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Derry Journal
19 December 2008

A leading IRSP member from the North West has claimed that the PSNI is increasing its efforts to recruit informers.

Strabane man Willie Gallagher made the comment after a series of arrests and house searches in the town over the last week connected with the investigation into the murder of nightclub doorman Bryan McGlynn.

Mr Gallagher, who was arrested as part of the investigation last Monday and held for two days, claims the wife of a man arrested in Strabane on Wednesday morning, was told her house will be raided regularly if she didn’t agree to provide information to the PSNI.

“The PSNI arrived at this woman’s house on Wednesday morning to arrest her husband and, while they were doing this, they took her into a room and asked her to become a police informer.

She told me she was asked to provide information about me and a number of other people.

“She was also asked about republican meetings held in Toome.

“She said the police told her she would be relocated along with her family if she agreed.

“She was also told if she did not agree that she would need to get used to raids as they would be coming to her house regularly,” he said.

The IRSP man said he believes the incident is one of a number of attempts to recruit informers. “We have noticed an upsurge in approaches to people to act as informers and we are sure that it is because the authorities are frightened by the idea of republican unity,” he said.

A PSNI spokesperson said: “We do not comment on specific intelligence matters and no inference should be drawn from this.”

Belfast Telegraph
Saturday, 20 December 2008

An explosive device was fired at police in Northern Ireland but failed to hit its target, officers said last night.

Members of the public in Newtownbutler, Co Fermanagh, have been placed on high alert following a telephone warning that the device was lying on wasteground near the town.

Dissident republicans in Fermanagh and elsewhere have been blamed for bomb and gun attacks on police in recent times and senior officers have said the threat remains grave.

Chief Superintendent Michael Skuce said: “Calling police two days later and failing to provide any useful details as to the location of the device demonstrates the indifference and disregard these people have for anyone but themselves and their own selfish motives.

“Causing disruption and distress to ordinary decent people at this time of year, when people are preparing and looking forward to Christmas, is despicable.”

Mr Skuce said leaving such a potentially deadly device on open ground where anybody could come into contact with it was totally irresponsible, particularly considering that the school Christmas holidays started today.

“I would like to make a direct call to those involved to provide more specific information as to the location of this device,” he added.

“Let’s not bring misery and destruction to anyone’s door this Christmas. Let your conscience speak louder than your prejudices.”

Officers are conducting an operation and are appealing for anyone with any information to come forward.

People in the Newtownbutler area are also being warned that, if they come across something suspicious or out of place, not to touch it, but to contact their local police station immediately.

Earlier this year, Police Service of Northern Ireland (PSNI) Chief Constable Sir Hugh Orde said his officers were taking longer to respond to emergency calls because of the danger from renegade republicans opposed to the Northern Ireland peace process.

There have been mortar and gun attacks in Counties Fermanagh, Londonderry, Tyrone and Armagh.

Last month the body which monitors the activity of armed groups, the Independent Monitoring Commission (IMC), warned that republican dissidents were more active than at any time in the last four and a half years.

In its 20th report, the IMC said dissidents engineered public disorder to expose officers to attack.

It said the current political vacuum in Northern Ireland is likely being exploited by the groups.

In its report to the British and Irish Governments, the IMC said dissidents had sought to raise tensions with loyalists during the parades season.

Assembly member Tom Elliott said: “This is reckless in the extreme.

“This is very worrying indeed and I must stress that this type of republican activity or behaviour must not be tolerated in Fermanagh, or anywhere throughout Northern Ireland.”

Belfast Telegraph
Friday, 19 December 2008

Visit the Lisa Dorrian Website

The devastated family of murdered Bangor woman Lisa Dorrian today said they will step up their campaign for justice in 2009.

Speaking to the Belfast Telegraph, Lisa’s heartbroken sister Joanne told how her family were prepared to pay “whatever it takes” in their quest to find the 25-year old’s body.

Murdered Bangor woman Lisa Dorrian

The family have offered a £30,000 reward to anyone who can help end their four-year nightmare.

But they have vowed to increase the reward to £100,000 if it can help provide the breakthrough they have been praying for.

Lisa was abducted in 2005 from a Co Down caravan park and murdered. Police believe her body was later dumped at sea.

Joanne, who has vowed to step up her campaign for justice in the coming year, pleaded with people to come forward over the festive season.

