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Thousands to descend on West Belfast for rally to honour hunger strikers

By Damian McCarney

Republicans were urged to turn out in strength for a march which will form the centrepiece of the 25th anniversary hunger strike commemorative events.

West Belfast will be the focus of the national commemorations on August 13, as republicans from across the country march to remember the 10 volunteers who died during the protest in the H-Blocks in 1981.

At Thursday’s official launch of the march at the Roddy McCorley’s Social Club on the Glen Road, former prisoners and family members of the hunger strikers were among the audience to hear prominent republicans speak of their recollections of the momentous period in history.

Those present included representatives of the Hughes, McElwee, Lynch and Hurson families, along with former Armagh POW, Jennifer McCann.

Pat Sheehan, who took part in the 1981 hunger strike, recalled the commitment the volunteers showed in taking a stand against the British government’s policy of criminalisation.

“I was on hunger strike when it came to an end on October 3, 1981. I had spent 55 days on hunger strike and if anyone appreciates what those lads went through, I certainly can.

“It is important, I believe, to remember the sacrifice of those lads during the dark days of 1981.

“I am sometimes asked what state of mind you have to be in to go on hunger strike and the answer is that you need to have absolute and total focus and single-mindedness. You cannot go with an attitude that you will go on it for a few days or weeks and see how it goes.

“Very few people have that focus and single-mindedness to go through with it and it is extraordinary that there were 10 men who were willing to die and sacrifice their lives for their comrades in the blocks and their communities outside for the sake of freedom for the people of this country.”

Pat also had that remarkable quality which enabled him to choose to take part in the hunger strike, being fully aware of the consequences.

“It was a difficult time for me anyway as my sister was diagnosed as having a terminal illness before I went on hunger strike. For me to tell my parents that I was going on hunger strike seems now, looking back on it, to be callous. They already had one child who was facing death and I was going down the same road.

“However, that is where the single-mindedness and focus comes in and absolutely nothing could deflect me from that decision.”

The IRA officer commanding in Long Kesh at the time of the hunger strikes, Brendan ‘Bik’ McFarlane, looked forward to the 25th anniversary march to Casement Park on Sunday, August 13.

“In every county of Ireland, local Hunger Strike Commemoration Committees have been holding events to mark this traumatic yet pivotal turning point in the course of Irish history when the sacrifice of 10 young republicans ensured that Thatcher’s government failed in its attempts to crush the struggle for Irish freedom.

“Committees from throughout the 32 counties have also been building and planning towards this major national event in Belfast. The theme of the commemoration will be ‘Cuímhníonn Glúinn/A Generation Remembers’ in which the story of the hunger strike will be told through street theatre along eight key points of the route from Dunville Park on the Falls Road to Casement Park on the Andersonstown Road.

“This will be done in the form of stage acts and visual drama, with each telling the story of a particular phase of that time. This will be repeated by the performers at each venue until the marchers have passed their spot.

“Different areas of Ireland have been designated with the staging of different scenes with republicans from Tyrone and Fermanagh re-enacting the elections of Bobby Sands and Kieran Doherty and the entry of Sinn Féin into electoral politics.

“The day’s events will culminate in a massive rally, commemoration and concert headed by Frances Black and other leading artists at Casement Park.”

Journalist:: Damien McCarney

BBC

A school in County Antrim has been attacked by vandals.

It is understood about 25 windows were smashed at the Good Shepherd School in Dunmurry during the incident which happened on Tuesday evening.

A number of children and youths were reportedly seen running away from the scene. The attack is not believed to have been sectarian. (**Standard PSNI response)

Police have appealed for anyone with any information about the incident to contact them.

**Posted by Peter Urban

By Ray Collins

Kevin Lynch died August 1st 1981 after 71 days on hunger strike.
‘A loyal determined Republican with a great love of life.’

Click to view - photo from CAIN

On Saturday afternoon April 18th, 1981, I visited INLA political prisoner Kevin Lynch in the H Blocks of Long Kesh prison. Despite the circumstances of my visit; there was extreme tension within and without the prison; Bobby Sands was on his 49th day of Hunger Strike: Kevin had a sound, strong humour on him and was very focused.

Towards the end of our visit he stated simply and straightforwardly that he would be next on Hunger Strike to replace INLA volunteer Patsy O’Hara. He said this without any visible signs of trepidation or emotion. Kevin was obviously aware of the seriousness of his words; no doubt much more than I was at that moment.

Kevin was obviously a very strong, disciplined, determined, and courageous young man. I could see that clearly in his eyes and his demeanour. At the conclusion of our visit we shook hands firmly, wished each other “good luck”, and bade our farewells. Kevin smiled and returned to his cell and his ultimate fate.

It was the last time I saw Kevin Lynch alive.

