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October 30, 2005

UVF Killers Named As Informers

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News about Ireland & the Irish

DI 10/30/05 UVF Killers Named As Informers
SL 10/30/05 UFF Killer Stone Meets Tutu
SL 10/30/05 Cops Offer £10,000 In UVF Double-Murder Hunt
SL 10/30/05 Feuding Loyalists Call A Halt To Slaughter
BB 10/30/05 UDA Meets Decommissioning Body
SL 10/30/05 Loyalist Women To Bring City To A Standstill
SL 10/30/05 Thousands Turn Out For Love Ulster Rally
SL 10/30/05 Into The Dark: Tommy, The Catholic UVF Man!
SL 10/30/05 £4.6 Million Spent Last Year Re-Hiring RUC Men
SF 10/30/05 Sorrow Expressed At The Death Of Daithí Forde
SL 10/30/05 Arlene Files Are Taken From Top Former Cop
DI 10/30/05 Frmr Prisoners' Anger After Support Group Raids
SB 10/30/05 Catholic Church Faces Major Sex Abuse Bill
IE 10/30/05 PDs Accused Of Doing U-Turn On Colombia Three
ST 10/30/05 McCabe Suspects Excluded From Irish Amnesty
DI 10/30/05 Stabbing Motive Angers SF
SB 10/30/05 Liam Lawlor And The Story That Never Was
SB 10/30/05 Opin: Council Vital To Put Manners On Media
BB 10/30/05 Irish Turf Club HQ Ruined In Fire
SL 10/30/05 Keenan Sister Fights For Life
SL 10/30/05 Tory Golden Boy Cameron Supports Review Motion
NH 10/30/05 Opin: The Past Is Not Done With Us
ST 10/30/05 Opin: DUP Should Emulate SF & Play Smarter Game
TS 10/30/05 Diplomat From N Ireland Speaks At MU
GU 10/30/05 Bk Rev: Mae West - Come Up And See Her

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UVF Killers Named As Informers

by Ciarán Barnes

'Haddock was able to act with impunity while the police
effectively colluded in his crimes'
– Pat Rabbitte

'The police knew about hundreds of murders the UVF was
planning before any triggers were pulled'
– Raymond McCord Senior

'The UVF was deeply infiltrated by Special Branch for a
very long time'
– British Irish Rights Watch director Jane Winter

The alleged Ulster Volunteer Force (UVF) killers of a 22-
year-old Protestant have been named as Special Branch
informers by the leader of the Irish Labour party.

Using parliamentary privilege, Pat Rabbitte yesterday named
Mark Haddock and John Bond as the men responsible for the
brutal 1997 murder of Raymond McCord Junior.

He also claimed the pair were responsible for trying to
bomb a Sinn Féin office in Monaghan town in 1997.

In an astonishing attack on the UVF and its links to
Special Branch, Mr Rabbitte said leading Belfast loyalist
John 'Bunter' Graham was the organisation's leader.

And he called for an international independent inquiry into
collusion between the UVF and security services. Mr
Rabbitte said: "The UVF murdered Raymond McCord because he
had been summoned by John 'Bunter' Graham, the officer
commanding the UVF on the Shankill Road, to account for his
role in ferrying drugs for Mark Haddock.

"He was murdered to prevent Graham finding out about
Haddock's unsanctioned drugs operations.

"At least two members of the gang who carried out the
murder were Special Branch informers. They were Mark
Haddock, who ordered the murder, and John Bond, who was
present when Raymond McCord was murdered.

"Both these men were also allegedly involved in an attempt
to bomb Sinn Féin offices in Monaghan in 1997."

Mr Rabbitte said he had information Haddock, who is
currently facing charges of attempted murder, has been
involved in eight murders since his recruitment as a
Special Branch informer in 1993.

The murders are that of Sharon McKenna, Gary Convie, Eamon
Fox, Rev David Templeton, Billy Harbinson, Tommy English,
David Greer and Raymond McCord Junior.

He added: "The central allegation is that Haddock was not
charged with any crime because he was an informer who had
to be protected.

"He was able to act with impunity, while the police
effectively colluded in his crimes."

Replying to Mr Rabbitte, minister of state at the
Department of Foreign Affairs, Noel Treacy, said government
had complete confidence in the independence and competence
of the Ombudsman's office in carrying out a rigorous
investigation.

He added: "In the context of the sensitive stage that the
investigation has reached, any comment on the possible
establishment of an independent inquiry into this issue
would be premature."

Mr Rabbitte's Dáil address has been welcomed by Raymond
McCord Senior, whose son Haddock and Bond are accused of
murdering.

He said: "This is only the beginning. The UVF has been
controlled by the Special Branch since the 1970s.

"The police knew about hundreds of murders the UVF was
planning before any triggers were pulled."

A Police Ombudsman report on the murder of Raymond McCord
Junior is to be published next month.

It is expected to recommend prosecutions against six
Special Branch officers who ran UVF members in north and
west Belfast.

In a report on the McCord murder compiled by human rights
group British Irish Rights Watch (BIRW), the man who Pat
Rabbitte believes is the leader of the UVF, John Graham, is
named as a Special Branch informer.

BIRW director Jane Winter, who has investigated dozens of
paramilitary killings, is in no doubt the UVF was "deeply
infiltrated" by Special Branch for a "very long time".

"There has been a high-level of collusion for some time,"
said Ms Winter.

"I would be very surprised if murders carried out by the
UVF since the 1970s were not preventable, or at the very
least detectable."

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http://www.sundaylife.co.uk/news/story.jsp?story=667237

Killer Stone Meets Tutu

Nobel peace prize winner in secret Ulster visit

Exclusive by Stephen Breen

30 October 2005

NOBEL peace prize winner Archbishop Desmond Tutu paid a
secret visit to Ulster last week, to link up with graveyard
killer Michael Stone.

The close friend of former South African President Nelson
Mandela met with the former UFF hitman and the family of
one of Stone's victim's in the Ards peninsular, last
Monday.

The victim's families are not related to any of the three
men murdered by Stone at Milltown cemetery, in 1988.

Archbishop Tutu made the trip, after he was asked by the
BBC to chair a meeting between the perpetrators of violence
during the Troubles', and their victims' relatives.

He was asked to participate because of his experience as
chairman of the South African Truth and Reconciliation
Commission, during the late 1990s.

The veteran anti-apartheid campaigner visited Northern
Ireland after spending time in the Irish Republic.

The peace activist is believed to have left the province
yesterday.

Said Stone: "I can confirm I met Archbishop Desmond Tutu
last week. He is extremely intelligent and is also a
gentleman.

"I met him after agreeing to participate in a programme,
which will focus on first ever meetings between victims of
violence and those who murdered their loved ones.

"I am not prepared to identify the victim's family, but the
meeting was a very worthwhile exercise. We spent the whole
day talking with the Archbishop.

"The Archbishop was able to put his experience of working
at the Truth and Reconciliation Commission to good use.

"I don't know what the family got out of meeting me, but it
must have been very hard for them. People will make their
own minds up in January."

We were unable to get a comment from the Archbishop's Peace
Centre in Cape Town.

The BBC production focuses on first ever meetings between
victims' families, and the men responsible for killing
their loved ones.

It is set to be screened in January and will feature Stone,
a former IRA man, a police officer and a soldier.

This is the second time the Milltown murderer has met the
family of loved ones murdered by loyalist terrorists.

We revealed in August how the killer-turned-artist met Joan
Feenan, after she challenged him in Sunday Life to a
meeting to discuss the murders of Kathleen and Terence
Mullan.

