion caused by a gas leak hampered rescue efforts and Heron Quay and Canary Wharf Tower were both evacuated over fears of a second device.

In Context

A second body was found during the clear up operation.

James McArdle, a 29-year-old bricklayer from County Armagh was found guilty of conspiracy to cause explosions in June 1998.

He was jailed for 25 years.

Murder charges - for the deaths of the two men killed, newsagents Inam Bashir and John Jeffries - were dropped when the judge dismissed the jury because of concerns about press coverage.

Eighteen months later the IRA agreed to another ceasefire.

Peace was finally negotiated with the Good Friday Agreement - accepted by voters in Ireland and Northern Ireland - in May 1998.

Under the terms of the agreement, James McArdle was released in July 2000.