On the journey back to Belfast, feeling saddened and humbled, Kevin’s words haunted me. Why would he need to take Patsy O’Hara’s place on Hunger Strike? Sure hadn’t Bobby Sands been elected MP for
Fermanagh/South Tyrone just the week before on April 10th focusing global attention and awareness of the Hunger Strike and bringing international pressure to bear on the British Government and their
allies in Leinster House. Wouldn’t the Hunger Strike be resolved without any loss of life? At least that’s what I thought and hoped for at the time, however naively.

Of course the consequences of what he had said became painfully obvious to me. If Kevin was prepared, as he obviously was, to replace Patsy O’Hara on Hunger Strike then at least four Hunger Strikers, and probably more, would have died.

Thirty-six days after my visit with Kevin, Bobby Sands, Francis Hughes, Ray McCreesh, and Patsy O’Hara were dead Their places were taken by Joe McDonnell, Martin Hurson, and Kieran Doherty.

It was exactly four weeks to the day since I had visited Kevin in the H Blocks; on Saturday May 23rd 1981, just two days before his 25th birthday, Kevin Lynch began his Hunger Strike.

Kevin had been on Hunger Strike for 5 days during the final stages of the 1980 Hunger Strike. Afterwards he spoke these words to his mother.

“If they took everything else away, they’d never take my principles. I’ll die before they take them from me.”

Seventy-one days after starting his Hunger Strike Kevin Lynch died on August 1st 1981 in the H Blocks of Long Kesh.

I was abroad when he died but managed to get to Dungiven in time for his funeral.

Twenty-five years later we commemorate the heroic sacrifice of those Irish Republican and Republican Socialist prisoners-of-war in their struggle for political status.

Unfortunately many of those who stood on the white picket lines in all kinds of weather and attended rallies in support of the Hunger Strikers in 1981 must continue to do so again in 2006, 25 years on. The prison struggle goes on in British and Irish jails as the British Government and New Free Staters in Leinster House continue a policy of criminalization against Irish Republican prisoners who refuse to bend the knee to `progress’. ‘nor meekly serve their time’; nor blindly accept the not-so-Good Friday Agreement.

As Patsy O’Hara said “Let the Fight go on”

In Solidarity,
Ray Collins

Irish Independent

MORE than 300 foreign children have disappeared from state care centres in the past five years.

New figures from the Irish Refugee Council show that 316 children who arrived in Ireland as unaccompanied minors have gone missing, sparking new concerns about child trafficking.

A leading missing persons campaigner, Fr Aquinas Duffy, has described the disappearance of the children as “sinister” and “of grave concern”.

Non-national children are much more likely to go missing than their Irish counterparts, a fact borne out on the Garda missing children’s website.

Of the 63 postings on the site, 57 are of non-national children and teenagers who have disappeared in the past four years. The youngest of these was just three when he went missing.

The remaining six are Irish children, four of whom are long-term missing person cases where the children vanished up to 29 years ago. The remaining two have been missing for the past two years.

“Five or six years ago very few children went missing in Ireland and, if they did, it was most likely from residential care. Five years down the line, the numbers have suddenly increased massively,” said ISPCC chief executive Paul Gilligan.

“Across Europe there is an acknowledgement that child trafficking is a problem. We are hugely concerned that these children might have been trafficked.

“If even one Irish child went missing in the morning, there would be pictures all over the papers and a major brouhaha. But about 60 non-national children go missing each year and there is no brouhaha,” he said.

“Most of the children who go missing are unaccompanied so they don’t have any parents lobbying to ensure everything is being done to trace them,” he added.

Fr Duffy said it is “of grave concern” that children can vanish from state care and not be traced for several years.

“It is a cause of concern that quite a number of unaccompanied minors who come into the country disappear. One has to wonder is this an organised thing and, if so, who is behind it.

“In the absence of knowing what exactly has happened to them, there is concern that there could be a sinister motive behind their disappearance,” he added.

Heilean Rosenstock-Armie, a spokesperson for the Irish Refugee Council, said that while it is impossible to know how and why these children went missing until they are found, it was reasonable to assume some had been trafficked.

Care centres housing separated young asylum seekers are not subject to the same rigorous checks as residential centres for Irish children, she said.

In some centres, there can be just one care worker to supervise 30 children.

“Nobody is looking out for them. It is easy for a trafficker to walk in and, more worryingly, for a child to walk out with them.”

A Garda spokesman said there can be particular difficulties in tracing non-national children as some of them do not want to be found.

“They are coming into the country as unaccompanied minors and are put in special HSE care centres. They stay there for a night or two and then disappear. Many will have arranged all this before they come over.”

He added that most are thought to disappear because they want to try to get into Britain or because they feel their asylum application will be unsuccessful.

“The big difficulty in tracing them is that many do not want to be found. Also, when gardai approach people from their own country, they can be reluctant to talk. They feel as if they are ratting on their friend.”