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http://www.sundaylife.co.uk/news/story.jsp?story=667238

Cops Offer £10,000 In UVF Double-Murder Hunt

Exclusive by Stephen Breen

30 October 2005

COPS are set to offer a £10,000 reward for information on
the brutal UVF murders of two teenagers.

A senior security source told Sunday Life, police will
offer the cash as part of a new probe into the killings of
Portadown lads, Andrew Robb and David McIlwaine.

An announcement on the reward is expected to be made next
month.

Andrew (18), and David (19), were butchered in a frenzied
knife attack by a UVF gang, on February 20, 2000.

Their mutilated bodies were discovered in a country lane,
outside Tandragee.

And a fresh appeal for information on the horrific murders
will be made by police on the BBC's Crimewatch programme,
on Wednesday.

Police want to speak to an individual, who was in a phone
box and drivers who may have been in the area at the time
of the murders.

Andrew's mum, Ann Robb, last night welcomed the new police
investigation into the killings.

Said Mrs Robb: "The new police investigation into my son's
and David's murder is a long time coming, but I'm pleased
it's happening.

"Hopefully, the police investigation will get somewhere,
and it would be great if we could get justice at the end of
it.

"It's my understanding that the announcement on the reward
will be made after the Crimewatch programme, and we hope it
might persuade people to come forward.

"There is quite a few people who know what happened to
Andrew and David, and we will never give up our campaign
for justice.

"After five years, it is still not any easier for us to get
over losing Andrew in the way we did."

Added a police spokeswoman: "A new investigation team has
been appointed, and the inquiry in relation to the killings
remains very active."

No one has ever been convicted of the double-murder. One
man charged in 2000 was later released, after the DPP
decided evidence was not strong enough to pursue a case.

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http://www.sundaylife.co.uk/news/story.jsp?story=667241

Feuding Loyalists Call A Halt To Slaughter

By Alan Murray
30 October 2005

THE bloody feud between the UVF and the LVF is over.

Loyalist sources confirmed yesterday that issues which have
prevented a truce being declared over the last fortnight
have been "nailed down".

Members of both terrorist groups are being informed this
weekend.

A formal announcement could come today signalling the end
of the feud, which has flared sporadically since the
creation of the LVF by expelled Portadown UVF man, Billy
Wright, in 1996.

Yesterday, PUP leader David Ervine gave an indication that
work on an agreement to end the feud was at an advanced
stage.

The most recent spate of feud-related murders began in
July, when UVF gunmen shot dead builder Jameson Lockhart at
Templemore Avenue, east Belfast.

Three more Protestants were killed by the UVF, ending in
the murder of father-of-three Michael Green in Sandy Row on
August 15.

None of the four victims was regarded by police as LVF
members although one, Mr Lockhart, was a close personal
friend of two leading LVF figures.

When the feud was raging in July and August, the larger UVF
demanded the total disbandment of the LVF as part of any
deal.

There is likely to be speculation again that the LVF will
now formally disband and perhaps decommission its weapons
through General John de Chastelain's Independent
International Commission for Decommissioning.

The issue of LVF disbandment is highly sensitive and
yesterday senior figures in the group declined to be drawn
on the organisation's future.

But if the LVF does disband it will increase pressure on
the UVF to follow suit, or at least greatly scale down its
organisation.

"There is talk that the UVF has discussed downsizing by 50
per cent within six months, and sometime after that to
halve again in size," said one loyalist source.

"That will be a major task because both the UVF and the UDA
have recruited heavily among teenagers in the Protestant
community and it would mean telling most of those kids
they're no longer part of any organisation."

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http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/1/hi/northern_ireland/4383760.stm

UDA Meets Decommissioning Body

The Ulster Defence Association has held a meeting in
Belfast with the Independent International Commission on
Decommissioning (IICD).

The delegation included leading north Belfast UDA member
Andre Shoukri.

A spokesman for the decommissioning body, headed by General
John de Chastelain, said the talks were part of the
continuing engagement with the UDA.

Loyalist sources said there was no suggestion of imminent
decommissioning on the part of the UDA.

Story from BBC NEWS:
Published: 2005/10/27 20:25:35 GMT
© BBC MMV

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http://www.sundaylife.co.uk/news/story.jsp?story=667248

Loyalist Women To Bring City To A Standstill

By Stephen Breen
30 October 2005

THESE are the loyalist women who are planning to bring
Belfast to a standstill later this week.

The Women Restoring Unionist Culture (WRUC) group -
established by Belfast women following September's serious
riots - will block roads in the city during rush-hour on
Friday.

The planned blockades have prompted Assistant Chief
Constable Duncan McCausland to arrange a meeting with the
group. Other senior cops will also attend the meeting on
Tuesday.

We can also reveal the loyalist women are currently
considering an offer to meet with West Belfast Sinn Fein
MP, Gerry Adams.

Speaking on behalf of the group, chairwoman Jean Barnes,
told Sunday Life the group was "entirely peaceful".

She also rejected suggestions that the protests could lead
to serious disorder across Belfast.

Said Ms Barnes: "We have had no correspondence from
unionist politicians about our concerns, yet we have had
word back from Gerry Adams. We want to speak to all
political parties.

"Our group is entirely peaceful and we are not out to cause
trouble. We are merely highlighting legitimate concerns
from the unionist community."

"We are opposed to violence from whatever quarter and all
we want is for the Government to listen to us."

The PSNI confirmed a meeting with the WRUC was taking place
on Tuesday.

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http://www.sundaylife.co.uk/news/story.jsp?story=667249

Thousands Turn Out For Peaceful Love Ulster Rally

By Sinead McCavana
30 October 2005

THOUSANDS of Protestants from across Northern Ireland
braved the rain yesterday at the Love Ulster rally in west
Belfast.

Fears that the event might spark violence, similar to the
scenes at the Whiterock parade, proved unfounded.

Community groups, victims' groups, bands and members of the
Orange Order joined the parade, which began on the Shankill
Road at noon.

Organisers said the march was part of a campaign for
unionist unity and represented a "demand to respect the
rights of the unionist community".

Victims' groups, some holding pictures of lost relatives,
led the parade, followed by several bands of Orangemen.

John Dickey chairman of new group, North Ulster Victim
Support Network, said the rally was about "getting across
the views of ordinary Protestant people".

Belfast Orange County Grand Master Dawson Bailie and Willie
Fraser of victims' group Fair were among the speakers.

Mr Baillie said Protestant people had been given a "raw
deal".

His message to the Government was: "the Protestant people
are still in the majority in British Northern Ireland".

There was a noticeable absence of flags in the crowd, one
loyalist who lifted a paramilitary flag was told by
stewards to put it down.

Willie Fraser took the platform and spoke of the Government
pandering to republicans and Ulster's vital role in World
War Two.

"Only for the loyalty of Ulster people (in the war) we
would be speaking German now -we've paid our way," he said.

The crowd dispersed quickly and there was no sign of any
trouble.

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(Poster's Note: See the first installment of these excerpts
at: http://irishaires.blogspot.com/2005/10/loyalist-stone-praises-london-bombers.html)

http://www.sundaylife.co.uk/news/story.jsp?story=667220

Into The Dark: Tommy, The Catholic UVF Man!

30 October 2005

Today Johnston Brown reveals the extraordinary story of the
ex-IRA man who joined the UVF and became a CID informer,
and how he:

• became the best friend of a UVF serial killer who is in
the pay of Special Branch...

• ran with the notorious Mount Vernon UVF team that is
riddled with informers...

• had Special Branch Officers put his life at risk by
exposing him as a CID agent...

