SAOIRSE32

Peter Robinson says his party’s decision to support counter-terrorism bill helped deliver major economic investment for Northern Ireland

Henry McDonald, Ireland correspondent
Guardian
Wednesday 31 December 2008

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Peter Robinson: ‘They came up with the goods in terms of the Bombardier deal.’ Photograph: Paul Faith/PA

Gordon Brown’s government did reward the Democratic Unionists for backing the 42-day detention of terror suspects, Northern Ireland’s first minister claimed today .

In his new year message, DUP leader Peter Robinson said his party’s decision to support the 42-days bill helped deliver major economic investment for the province.

But Robinson repeated an earlier denial that his party had sought or been granted political favours for backing the prime minister before the crucial Westminster vote on the issue in June.

Robinson said the decision had proved the DUP was a responsible party and that the government later “bent over backwards to help” it.

The House of Commons split by 315 votes to 306 over the controversial counter-terrorism bill – with the DUP’s nine MPs securing a crucial victory for the government. The bill was defeated in the House of Lords in October.

Brown denied his government had bought the DUP votes and today Robinson said his party had simply done the right thing.

“It would have been much easier to vote with the Conservative party than to vote with the government,” he said.

“We did what was right. And I think we showed at the same time that our votes matter at Westminster.

“We showed we are a party that can determine a major issue – perhaps the most major issue of the last year at Westminster.”

He added: “We neither sought nor received any pay-off for that. But I think we have seen since then that if you act responsibly with government, government in turn will act responsibly with you.”

In July it was announced that Bombardier Aerospace was investing half a billion pounds in Northern Ireland, sustaining more than 800 jobs at the Shorts aircraft factory in Robinson’s East Belfast constituency.

“They [the government] came up with the goods in terms of the Bombardier deal … which was the largest single investment in Northern Ireland,” Robinson said. “But they bent over backwards to help us.”

In November a £900m financial deal to kickstart Northern Ireland’s devolved government was finalised after talks involving Brown.

Robinson said: “Would we have got the £900m if we had been irresponsible in the way that we behaved at Westminster? I think there is a recognition that if you are seen to be acting responsibly, then people will act responsibly with you.”

He said the government had also brought forward legislation to compensate Orange Order halls attacked by arsonists and accepted DUP changes to the proposals.

The first minister added: “We didn’t ask for any of those things. We recognised that if people saw that we were behaving responsibly, that we were a credible party at Westminster, that they could deal with, that people would deal with us in a way that was helpful to the electorate in Northern Ireland.

“But there is no link between the two – other than the fact that people knew that when we asked for something, we genuinely had a good reason for doing so.”

By IBRAHIM BARZAK and AMY TEIBEL, Associated Press Writers
San Francisco Chronicle
Thursday, January 1, 2009

(01-01) 12:14 PST GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip (AP) —

Israel dropped a one-ton bomb on the home of a Hamas strongman Thursday, killing him along with two wives and four children in the first attack on the top leadership of Gaza’s rulers. As the aerial bombardment escalated, the army said it was also poised to launch a ground invasion. Israel also appeared to be sounding out a possible diplomatic exit from the 6-day-old military offensive against Hamas by demanding international monitors as a key term of any future truce.

Photo from aljazeera.net

The bombing targeted 49-year-old Nizar Rayan, ranked among Hamas’ top five decision-makers in Gaza. His four-story apartment building crashed to the ground, sending a thick plume of smoke into the air and heavily damaging neighboring buildings. It killed Rayan and 11 others, including two of his four wives and four of his 12 children, Palestinian health officials said. The Muslim faith allows men to have up to four wives.

Israel has made clear that no one in Hamas is immune in this offensive, and the strike that flattened Rayan’s apartment building in the northern town of Jebaliya drove that message home.

“We are trying to hit everybody who is a leader of the organization, and today we hit one of their leaders,” Israeli Vice Premier Haim Ramon said in a television interview.

Hamas leaders went into hiding before Israel launched the offensive on Saturday, but Rayan was known for openly defying Israel. He was seen earlier Thursday praying in a mosque, and the military said he had a tunnel under his house that could serve as an escape route.

