SAOIRSE32

Sunday Life

**Photos from the PSNI article Policing from the Skies

Ulster’s first police helicopter may be known for chasing speeding criminals - but the spy-in-the-sky has also been involved in many life-saving operations, writes SINEAD McCAVANA

18 June 2006

IT’S almost a year since the PSNI’s first helicopter took to the skies. And, in that time, it has attended more than 800 incidents and clocked up 1,500 flying hours. (Click photo to view)

Sunday Life spent a day with the PSNI’s highly-specialised air support team at their purpose-built base in RAF Aldergrove.

PSNI’s head of air support, Detective Inspector Roger McConnell, told how the chopper had an increasing role in air-lifting casualties.

He said: “We would carry out a casualty evacuation in emergency circumstances - we’re not an air ambulance, but in a life-or-death situation, we are called in.”

The Eurocopter 135 T2, which was bought for £3.7m is also the fastest search facility in Northern Ireland.

“We can get to Belfast in a few minutes - it takes about 15 to 20 minutes to reach the north coast and about half an hour to get to Fermanagh,” said deputy commander of air support, Detective Sergeant Brian Cairns.

“The coastguard would call us out from time to time because we can find people quickly using the thermal imaging camera, which detects body heat.

“We found the fishermen who were in trouble around Whitehead after the coastguard couldn’t locate them.

“It was dark and the weather was terrible, but we were able to spot them.”

The helicopter crew also helped rescue five lost scouts on Black Mountain in west Belfast.

“It’s hard to imagine anyone getting lost on Black Mountain but it did happen and police on the ground couldn’t find them,” added Det Insp McConnell.

“But by using the thermal imager, we found them and directed police to their location.”

The helicopter is also effective in finding young children or elderly people who have wandered off.

“We found an old man in a river - he was trying to scrabble up the bank. Again it was dark, so no one could see him but we picked up his body heat straight away.”

The black helicopter is an impressive piece of machinery and the envy of many other forces in the UK.

It has state-of-the-art equipment including a broadcast quality video camera and a searchlight - as powerful as 30 million candles.

Click photo to view

“We have to turn it off when we land or it would burn the grass,” laughed Det Sgt Cairns.

A civilian pilot flies the hi-tech chopper, while two PSNI officers - known as observers - operate the cameras, read maps and communicate with police on the ground.

Another job for the helicopter is at serious road traffic accidents, where aerial shots of the scene are important for investigating officers.

It is also involved in planned operations, including contentious parades, where video evidence may be needed later in court, if trouble flares.

But air support team’s most high profile incident came earlier this year when they chased a suspected robber on a motorbike for an hour and 20 minutes.

It is thought to be the longest recorded air pursuit in UK police history.

“That was unbelievable,” said Det Insp McConnell. “It started in Belfast and ended in Omagh.

“Another advantage of chasing someone in a helicopter is that it reduces the risk of people on the ground getting hurt.”

It is estimated the Eurocopter costs around £750,000-per-year to run.

But the air support chief believes that is value for money.

“Every best value review carried out on other police forces in the UK always come back saying that it’s good value for money,” said Det Insp McConnell.

“At the end of the day, what price can you put on a life?”

Sunday Times

**Via Newshound

Carissa Casey
June 18, 2006

PRESIDENT Mary McAleese will join forces with UDA brigadier Jackie McDonald to launch a cross-community, anti-sectarian project in the Finaghy area of Belfast on June 29.

The Finaghy Crossroads Group (FCG), a 12-strong committee comprising former paramilitaries from both sides of the community, will unveil plans to cut sectarian attacks and promote Finaghy as a safe environment.

McDonald has offered the group his full support and will speak at the launch. McAleese has also accepted an invitation to attend.

Harry Smith, a former UDP councillor, who co-chairs the group with Stiofain Long of Sinn Fein, said that former prisoners were involved in the initiative because young people in the area often looked to them as role models.

“It’s about leading by example, showing young people they can have a positive impact on the community and create a shared space for everyone to access,” he said.

The FCG was formed out of contacts between Smith and Long six years ago at the height of sectarian tensions in the area.

About 6,000 people live in Finaghy, with almost equal numbers from both communities. Six years ago there were a number of vicious sectarian assaults and homes were burnt.

“There was a real concern that Finaghy crossroads was becoming a fully fledged sectarian interface where a peace barrier might become necessary,” said Smith.

“It’s a main thoroughfare through south Belfast. Children from five different schools across the religious divide come through the crossroads.”

The initial contact succeeded in reducing the tensions between the two communities. It took until 2004 before Long and Smith conducted the first face-to-face meetings. Following that it was decided that a cross-community group involving residents and community groups from both sides of the divide would be set up.

According to Long, the FCG is unique because it is a genuine grassroots initiative and not one that has been imposed by outsiders.

“It’s an inclusive process all along. We have former combatants involved because they can be role models within their community.”

While both men use representatives on the street to discourage young people from becoming involved in sectarian incidents, Smith denies that they act as vigilantes. “It’s about using common sense,” he said.