The Co Down woman said: “We are willing to pay whatever it takes to get my sister home. I am pleading with people at this time of year to search their conscience and come forward.

“If someone comes to us with a figure which is more than £30,000, then we will get the case because we are desperate.

“Our nightmare is ongoing and the only thing we want is to get Lisa home so that we can grieve for her properly.

“There are people out there who know where she is and we just want them to make the call.

“If the friends, girlfriends and the families of the people who know what happened to Lisa could step into our world for a minute, then maybe this would persuade them to come forward.

“We don’t care how long it takes and how much it could cost us — we remain determined to find Lisa and we hope this could be in 2009.”

North Down UUP MP Lady Sylvia Hermon has urged anyone with information on the location of Lisa’s body to come forward.

Lady Sylvia said: “This time of year is particularly hard for this very brave family and I pray their nightmare will end sooner rather than later.

“They have shown tremendous character in the last four years and their main concern at the minute is finding Lisa so they can give her the Christian burial she deserves. I am willing to meet anyone who can shed some light on this tragedy.

“There are people out there who know where Lisa is and I would urge them to come forward immediately.

“As these people sit around the Christmas table with their loved-ones, I would ask them to think for a minute how they would feel if it was one of their relatives who had been murdered in this way.”

By Barry McCaffrey
Irish News
20/12/2008

CLOSURE: IRA victim Danny McIlhone’s remains being taken from a remote hillside near Blessington Co Wicklow

THE family of IRA murder victim Danny Mcilhone is to be buried on Monday – 27 years after he was killed and buried in a secret grave.

The McIlhone family have agonised for almost three decades over the whereabouts of their brother’s remains.

And yesterday they spoke of their relief after it was confirmed yesterday that the partial remains uncovered on a Co Wicklow hillside last month were his.

Plans are now underway to finally lay him to rest in Belfast on Monday.

Danny McIlhone was abducted from his west Belfast home in 1981 after allegedly stealing weapons from the Provisional IRA. In 1999 the PIRA admitted killing the teenager claiming he had been shot by accident when he tried to escape during a struggle with his captors.

Previously there had been two unsuccessful searches at the Co Wicklow site in 1999 and 2000.

Last month a special forensic team uncovered human remains at Ballynultagh in Co Wicklow.

Expressing relief that the 19 year-old’s body had finally been recovered after more than 27 years, the McIlhone family said in a statement: “We are relieved and eternally grateful that our long search for our brother has finally come to a close.

“We as a family are now at peace and now have the opportunity to given our brother Danny a Christian burial and to lay him to rest with our beloved mother and father. While we have now found peace our thoughts and prayers remain with and will always be with the families whose anguish and loss continues.”

The Independent Commission for the Location of Victims Remains welcomed the identification of Mr McIlhone’s remains.

“Our thoughts and prayers are with the McIlhone family at this time and we hope that the confirmation that the remains of their brother have been recovered will bring them closure.

“The work of the commission continues and we hope that we can also bring closure to other families of the disappeared.”

In 1999 the Provisional IRA admitted that it had abducted, killed and secretly buried nine of the so-called Disappeared – Seamus Wright, Kevin McKee, Jean McConville, Columba McVeigh, Brendan Megraw, John McClory, Brian McKinney, Eamon Molloy and Mr McIlhone.

To date, the remains of Eamon Molloy, Brian McKinney, John McClory, Jean McConville and now Danny McIlhone have been recovered.

Others who vanished during the Troubles include Gerry Evans, Charles Armstrong, Robert Nairac and Seamus Ruddy, who disappeared in France and whose murder was admitted by the INLA.

Mr McIlhone will be buried at Milltown cemetery on Monday following noon Requiem Mass at St Teresa’s Church on the Glen Road.”>CLOSURE: IRA victim Danny McIlhone’s remains being taken from a remote hillside near Blessington Co Wicklow

THE family of IRA murder victim Danny Mcilhone is to be buried on Monday – 27 years after he was killed and buried in a secret grave.

The McIlhone family have agonised for almost three decades over the whereabouts of their brother’s remains.

And yesterday they spoke of their relief after it was confirmed yesterday that the partial remains uncovered on a Co Wicklow hillside last month were his.

Plans are now underway to finally lay him to rest in Belfast on Monday.