A professor of Islamic law, Rayan was closely tied to Hamas’ military wing and was respected in Gaza for donning combat fatigues and personally participating in clashes against Israeli forces. He sent one of his sons on an October 2001 suicide mission that killed two Israeli settlers in Gaza.

Defense officials said a one-ton bomb was used to attack Rayan’s home, and that weapons stored inside set off secondary explosions. They spoke on condition of anonymity because they weren’t authorized to speak to the media.

Israel has assassinated top Hamas officials in the past, including the group’s paraplegic spiritual leader, Sheik Ahmed Yassin, who was killed in a wheelchair as he left a mosque in 2004. It had halted the practice during a recent six-month truce, which expired last month and collapsed into all-out violence last week.

Israel launched the offensive to crush militants who have been terrorizing southern Israel with rocket fire from Gaza since the truce expired.

Israeli warplanes have carried out some 500 sorties against Hamas targets, and helicopters have flown hundreds more combat missions, a senior Israeli military officer said Wednesday.

More than 400 Gazans have been killed and some 1,700 have been wounded, Gaza health officials said. The U.N. says the death toll includes more than 60 civilians, 34 of them children.

Three Israeli civilians and one soldier have also died in rocket attacks that have reached deeper into Israel than ever before, bringing one-eighth of the population within rocket range.

Throughout the day, huge blasts had rocked cities and towns across Gaza as Israeli warplanes went after Gaza’s parliament building, militant field operatives, police and cars. The military said aircraft also bombed smuggling tunnels along the Gaza-Egypt border, part of an ongoing attempt to cut off Hamas’ last lifeline to the world outside the embattled Palestinian territory.

So far, the campaign to crush rocket fire on southern Israel has been conducted largely from the air. But military spokeswoman Maj. Avital Leibovich said preparations for a ground operation were complete.

“The infantry, the artillery and other forces are ready. They’re around the Gaza Strip, waiting for any calls to go inside,” Leibovich said.

Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert told a meeting of mayors of southern communities Thursday that Israel would not shy from using its vaunted military power.

“We have no interest in a long war. We do not desire a broad campaign. We want quiet,” Olmert said. “We don’t want to display our might, but we will employ it if necessary.”

Thousands of soldiers were massed along the border with Gaza, backed by tanks and artillery. Along the border, the ground troops watched warplanes and attack helicopters flying into Gaza, cheering each time they heard the explosion of an airstrike.

Hamas threatened to take revenge against the Israeli soldiers massed along the border with Gaza.

“We are waiting for you to enter Gaza to kill you or make you into Schalits,” the group said in a statement, referring to Sgt. Gilad Schalit who was seized by Hamas-affiliated militants 2- 1/2 years ago and remains in captivity.

Israeli Cabinet ministers have been unswayed by international calls to end the violence.

Instead, they authorized the military to push ahead with its campaign against militants, who fired more than 30 rockets into Israel Thursday, the military said. No injuries were reported, but an eight-story house in Ashdod, 23 miles from Gaza, was hit by a rocket.

Israel’s foreign minister, Tzipi Livni, was in Paris on Thursday to prepare for an upcoming Mideast visit by French President Nicolas Sarkozy to push for an end to the violence. She told reporters the offensive was launched “to change the equation” with Hamas. She said the operation has badly damaged the Islamic militant group.

“We affected most of the infrastructure of terrorism in Gaza Strip and the question (of) whether it’s enough or not will be according to our assessment on a daily basis,” Livni said.

Earlier this week, Olmert rebuffed a French proposal for a two-day suspension of hostilities. But at the same time, he seemed to be looking for a diplomatic way out, telling Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and other world leaders that Israel wouldn’t agree to a truce unless international monitors took responsibility for enforcing it, government officials said. They spoke on condition of anonymity because the talks were confidential.

International intervention helped Israel accept a truce that ended its 2006 war with Lebanese Hezbollah guerrillas, when the U.N. agreed to station peacekeepers to enforce the terms. This time, Israel isn’t seeking a peacekeeping force, but a monitoring body that would judge compliance on both sides.

The idea was floated before the offensive but did not gain traction because of the complications created by the existence of rival Palestinian governments in the West Bank and Gaza, defense officials said.

Gaza has been under Hamas rule since the militant group overran it in June 2007; the West Bank has remained under the control of moderate Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, who has been negotiating peace with Israel for more than a year but has no influence over Hamas. Bringing in monitors would require cooperation between the fierce rivals.