Daily Ireland

**Via Newshound

Research reveals children as young as three displaying bigotry

By Connla Young

Children as young as three years-old in the North are displaying sectarian attitudes, a Belfast conference heard yesterday.
Queen’s University professor Paul Connolly told delegates attending the Diversity and Inclusion in the Early Years conference, organised by parent support group, Nippa, that children can relate to cultural symbolism by the time they reach the age of three.
Experts from across the globe have gathered in Belfast for the three-day conference which will examine a range of issues of importance to the development of children.
“Many people may find it hard to believe, but the signs of sectarianism and racism and other prejudices can be evident at this very early age,” said Professor Connolly.
“Children can show a strong preference for the cultural events and symbols of their own community by the time they are three.
“When they are six, many are fully aware that they belong to one side or another.
“At six years of age one third of children already see themselves as part of one community and 15 per cent make sectarian statements.
“But the foundations of this are laid at the age of three or four.
“For instance, Catholic three year-olds are twice as likely to say they don’t like the police or Orange marches.
“At that age there is a clear tendency for children to like their own flag. Children pick up and internalise the prejudices of their own community.”
The Queen’s academic, who has written extensively on issues surrounding diversity said sectarian attitudes are more likely to be seen in boys because they are brought up to be more aggressive
“It is important that at this young age we give children a more positive, rounded and inclusive view of difference and diversity in all its forms,” he said.
Professor Connolly is currently involved in several media-based projects aimed at breaking down prejudice among children in the North.

Sunday Independent

**Goodwill visit?

DON LAVERY

THERE will be tight security in Dublin Port at the end of the month when Britain’s biggest warship, the helicopter carrier HMS Ocean, visits.

Click photo to view - image from >>here

The 21,000-ton ship, which was part of the UK task force supporting the invasion of Iraq, will pay its second visit to the capital within three years.

There will be restricted airspace over the ship while she is in port. HMS Ocean can carry 480 Commandos, 450 sailors and aircrew, along with vehicles, artillery and stores. It can carry 12 large Merlin and six smaller Lynx helicopters. Chinook transport and Apache attack helicopters can also use the ship.

The occasion (starting June 29) is the latest in a series of goodwill visits by UK armed forces here since the ending of the Troubles.

**This is an article written in 2004 on the 10th anniversary of the Loughinisland tragedy. I found it on the Danny Morrison forum, which is now closed, and the newspaper link to this is now behind an archive payment service. This is one reason I post whole articles rather than just give a link.

The Independent.co.uk
18/06/04

Six Catholics were shot dead in Loughinisland, Co Down, in June 1994. Their loyalist killers were never caught. David McKittrick reports on a community moving on

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

O’TOOLE’S BAR AND ITS VICTIMS

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

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

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

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

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

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

Sunday Life

18 June 2006

Relatives of the victims of the Loughinisland massacre have been assured by police that they have not given up on catching the UVF killer gang.

Today marks the 12th anniversary of the massacre, in which six innocent Catholics were gunned down at the Heights Bar in the Co Down village.

Relatives had hoped that last week’s arrest of a man and a woman would finally bring a breakthrough in what has become known as the ‘forgotten’ atrocity of the Troubles because no one has ever been charged.

However, the man and woman were released without charge.

One security source claimed that, contrary to speculation, the arrest operation was not linked to any new UVF supergrass, but was connected to a letter purportedly written by someone who was a witness to the planning of the June 1994 massacre.

Ahead of the anniversary, a number of the families were briefed on the current state of the police investigation.

The PSNI probe has been given a new focus after the intervention of the office of Police Ombudsman, Nuala O’Loan.

She stepped in at the request of Down SDLP councillor Eamonn O’Neill who handed her a dossier two years ago, compiled in consultation with the families.

Said Mr O’Neill: “I am heartened that police inquiries are taking place with more vigour.

“This is quite a difficult time for the families. There have been false dawns in the past.”

The families have asked Mrs O’Loan to investigate why a prime suspect was never charged.

The man has long been suspected of helping to plan the last UVF atrocity of the Troubles and acting as getaway driver for the Belfast-based killer gang.

Sunday Life

UUP executive meets on Friday for first time since Sir Reg’s controversial alliance with UVF-linked party… and it’s predicted to get ‘hot and heavy’

By Joe Oliver
18 June 2006

Sir Reg Empey this week faces his first major crisis since taking up the reins of the Ulster Unionist Party.

For members of the UUP executive are to meet on Friday to have their say on the party’s controversial alliance with PUP boss David Ervine.

And last night one senior party officer told us: “It’s the first time the executive will have met since the deal and there’s no doubt the issue will dominate proceedings.

“It’s likely to be hot and heavy and the outcome is difficult to forecast - something which Sir Reg is well aware of.”

Around 100 members sit on the executive - including representatives from the 18 constituency associations, MLAs, the Women’s Association and Young Unionists.

It also includes the party’s only remaining MP, Lady Sylvia Hermon, who is an outspoken critic of the pact.

We can also reveal that some executive members will be meeting privately before Friday’s showdown with Sir Reg at the party’s Cunningham House HQ in Belfast.

They are hoping to secure enough support to persuade their party leader to sever the link now because of on-going UVF violence.

Sir Reg has come under mounting criticism since inviting Mr Ervine on board in a bid to ensure there would be a majority of unionist ministers in a future Assembly executive.

Two prominent party members have already defected to the Conservative Party with one of them - Down District councillor Peter Bowles - making it clear he did not want to be a member of a party with paramilitary connections.

The outlawed loyalist terror group is known to have been involved in the murder bid on former UVF commander Mark Haddock three weeks ago.

And Sunday Life revealed last week that a cousin of anti-UVF campaigner Raymond McCord was attacked by former pals of Special Branch spy Haddock.