• and finally fled fearing a set-up, after he was ordered
to bomb Sinn Fein offices in the Republic...

'TOMMY' feared no man.

He was a formidable figure, heavily-built but with a warm
and affable personality.

A Catholic, he was a member of the junior IRA who was,
years later, sworn into the UVF in a flat in the Rathcoole
estate.

He was able to swan into UVF clubs anywhere - even the
terror group's Shankill Road HQ - in the company of a
serial killer who was in the pay of Special Branch.

I first met him in 1985 while I was investigating the IRA
murder of a member of the security forces, who was shot in
the back at his home in the loyalist Tigers Bay area of
Belfast.

Tommy was a friend of the young man's family, and the
cowardly murder had sickened him.

At that time he lived in a nationalist area and was very
knowledgeable about local PIRA members.

He agreed to help us bring the killers to justice, but he
was cautious. He would speak in riddles, saying a lot but
telling us very little.

Tommy remained in touch with us for years and soon got over
his fear of working with the RUC.

He had been a member of the Fianna (junior IRA) but escaped
the grip of the Provos when he moved to England for a few
years.

He did not renew his association with the IRA when he
returned.

Tommy, who had a criminal record, moved freely among both
communities, having family ties in nationalist areas and
friends from loyalist areas.

But when he first came forward to help us, he was actually
under a death threat from the PIRA for reasons he did not
want to reveal. On a one-to-one basis, no Provo would dare
to tackle him without a gun in his hand.

In 1991, Tommy began to develop a close friendship with a
local senior UVF man - 'X', from the loyalist Mount Vernon
estate. It's a measure of Tommy's personality that he was
able to get so close to 'X'. What he did not know was that
my CID partner, Trevor McIlwrath, had recruited 'X' some
years earlier.

But now that 'X' was actively involved in terrorist crimes,
he had been passed over to Special Branch.

Trevor had remained with 'X' as a joint CID handler, and
kept me fully briefed.

Other CID sources in 'X"s UVF group were reporting he was
becoming vicious and uncontrollable.

This was a sad, because initially he had co-operated fully
with us and had frustrated UVF operations always to save
life.

Trevor and I had long resolved to arrest 'X', but the only
obstacle was the absolute carte blanche he had been
afforded by his Special Branch handlers.

Special Branch took the view that he was far too valuable
to them at that time to consider removing him from the
picture, even though we argued there were other informants
in the same group.

We watched with fascination as the strange relationship
between Tommy and 'X' blossomed.

'X' trusted Tommy implicitly, and Tommy reported back to
us.

Tommy moved to a new home just outside Belfast. Both he and
'X' had common-law wives. They also had other girlfriends -
they played hard.

As long as Tommy was in 'X"s company, he was made welcome
in UVF haunts anywhere.

He even frequented the UVF headquarters on the Shankill
Road in Belfast.

But, the truth was, Tommy was walking on eggshells. I knew
it would only be a matter of time before his new-found UVF
friends would turn on him, and we warned him of this
possibility time and again.

Treacherous Branch man exposes Tommy as tout

TOMMY saved an innocent young Catholic man from UVF killers
- but in return he had own life jeopardised by an
unscrupulous Special Branch man.

The treacherous Branch man exposed Tommy as an informer to
protect one of his own agents - a UVF killer - from arrest.

It was in 1995 that Tommy revealed he had been asked to
supply a car for a UVF sectarian murder.

The target was a young Catholic man who regularly walked
his Protestant girlfriend home to a loyalist area just off
the Antrim Road.

Tommy could not find out the identity of the intended
victim.

He had merely been tasked by 'Y', a senior UVF man, to
supply a roadworthy car to the murder gang.

What he didn't know was that 'Y' was a Special Branch
informer, just like his best friend 'X'.

Worse, 'Y"s handler was a particularly unpleasant Special
Branch officer, Alec (not his real name).

Tommy said 'Y' was keen to carry out the murder personally
to elevate himself in the eyes of his Shankill Road bosses,
while 'X' was on holiday abroad.

Tommy volunteered to give us the car first so that we could
plant a tracker device and intercept the killers.

My CID partner and I had carried out similar operations
before, with full Special Branch co-operation.

But this time we would be asking the Branch to move against
'Y', one of their own agents, and I just did not trust
Alec.

I asked another Special Branch officer I trusted, who was
based at Tennent Street, to handle the car bugging
operation and I did not reveal 'Y's involvement.

Tommy supplied the car to Special Branch and it was quickly
returned to him kitted out with a tracker device.

But, a few days later, an anxious Tommy called me saying
the UVF had not collected the car.

UVF men, who daily visited his home, had suddenly stopped
calling.

He feared they knew about the bug in the car.

"How did the UVF find out?" he asked.

I tried to pacify him saying there was no way they knew.

Tommy was not easily rattled but he was panicking. I
advised him to brazen it out with his UVF associates. He
was terrified - but he agreed.

As it happened, he was due to attend a UVF meeting at a
commander's home in Shore Crescent within the next day or
so.

After that meeting, a terrified Tommy called me again. It
had not gone well.

There had been an overnight arson attack on a bar on the
outskirts of Glengormley, a well-known UVF haunt in those
days.

CID's Serious Crime Squad had an on-going operation in the
bar, which they believed would result in the arrests of
sinister UVF men who were extorting money from the owner.

RUC covert cameras had been installed to capture the
blackmailers, who included Branch agents 'X' and 'Y'.

An ashen-faced Tommy arrived at my home later as arranged.
He said when he walked into the UVF leader's house, some of
his former cronies had pinched their noses with their
fingers.

"F***, do you smell that?" one had said.

"Are your mates Jonty and Trevor out there, Tommy?" they
asked.

Tommy said he was met by a barrage of profanities when he
tried to bluff it out.

The UVF commander 'Y' had later called at his house,
ordered him into his car and drove him to the burnt-out
Glengormley bar.

"Look at it! What you see is what we do to people who f***
us about, Tommy," said 'Y'.

He told Tommy the UVF had been tipped off about the
concealed cameras.

"We know all about the bug in the car, too. We don't want
the f****** car. We know you are working for Jonty Brown
and Trevor McIlwrath.

"You have been f****** us about, Tommy. This is what
happens to people who f*** us about.

"Do you want a fire at your house with a wee baby there? Do
you?" barked 'Y'. Tommy's gut reaction was to reach over
and pull the head off 'Y'. God knows, he was capable of it.

But he kept his cool and denied contacts with Trevor and
myself.

As I listened to him, I became incensed. Who was tipping
off the UVF?

Despite friction between myself and some unscrupulous
Special Branch officers, even I did not think that they
would do such a thing.

My partner and I decided that 'X', the UVF man from Mount
Vernon, might have the answers.

'X' was now taking life after life, but he was a "protected
species" as a Branch informer.

It would have been easier to put him in jail than it was to
put Johnny Adair away. Yet, no-one was interested.

My partner and I were normally not allowed to meet or speak
to him. But on this occasion we received clearance from a
senior CID officer

We drove 'X' to countryside near Templepatrick where he
revealed Special Branch man Alec's treachery.

He said 'Y' claimed to have a relative or friend who was an
RUC reservist at a Co Antrim police station.

'Y' had told Shankill Road UVF leaders how the reservist
overheard Special Branch men talking in the staff canteen
about a tout called Tommy, who let them bug a car that was
to used in a UVF murder.

'X' said few people really believed 'Y"s reservist story,
adding the UVF suspected he was a tout.

'X' also revealed that Alec and his other Special Branch
handlers had tipped him off about the CID cameras at the
Glengormley bar.