Abbas confidant Nabil Abu Rdeneh said the Palestinian president is asking for a cease-fire and an international presence to monitor Israel’s commitment to it.

___

Amy Teibel reported from Jerusalem.

News Letter
01 January 2009

DUBLIN was using the cover of Anglo-Irish co-operation talks with London, in 1977-78, to push the agenda for a united Ireland.
This was the belief of Whitehall ministers and officials, which has emerged in UK Government papers from the time.

While unionists had taken to the streets in the 1970s to oppose any suggestion of Irish unity, and the IRA bid to bomb the UK into submission, behind closed doors at Anglo-Irish talks British officials were seeking to prevent the issue of an all-Ireland becoming a real matter for debate.

An elaborate game of cat and mouse, in which the Irish attempted to work into talks matters of a cross-border nature which would weaken the Union, and the British attempted to avoid such discussion, is revealed in secret minutes of meetings and internal UK briefing notes by civil servants and political figures.

Throughout late 1977 and 1978, the UK and Ireland embarked on a series of meetings at senior levels.

These discussions were designed to look into ways in which the two countries could work more closely on matters of mutual interest and mutual benefit.

On the agenda were issues like promoting jointly Fermanagh Lakelands, the Belfast-Dublin rail link, cross-border roads upgrading, studies on how Londonderry-Donegal and, Newry-Louth could work together in a range of ways, joint trade missions to attract inward investment, environmental studies, creating an electricity interconnectors and much more.

In areas of business and the economy, tourism, agriculture, transport, security and more, there was seen to be a need for closer links.

And an Anglo-Irish Joint Steering Group was created for meetings between the two sides.

But relations between the two nations remained chilly.

UK officials were distinctly nervous as to how the discussions may be portrayed to unionists in the Province and also at how the Irish may be intent on guiding them onto the ground of Irish unity.

Internal Whitehall briefing papers, some for then Secretary of State Roy Mason but also for other NIO and central government ministers, uncover endless reminders to keep the Dublin administration from using talks as an opportunity to begin eroding the border.

At a September 6, 1977 meeting (minutes released with the 1978 papers) British ministers in Whitehall heard the Chairman of the British Government Anglo-Irish Economic Committee P Mallet (of the Foreign Office) explicitly outline Dublin’s intentions.

“The main purpose of the Anglo-Irish Joint Steering Committee (set up by London and Dublin) was to satisfy pressure from Dublin for discussion of North-South matters,” he said.

“This is while cloaking the whole affair in the mantle of Anglo-Irish relations, as whole, in order to minimise political repercussions in Northern Ireland.”

So far, he noted, this had been avoided and, while the UK had interests in pursuing better relations in many areas with Ireland – not least because it was GB’s sixth biggest export market – there was “no haste on the British side on many of the North-South matters” the Republic was pushing.

So concerned was the UK Government that ministers and officials were briefed not to introduce new topics for discussion at Steering Committee meetings – in case it expanded the nature of the talks.

On November 28, 1977, the first meeting of the Steering Group was minuted by the UK and the report reads: “The Irish ideas on suitable subjects were similar to our own, although it was quite clear that they were far more interested in establishing North-South talks, than commencing Anglo-Irish (East-West) discussions”.

Again an NIO briefing paper for the Secretary of State said on November 29, 1977: “The Irish wish to take us much further and this will be a difficulty. They will seek… objectives which we should move to frustrate.”

These objectives including building economic links North to South and moving the agenda onto the European Economic Community – because Ireland was pressing that the Province should be represented by Dublin in Brussels.

The briefing note said the Irish would see the EEC “used to drive a wedge between Belfast and London and forge links between Belfast and Dublin”.

The Whitehall paper added: “Our (UK) objective is to keep the discussions at a practical level of co-operation with the avoidance of institutional frameworks.”

BBC
1 Jan 2008

The threat from republican dissidents was at its highest for many years during the past 12 months.

At the same time, the government said it would give loyalists a final chance to decommission their weapons. Our Home Affairs Correspondent Vincent Kearney looks back at the security situation in 2008.

A roadside bomb is found in County Fermanagh in October

The police and government were consistent in their public utterances about dissident republicans during 2008.