Said one executive member: “There’s no suggestion that Sir Reg’s leadership is on the line, but the growing view of many is that the party has been unnecessarily tarnished.

“The UVF remains armed, active and dangerous and many feel the party must urgently review its links with a spokesman for that organisation.”

Sir Reg has pledged to stand by his alliance with Mr Ervine and to seek an end to all loyalist paramilitary activity.

A party spokesman said yesterday: “Sir Reg has made his position clear.

“His arrangement with Mr Ervine can be reassessed at any time if the UVF is being disingenuous and shows no sign of giving up its weapons.”

Sunday Life

By Alan Murray
18 June 2006

Peter Hain has been urged to clarify if he has lobbied the US government to lift its ban on Sinn Fein fundraising activities across the Atlantic.

Lord Trimble, who made his maiden speech in the House of Lords earlier this month, said the Secretary of State should “come clean” over the matter following reports that US officials had been angered by his approach.

He added Lord Rooker, deputy leader of the Lords, failed to clarify precisely what Peter Hain had been up to on behalf of Sinn Fein after he posed the question during his maiden speech.

“I am very disappointed in the answer from the Government, and because it was my maiden speech I was not permitted to be controversial.

“But I think the Secretary of State should now clear the air and come clean over this matter,” Lord Trimble said.

A recent article in The Times suggested US officials were annoyed at an approach by Mr Hain to the administration on behalf of Sinn Fein over the fundraising issue.

The party is currently banned from fundraising in the States, and the most recent visa granted to Gerry Adams in March stipulated that he must not raise funds during the visit.

Lord Trimble said it was “unusual” for the Americans to brief a British newspaper over complaints about a minister and said the move suggested that Mr Hain had greatly annoyed either the White House or the State Department.

“The manner in which Lord Rooker responded to my question suggested that the thrust of the complaint was well-founded but that Downing Street did not support Peter Hain’s approach to the Americans.

“I think we need to know if Mr Hain is operating on behalf of Sinn Fein without Downing Street’s approval, and why he is doing so,” he said.

It’s understood that the US State Department isn’t happy with the Government’s overall policy towards Sinn Fein and wants to see more pressure applied to the party to give an unreserved commitment to support the PSNI before any political deal is concluded.

A spokesman for the Northern Ireland Office refused to discuss Lord Trimble’s comments in the House of Lords or provide clarification.

“The issue of Sinn Fein fundraising in the United States is a matter for the Americans,” is all a spokesman would say.

Sunday Life

By Chris Anderson
18 June 2006

The ex-Army intelligence unit handler who claims to have unmasked Martin McGuinness as a British spy has now offered to unmask himself - for a TV debate with the Sinn Fein MP.

The former soldier - who uses the alias ‘Martin Ingram’ - says he will break cover and appear on live TV to discuss his allegations that Mr McGuinness was a tout.

He has thrown down the gauntlet to Mr McGuinness, and also challenged Gerry Adams to join his Sinn Fein colleague for the debate.

The ex-Force Research Unit member (pictured above) dismissed republican claims that he was hiding behind a pseudonym as “nonsense”.

He pointed out to Sunday Life that he’d already entered the public arena some time ago for face-to-face meetings with the family of murdered Belfast solicitor Pat Finucane.

Mr Adams recently completely rubbished allegations that the Mid-Ulster MP was a British agent, saying they were based upon a “shadowy network of anonymous opinions and secret briefings”.

The West Belfast MP said Martin Ingram was a former member of the FRU, a covert British Army unit that had been at the heart of collusion and had a “long and ignoble” history of setting people up for assassination in Ulster.

He added “subversion” and “dirty tricks” were routine for the FRU.

Mr Ingram, who previously ‘outed’ former Provo Freddie Scappaticci as a British spy, said Mr Adams was being “economical with the truth”.

“I notice Gerry Adams avoided raising the Freddie Scappaticci issue,” he said.

“He knows I - along with others - was involved in that exposure. I would have thought Mr Adams would have mentioned that issue, if for no other reason than to be seen as being fair and objective.

“After all, he got it wrong when he described the Scappaticci exposure as a tale of lies and an attempt to wreck the peace process.”

When the Scappaticci affair broke in 2003, Mr Adams said he accepted Scappaticci’s public denials and pointed the finger of blame at the “faceless people” of the British security services, who, he claimed, misled the media.

Sunday Life

By Alan Murray
18 June 2006

Some of the most important British agents within the IRA never met their handlers in Ireland because they were so highly-placed, their security couldn’t be risked.

And despite claim and counter-claim over Martin McGuinness, former spooks said few within the Northern Ireland security establishment would have known if he was.

One officer with 30 years’ experience said the public and the IRA would be “astounded” if the full details of who spied on the Provos were ever divulged.

Said the officer: “I personally do not know if Martin McGuinness is, or was, an intelligence asset.

“I wouldn’t expect to know, either, because the handling of the very highest-level informants was not something that was disclosed - even to the Chief Constable.

“It’s no surprise that former police and Stormont security figures, as well as some journalists, say they never heard any whisper of this, frankly, it means nothing.”

A former Special Branch officer told Sunday Life: “Genuinely, there was never any chat within the Branch that Martin McGuinness was a Special Branch or MI5 agent - but that does not mean he wasn’t a British agent.

“I don’t know that this is the case, but I am sufficiently realistic to accept that the absence of chat within the Branch or MI5 doesn’t tell the whole picture.”