And he said it was very likely that the Branch man had also
warned 'Y' about both the cameras and bugged car, as he had
told him 'Y' worked for Special Branch.

As I sat in that police car, I became more and more
outraged. I asked about Tommy.

'X' told me that Tommy was doing a good job on the denials,
but, since he was a "Fenian", it was likely that the UVF
would err on the side of caution and kill him.

We appealed to him to do all he could to save Tommy.

He agreed, but added nonchalantly: "What if I can't, Jonty?
What if Tommy gets whacked?"

I lost it. I said if anything happened to Tommy, I would
put in enough "mix" to see he met the same fate. I had no
intention of doing any such thing, but my threat had the
desired effect.

Trevor and I dropped him off and headed back to Castlereagh
barracks. I was furious. We now knew that Tommy's life had
been put at risk and two police operations deliberately
compromised to protect Alec's Branch agent 'Y'.

Was Tommy's life so worthless? Who did these people think
they were?

How the UVF was riddled with touts

IT was through Tommy I discovered a Special Branch agent
was pushing to have me murdered by the UVF.

"Use a rat to kill a rat" was a tactic used by some Branch
officers - use a terrorist to kill a terrorist.

Now I feared that an idiot Branch officer called 'Alec'
(not his real name) was using the same dirty trick against
me.

Tommy had previously brazened out suspicions he was a CID
tout.

Every fifth person in the UVF is an informer and I knew
they were reluctant to have an inquiry.

Tommy was now telling me how 'Z', another Mount Vernon UVF
man, was raising suspicions about him again.

'Z' was also telling everyone my address, pushing to have
me "done".

He didn't know that 'Z' worked for Special Branch. His
handler was my "old friend".

He handled some of the most vicious terrorists and had
often threatened to turn them on me.

On Wednesday, 2 April, 1997 Tommy called saying he was in
danger of being shot by the UVF and wanted to "come in". He
told of a proposed UVF bomb attack on a Sinn Fein office in
Monaghan.

The UVF had told him to hire a car to plant the bomb, and
he'd already taken part in a dummy run, and collected
Powergel explosives.

Fearing a set-up, he said: "Can you imagine what it would
be like for me, a Fenian in Portlaoise jail, on remand for
a UVF bomb on Sinn Fein office?"

When he got cold feet and pulled out of the mission, the
UVF turned on him. Tommy wanted to "come in". But in order
to convince my bosses that he was worth a good resettlement
package, he agreed to supply information that would lead to
a massive haul of UVF weapons.

'X' had made him quartermaster in charge of some of the
Mount Vernon UVF's best "gear", including a large quantity
of Powergel and a new VZ58 assault rifle.

As a result, CID planned a series of raids, codenamed
'Operation Mechanic'.

But when Special Branch were briefed, they claimed our
source could not produce the Powergel or the rifle, unaware
Tommy had already handed them over!

It would have been laughable, if had not been so serious.

We were told the raids could go ahead, but Special Branch,
for reasons best known to themselves, had vetoed the more
important ones, including a virtual arsenal in the Shore
Road area and other dumps in north and west Belfast.

Special Branch also put a 24-hour block on Operation
Mechanic. Clearly they were having difficulty contacting
some of their informants. The 'force within a force' were
warning UVF murderers we were coming after them.

When Operation Mechanic finally went ahead I watched as
officers returned from house after house empty-handed.

My partner Trevor and I became the butt of jokes from other
inept officers, who loved to see us fail.

Thank God we had isolated the two big items - without the
Powergel and the VZ58 assault rifle, the operation would
have been a complete disaster.

The UVF Mount Vernon terrorists had been given time to move
their weapons.

This bunch of murderous thugs continued to kill long after
the loyalist ceasefires and we knew they were planning
bombings in the Republic.

If I had been given a free rein and a few detectives, I
could have put the entire unit of business.

Why were we being obstructed by Special Branch? What was
the alleged "bigger picture"? I really would have liked to
have known.

Extracted from Into The Dark: 30 years in the RUC,
published by Gill and Macmillan on November 1, priced
£16.99
----

http://www.sundaylife.co.uk/news/story.jsp?story=667219

Into The Dark: Beaten up by a fellow cop and told I would
be shot

Former detective Johnston Brown reveals today how he was
brutally attacked by a UVF supporting RUC colleague who
also issued a chilling death threat...only days before a
gunman arrived on his doorstep.

30 October 2005

He fought to put terrorist killers like Johnny Adair behind
bars and was the victim of dirty tricks from sinister
elements inside the RUC's Special Branch. Now former top
CID detective Johnston Brown has written a gripping account
of his career. Adapted by Sunday Life's Stephen Gordon from
Into The Dark.

"I'll see you're shot," my CID colleague shouted at me.

"I've given your new address in Monkstown to the UVF." This
was no idle threat.

Detective John Duncan (not his real name) was known as a
loyalist paramilitary sympathiser.

The mistake I'd made in Duncan's eyes was to arrest a van
load of suspected UVF men in Monkstown, in Christmas 1974
and then try to bring them to justice.

What followed was to make me question what sort of police
force I'd joined a couple of years earlier, and to bring me
close to quitting.

A colleague and I had brought the UVF suspects back to
Newtownabbey RUC station, after two handguns were found in
the van we had stopped.

Inside the station, a Christmas party was in full swing.

Other colleagues cheered at news of the arrests and arms
find, but I noticed two CID officers, Duncan and Walter
Jamieson (also not his real name) make their way to see the
prisoners.

When I opened the parade room door to see what was
happening, Duncan shouted: "GET OUT OF HERE, JONTY."

The prisoners were laughing and pointing at me.

"We're dealing with this now," he said.

I was already amazed that a man I had arrested after he had
identified himself as leader of the group had walked free
from the station.

Later that night, an angry Duncan pummelled me with his
fists, knees and feet as he shouted:

"Those men you stopped were on their way to guard a pub
from republican attack.

"Decent men and you have ruined their Christmas."

Duncan also warned me not to report a complaint from the
father of the youngest of the men arrested.

The distressed dad had telephoned, claiming his son had
been told by Detectives Duncan and Jamieson that Monkstown
UVF were ordering him to accept sole responsibility for the
guns - or his family would suffer.

Duncan viciously attacked me after I'd been lured into a
room, by another detective.

In a split second, he lifted me clear of the ground and
threw me against the wall. My head and back struck the wall
so violently that I was winded and stunned.

He then punched me on the side of my head. I saw blue and
white flashes as my head flew back against the wall.

I tried to push him away, but he was too strong.

He brought his face right up against mine. I could smell
the stench of bad breath and alcohol.

My mouth was filling with blood. I had bitten my tongue,
and I was afraid of passing out.

I considered reaching for my pistol, but feared it would
only up the ante, perhaps to the point of no return.

The other officer stood guard at the door as Duncan
continued beating me.

"There'll be no complaints from (the youth's father), you
can be sure about that," he said.

"And there'd better be none from you either or I'll see
you're shot. Do you understand me?

"Take yourself down to Bawnmore and stop Fenian cars
there."

"We'll see," I replied indignantly.

It was the wrong answer. Duncan lifted me off my feet and
placed a large hand around my throat and began choking me
before his colleague ran over and pulled him off me.

"Say one word about this, and we'll see you get it," he
said as I lay gasping for breath.

He then ran back and levelled one last kick at my left
shoulder.

I suffered more serious attacks during my 30 years as an
RUC officer.

But this was different. My assailant and his accomplice
were not street corner thugs. They were colleagues, dishing
it out at the behest of Monkstown UVF.