Breda Heffernan

BBC

The use of a Belfast City Council leisure centre for a meeting about an internal UDA dispute has been defended by Ulster Unionist Jim Rodgers.

About 200 people attended the meeting at Ballysillan Leisure Centre in the north of the city on Tuesday.

Mr Rodgers said he believed the meeting in the leisure centre was “a genuine attempt to solve problems in the area”.

However, Sinn Fein councillor Margaret McClenaghan claimed the meeting “amounted to a UDA rally”.

The Ulster Political Research Group represented the views of the paramilitary organisation’s leadership.

They faced angry questions from the audience made up largely of women.

‘Genuine attempt’

The meeting was held in response to a standoff between rival Ulster Defence Association factions in the area and talk of a possible loyalist feud breaking out.

Mr Rodgers said: “The last thing we want to see is mayhem on our streets, people losing their lives or being seriously injured.

“If it’s going to bring about what we all hope is a peaceful situation, I have absolutely no problem or difficulty with it, but in saying that, I am totally opposed to any paramilitary organisation, be they republican or loyalist.”

However, Margaret McClenaghan said leisure centres were “rate-payers’ buildings” and should not be used for political meetings

She has demanded “urgent talks” with Belfast City Council’s chief executive.

“No matter how you try to dress it up, it was in support of a unionist paramilitary group, namely north Belfast UDA,” she said.

Application

“There were a lot of people there from different factions and some explanations need to be given.”

On Wednesday, a spokesperson for Belfast City Council said an application for hire of facilities at the leisure centre was received on 31 July.

“This application was from a local community residents’ group seeking to book a room at the leisure centre for a community consultation meeting at 7pm on the following evening,” the spokesperson said.

“The application was granted on this basis as per normal council procedures.”

Pastor Jack McKee, who has been involved in the negotiations, said it had been a useful meeting.

On Monday, members of the UDA’s so-called ruling inner council held talks with representatives of the break-away faction in north Belfast.

Tensions within the UDA are high following a weekend stand-off between rival factions and a public show of strength by its leadership.

Senior figures held talks with members of the organisation in north Belfast, loyal to Ihab and Andre Shoukri.

They were expelled from the organisation last month.

On Friday night in north Belfast, police seized a shotgun, ammunition and petrol bombs following a stand-off between up to 80 members of rival UDA factions.

BN.ie

02/08/2006 - 12:27:18

Police in the North have arrested three men in connection with two separate investigations into suspected dissident republican activity.

Two of the men, who are believed to be related, were arrested during raids on houses in Bellaghy, Co Derry, this morning.

The PSNI has refused to disclose details of the operation or of the offences about which the men are being questioned.

Sinn Féin has criticised the searches, saying the police had refused to allow women and children to leave the targeted houses.

The party says it has lodged a complaint about the conduct of the PSNI officers with the Police Ombudsman.

Meanwhile, another suspected dissident republican was also arrested in connection with the seizure 15 million contraband cigarettes in Co Armagh last November.

Two men charged earlier this year in connection with the seizure, while a third was released on bail.

BBC

Nationalists have concerns about parades before the march in Derry

Nationalists in Londonderry have voiced concerns about several feeder parades taking place before the main Apprentice Boys demonstration in the city.

The Bogside Residents Group have described marches in Maghera and Castlederg as “coat-trailing exercises”.

Apprentice Boys in Castlederg have said they have a right to celebrate their culture and heritage in the town.

The Derry parade is to be held on Saturday 12 August.

Sinn Fein councillor Charlie McHugh said there was no need for the demonstrations to take place.

“In order to go to Derry, a good 45 minutes from Castlederg, they actually form up at the southern most end of Castlederg,” he said.

“(They) parade through the town centre and travel westward in order to flaunt their flags through an area where they are not welcome.”

Derek Hussey said the parade in Castlederg has always taken place

Ulster Unionist Assembly member Derek Hussey said the Apprentice Boys have traditionally held a parade in Castlederg before going to the main demonstration in Derry.

“I am absolutely aghast that the Bogside Residents Group is concerning itself with events outside Londonderry,” he said.

“We in Castlederg are celebrating our heritage, we don’t see why the residents group should be concerning itself with issues within our community.”

The Apprentice Boys parade in Derry commemorates the actions of Protestant Apprentice Boys who shut the city gates against the forces of the Catholic King James in December 1688.

King James laid siege to the city from December to August 1689 until the Protestant forces of King William of Orange relieved the city.