Sunday Life

Mum pleads with US to allow ex-INLA man back to country if he visits dying dad in Ulster

By Stephen Breen
18 June 2006

The mother of a former INLA man facing deportation from the United States has accused the Washington government of stopping her son visiting his seriously ill father.

Ellen McAllister, from Belfast’s lower Ormeau Road, told Sunday Life that Malachy McAllister is “desperate” to visit dad Robert, who has Alzheimer’s.

The mother-of-eight fears that if her son makes a brief visit, he won’t be allowed to re-enter the US.

Said Mrs McAllister: “My husband is very seriously ill and needs 24-hour care and attention. The only thing that keeps him going is his desire to see his son again.

“Malachy went to America because loyalists fired over 30 shots into his living room and his kids’ bedroom - what else was he meant to do?

“He is worried that if he makes a visit there is no way the US authorities will let him in again. This whole nightmare is destroying him.”

She added her son had been an “upstanding member of the community” since he emigrated to the US.

“My son and his two kids are no threat to anyone, their whole life is in America,” she said.

A Federal Judge in New Jersey - who admitted she had “no choice” but to allow the deportation of the former republican - urged US Attorney General Alberto Gonzales to intervene in the case.

McAllister (48), who has met with former US President Bill Clinton to discuss his case, is facing expulsion from his adopted country because of a conviction in the 1980s.

The builder was jailed when he signed a police statement after being implicated by republican supergrass Harry Kirkpatrick.

He fled Ulster in 1988 after Red Hand Commando terrorists came within inches of killing him and his family.

The weapons used in the attack were later found - along with McAllister’s personal details - in a loyalist arms dump.

His family are being backed by US congressmen Joe Crawley and Steve Rothman, as well as other senior politicians.

Sinn Fein MLA Alex Maskey has also offered to meet the family to discuss the case.

Sunday Life

**See also ‘Save our son’

18 June 2006

“The staggering responce to our story last week was unprecedented and extremely gratifying, showing this province and its people in their finest light…” Jim Flanagan, Sunday Life editor

Literally hundreds of incredibly generous people from every corner of Northern Ireland responded to Sunday Life’s Baby James Appeal.

Within days of James’ heartbreaking story appearing last weekend, more than £30,000 had been pledged towards his life-saving surgery.

The response was overwhelming; Sunday Life staff were deluged with phone calls, emails and letters pledging support.

Never in the paper’s 18-year history has it witnessed such a response to a story.

As soon as Sunday Life hit the news-stands last weekend with little James’ photograph on the front page, people clamoured to donate cash to the appeal fund.

The public also came up with all sorts of ways to raise money - one butcher’s shop in Belfast, close to where the baby’s father, Jim, grew up, put out donation buckets.

Schoolchildren at Malone College, where James’ mother, Cathy, works, held a series of events including a BBQ and a lollipop sale and raised a staggering £10,000 in just 24 hours.

As far afield as Dundalk, a gala greyhound race night was quickly arranged.

Breeders as far away as England were auctioning off dogs to contribute to James’ appeal fund.

Even when the NHS revealed that it WOULD fund the surgery he needs, the cash still kept coming in.

It will now go towards other children suffering from leukaemia and to the cost of the family’s lengthy stay in Germany. (more…)

Sunday Life

By Alan Murray
18 June 2006

Two men charged with trying to kill UVF double-agent Mark Haddock are still waiting to hear if they’ll be allowed on to loyalist wings at the top-security Maghaberry jail.

Darren Moore (36), and former boxing champion Trevor Bowe (29), were denied bail at the High Court in Belfast on Friday.

But sources at Magilligan say they’re being kept off specially segregated prison wings reserved for loyalist prisoners.

Said one source at the jail: “The buzz is that the UVF has told their men in the segregated unit not to accept them in there.”

A Prison Service spokesman would only say on Friday: “All prisoners are assessed by the service before they are allocated accommodation within the jail. That process takes some time.”

But reliable sources at the prison say the assessment has been delayed because of “security considerations.”

Said another source: “There is a problem with these two going into the segregated loyalist unit at the moment.

“There is some uncertainty on the security front and a bit more consideration is being given to their suitability to go into this unit.

“They’re waiting for a bit of clarification on how these guys will be received,” he said.

Moore and Bowe have both denied involvement in the plot to murder Haddock - who is the subject of a major probe by Police Ombudsman Nuala O’Loan.

Her investigators are expected to receive a quantity of material from the BBC this week. The corporation was ordered to hand it over by the High Court.

It’s expected that it will take weeks to examine the film and documentation - used in a recent current affairs programme - and then interview ex-RUC detectives and other individuals referred to in the material.

Sunday Life

By Alan Murray
18 June 2006

Parades Commission member David Burrows is unlikely to face disciplinary action from the Orange Order for joining the controversy-ridden body - boycotted by the organisation’s Grand Lodge.

A report from the Armagh County Grand Lodge on Mr Burrows’ membership of the commission is inconclusive, according to informed sources.

Final legal opinion is now being sought by the order’s ruling body.

The report was presented to the Grand Lodge’s quarterly meeting in Belfast last week, but will not be acted upon.

Orange Order sources say its findings are inconclusive - and no decision has been taken on whether to charge Burrows with a breach of rules for accepting a position on the commission - appointed by Secretary of State Peter Hain in March.