I walked unsteadily to the toilet area and watched with
sadness, as blood flowed from my mouth into the white
washhand basin.

My head was still spinning. What sort of police force had I
joined? I will resign tomorrow, I thought.

I confided in an older CID man, who warned me not to take
the matter further.

"You're wasting your time. John Duncan is untouchable. All
you'll do is get yourself transferred," he warned.

Extracted from Into The Dark: 30 years in the RUC,
published by Gill and Macmillan on November 1, priced
£16.99
----

http://www.sundaylife.co.uk/news/story.jsp?story=667217

Into The Dark: Tout Tommy's exile

30 October 2005

He fought to put terrorist killers like Johnny Adair behind
bars and was the victim of dirty tricks from sinister
elements inside the RUC's Special Branch. Now former top
CID detective Johnston Brown has written a gripping account
of his career. Adapted by Sunday Life's Stephen Gordon from
Into The Dark.

TOMMY was resettled in England after Operation Mechanic -
but, to our amazement, this Catholic ex-IRA man renewed his
contacts with the UVF!

He received just £10,000 from the RUC and was naturally
very disappointed.

My partner Trevor flew over to England to fully debrief
him.

Trevor contacted me in an agitated state shortly after his
return flight touched down in Belfast, saying he had just
taken a call on his RUC mobile phone from 'Y', a UVF man
and Special Branch agent.

'Y' asked Trevor how "Tommy the tout" was doing in England,
even naming the town he had been resettled in! He asked
Trevor to give Tommy his regards, and to ask him if it was
worth it for £10,000.

In any event, our friend Tommy settled down in England,
having initially been suicidal.

He lives there today in self-exile, and is doing well in
business. I will always be grateful to him for his
assistance to us in our fight against terrorism.

But we were astounded to hear he was back in contact with
his old Mount Vernon UVF friend 'X', a sectarian killer.

He even had 'X' and some of his other former UVF cronies
come over to visit him.

We warned Tommy that it would end in grief, that 'X' was
evil. Tommy argued that we didn't really know 'X', that he
was a "great guy, really".

Extracted from Into The Dark: 30 years in the RUC,
published by Gill and Macmillan on November 1, priced
£16.99
----

http://www.sundaylife.co.uk/news/story.jsp?story=667216

Into The Dark: When the UVF came to visit

30 October 2005

He fought to put terrorist killers like Johnny Adair behind
bars and was the victim of dirty tricks from sinister
elements inside the RUC's Special Branch. Now former top
CID detective Johnston Brown has written a gripping account
of his career. Adapted by Sunday Life's Stephen Gordon from
Into The Dark.

A NERVOUS young gunman came to kill me just 10 days after a
rogue CID colleague claimed he had given the UVF my
address.

I have no doubts at all that the gunman had been sent to my
door at the request of my UVF-sympathising colleague.

I had only moved into my new home in Twinburn, Monkstown a
month earlier and, as far as I knew, no paramilitary group
knew of my new address.

I was out on the lawn in my front garden, making the most
of some beautiful May weather to weed the flowerbeds.

My personal protection weapon, a 9mm Walther, was hidden
underneath a bin lid, which I was tossing the weeds into.

The quiet in the estate was suddenly broken by the noisy
arrival of a car with a broken exhaust, and it stopped
outside my next-door neighbours' house.

I was on my knees weeding when I heard a door opening and a
gruff male voice shout:

"His motor's there, make it quick."

My car was parked up the side of the house and my gate was
closed.

I knew I was in trouble. Still on my knees, I reached below
the bin lid and grabbed hold of my Walther pistol.

My palms were sweating but my grip on the handgun was firm.

I watched with trepidation as a youth aged between 18 and
20-years-old approached my house.

He was slim, not very tall, had long, dark hair and wore an
overcoat three sizes too big for him.

He was so engrossed in watching my front door that he
didn't notice me kneeling on the other side of the three
foot garden wall, close enough to touch him.

He kept looking back at the car he had just left, as if for
inspiration.

I could see he was very nervous as he walked straight past
me and stopped at the front gate. He had his right hand
inside his overcoat pocket and, judging by the shape of the
bulge, was holding something in the pocket. I had no doubt
it was a gun.

He was trying with difficulty to open the wrought iron gate
with his left hand.

I was as nervous as he was, but I didn't want to do
anything that would make him panic.

"Can I help you?" I called as he wrestled with the gate.

He was totally taken aback. He stared at me and then looked
back at his friend in the car.

"It's about the car for sale," he said.

I saw him staring towards my right hand, which was hidden
under the bin.

I smiled at him in a bid to indicate that I had no idea
that anything was wrong. I could see the blind panic in his
eyes.

He looked back yet again over his shoulder towards the car
where his waiting friend pumped the car horn twice and
revved the engine.

The youth was sweating. He moved slowly up from the gate
until he was standing directly above me. He tried to remove
his right hand from his coat pocket but it was stuck, so he
pointed the pocket and its contents up in my direction.

I was afraid that he was about to shoot me and removed my
handgun from below the bin into full view.

He couldn't take his eyes off it. He backed away a few
steps at a time. He didn't speak. Then he panicked and ran
to the car.

I was honestly glad to see him go. I had no wish to hurt
him, even though I knew he had come to my home to murder
me.

I got to my feet. There was a loud sound from the exhaust
as the dark-coloured Hillman Avenger sped off up Twinburn
Drive.

I had been very lucky.

Extracted from Into The Dark: 30 years in the RUC,
published by Gill and Macmillan on November 1, priced
£16.99

******************************************

http://www.sundaylife.co.uk/news/story.jsp?story=667233

£4.6 Million

That's how much the PSNI spent last year re-hiring RUC men
paid off in policing reform

By Alan Murray
30 October 2005

THE PSNI spent a staggering £4.6m hiring ex-RUC officers
and other specialists to help solve crime last year.

More than 200 former RUC officers have been regularly
engaged by the PSNI to assist crime investigations and
review cases since November 2001, Sunday Life has learned.

Of the 2,816 officers who left the RUC and the PSNI through
the downsizing programme, around 225 (8pc), have been hired
to carry out tasks for the police.

The revelation is contained in a letter to the DUP's Sammy
Wilson from Joe Stewart, the PSNI's Director of Human
Resources.

Mr Wilson, a member of the Policing Board, said he was
astonished at the cost of hiring former RUC officers and
other specialist personnel.

"If they needed these skills why did they ever get rid of
the officers who can provide them in the first place," said
the East Antrim MLA.

"This was just part of the Patten madness which was more
intent on cleaning out officers with an RUC background,
than delivering effective policing.

"Now the police are left with a huge bill to employ former
officers at high fees, to achieve those skills which vast
amounts of taxpayers' money was used to get rid of.

"What a waste of cash and resources," said the DUP man.

"I wonder what the total cost would be since November 2001
- it could be nearly £20m.

"How many full-time police officers could the Chief
Constable have employed for that?" he asked.

In his letter to Mr Wilson, dated October 6, Mr Stewart
revealed that during the financial year 2004/05 "we
incurred total costs of £4.6m for the assignment of Agency
workers to the PSNI".

Mr Stewart's stated that the details were presented by the
Deputy Chief Constable, Paul Leighton, in July this year,
and given to the Human Resources Committee.

He said Mr Leighton stated that 8pc of former officers had
been engaged, via the Grafton recruitment agency, as at
July 2005.

Sunday Life had asked the PSNI to provide figures under the
Freedom of Information Act three months ago.

But the force said it was unable to provide an accurate
breakdown of how many former RUC officers had been engaged
to assist in the processing or completion of
investigations, or the cost during the last financial year.