Repeatedly, we were told, they were “high on intent, but low on capability”, had little public support, were engaged in widespread criminality and operating as independent factions with no central leadership or strategy.

‘Clear intent’

At the same time we were told that they posed a growing threat and were determined to kill police officers.

The PSNI had a number of lucky escapes during the past year, with lives being saved due to good fortune on the part of a number of officers, and a lack of technical ability on the part of the terrorists.

But while dissidents remain relatively small in number and do lack any kind of widespread support, there is a growing concern.

Intelligence suggests they have been much more active in recent months in targeting potential victims and planning attacks.

They haven’t succeeded, but the intent is clearly there.

They’ve also experimented with a variety of weapons, from improvised rocket-propelled grenades to under car booby traps and large fertiliser-based bombs.

And they’ve tested a number of different ways of triggering bombs in an attempt to increase the likelihood of detonation.

Dissidents have also been recruiting new members, many of whom were in primary school when the IRA declared its ceasefire, and have no memory of the Troubles.

The advantage for the security forces is that these individuals are inexperienced and amateurish; the disadvantage is that in terrorist terms they are ‘lilly whites’ with no track record, and that makes them much harder to detect and monitor their behaviour.

When MI5 opened its huge new offices in Holywood, the view was that ‘the Irish problem’ had been resolved and the intention was that the spooks based their would devote the majority of their time to tackling the threat from al-Qaeda and other international groups.

That is the case, but the security service deploy around 15% of their resources to dealing with domestic terrorism, and dissident republicans are the main focus of their attentions.

“There is a huge amount of activity going on behind the scenes to combat these groups,” said one well-placed security source.

“There have been a number of reported attacks, but there is a lot of other activity going on that is not known publicly and that is causing a lot of concern.”

Security sources estimate that dissident groups have around 80-100 active members, with around 250-300 others willing to lend support and some assistance, while not wanting to become active terrorists.

There are small but relatively strong elements in Derry, Tyrone, Fermanagh and north Armagh.

Dissidents tried to bomb Fermanagh police on foot patrol in August

Despite all their intent and activity, however, the dissidents have not been able to mount a successful attack against the police, and even if they eventually do, there is no evidence to suggest that they are capable of mounting a sustained campaign of violence.

The police and security services will hope that the level of threat will diminish during the coming year.

While the increasing activity of republican dissidents has been causing concern, the government has been frustrated by a lack of activity from loyalist paramilitary groups when it comes to decommissioning their weapons.

Shaun Woodward, the NI Secretary of State, warned last May that the “decommissioning train” was about to leave the station.

Journalists were told that it was highly unlikely that the legislation that enables the international decommissioning body to function would be renewed again in February.

But after all the bluster and warnings, the government changed its position and has started the process to renew the legislation, which will give the loyalist groups another 12 months to finally deal with the issue of their weapons, 14 years after they declared that their war was over.

The UDA and UVF have both engaged with General John de Chastelain and his decommissioning body, but as yet there is no evidence that weapons are going to be put beyond use.

Shaun Woodward will hope that at least one of the loyalist groups demonstrates that he was right.

By Mark Devenport
BBC Northern Ireland political editor
BBC
1 January 2008

For decades in opposition and a memorable year in power, Ian Paisley Senior loomed over the Northern Ireland political scene like a unionist colossus.

2008 will be remembered as the year he finally stepped down as DUP leader.

Did he jump or was he pushed? The historians can debate that one.

But there’s no getting away from the fact that DUP backbenchers grew increasingly impatient of the “Chuckle Brothers” relationship between the Big Man and Martin McGuinness, and the constant press reports about the activities of his son and Junior Minister, Ian Paisley Jr.

Although the Stormont Ombudsman subsequently ruled there was no evidence to suggest Ian Paisley Jr broke Assembly rules, by the end of May both he and his father had stepped down from their ministerial roles.

The common joke is that the “Chuckle Brothers” have been replaced by the “Brothers Grimm”.

Martin McGuinness insists his personal relationship with Peter Robinson is good.

However, the new partnership did not get off to the best of starts.

Sinn Féin sources let it be known the party might not put Mr McGuinness’s name forward again as deputy first minister unless the DUP gave them a commitment to a date for the devolution of justice.