One Grand Lodge member said: “It’s one of those situations where it could be argued either way.

“Did David join the commission as an Orangeman - or did he join as a member of the public?

“If he said he joined it, not to represent the Order, which I’m sure he would, then that means he was joining it as a private citizen.

“There’s no clear evidence to suggest that a rule of the institution was broken by David, or by Don MacKay, who has since resigned from the commission,” added the member.

“It would be difficult to bring a good case on the basis of the County [Grand Lodge’s] examination.

“Their report has been handed in and it will be passed to our lawyers for further examination.”

With Mr Burrows’ appointment to the commission vindicated by an Appeal Court ruling 10 days ago, he is likely to serve a full term - unless the majority judgement, which was supported by Lord Chief Justice Sir Brian Kerr, is overturned by the House of Lords.

Another Grand Lodge member said: “Some leading figures in the institution aren’t happy about this outcome, so it will be passed to the lawyers for a final legal opinion.

“The County [Lodge] examined the circumstances and looked at the rulebook for a considerable period of time, but couldn’t see precisely what rule Bro Burrows might have broken,” he said.

“Also, we are in the era of the European Convention on Human Rights, which guarantees David certain rights which we cannot infringe,” he said.

“So, unless the lawyers come up with a dimension the County has missed, it looks as if he will not be hauled before it on a rule violation and will be free to participate in the annual Drumcree protest in a few weeks’ time.”

Sunday Independent

LARA BRADLEY

THE smoking ban has had a knock-on effect on habits in the home, with more people now forbidding smoking in their household.

A study by the HSE has found that 50 per cent of people did not allow smoking anywhere in their home last year, compared to just 42 per cent in 2002 before the ban on smoking in the workplace.

Similarly, the number allowing smoking in selected rooms dropped from 28 per cent to 25 per cent.

Research officer David Evans said: “People are now more aware of the dangers of passive smoking, and the attitudes of both smokers and non-smokers have changed.”

Smokers are increasingly choosing to go outside to smoke when visiting the homes of non-smoking friends, and half of smokers have even banned smoking in their own home.

But while the ban has given some non-smokers the confidence to ask smokers not to smoke in their home, others lack the confidence to do so.

Mr Evans said: “Thirty-seven per cent of people who allowed smoking in their homes told us they would prefer their homes to be smoke-free, but they lacked the assertiveness skills necessary to insist upon it.”

But concerns have been raised about those who believe they are protecting the health of their family by restricting smoking to just one part of the home.

Mr Evans said: “A recent scientific test showed that of the 2,500 cigarettes which were smoked in one room in a house, the smoke of 400 cigarettes got upstairs into a child’s bedroom, turning her into an involuntary smoker.

“The smoking ban has had a positive effect, but there is no room for complacency,” he said. “Smoking is still allowed in 50 per cent of homes and that is a major public health issue. We have come a long way towards promoting atobacco-free society and we have taken a bold step ahead of other countries, but we need to build on that and make sure Ireland stays at the top on this issue.”

Indymedia.ie

**I’ve posted this article before, but it bears repeating

By Donnchadh
donn2010 at hotmail dot com
Sunday June 18, 2006 14:46

“It’s hard to see ex-prisoners destitute when the leadership are so wealthy and have holiday homes.” Hughes mentions Kieran Nugent, the first IRA man on the Blanket protest in Long Kesh. “Kieran died in 2000. They called him a ‘river rat’ because he spent his last days drinking by the river in Poleglass. “Why didn’t somebody in the movement not see he’d problems and help him? He was the bravest of the brave. The screws ordered him to wear the prison uniform and he replied, ‘You’ll have to nail it to my back.’”

[Below is an] interview by Suzanne Breen of ex-POW and hunger striker Brendan Hughes. We all know that Breen is no fan of PSF, but Hughes’ words speak for themselves.

Martin McGuiness and Gerry Adams negotiated a GFA which saw POWs come out of British camps with criminal records - barring them from any employment that Gerry and Martin didn’t control. Those that don’t toe the Gerry and Martin line are thrown on the scrap heap as Kieran Nugent was. Was this Gerry and Martin’s plan, or are they really such incompetent negotiators? Make up your own mind. Please read this article and ask yourself if this is who we should trust to lead the republican cause:

Brendan Hughes interview - full text

Decomissioned Provos thrown on scrap heap

Newshound

“Welcome to my cell,” says ex-IRA prisoner, Brendan Hughes, as he opens the door of his tiny, threadbare flat on the Falls Road. “Sometimes, I’ve sat here crying for a week. I think of all my comrades’ suffering and I don’t even want to go out. You never really leave prison.”

Hughes killed and saw his friends die too. A former ‘officer commanding’ the Belfast Brigade, he’s a living legend among republicans. Small and swarthy with a mop of black hair, he was known as ‘the Dark’.

His bombs reduced the city to rubble; his gun battles with the British entered republican folklore; he spent 13 years in jail and 53 days on hunger-strike. His best friend was Gerry Adams. Hughes, 57, now lives on disability benefit in Divis Tower – the only part of the flats’ complex not bulldozed.

Over the past 35 years, around 15,000 republicans have been imprisoned on both sides of the Border. On release, those close to the Sinn Féin leadership usually fare best. A minority secure paid community jobs; the rest are employed in IRA owned or supporting bars and taxi-depots.

