SAOIRSE32

By Jim Gibney, The Thursday Column
Irish News
**Via Newshound
06/11/08

The consequences for the people of this island’s nationalist, unionist, republican and loyalist of English interference in our affairs was the backdrop against which the centre of Belfast became a contested space last Sunday morning.

The street confrontation was sparked off, not by any decision taken by the inhabitants of Belfast. Not for the first time in Ireland’s long and tragic history of conflict the people who live here were directly affected by a decision taken elsewhere, by people who more than likely live safely in Britain where the legacy of their decision will have little or no impact on their lives.

However, the people of Belfast and beyond were plunged into a maelstrom of dispute and emotional turmoil over the past month because someone in the British Ministry of Defence decided to parade through the streets of Belfast, with a regiment of occupation returning from the streets of Baghdad and Kabul where the British army visited on those inhabitants what they visited on nationalists and republicans during the war years here.

The insensitivity and indifference of those behind the parade was felt most acutely by those relatives whose loved ones were killed directly by the British crown forces or indirectly by loyalists through collusion. Many of them were on last Sunday’s protest march clutching to their breasts treasured photographs of their murdered loved ones.

Mark Thompson, the director of Relatives for Justice (RFJ), one of the main groups leading the relatives’ campaign for the truth into state killings, told the media at Sunday’s protest that relatives’ organisations are ensuring that the record of killings and collusion by the crown forces “was not air-brushed from history”.

Over the last decade organisations like RFJ, the Pat Finucane Centre, Justice for the Forgotten and An Fhirrine have painstakingly kept state killings on the public agenda.

Their patient and determined approach has given confidence and strength to a community, many thousands strong, who were marginalised and demonised by sections of the political and media establishments to the point where they believed that the state would never be made accountable for its actions.

Today the relatives’ organisations are much more confident of achieving their objective of an International Independent Truth Commission to oversee the truth recovery process and an independent body to delivery it. Their confidence stems from the momentum that has been built up behind the demand for truth.

They believe they have effectively challenged the hurtful argument contained in the Bloomfield report, published in April 1998, which suggested there was a hierarchy of victims – those killed by republican organisations and loyalists and those killed by the Crown forces. According to this script the relatives of the former are less deserving of society’s support and sympathy than the latter.

Significant progress has also been made in the debate for an independent examination of the past, for example, the setting up of the Saville Inquiry into the Bloody Sunday massacre; the public enquiries into the deaths of Rosemary Nelson, Billy Wright and Robert Hamill and the devastating report by former Ombudsman Nuala O’Loan into collusion between Belfast loyalist Mark Haddock and the RUC-PSNI Special Branch.

The setting up of the Lord Eames-Denis Bradley Consultative Group on the Past is a further indication that dealing with the legacy of the conflict is now at the centre of the political stage. This is also reflected in the announcement by Sinn Fein president Gerry Adams that Sinn Fein supports an independent truth commission.

Today there is little doubt anywhere that the British government, through its armed forces, ran loyalist murder gangs who killed hundreds of innocent Catholics. That was not the case a number of years ago.

However, there remains understandable concern about the British government’s commitment to a truth recovery process given the delay in Saville’s report, their refusal to hand over files relating to the Dublin-Monaghan bombings and their inexcusable opposition to an independent investigation into the killing of Pat Finucane.

This stance highlights the need for independent arbitration because the British government is compromised over its role as both perpetrator and facilitator.

Truth recovery will be best served by all relevant parties to the conflict fully participating in it. Those families affected need and deserve this.

BBC
6 Nov 2008

A settlement thought to be in the region of 100,000 euro has been paid to Fine Gael MEP Jim Higgins and former FG minister Ivan Yates.

It relates to Sunday Independent articles in 2004 which claimed they had colluded with the IRA in a multi-million euro milk scam.

An apology by the newspaper was also read to the Republic’s High Court.

It said the allegations were made by an alleged former British agent and were without foundation.

Speaking afterwards on Thursday, Mr Higgins said the actions of the newspaper has been “absolutely irresponsible”.

A solicitor for Mr Yates said it was ‘”mind-boggling” that it had taken four years to issue an apology in respect of an “utterly groundless and reckless libel in relation to two public figures”.

The articles appeared in the Sunday Independent in October and November 2004 and contained allegations made by a man known as Kevin Fulton.

By Ciarán Barnes
Belfast Media
Andersonstown News Thursday

CATHOLIC Church officials are privately admitting that up to 11,000 bodies may be buried at the Bog Meadows nature reserve.

At first it was thought the figure was in the hundreds, however the projected number has now soared to 11,000.

The bodies ended up in the Bog Meadows after Church leaders blundered and sold land at Milltown Cemetery that contained unmarked graves to the Ulster Wildlife Trust.

The graves are now cut off from the cemetery by a wooden fence and are part of the Bog Meadows. Relatives of infants buried there are campaigning for the land to be reallocated to Milltown.

However the Catholic Church, which has apologised for the mix-up, has still not secured its return.

After reading about the scandal in the Andersonstown News last month, Rosemary White learned her daughter is one of the Bog Meadows babies.

Little Anne White was just a day old when she died in March 1964. She was buried in Milltown on land that is now a car-park.

Last week Rosemary, who now lives in Bushmills, was told the exact location of her child’s grave. After making the disturbing discovery she has joined with others in calling on the Catholic Church to reclaim the land.

“I have been told by Church officials that there are 11,000 graves in the Bog Meadows,” explained Rosemary.

“I feel totally let down by the Church. I was crying when I was told where my daughter is buried. The land has to be returned.”

West Belfast woman Eileen Strong first stumbled across the Bog Meadows baby scandal while trawling through old cemetery records last April. The grave of her son, Stephen, is among those now in the nature reserve.

She said: “When I first spoke out about this in April I was called a liar, but now I have been proved right. The Church should do the decent thing and reclaim the land where the babies are buried.”

A Catholic Church spokesman said it wants to resolve the matter “as soon as possible”.

A spokesman for the Ulster Wildlife Trust says it has spoken to the relatives of the Bog Meadows babies and is awaiting maps that are currently being looked for by Milltown Cemetery officials.