Sinn Féin’s refusal to re-nominate would have scuppered Mr Robinson’s ascension to the first minister’s job.

After a period of apparent quiescence, Gerry Adams seemed to be an influential mover in this drama as he made his way into Downing Street through a back door.

Aided by the personal intervention of Gordon Brown, the transition went ahead and Mr Robinson moved in to Stormont Castle.

However, the wrangle over the devolution of justice festered, leading to a 150-day stand off during which the Ministerial Executive failed to meet.

Devolving justice is an important principle to republicans as the deal they sold to their extraordinary Ard Fheis back in January 2007 had essentially been to support the police on the proviso that they would soon be answerable to a justice minister from the island of Ireland.

However, as the stand-off continued many ordinary voters didn’t appreciate that this concern should take priority over other pressing social and economic matters.

The public attitude to the politicians appeared to be “a plague on all their houses” and, during the 150 days, the image of devolution took a nosedive.

In November, the DUP and Sinn Féin reached an agreement which lifted the blockade on Executive meetings.

The deal involved the eventual appointment of a justice minister by a cross-community vote in the Assembly. Both the two big parties would count themselves out from applying for the job.

This has led to speculation that an Alliance candidate will be appointed, although the first and deputy first ministers say the SDLP or Ulster Unionists shouldn’t be ruled out.

No date for the appointment has been announced, but a process was agreed which some Stormont sources reckon will take months, not years.

Once the stand-off ended, the Executive wanted to convince voters it was getting back to business.

Announcements followed on the deferral of water charges, investment in a Titanic Quarter Signature Project and a green light for Belfast’s Rapid Transit system, a bus operating on dedicated routes.

Finance Minister Nigel Dodds made a pre-Christmas “Santa statement” which adopted Margaret Ritchie’s proposal for a fuel poverty credit, extending it to 100,000 vulnerable households.

However, relations between ministers weren’t marked by a seasonal outbreak of peace and goodwill.

During the Sinn Féin-inspired break in Executive meetings, the SDLP minister had appeared alongside her unionist colleagues.

But in December, Margaret Ritchie’s relationship with both the DUP and Sinn Fein hit a low point as she accused Finance Minister Nigel Dodds of raiding her social development budget to pay for other priorities.

The invective traded between the SDLP minister and Peter Robinson stirred memories of their 2007 clash over a UDA-linked conflict transformation initiative.

The fuel poverty credit was part of the Executive’s response to the economic downturn.

In May, the Executive organised a big investment conference at Stormont to celebrate a year since the restoration of devolution.

Addressed by Gordon Brown and the New York Mayor, Michael Bloomberg, at the time the conference generated a buzz.

A short time later, the US President George Bush paid Stormont a flying visit.

But as the credit crunch began to bite, securing investment from the USA or anywhere else became harder to achieve whilst protecting existing jobs seemed an uphill task.

Looking ahead, the local parties are preparing for next June’s European elections and the possibility of an early Westminster election.

The DUP has been sensitive to the challenge posed by the anti-power sharing MEP Jim Allister.

His Traditional Unionist Voice polled well in a council by-election in Dromore in February and there’s speculation that the DUP would like to field a “big gun” to try to ensure they retake their Euro seat with a handsome margin.

The UUP benefited from the TUV-DUP battle in Dromore but were unable to dent the DUP minister Arlene Foster who took the unusual step of contesting another council by-election in Enniskillen in September.

However, the Ulster Unionists did pull off a coup of sorts when they attracted the Conservative leader David Cameron as their keynote speaker at the UUP conference in December.

Mr Cameron’s appearance put the seal on a revived partnership between his party and the Ulster Unionists.

The two parties plan to field a joint candidate in the European poll. The partners claim they are trying to build a new political force which will appeal across the traditional divide.

However, the DUP reckons the new force could cost unionists Westminster seats if they contest every constituency rather than agreeing a voting pact.

The Conservatives’ decision to link up with the UUP followed the DUP’s decision to support Labour over the proposed 42-day detention of terror suspects.

Controversial comments by the Strangford DUP MP Iris Robinson about the gay community may also have helped convince the Tories that the Ulster Unionists were the people to do business with.

With Fianna Fáil beginning to extend its grassroots organisation in south Armagh, the UUP-Conservative experiment will prove an interesting test of the contention that, ten years on from the Good Friday Agreement, the nature of local politics is bound to change.