While some ex-prisoners start businesses independently, the IRA gives others businesses to run. But many former prisoners who – for personal or political reasons – are outside the loop, face greater difficulties.

Last week, an ex-IRA prisoner was one of three men charged in connection with the hijacking of a vodka lorry in Co Meath. Former security force members and prison officers received generous retirement and redundancy payments from the state. “We were decommissioned with nothing,” says Hughes. “IRA men and women, who gave everything to this struggle, got poverty, premature death, and mental problems in return.”

It’s the untold story of the Troubles, he claims: “People stay quiet out of loyalty to the movement.” Money never mattered to him, he says: “I was offered £50,000 to become an informer. I told them £50 million wouldn’t sway me. But it’s hard to see ex-prisoners destitute when the leadership are so wealthy and have holiday homes.”

Hughes mentions Kieran Nugent, the first IRA man on the Blanket protest in Long Kesh. “Kieran died in 2000. They called him a ‘river rat’ because he spent his last days drinking by the river in Poleglass.

“Why didn’t somebody in the movement not see he’d problems and help him? He was the bravest of the brave. The screws ordered him to wear the prison uniform and he replied, ‘You’ll have to nail it to my back.’”

Research suggests a third of prisoners suffer broken relationships. Hughes had a baby daughter and his wife was pregnant with their son when he was arrested. “My wife became involved with another man while I was in prison. The lads inside told me to give her a hard time.

“I called her to the jail and told her there was no problem – she was young and deserved a bit of happiness. She always said the war was my number one priority and she was right. I was selfish. I neglected my family. When I got out of jail, I went to her house and shook her partner’s hand.” Hughes is close to his grown-up daughter but has no relationship with his son.

He was released from prison without skills or qualifications. He began labouring. “A big west Belfast contractor paid us £20 a day. I tried to organise a strike but the other ex-POWs were so desperate, they wouldn’t agree. One of the bosses said ‘Brendan, we’ll give you £25 a day but don’t tell the others’.

“I told him to stick it up his arse, and I never went back. I wrote an article about it for ‘Republican News’ but it was heavily censored. People we’d fought for exploited us, and the movement let them.” Hughes never considered crime – “I’m not a thief” – but doesn’t blame those who do “so long as they target only big business”.

Prison left him with arthritis and weakened his immune system. He’s had pneumonia and heart problems, and suffers depression. “After jail, no-one mentioned counselling. I’d to arrange it myself. They say I’ve post-traumatic stress. The hunger-strikers’ faces are always before me.”

He speaks of dislocation after jail: “Everything was different. I went for a walk, just to be on my own. The old streets were gone and I got lost in the new streets. A man had to bring me home. Everything was noisy. I hate crowds. I only go to the pub in the afternoon when it’s quiet.”

Pictures of Che Guevara – laughing, smoking, drinking coffee – dot the living-room. “My brother is taking me to Cuba. The revolution improved ordinary people’s lives there. It was a waste of time here.”

Beneath a picture of the Sacred Heart, is a photo of two tanned, smiling young men in Long Kesh, arms around each other – Hughes and Adams. “I loved Gerry. I don’t anymore, but I keep the photos to remind me of the good times.”

Willie Gallagher from Strabane joined the Fianna at 13. Two years later he joined the IRA – “I lied about my age”. At 15, he was arrested with a gun. He spent 18 of his next 20 years in jail.

“I don’t feel I lost out because I’d no life to lose. I was the youngest in jail and my comrades spoilt me rotten. I remember digging a tunnel for an escape and thinking it a great adventure.” By now, Gallagher was with the INLA.

“At 20, he embarked on a 50-day hunger-strike after beatings by prison officers: “I lost my eyesight. It took me 18 months to recover. Then, I watched the 10 hunger-strikers die. Such brutality damaged me emotionally. I left jail at 25 and wasn’t interested in a normal life. I was full of bitterness. There was no point in killing Brits in ones and twos – I wanted to kill lots of them.

“I planted a no-warning bomb in a pub the security forces frequented. Then I went home, got washed and headed into town. Twenty people could have been killed and it wouldn’t have fizzed on me.” No-one died but 30 people were injured.

Gallagher went back to jail. His first marriage broke up when he was inside but he remarried within a year of his 1993 release. “My heart never hardened in my personal life, but my reputation means my wife’s friends think I’m aggressive. ‘Would Willie hit you?’ they ask.”

Compared to other prisoners, Gallagher, 48, is lucky. His wife owned her own home – they now have two children – and he secured a paid community job. It’s also harder for those whose don’t come from a republican family, “but my brothers were involved – two did 10 years – so I’d a lot of support.”

He runs a prisoners’ group, Teach na Failte. Funding has been suspended pending an official investigation amidst allegations of criminality which the group denies.

Gallagher has been arrested and questioned following a bank robbery in Strabane. The getaway car was bought under the name Robin Banks. “I wasn’t involved but if ex-prisoners were, good luck to them. I’ve no problem with cigarette or alcohol heists either. People who made enormous sacrifices in jail were left with nothing.

“I know one guy who was very fit and always training before he went into jail but he turned to drink and drugs on release and was found dead at 40. If former political prisoners’ records were expunged, they’d have far better employment opportunities and life wouldn’t be so hard for many.” Gallagher has no doubts about his own past: “It’s better to fight and lose than not to fight at all.”

Tommy McKearney from the Moy, Co Tyrone, served 16 years for a UDR man’s murder. One of his brothers was shot dead by the SAS, and another brother and an uncle were killed by loyalists while he was in jail.