Danny McIlhone was abducted from his west Belfast home in 1981 after allegedly stealing weapons from the Provisional IRA. In 1999 the PIRA admitted killing the teenager claiming he had been shot by accident when he tried to escape during a struggle with his captors.

Previously there had been two unsuccessful searches at the Co Wicklow site in 1999 and 2000.

Last month a special forensic team uncovered human remains at Ballynultagh in Co Wicklow.

Expressing relief that the 19 year-old’s body had finally been recovered after more than 27 years, the McIlhone family said in a statement: “We are relieved and eternally grateful that our long search for our brother has finally come to a close.

“We as a family are now at peace and now have the opportunity to given our brother Danny a Christian burial and to lay him to rest with our beloved mother and father. While we have now found peace our thoughts and prayers remain with and will always be with the families whose anguish and loss continues.”

The Independent Commission for the Location of Victims Remains welcomed the identification of Mr McIlhone’s remains.

“Our thoughts and prayers are with the McIlhone family at this time and we hope that the confirmation that the remains of their brother have been recovered will bring them closure.

“The work of the commission continues and we hope that we can also bring closure to other families of the disappeared.”

In 1999 the Provisional IRA admitted that it had abducted, killed and secretly buried nine of the so-called Disappeared – Seamus Wright, Kevin McKee, Jean McConville, Columba McVeigh, Brendan Megraw, John McClory, Brian McKinney, Eamon Molloy and Mr McIlhone.

To date, the remains of Eamon Molloy, Brian McKinney, John McClory, Jean McConville and now Danny McIlhone have been recovered.

Others who vanished during the Troubles include Gerry Evans, Charles Armstrong, Robert Nairac and Seamus Ruddy, who disappeared in France and whose murder was admitted by the INLA.

Mr McIlhone will be buried at Milltown cemetery on Monday following noon Requiem Mass at St Teresa’s Church on the Glen Road.

By Barry McCaffrey
Irish News
20/12/2008

POLICE were last night understood to be investigating possible Real IRA involvement in a tiger kidnapping which saw a mother and her two young children being abducted and held hostage.

The gang of up to five masked and armed men took over the house of Marks & Spencer manager Gerard Fearon at Hawthorne View at Hannahstown on the outskirts of west Belfast at around 4am on Thursday.

The raiders, who were all dressed in army camouflage fatigues, forced Mr Fearon’s wife and the couple’s two young girls, aged 11 and five, into a bathroom where they were held for more than an hour.

Shortly after 5am Mrs Fearon and her two terrified daughters were ordered to take duvets from their beds and forced to get into the rear of a van.

Then just before 7am Mr Fearon was forced to go to the Marks & Spencer store at Sprucefield near Lisburn where he worked and to take money from a safe.

He was forced to bring the cash, believed to have been £90,000, to a silver or grey Vauxhall Corsa parked nearby.

Shortly before 8am Mrs Fearon managed to free herself from the back of the van, which had been parked on the Boucher Road in south Belfast.

As more details of the kidnapping emerged yesterday retailer Marks & Spencer offered a £10,000 reward for information which would lead to the arrest of the kidnap gang.

Police meanwhile were yesterday carrying out forensic tests on the van in the hope of recovering potential forensic evidence which the gang may have left behind by failing to destroy the van.

It is understood police may also hope to uncover potential footage from secret British army surveillance cameras which are thought to monitor the homes of a number of senior republicans living in the area.

Security sources last night linked the Real IRA to the kidnap robbery.

Detective Chief Inspector David Cunningham said the Fearon family’s experience was horrific.

“It was a very frightening ordeal,’ he said.

“They were clearly very distressed about being taken from their beds at 4.30am in the morning by armed and masked men who cowardly and slyly crept into the premises.

“They were held in the bathroom of the house in their night clothes and not allowed to change into their day clothes.

“After an hour or so they were ordered downstairs and outside and put into a panel van which is described as being very wet and very cold inside.

“They were allowed to take quilts off the children’s beds to sit on or wrap themselves in inside the van.

“Then they were driven some distance, ultimately ending up in the Boucher Road.

“After a while the lady thought the kidnappers had left and then she had the courage to open the door of the van and release herself.”