By Scott Millar
Irish Examiner
01 January 2009

THE spectre of international terrorism stalked Europe during the late 1970s with far-left groups such as the German Baader-Meinhof gang (later the Red Army Faction) and Italian Red Brigades the focus of cross border security operations.

But a renewed push, led by France, for a quick extradition system between EEC member states left Ireland diplomatically isolated during 1978. The government was intent on negotiating an opt-out so they would not be forced to hand over republican suspects to Britain.

The Irish ambassador in Paris, in a December 17, 1977, letter to foreign affairs, linked increased pressure on Ireland to sign up to the European convention on the suppression of terrorism to the hasty extradition of Klaus Croissant, a lawyer and associate of the Baader Meinhof gang, from France to West Germany.

The speed of president Giscard d’Estaing’s decision to allow the extradition in November 1977 had caused uproar with criticism not only from the French Left, but also from Gaullist leader Jack Chirac. As ambassador, Hugh McCann saw the move as an attack on “a long and deeply rooted tradition of political asylum in France” which through the years had been used by “the Maud Gonnes and John O’Learys of many countries.”

In response, president Giscard was seen as intent on “merging the emotive German question into a wider context” by pushing for all EEC member states to sign up to a strengthened inter-state extradition agreement. The French presented their idea of creating what was termed a “l’espace judicarie european” (or “European legal area”) throughout the EEC’s nine member states to their European partners in December 1977.

The proposals gained support from most other states, including Britain, but set alarm bells ringing among Irish diplomats, who had refused to sign the anti-terror convention in early 1977 due to existing concerns over its extradition clauses.

Department of foreign affairs official Hugh Swift, in an April 12, 1978, note, stated that the French concept “must be qualified in the Northern Ireland context and that their ideas of automatically and simplified procedure may give rise to serious political as well as legal problems.”

While publicly the government denied they were under pressure from other EEC states to sign up to stronger anti-terrorism agreements, saying there was respect for Ireland’s “constitutional” position, privately officials felt otherwise.

In August Mr Swift wrote to a Mr Corcoran at the office of Ireland’s permanent representative on the Council of Europe, about a new anti-terrorism declaration for which agreement was being sought. Referring to a widely reported address made by taoiseach Jack Lynch to the Fianna Fáil parliamentary party in which claims that the republic was a “safe haven for terrorists” were refuted, Mr Swift said: “In the course of this address, the taoiseach specifically denied the allegations then current and originating from British ministers, that we were under pressure in Europe to accede to the European convention on the suppression of terrorism. The present draft declaration would constitute an example of such pressure. It is not, in my opinion fanciful to imagine that the declaration may be the result of British influence in the Council of Europe.” However, he felt the draft declaration should be “vigorously opposed”.

Ireland would eventually sign up to an anti-terrorism agreement with its EEC partners in December 1979 which allowed a state to decide to try an offender itself rather then extradite them.

Ireland eventually signed up to European convention on the suppression of terrorism in February 1986, although the convention did not come into full force here until 1989.

AFP
31 Dec 2008

DUBLIN (AFP) — Ireland feared a doomsday scenario could develop in British-ruled Northern Ireland in the 1970s if sectarian violence descended into all-out civil war, newly-released archives showed Tuesday.

Dublin drew up a contingency plan amid concerns that over 250,000 Roman Catholics could be trapped and unable to escape, according to the previously secret files released by the national archives office.

There were also fears that if the British army withdrew Dublin might be forced to deploy the Irish army, to prevent the Irish Republican Army (IRA) from taking up the role of “protectors” of the minority community.

Up to 200,000 Catholic refugees could flee south across the border into the Irish Republic, according to one file which suggested boosting Irish army and police numbers “without provoking an answering escalation” in Northern Ireland.

Northern Ireland, a province of the United Kingdom, was dogged by three decades of civil unrest known as the Troubles, which killed about 3,000 people before Britain and Ireland brokered the 1998 Good Friday peace agreement.

In 1974, Dublin was worried the situation might deteriorate and Britain could re-assess its involvement in Northern Ireland after a five month old Catholic-Protestant power-sharing administration collapsed.

