SAOIRSE32

BBC
12 Oct 2008

**Presumably the last sentence in this story does not refer to the RUC who just watched Robert Hamill get beat to death without intervening…

A stained glass window honouring RUC officers killed or injured during the Troubles has been dedicated in a ceremony at St Anne’s Cathedral.

The window’s design includes the RUC’s insignia and the George Cross

Families were joined by dignitaries to remember their loved ones, and the work of the RUC George Cross Foundation.

Joan Beacom, whose son William was killed by the IRA, said it was a “proud day”.

“You think of all the bad people running around, I’m very proud to have him for a son,” she said.

A major theme of the memorial window is peace, and the design includes the force insignia and the George Cross.

Ann Ferguson, whose husband James was shot dead 25 years ago, says it serves as a permanent reminder to everyone of the sacrifices made by the RUC.

“It’s important that those outside, the people who haven’t been touched, are the people who need to be reminded, and hopefully the memorial will serve that purpose.”

Secretary of State Shaun Woodward said the ceremony was a “special opportunity to remember all the brave men and women who gave their lives to protect the community.”

“This unique window gives us all a chance to reflect on the extraordinary sacrifice of these officers,” he said.

Dean of Belfast, Houston McKelvey, told the congregation that the window should be a “focus of pilgrimage and prayer”.

“I would suggest that your prayers to God will also include prayers of thankfulness for the overwhelming majority of the members of the RUC who down through the entire history of the force, regardless of provocation, insult or propaganda, upheld the law impartially and professionally.”

By Alan Murray
Sunday Life
12 October 2008

Cops were forced to pay old informants to return to work after the infamous Northern Bank robbery. In the security panic that engulfed the force after the huge £26m heist, officers from the elite C3 made contact with republican agents sacked earlier that year and offered them their jobs back.

But several refused and demanded cash payments before they would come back into the intelligence net.

Some did tell their new handlers that they had been aware that a major event was planned by the IRA before Christmas and it’s understood that two of the sacked agents named IRA men who were involved in holding the families of the two bank workers hostage.

Said a source: “One said he saw a couple of IRA men he knew the day before the robbery was carried out with their heads shaved and their eyebrows shaved and knew that they had been picked to do something big.

“Another former agent confirmed this and identified the same men with their eyebrows and heads shaved to ensure no hair follicle was left at the hostage scenes that could link them to the crime.”

The former agents had been dumped months before the robbery following a review of registered informants by the PSNI’s then head of Crime Operations Sam Kincaid.

His successor Assistant Chief Constable Peter Sheridan — now also retired — told a Policing Board meeting in Enniskillen in June 2006 that a reassessment of informants started in the summer of 2004 had ultimately led to 24% of informants recruited by the RUC being discarded.

He said the review led to the dumping of some informants who were involved in criminal activity, established new procedures to deal with informants suspected of committing serious crimes and created a new unit called the Central Authorisation Bureau to oversee all permits for covert policing operations.

The biggest puzzle arising out of the intelligence debacle was that none of the high level intelligence agents close to the IRA’s Army Council ever gave any hint that the robbery was being planned.

BBC
12 Oct 2008

A 40 foot section of the 400-year-old battlements at Antrim Castle has collapsed.

Clotworthy House in the grounds of Antrim Castle

The area has been cordoned off and an investigation into the incident is under way.

The town’s deputy mayor, Adrian Watson, said it was lucky no-one was hurt. “What was an historic monument in the town is now a pile of rubble,” he said.

“Thankfully no-one was hurt, but it is a terrible mess.”

BBC
12 Oct 2008

Next time your flight from Belfast International Airport is delayed, find the viewing area and use the telescopes provided to take a good look at the other side of the runway.

You will see a community of around 2,000 people in a vast estate which most of us will never visit. RAF Aldergrove has been there for 90 years, so long that it predates Northern Ireland itself.

But its days are numbered. In April this year the Armed Forces Minister Bob Ainsworth announced that 230 Squadron based at RAF Aldergrove will relocate to RAF Benson in Oxfordshire.

In the meantime, there has been no let up in the flying that the RAF is doing, and it is getting them noticed.

‘Puzzled sheep’

On a training flight in one of 230 Squadron’s Pumas, I get an insight into what they learn before they deploy to the Middle East.

We fly very low, twisting and turning between areas of population as best as the crew can manage.

When the crew practises flying under electricity cables or landing in tight spots, we are watched only by a few puzzled sheep.

The pilot, Flight Lieutenant Andrew Ferguson, is from Belfast, and has already completed tours of duty in Iraq.

“We do need this training,” says Andrew, “because it’s pretty much our bread and butter, and without it we wouldn’t be able to survive out there.”

But the low-level flying, much of it at night, generates plenty of complaints from those living in the training areas.

Unlike the days of the Troubles, Andrew’s boss, Squadron Leader Marty Lock and other senior officers can now visit the people involved, and try to help both sides understand each other.

When pupils sit the 11-plus examinations next month, the RAF will operate a ban on all non-essential flying to avoid distracting the children.

Relocation

By the end of 2009, 230 Squadron will have relocated to RAF Benson, and the remaining RAF personnel will pull out during 2010.

Then 38 Engineer Regiment will move in, leaving its base at Massereene Barracks in Antrim.

There are 420 civilian jobs at the bases, and it’s thought up to 140 might face redundancy. The RAF and the Ministry of Defence are already in negotiation with the trade unions.

The Army pilots are staying. 5 Regiment Army Air Corps flies Gazelle helicopters and Islander aeroplanes from Aldergrove.

“Under the Patten arrangements we still support the Police Service of Northern Ireland” says Lieutenant Colonel Chris Butler, the Commanding Officer.

“But really a larger focus now is on training for overseas operations.”

After 2010 the RAF will still train in the skies above Northern Ireland, but they will not be based here.

Many aircraft have come and gone in 90 years.

Anyone watching from the public side of Aldergrove should take their chance now to see the last days of the Puma, and the RAF in Northern Ireland.

You can hear Will Leitch’s reports from the skies above Aldergrove on Good Morning Ulster, on Radio Ulster, between 0630 and 0900 BST on Monday and Tuesday.