Revealing the ruthless fashion in which the gang had operated, he said: “As regards those responsible all I can tell you is that there were four to five people involved, wearing combat-style clothing, carrying handguns, who were clearly very organised in the way they approached this incident.

“There was obviously pre-planning.”

Questioned about a paramilitary link to the kidnapping, Mr Cunningham said: “I can’t rule it out. I have to say that I am ruling everything in at this stage.

“They were very well organised. Whether they had done this before, is still part of my investigation.

“I have nothing at this stage to link them to any other similar offence.”

Irish News
20 Dec 2008

FREED: The four Derry men back in the city last night after the trial against them at the Special Criminal Court in Dublin collapsed yesterday. Included, from left, are Martin O’Neill, Michael Gallagher, Gary Donnelly and Patrick McDaid PICTURE: Margaret McLaughlin

The trial of four Derry men accused of Real IRA membership collapsed dramatically on its eleventh day at the Special Criminal Court in Dublin yesterday.

The court heard during the trial that the men were arrested a day after a Real IRA ‘press conference’ which was filmed by the BBC in the Creggan area of the city.

A Detective Garda identified two of the accused – Gary Donnelly and Martin O’Neill – as having been photographed in the background of the press conference, which was given by three masked men.

Mr Donnelly (38) from Kildrum Gardens and Mr O’Neill (40) of Colmcille Court in Derry city, along with Michael Gallagher (28) of Sackville Court and Patrick John McDaid (38) from Marlborough Street, had all pleaded not guilty to membership of an unlawful organisation on March 16.

Prosecuting counsel Patrick Marrinan SC told the three-judge, non-jury court yesterday that his instructions were to enter a ‘nolle prosequi’ at this stage of the trial – meaning the state is not proceeding with the case.

Following the application, Mr Justice Paul Butler, presiding at the court, discharged the four men and they left the dock.

They hugged and greeted friends and family after the decision.

It came after the court had ruled that the initial detention of the four men, when their car was stopped by a Garda sergeant at Bridgend near the Derry border in Co Donegal, was unlawful and that their subsequent arrest was therefore unlawful.

At the opening of the trial Mr Marrinan told the court that the state would be relying on the opinion evidence of Chief Superintendent Terry McGinn and that this would be corroborated by other evidence, including the failure of the men to answer questions when interviewed after their arrest.

The court heard that a day earlier, seven men – including four BBC journalists – were arrested on the night of March 15 and that gardai seized digital video cameras and tapes which showed 52 minutes of an interview with three men wearing balaclavas and combat jackets.

One of the masked men was carrying an AK 47 assault rifle and the men told the BBC they were representatives of the leadership of ‘Oglaigh na hEireann’.

None of the seven arrested on March 15 were ever charged with any offence.

However, on the afternoon of the next day, the four Derry men were arrested after their car was stopped close to the border at Bridgend and they were subsequently charged with Real IRA membership.

The formerly strife-torn city of Belfast is now one of the world’s top tourist destinations, according to a leading travel guide publisher.

Belfast Telegraph
21 Dec 2008

Transformed from a fractured city into a hot city-break destination: Belfast city centre Photo: PA

In little more than a decade, the city has been “transformed from a fractured city into a hot city-break destination, moving fast towards its 19th-century accolade of the Paris of the north”, said Frommer’s.

The Northern Ireland city was the only UK place listed in Frommer’s top 12 destinations to visit in 2009.

Praising Belfast’s landmarks, Frommer’s added: “The army check points that encircled the city centre during The Troubles are a thing of the past; today you can amble along the Golden Mile for relaxed drinks or enjoy Irish music in Cathedral Quarter bars.”

From the late 1960s, there was conflict between the republican and loyalist paramilitary organisations, the Royal Ulster Constabulary and the British Army.

The Troubles only drew to a close in the late 1990s, with prolongued talks culminating in the Good Friday peace agreement.

These were the other top destinations for 2009:

:: Istanbul

:: Berlin

:: Cape Town

:: Saqqara, Egypt

:: Washington DC

:: Cambodia

:: Waiheke Island, New Zealand

:: Cartagena, Colombia

:: Waterton Lakes National Park, Alberta, Canada

:: Civil Rights Trail from Selma to Montgomery, Alabama, US

:: Lassen Volcano National Park, California

Ministers anger as gardai uncover weapons in Co Cavan

John Mooney
The Times
21 Dec 2008

A HAUL of Semtex military explosive and detonators seized by gardai in Co Meath last week is believed to have come from an arms dump that the Provisional IRA retained after the decommissioning process.