“When I got out my father took me to see my brothers’ graves. But what struck me was the graves of the post-mistress and the baker. I couldn’t believe all the changes in our small community. The world had moved on without me. Many prisoners feel lost for so long.”

McKearney now runs Expac, a Monaghan-based group for ex-prisoners in Border areas. “There’s no ideal time to go to jail, but it’s probably best in your mid-20s. Jail stunts teenagers’ emotional development and prison is very hard in your 40s or 50s because you realise how little time is left.

“Serving more than four years affects people. They start to lose contact with the outside world and all but close relatives. After 10, they’re institutionalised. It’s like marathon runners ‘hitting the wall’. After a certain distance, the battle gets too much physically and psychologically.”

Ex-prisoners often feel their relatives are strangers and they left their real ‘family’ in jail. Those who were single when they went to jail, then “play catch-up” with children and mortgages in their 40s and 50s, McKearney says. “At retirement time, when life should be easing, they’re up to their necks in mortgages and debt.”

The situation has improved since the ceasefire, but ex-prisoners still face employment discrimination, he says. They’re officially barred from civil-service jobs and unofficially from many others. “How many become teachers or journalists?” McKearney asks. “I mightn’t reasonably expect to be able to join the gardai but I think I should be eligible for a job as local librarian.”

Even if ex-prisoners slip through the door, “it’s just like with women – there’s a glass ceiling”. Neither the Equality Authority nor the North’s Equality Commission recognise ex-prisoners as a vulnerable group, he says. “An employer can bin an ex-prisoner’s application form, admit it, and the law provides no protection.”

Low-paid jobs are no better: “A supermarket can draw up a list of 20 candidates for shelf-stackers and cashiers. Its head of security, an ex-Special Branch man, says ‘get rid of numbers one and seven’.”

The Special Branch also visit employers, demanding ex-prisoners are sacked, he says. “I was labouring and they ordered my boss to get rid of me. He told them to get lost, but 99% of employers wouldn’t be so principled.”

Still, it’s easier in Border areas than in parts of country where there’s hostility to republicanism and a smaller black/illegal economy. Ex-prisoners are usually barred from the US, Canada, Australia and New Zealand, where many would like to begin new lives.

Anthony McIntyre, who served 18 years imprisonment, says: “I laugh when I hear about an ‘IRA pension plan’. The IRA offered me a Christmas loan and nothing else when I was released. I’d two kids and, I’m not ashamed to say, I had to shop-lift to feed and clothe them.”

Today, Brendan Hughes won’t attend any 1916 parade but he’ll privately pay tribute at the IRA Belfast Brigade monument. “I keep wondering ‘what it was all about?’” he says. “The doctors tell me not to drink but I do. It eases the pain, it doesn’t kill it.” A picture of the hunger-strikers hangs in Hughes’ hallway. ‘Soldiers of our past, heroes of our future’, it says. Somehow, it doesn’t seem that way.

April 20, 2006
________________
This article appears in the April 16, 2006 edition of the Sunday Tribune.

Sunday Life

By Stephen Breen
18 June 2006

The UUP’s only MP last night called for a full and independent judicial inquiry into the murder of Belfastman Raymond McCord jnr.

Lady Sylvia Hermon (above) made the plea after meeting with the murder victim’s father, Raymond snr.

Said Lady Sylvia: “Raymond and I discussed a wide range of issues pertaining to the appalling circumstances of his son’s murder by the UVF and I fully support his quest for the truth in relation to the killing.

“Although we must await the forthcoming report by the Police Ombudsman into the murder of young Raymond, it is widely anticipated that her findings will not bring an end to the matter.”

Guardian

Gaby Hinsliff and Ned Temko
Sunday June 18, 2006
The Observer

Gordon Brown is to make his first political visit to Northern Ireland this week in what will be seen as a further step in his preparations for Number 10.

The Chancellor will receive briefings on the security situation from the province’s most senior policeman, Sir Hugh Orde, and meet representatives of all the main political parties. Brown is now understood to want to familiarise himself further with the peace process.

The visit will also be the first time he has been seen in public with one of the contenders for Labour’s deputy leadership, Northern Ireland Secretary Peter Hain, since speculation over who might replace John Prescott became public earlier this month. If Brown and Hain, who have been suspicious of each other, are seen to work well in tandem, it would boost Hain’s chances.

However, both contenders face an uphill task convincing their own party supporters to vote for them at the next election, says a new poll.

Almost one in four Labour supporters wants their party to lose the election, the poll revealed. In a sign that the leadership has become increasingly divorced from its grass roots, 23 per cent agree that Labour should be kicked out of power to give it ‘a period out of office to rethink what it stands for and what its vision is for the future of the country’.

The Tory leader, David Cameron, is considered more in touch with what ordinary people think and a relatively greater asset to his party than either Brown or Tony Blair by the electorate as a whole, according to the Ipsos MORI poll. The findings suggest that even Labour supporters are not convinced that the party is heading in the right direction, reflecting fears in the government that the past few weeks of sleaze allegations and Home Office turmoil have irritated core supporters. Hazel Blears, the party chairman, admitted yesterday that ‘the voters are angry that we have taken our eye off the ball’.

The poll will also fuel demands from some MPs to bring forward the date of Blair’s departure from next summer. One senior minister said that, if a leadership contest was not brought forward, ‘we’ll lose the Scottish and Welsh elections’ next spring.