In a letter dated September 16, Michael Ross, the PSNI's
Corporate Information Manager, said: "The PSNI does not
hold the information requested, as our financial system
does not break the costs down to this level."

******************************************

http://www.sinnfein.ie/news/detail/11746

Gerry Adams Expresses Deep Sorrow At The Untimely Death Of
Daithí Forde

Published: 30 October, 2005

Sinn Féin President Gerry Adams MP has expressed his deep
sorrow at the untimely death of party Ard Chomhairle member
Daithí Forde, who died early this morning [Sunday]. Mr.
Adams has extended his sympathy to Daithí's three children,
Thomas, Ciara and Lyndsey.

Mr. Adams said:

"It was with deep sorrow that I learned of Daithí's
untimely death early this morning. Although he had been
seriously ill, the death of such a young man will be very
difficult for all those who knew him.

"In recent years, Daithí played a major role in the
development of Sinn Féin both in his native Wexford and
throughout Leinster. He was also very active on the
national stage and a regular visitor to many counties
throughout Ireland where he was held in high regard.

"I want to extend my deepest sympathy to Daithí's family
and friends, particularly his children, Thomas, Ciara and
Lyndsey. He will be deeply missed by all those who knew
him.

"I measc laochra na nGael go raibh sé."ENDS

******************************************

http://www.sundaylife.co.uk/news/story.jsp?story=667240

Arlene Files Are Taken From Top Former Cop

By Joe Oliver
30 October 2005

POLICE files held by a former top cop who led the Arlene
Arkinson murder inquiry have been 'retrieved' by
investigators from the Police Ombudsman's office, it was
revealed yesterday.

They also intend to interview retired RUC Chief
Superintendent Eric Anderson as part of their investigation
into the police handling of the controversial case.

Mr Anderson, who quit the force four years ago, was
secretly filmed during a UTV Insight documentary saying he
held onto files from the 1994 inquiry. He said they were
with his legal advisor - and asked for £700 to discuss the
tragic teenager's case.

Following the first screening of the show two weeks ago,
police made it clear that all documents generated in the
course of an investigation were the property of the Chief
Constable and not any individual officer.

Mr Anderson, who also headed the Omagh bomb probe, could
not be contacted yesterday.

The Police Ombudsman's office launched an inquiry following
a complaint by Arlene's sister, Kathleen.

Serial sex beast Robert Howard (61) was cleared of Arlene's
abduction and murder last June - but the Belfast jury was
not told of his sickening history of sex crimes, including
the murder of English schoolgirl Hannah Williams in 2002.

Arlene (15) disappeared in 1994 after a night out in Co
Donegal and was last seen in the company of Howard. Her
body has never been found.

The Arkinson family recently demanded a public inquiry into
the events surrounding Arlene's murder, but Secretary of
State Peter Hain said such a decision could not be taken
until the conclusion of any investigation by the Police
Ombudsman or PSNI.

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http://dailyireland.televisual.co.uk/home.tvt?_ticket=NBSEAOWM4BEFURUSRVMAAQ4S7AKACK5IURWGIRNBJR1JBKLAFSMY7QRFL1OAERSEAOW4Z3RGUU4EIOTE9NTKJKLAFS4061C0AY&_scope=DailyIreland/Content/News&id=13408&opp=1

Former Prisoners' Anger After Support Group Raids

Connla Young

Former republican prisoners have reacted with anger after
the offices of a support group was raided by the PSNI
yesterday.

The offices of Teach na Fáilte in Strabane, Co Tyrone, and
on the Falls Road in Belfast were searched and documents
were removed during a series of raids carried out across
the North yesterday morning which saw 20 homes and
businesses targeted.

Set up almost ten years ago, Teach na Fáilte works with
former Irish National Liberation Army prisoners.

A Teach na Fáilte spokesperson said a number of homes
belonging to Teach na Fáilte employees were also raided by
several heavily armed PSNI units.

A leading figure in the ex-prisoner's group Eddie
McGarrigle hit out at the PSNI after he was tossed from his
wheelchair by a PSNI man attempting to pull the shutters
down outside the group's Strabane office.

"At a time when Teach na Fáilte is getting its doors
sledgehammered open Bertie Ahern met with political
representatives of a group that has killed 28 people since
its ceasefire," said Mr McGarrigle.

"What is Bertie Ahern going to say about these raids?

"Two years ago he spoke about his support of Teach na
Fáilte and the republican socialist movement and the
direction they are taking.

"The mood of the republican socialist movement and former
INLA prisoners is one of absolute anger.

"They have taken away all our funding documents and put a
lot of people out of employment.

"For over ten years we have been peace building and working
towards conflict resolution and this work can all be
verified.

"People should be aware that the offices of the IRSP were
not raided and with the exception of two people who are
members of the IRSP the majority of raids were carried out
at the homes non-political people. They are simply
employees at Teach na Fáilte.

"Many of these people work with us on the New Deal
programme.

"I believe this action has been carried out to provoke a
response."

Earlier this month Mr McGarrigle called on anti agreement
republicans not on ceasefire to bring their campaigns to an
end.

Belfast-based IRSP man Paul Little said the raids were
politically motivated.

"The PSNI have demonstrated once again that they are not a
new beginning to policing but rather a new politically
motivated paramilitarist force, that excels in all the bad
traits of the RUC."

A spokesperson for the PSNI said the 20 raids were carried
out by their Organised Crime Squad.

The PSNI claimed the raids formed part of an ongoing
criminal investigation.

******************************************

http://www.thepost.ie/post/pages/p/story.aspx-qqqt=NEWS-qqqs=news-qqqid=9264-qqqx=1.asp

Catholic Church Faces Major Sex Abuse Bill

30 October 2005 By Paul T Colgan

The Catholic Church faces a potential compensation bill of
as much as €250 million for clerical sex abuse resulting
from existing claims and new cases set to emerge following
the publication of the Ferns Report last week.

This is in addition to the €128 million already paid to
victims of abuse in children's homes run by religious
orders, bringing the total potential cost to as much as
€380 million.

The number of sex abuse claims in Ferns could average about
one for every four priests, taking into account the
likelihood of multiple claims against offending clerics,
according to figures to be released next month.

With the number of priests and brothers in Ireland standing
at more than 6,500 and the average cost of a settlement in
Ferns totalling €150,000, the Church could be landed with a
bill of €250 million in compensation and legal fees as
inquiries into abuse continue in all dioceses. So far, more
than 250 priests have been accused of abuse, 21 of whom
served in the Ferns diocese.

By last November, the Wexford diocese had made 17
settlements at a cost of €2.8 million. This figure is
expected to have risen by around a third in this year's
financial results.

In some cases, victims of abuse have received settlements
in excess of €300,000.

Mervyn Rundle, who was molested by convicted sex abuser Fr
Tom Naughton, received an estimated €345,000 in 2003.

In addition, the Church is thought to have paid around
€150,000 in legal fees for both sides in that case.

The government will be carrying out audits in every diocese
in the state. It is thought that the investigations could
uncover scores of previously undisclosed abuse cases.
Michael McDowell, the Minister for Justice, will bring
proposals to government shortly for an inquiry into
clerical abuse in the Dublin archdiocese.

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http://www.irishexaminer.com/pport/web/ireland/Full_Story/did-sghlGHTSazhBcsgDQQ5wn3uAIg.asp

PDs Accused Of Doing U-Turn On Colombia Three

By Harry McGee

THE Progressive Democrats were yesterday accused of backing
down from their proposal that the so-called Colombia Three
be made serve their prison sentences in Ireland.