The disclosure could have serious ramifications for Sinn Fein and the IRA, which claimed it destroyed its entire arsenal of weapons three years ago in an historic move that allowed republicans to share power with unionists in Northern Ireland.

The explosives were seized by local gardai on Wednesday night after a car was stopped on the outskirts of Kells following a surveillance operation.

A follow-up search yielded a large quantity of high velocity ammunition. Detectives believe the haul, which consisted of 2.5kg of Semtex and two detonators, were “removed” from an IRA arms dump in north Co Cavan or Co Leitrim.

A top-level investigation, involving Special Branch as well as the Crime and Security division — the spying agency — is now under way.

The disclosure that IRA members appeared to have retained stockpiles of weapons and explosives will be unsettling for the Democratic Unionist party, which recently re-started the Stormont power-sharing executive with Sinn Fein.

Peter Robinson’s party has been demanding that the IRA’s army council disband.

Jeffrey Donaldson, a DUP minister, said: “If it is proved these weapons were being stored by the IRA, or retainedby a rogue element, that has consequences in terms of people’s confidence in the republican movement. If there are people associated with the IRA who have retained, and are storing, weapons it needs to be dealt with.

“We were given assurances the IRA had decommissioned its weapons. It’s yet another reason for the Provisional IRA to completely disband.”

Jim Allister, the independent unionist MEP, said the seizure was proof the Provisionals still retained arms and “totally undermines Sinn Fein’s participation in government . . . and the DUP’s weakness in dealing with them”.

Gardai are trying to establish whether the bomb-making materials were “stolen” from the IRA or given by republicans to a third party to sell.

Gardai are carrying out searches of farmland in Cavan and the IRA is also believed to be conducting its own investigation.

BBC

A handful of people, picked from a lottery of 34,000 names, celebrated the winter solstice at the Irish ancient burial site of Newgrange on Sunday.

On 21 December - the shortest day of the year - the sun shines deep into the tomb in County Meath, flooding the neolithic chamber with light.

Every year, crowds gather at Newgrange for the Winter Solstice

But poor weather dampened celebrations this year. The sun’s rays should have entered the chamber at 0858 GMT on Sunday. But cloudy skies meant this failed to happen.

Usually, at the solstice, as the sun’s rays clear the horizon, they illuminate, in perfect alignment, a 19-metre passage and chamber.

In the days before Christianity, festivals were held around the winter solstice to welcome back the longer, lighter days and pay tribute to the Sun.

The Newgrange tomb is one of Ireland’s top tourist attractions.

It dates to about 3200 BC - 1,000 years before Britain’s Stonehenge was built and 500 years before Egypt’s Great Pyramid of Giza.

People travelled from the United States, Canada, Italy, Switzerland, Australia, Poland and Britain for the experience.

Newgrange: Pic: Knowth.com

The prehistoric tomb was carefully aligned by its Neolithic builders so the sun only cuts through the gloom of the chamber at sunrise through a small window above the entrance.

When skies are clear, the rising sun slowly shines all the way down the 19-metre long chamber into the centre of the tomb, lighting it for up to 17 minutes before the rays disappear and darkness returns.

The sun lights up where the cremated ashes of the dead were laid on large stone basins deep inside the tomb.

Newgrange is believed to be the world’s oldest continuously roofed building.

When the tomb’s solstice phenomenon was discovered in 1967, archaeologists were astonished Stone Age builders had the architectural skills and scientific understanding of the sun’s movement that was needed to construct it.

The grass-roofed tomb is about 13 metres high and 85 metres in diameter, and covers almost half a hectare.

About 200,000 tonnes of stone and earth were used to build it.

BBC
21 Dec 2008

Education Minister Caitríona Ruane has been reported to the police for praising IRA hunger striker Bobby Sands.

Ms Ruane said she was not prepared to “preside over education apartheid”

Ms Ruane was speaking at a prize-giving ceremony at St Colm’s High School in Twinbrook last week.

The complainant claimed Ms Ruane’s remarks breached the law on glorifying terrorism.

Police said a complaint had been made but it had not been established that an offence had been committed.