The poll gives the Tories a 7 per cent lead over Labour among those who declare themselves certain to vote, falling from 10 per cent earlier this month.

Yesterday Ed Balls, the new Treasury minister who is close to Brown, accused Cameron of ‘hollow hypocrisy’ in what will be seen as a foretaste of the Chancellor’s own line of attack. In a speech to a conference of the left-wing pressure group Compass in memory of Robin Cook, Balls said Cameron had opposed Labour’s climate change levy despite his supposedly green credentials, and opposed tax credits for poor families despite professing concern about child poverty.

He said a Cameron-led Britain would cut funds for public services and rely on charities to provide cut-price services for ‘the poorest and the weakest’, adding: ‘This is not a new Conservatism of the 21st century, but the old Conservatism of the 19th century.’

James Purnell, the Blairite new pensions minister, called for Labour to ‘expose the gap’ between Cameron’s rhetoric and policy on issues such as balancing work and family life.

The poll found that Brown is still considered an asset to his party, with a net strength - the number considering him an asset minus those judging him a weakness - of 26 per cent, down on his ratings in 1997 and 2001. Blair is, by contrast, considered a liability, with a rating of -21.

Cameron has the highest strength rating, at 31 - better than William Hague or John Major had in 2001 and 1997.

The new climate is reflected in a separate poll of ‘opinion formers’ from the worlds of business, media and politics, conducted last week for Opinion Leader Research. It found that a narrow majority now expect either a Tory victory or a hung parliament at the next election, although 45 per cent still believed Labour would win. This poll also suggests the Chancellor is still considered the most natural choice to succeed Blair.

BBC

One of the biggest dates on the loyalist calendar is approaching - the night of 11 July, when bonfires blaze across Northern Ireland.

Bonfires are lit in Protestant areas of NI on 11 July

While it is a night of celebration for loyalists, the bonfires have come in for criticism from some quarters.

Among these are that they raise community tensions and damage the environment, especially through the use of burning tyres.

However, efforts are being made in some areas to improve the situation.

The bonfires are built by the members of the Protestant community ahead of the 12 July commemoration of William of Orange’s victory over the Catholic King James II at the Battle of the Boyne in 1690.

Paul Hoey, chairman of the Crown Project in east Belfast, said efforts had been made to scale down one of the city’s largest bonfires at Pitt Park off the lower Newtownards Road.

“Last year the bonfire was massive, they’ve downsized it considerably this year,” Mr Hoey said.

“There’s no tyres, there’s no dumping, there’s people there every night to make sure there’s no dumping of wood or anything else.”

Bob Cameron, environmental health officer at Larne Borough Council, said the council had been working with the local community on the issue for some time.

“In Larne we’ve been meeting for several years now all the bonfire organisers plus statutory agencies from very early on to talk about issues.”

He said one bonfire being held near a children’s play area had now been concreted off to keep it small and stop it causing damage, while the whole event had been turned into more of a “street party”.

‘Shadowy side’

However, SDLP assembly member for East Derry John Dallat said more should be done to enforce laws against burning dangerous materials at bonfires.

Mr Dallat added that while progress had been made on the issue, there was still a “shadowy side” to bonfires.

“The paramilitaries are still involved in many areas, if not overtly, they’re sending out the younger fry to do it and of course Catholic families come under extreme pressure during these periods,” he said.

There was a paramilitary “show of strength” at the Pitt Park bonfire last year, but Mr Hoey said there would be no repeat.

“I got a guarantee from people on the ground there will be no show of strength this year,” he said.

Mr Hoey said there had been a dramatic change in bonfires over the years.

“We’ve come a long way over the last 10 or 15 years.

“There was a bonfire on every street corner, now we’re down to a small number of bonfires that are organised and, I have to say, pretty well organised.”

Sunday Independent

ALAN MURRAY

MARTIN McGuinness has publicly accused two leading figures in the Democratic Unionist Party of trying to ignite a plot to have him killed by the IRA over allegations that he is a British agent.

In an extraordinary outburst during a meeting of a Stormont Committee on Friday, he accused the two senior DUP figures of attempting to hatch a plot to have him killed which, he said, had caused great upset to his wife.

The outburst lasted only about one minute according to sources and the Rev William McCrea, who raised the alleged involvement of the senior SF negotiator with the British security services during an intervention in the House of Commons in February, made no response.

But Ian Paisley Jnr warned the Mid-Ulster MP that if he dared to repeat the allegation outside the privilege of the Stormont Committee, then he would sue him for making unfounded allegations against his character.

A fortnight ago Mr Paisley said the allegations made by a former British army agent handler who uses the pseudonym Martin Ingram should be thoroughly investigated.

“It was quite astonishing,” said one politician who was in attendance, Jim Wells of the DUP. “It was a session of the Restoration of Government Committee and literally out of the blue Martin McGuinness very calmly said to the Chair that he wanted to say something.

“Then he just said that Willie and Ian Junior had said things recently that had put his life in danger. It was very calculated and it wasn’t an outburst; he had planned it.

“Willie McCrea said nothing, but Ian Jnr warned him that if he dared repeat the allegation outside the Committee he would sue McGuinness for implying that he had been involved in or would support any illegal action,” he said.

West Belfast Assembly member Diane Dodds is believed to have taken a verbatim note of Mr McGuinness’s outburst.