A foreign ministry study warned that, if a civil war broke out, some 262,097 Catholics were at risk in Belfast, north County Down and County Antrim where the Protestant population numbered 665,653.

“If a doomsday situation does arise, these 262,097 RCs will be in immediate danger with minimum chances of escaping to safety. This situation could arise even if the British army was present, although attacks would probably be reduced in scale.

“Except for West Belfast and the Glens area of Antrim, the minority population would be able to offer only the minimum of resistance if attacked.

“Most of the minority is isolated with no avenues of escape and little chance of survival in a doomsday situation. Except for the Belfast area food has not been stocked and there has been no planning or preparations for a crisis situation,” the study said.

It suggested the possibility of getting relief supplies into some beleaguered areas by air and evacuating some parts by sea.

It said United Nations involvement would probably not take place until after widespread violence had subsided and “the sides, tacitly at least, ask for some outside force to keep them apart”.

Power-sharing self-rule was restored in Belfast earlier this year after a landmark deal between the Republican Sinn Fein and the Protestant-backed Democratic Unionists.

By Ryle Dwyer
Irish Examiner
01 January 2009

THE government was embarrassed after New York congressman Mario Biaggi wrote to taoiseach Jack Lynch on January 24, 1978, congratulating him on an RTÉ interview a fortnight earlier in which he called on the British to declare their intention to withdraw their troops from Northern Ireland.

Biaggi had been a prominent member of the Irish National Caucus (INC) and was writing as chairman of a newly formed ad hoc congressional committee.

“The ad hoc committee is most interested in seeing this declaration of intent become a reality,” Biaggi wrote. His letter was a distinct embarrassment to the government, because he had been outspoken in his support of the Provisional IRA.

Fred Burns O’Brien, national director of the INC, wrote a similar letter in which he went on to commend Lynch for not only firing Garda commissioner Edmund Garvey, but also suggesting an amnesty for republican prisoners and, above all, for securing “a victory against the British over that government’s inhuman and degrading treatment of detainees in Northern Ireland”.

The influence of the INC, and the ad hoc committee were “minuscule” in comparison with that of the so-called Four Horsemen: speaker of the House of Representatives “Tip” O’Neill, senators Ted Kennedy and Daniel P Moynihan and governor Hugh Carey of New York. They had come out strongly in favour of the Government, but the ad hoc committee’s appeared to distort Lynch’s position as being similar to the Provisionals.

The ad hoc committee could not be dismissed lightly. It comprised 87 congressmen, which increased to 104 in coming days.

As far as Iveagh House was concerned, however, the Italian-American Biaggi was only playing the Irish card for his own political ends.

On February 17 the taoiseach acknowledged Biaggi’s letters with a stinging reply, denouncing the misrepresentations of Irish policy by the INC and Biaggi’s ad hoc committee. Copies of this reply were widely circulated and received extensive publicity.

John M Keane, president of the Ancient Order of Hibernians (AOH), sought to retaliate against the Taoiseach by trying to call off an AOH convention planned for Killarney that summer. But Keane was overridden by over two-thirds of AOH executive.

Irish officials in America could hardly have cared less, as they were disillusioned with the AOH. The embassy in Washington warned that the AOH had been requesting 2,000 rooms in Killarney, but there had only been 250 bookings.

The New York manager of CIE said he would be glad if the whole thing was called off. After the last convention held in Ireland, CIE had to sue AOH to collect about $14,000 in fees.

Lynch effectively undermined the ad hoc committee by depicting it as sympathetic to the PIRA. Although the committee boasted of 104 congressional members at one point, only Biaggi and two other congressmen turned up on May 3 for its well-flagged meeting to be addressed by the AOH president.

Nevertheless Biaggi still exerted enough electoral clout to divide the Four Horsemen. In his bid for re-election as governor of New York, Hugh Carey played along with Biaggi.

But when Biaggi planned to visit Dublin and Belfast in November 1978 Ambassador Seán Donlon warned Iveagh House “that we should do nothing which would enable the congressman to use the visit to build up his own prestige in the United States. Accordingly, it is deemed desirable that he should not be received by any minister.”

Biaggi was later destroyed politically when he was convicted of obstruction of justice and accepting bribes, along with 15 other felony counts. In 1988 he was fined heavily, sentenced to two years in jail, and forced to resign his seat in Congress.