Fine Gael justice spokesman Jim O'Keeffe yesterday claimed
Tánaiste Mary Harney suggested last August that the
Transfer of Sentences Bill might provide a solution to
allow the three republicans serve sentences in Ireland for
convictions handed down in Colombia.

"But, said Mr O'Keeffe, the PDs had gone "very cold on the
idea of using the new legislation."

The claim of a PD U-turn emerged during an exchange between
Mr O'Keeffe and Justice Minister Michael McDowell as the
Report Stage of the Transfer of Sentence Bill was being
debated in the Dáil.

Mr McDowell said the Bill was prepared long before the
Colombia Three controversy arose. He said it was never the
case that the Bill was "tailor made" to deal with that
situation.

The Justice Minister said the State which imposed the
sentence needs to sign up to the Convention and Protocol
that allows sentences to be transferred from one
jurisdiction to another. Colombia has not done that to
date, he said.

He also pointed out that Colombia has also applied for
extradition of the three men, James Monaghan, Niall
Connolly and Martin McCauley. He went on to say that if
extradition was not possible, then it was unlikely that
sentences could be transferred if there was no equivalence
between the offences in Ireland and Colombia.

However, the minister's spokesperson later said that it
would remain an option if extradition was not possible
because of other reasons other that the need for equivalent
offences.

However, Mr O'Keeffe contended the minister's
identification of obstacles to this solution flew in the
face of a press release issued by the Tánaiste in August
when she specifically identified this legislation as a
means of making the men serving their 17-year sentences.

Mr O'Keeffe argued: "Tough talk at the end of the summer
has wilted away to dry procedural debate. All the while the
three convicted men remain at large as the solution is
abandoned."

Meanwhile, Mr McDowell also formally withdrew his threat
yesterday to outsource prison escorts and other services to
private contractors.

In a Senate debate on the Prisons Bill, he said the
acceptance by prison officers of new work practices and pay
arrangements no longer made those contingency plans
necessary.

******************************************

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2091-1849337,00.html

McCabe Suspects Excluded From Irish Amnesty

Liam Clarke

TWO men who are wanted for questioning in relation to the
murder of Garda Jerry McCabe will be excluded by the Irish
government from a planned amnesty for IRA fugitives.

Irish legislation providing immunity for on-the-run
terrorists will be more restrictive than Britain's. Both
governments are bringing forward legislation allowing for
the amnesty as part of the political payback for the IRA's
decomissioning. The British legislation will be laid before
parliament next week. An Irish government source said:
"There may well be significant differences."

Paul Damery and Gerry Roche, who are living abroad and are
wanted for questioning by gardai about McCabe's murder,
will be excluded from any amnesty. Michael McDowell, the
Irish justice minister, has already vowed to seek their
extradition if they turned up in any country that has
extradition arrangements with Ireland.

Terrorists wanted in connection with the killing of members
of Northern Ireland's security forces will be covered by
the Irish legislation, however, which could lead to claims
that the amnesty provision is biased.

Under current British proposals, any person suspected of a
crime committed on behalf of a paramilitary organisation on
a recognised ceasefire would, if caught, be eligible for
immediate release on licence.

Attempts by the Police Service of Northern Ireland and some
civil servants to limit this provision have been rejected.
They had proposed limiting the amnesty to a year, during
which offenders could confess and be granted immunity from
punishment. If detected after the year had passed, they
would be tried in the normal way.

This, police argued, would create an incentive for
offenders to come forward, helping to create closure for
victims. Without the time limit there is no incentive to
confess and any offender would be advised by lawyers to
wait until they were apprehended by police.

About 1,800 murders related to the Troubles are unsolved. A
"cold-case" review of these killings is under way, but if
the current proposals go ahead, anybody caught will
automatically be released after a perfunctory court
appearance.

In the republic, the number of terrorist-related crimes is
smaller. However those suspected of atrocities such as the
Dublin and Monaghan bombings in 1974 and the murder of
Seamus Ludlow in Co Louth in 1976 could benefit from the
provisions if sufficient evidence was gathered against
them.

An Irish government source refused to say what mechanism
would be used to exclude Damery, Roche and those currently
jailed for the 1996 McCabe murder.

Damery, an electrician from Cobh in Co Cork, is believed to
be living in Nicaragua which has no extradition treaty with
Ireland. He owns the Shannon Irish bar in Managua, and in
2003 he was the secretary of the Irish Club of Nicaragua.
The club meets in his pub.

A former INLA man who later joined the Provisional IRA,
Damery fled Ireland shortly after the McCabe murder, which
occurred on June 7, 1996. He went to work for the Agency
for Personal Services Overseas (APSO), an Irish government-
funded relief agency, in Nicaragua. He had worked for APSO
in the early 1990s in Segundo Montes, El Salvador, along
with Niall Connolly, one of the Colombia three.

In October 1996, gardai told APSO that Damery was wanted
for questioning in connection with a serious criminal
offence and the agency agreed to co-operate by providing
information on his movements. The agency did not renew his
contract when it expired in 1999 and he then moved into the
pub trade.

Damery, who has denied involvement in republican
activities, has a Nicaraguan wife, Karla, and two sons.
Supporters claim that he visited Ireland at least once
before his contract with APSO expired.

Gardai believe that Roche, another McCabe suspect, is on
the run in Europe.

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Stabbing Motive Angers SF

PSNI says it is following a sectarian line of enquiry after
man is attacked in north Belfast

Ciarán Barnes

A stabbing incident in north Belfast which the PSNI believe
may have had a "sectarian motive" has drawn an angry
response from Sinn Féin.

A man was hospitalised late on Wednesday night after being
attacked by four males in the Peter's Hill area at the
bottom of the Shankill Road.

He was taken to hospital, but his injuries are not thought
to be life-threatening.

The PSNI are unsure about what direction his attackers ran
off in, and by yesterday afternoon had yet to establish the
religion of the injured man.

However, in a statement released yesterday morning the PSNI
said a sectarian motive was a line of enquiry.

This has angered Sinn Féin politicians who accused the PSNI
of double standards.

North Belfast councillor Carál Ní Chuilín said the comments
are in stark contrast to the silence surrounding summer
attacks on nationalists by loyalists.

Catholic schoolboy Thomas Devlin was murdered in August by
loyalist paramilitaries on Belfast's Somerton Road.

The PSNI is still refusing to described the murder as
sectarian.

And it took a number of days before detectives in Co Antrim
admitted there was a sectarian element to attacks on the
homes of Catholics in the village of Ahoghill.

Councillor Ní Chuilín said: "The response from the PSNI is
highly questionable and indeed dangerous. They jumped to
state that this attack was of a sectarian nature with very
little to go on.

"This statement stands in stark contrast to the silence
surrounding a summer of attacks against nationalists, when
the PSNI refused to state that such attacks were sectarian
despite overwhelming evidence that unionist paramilitaries
were behind them."

Referring to the Peter's Hill stabbing, a PSNI spokeswoman
said: "A sectarian motive is just one line of inquiry being
explored by the police."

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http://www.thepost.ie/post/pages/p/story.aspx-qqqt=NEWS%20FEATURES-qqqs=news-qqqid=9234-qqqx=1.asp

Liam Lawlor And The Story That Never Was

30 October 2005 By Seamus Martin

Alarm bells rang in the heads of experienced journalists as
soon as they read The Sunday Independent and The Observer
last Sunday.

One colleague was 35,000 feet above northern Spain on a
flight from Madrid to Dublin when the Sunday Independent
was distributed.