INA

Kieran Doherty - Irish Hunger Strikes Chapter 40

The Dohertys

“The Dohertys lived on a hill in a nationalist section of West Belfast called Andersonstown. Kieran was the third of six children. His mother Margaret was a Protestant who converted to Catholicism after she married Alfie Doherty. The family was Irish republican through and through. Alfie managed the local Republican Club that helped raise funds for the prisoners’ families after the previous manager was shot dead. Kieran’s granduncle, Ned Maguire, had taken part in a famous escape from the Crumlin Road jail in 1943. Two of Kieran’s second cousins, Maura and Dorothy Maguire, were shot dead by the British army in 1971. His second cousin Ned was interned and was now on the blanket. In 1972, his uncle Gerry took part in another famous escape from the Crum, when republican prisoners pretending to be playing football leaped over the fences en masse to freedom.

At fifteen, Kieran left formal schooling to work with his father as a floor tiler. His brothers Michael and Terence were at that time interned without trial and the Doherty family were constantly harassed and raided.

Kieran joined Na Fianna Eireann in 1971 at the age of fifteen. He was arrested almost immediately, but his father Alfie raised hell about his son’s age and Kieran was released — only to arrested and taken away again when he turned sixteen and interned without trial.

In November 1975, Kieran was one of the last internees to be released. He immediately went on active service with the IRA in the Andytown area with Joe McDonnell, John Pickering and others. He was mostly on the run as their unit was very active and effective.
Kieran

They say Kieran was a very internal person, but big, very strong and decisive. Once he gave a man a public beating for hitting a woman. He was quiet and shy, but nobody crossed Kieran Doherty. They called him “Big Doc.”

He was arrested in 1976 after a bombing, with John Pickering [who was to join him later on hunger strike] and others including Terry Kirby [who escaped from the Kesh in ‘83 and was later arrested and held for extradition in the U.S.], and in 1978 was given 18 years.

He went on the blanket immediately. He was not an easy man.

He would take no orders. He would neither talk to or “hear” screws. He wouldn’t even acknowledge the existence of screws!

He was beaten unmercifully. Once he was hit, kicked and had his testicles squeezed until he was unconscious because he refused to cooperate on a mirror search. Another time eight screws took him into a room for a rectal search. Kieran treated this as usual. They nearly beat him unconscious but he refused to comply. Next they asked him to open his mouth for an oral search, but he refused again and was punched and karate chopped to get him to open his mouth. He didn’t. They took him back to his cell. He refused to wash to see the doctor. He was beaten so badly the doctor came to his cell. Later that night, he began to vomit, probably from the stomach punches and kicks, and was taken to the prison hospital.

Typically, Kieran on his release was sent to the punishment cells and charged with attempting to strike a warder.

By God, they will not rub my nose in it

When the first hunger strike was broken through the deceit of the Brits, Kieran was very angry [he was among the last group of hunger strikers in ‘80]: “They are rubbing our noses in it. By God, they will not rub mine.”

On Friday, 22 May 1981, Kieran Doherty replaced Raymond McCreesh on hunger strike. Almost immediately, Kieran was put forward for the Dail elections. On 11 July, he was elected TD for Cavan/Monaghan. Some thought that this would get the Irish government into action. Kieran was under no such delusions.

‘The Menace’

In the beginning of August, Kevin, Kieran, and Paddy Quinn were all into the last stages of deterioration. The Republican movement was coming under a lot of pressure in the press and from the hunger strikers’ families because of the behind the scenes actions of various forces including Catholic Churchmen. Particularly active in this regards was Fr. Denis Faul, whom the prisoners called “The Menace”. They were spreading the lie that the Movement was ordering the men on the hunger strike and then orchestrating events. The press loved this angle.

When Joe McDonnell died, the Daily Mail [11 July 1981] wrote: “In the blackmailing battle to achieve political status for thugs, they had ordered him to starve to death. To the IRA Joe McDonnell is worth far more dead than alive. The men with the guns are weeping no tears. For them the funeral was no more than another well managed melodrama, another notch on the gun barrel in their propaganda war.”

The lie that the Movement was keeping the hunger strikers ignorant of what was going on outside the prison was another manufactured problem. Fr. Faul was to thank for this one as well, who stirred up the families that the men were being kept in the dark. It was decided that Gerry Adams, Owen Carron, and Seamus Ruddy of the IRSP would be allowed to go into the Kesh to explain the realities to the men, not that they needed any explaining.

Fr. Faul’s reasoning was: if Adams and the others told the men exactly what the situation was and explained that the decision to stay on the strike was totally theirs, then the men would come off. The Movement’s reasoning for agreeing to the meeting was: the men were always in charge of the hunger strike, so what was to loose? In fact, the hunger strike was costly for the Movement in terms of human loss and resource depletion as well as energy going into one part of the struggle. The men went on hunger strike themselves. They could call it off as easily and the republican movement would welcome the decision. Even if one man decided off, his decision would be respected.”

Larkspirit

Click thumbnail to view all photos at Larkspirit’s ‘Scenes from the Funerals’

>>Read Kieran’s biography