He turned to his wife and told her he was convinced the
story was wrong. It was the way things were phrased; there
was something strange about the way the stories were
written.

Journalists read newspapers in a different way to ordinary
readers.

We are accustomed to reading between the lines. Phrases
send signals to us that do not reach others.

In my own case the signals were especially strong. The
accident that led to what Seamus Dooley of the National
Union of Journalists (NUJ) has described as a "black day
for Irish journalism'' took place on a stretch of road I
know like the back of my hand. I must have travelled it a
couple of hundred times in my days as the Moscow
correspondent of the Irish Times and later as an
international observer for the Organisation for Security
and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) at Russian parliamentary
and presidential elections.

The place where Liam Lawlor died was part of the
constituency in which I was based for the OSCE; I know it
extremely well.

"Lawlor killed in red-light district with teenage girl''
read the headline in the Sunday Independent.

I read on and discovered this "red light district'' was
Khimki, a bleak suburb outside the Moscow city area.

Like anyone who knows Moscow, I began to laugh inwardly at
the ludicrous suggestion that Lawlor drove out from central
Moscow to pick up a girl.

Khimki had been the scene of roadside prostitution, but a
mass protest by residents in January 2004 led to police
action in cleaning the place up. Central Moscow, however,
is awash with prostitutes.

For someone to drive from there to Khimki for a 'devka', as
prostitutes are called in Russian slang, would be like
someone in the Pigalle area of Paris setting out for
Charles de Gaulle airport in search of sex. It simply made
no sense.

This information appeared to have been supplied by the
Moscow city police. Not so, according to Larisa Filatova,
spokeswoman for the city's police force, with whom I made
contact during the week.

The Moscow force had nothing to do with the accident, since
it happened outside Moscow, she said.

"We gave no information on it to anyone," she said.

Khimki is indeed outside the Moscow city area, so where
exactly did the accident happen?

The Observer article was specific. "The accident took place
close to the village of Symoka as Lawlor, his driver and
the girl were returning from Khimki," the newspaper said,
quoting a "spokesman from the Moscow city police'', which
has now denied having made any statement.

There are no villages on that stretch of the Leningradskoye
Chaussée, referred to by the Observer as the "Leningradski
Highway''. It is part of the main road from Sheremetyevo
Airport to the centre of the city. A huge red sculpture in
the form of a tank trap marks the point the Nazis reached
before being turned back for the first time in their quest
for lebensraum.

Among the "palaces of ill-repute'' along the way are Ikea,
a rival furniture store called Grand and a number of other
retail outlets.

Multi-storey apartment blocks line each side of the busy
dual carriageway.

When the truth emerged, that the woman who survived the
accident was a legal translator, the managing editor of
Independent Newspapers, Michael Denieffe, made an
unconditional apology and promised an internal
investigation. The Observer took a different line.

The Observer, once a bastion of quality journalism in
Britain, wrote that the woman was "suspected of being a
prostitute'' and initially refused to apologise, saying
that it had reported "accurately and in good faith'' on
comments made by the Moscow police. To use the term
"suspected of being a prostitute'' when no proof was
forthcoming does not smack of good faith.

And which Moscow police force was being reported
accurately?

Greater Moscow is a vast conurbation of more than 12million
people.

Like Greater London, it has more than one police force. The
Moscow city police, the equivalent of the London
Metropolitan Police, had denied making any statements
because the accident happened outside its jurisdiction.

I managed to make contact with the force in whose area the
accident took place.

A spokesman for the Moscow regional GUVD would not give his
name, but said that no statement on the accident was made
to journalists by his force.

The Observer, while eventually apologising, laid the blame
on the police, and it is possible that the police forces I
contacted were backtracking.

Nevertheless, the Observer report contained some glaring
inaccuracies. If we are to believe that newspaper, Lawlor
was killed in an unknown village in a place where there are
no villages, on a misspelled highway, with a translator who
was a "suspected prostitute''.

Belatedly, the Observer relented, saying that there were
"serious discrepancies'' in the account of events supplied
by the police.

"In the light of these discrepancies, we have removed the
story published in the Irish edition of the Observer from
our website. We would like to apologise for the
inaccuracies in the story and for the distress the story
caused." Once again, the paper was anxious to blame someone
else.

It may have been a "black day for Irish journalism'' but it
was not a particularly dazzling day for British quality
journalism either.

The Minister for Justice, Michael McDowell, in a
predictable reaction, promised his press council soon.

Will its remit deal not only with Irish newspapers but also
with the Irish editions of their British counterparts?

******************************************

http://www.thepost.ie/post/pages/p/story.aspx-qqqt=VINCENT%20BROWNE-qqqs=commentandanalysis-qqqid=9216-qqqx=1.asp

Opin: Press Council Vital To Put Manners On Media

30 October 2005 By Vincent Browne

Callers to RTE's Liveline programme who demanded the
resignation of Aengus Fanning as editor of The Sunday
Independent because of the grotesque defamation of Liam
Lawlor do not understand the politics of the media, or at
least the media controlled by Tony O'Reilly.

What matters is profit - and Fanning has delivered profit
to O'Reilly since he became editor in 1984. He is not about
to be dispatched because of a temporarily embarrassing faux
pas.

For a faux pas is all it is in O'Reilly medialand. A
"singular error'', we may be told - again. A mere mistake -
and, after all, in journalism, don't we all make mistakes?

That "singular'' error was replicated in the Sunday
Tribune, which O'Reilly also controls.

It was replicated also in the Sunday World and in the Star
on Sunday.

I suspect that not one of the editors responsible will be
admonished. Easy to see an error was made 'in hindsight',
it will be claimed.

It has nothing to do with hindsight. The editorial
executives across all four newspapers in the O'Reilly
stable should have known the articles were based entirely
on speculation.

Some of them should have realised that the story was based
on the speculation of a police officer who didn't deserve
to be believed anyway, for he had asserted confidentially
(or so it was reported) that Lawlor and the young woman
were not close associates.

How could he possibly have known?

In publishing the claim that the woman in the car was
"likely'' to be a prostitute, they all gave the game away.

They didn't have any basis to say whether she was or was
not, but they went ahead and smeared the name of Liam
Lawlor anyway. They did it in the belief that:

(a) no libel action could ensue from the defamation of a
dead man;

(b) the "likely prostitute'' was unlikely to sue in
Ireland, and anyway would have no chance of success because
she would not have had a reputation to be damaged here; and

(c) there would be no other comeback, for there was no
sanction of any kind on the media here for such gross,
reckless and cruel infliction of hurt on the already grief-
stricken family of Liam Lawlor.

Well, they may be wrong on one or two of these assumptions.
It is true that in common law – from which the law of libel
is derived, in the main - there is a rule that deceased
persons have no reputation to be harmed.

I do not know why or how this rule developed, but there it
is.

However, things may be different here in Ireland, for we
have a constitution that is also relevant to the law of
libel.

The Constitution requires the state to "vindicate'' the
good name of every citizen, and it might be argued that
even a dead citizen has a "good name'' to be vindicated.

Certainly the matter is not clear, and it would be
delightful were the Lawlor family to test the issue.

As for the "likely'' prostitute - the interpreter Julia
Kushnir - she too may have a case against the media that
published the material.

There might be a problem with identification, but again, it
would be worth a try.

But on one issue, these 'likely' lads were on a sure
wicket: there is no other comeback that would ensure a
sanction of any kind for the gross, reckless and cruel
infliction of hurt on the Lawlor family.

The O'Reilly media empire is permitted to make profit from
the infliction of such hurt, without sanction or redress -
except for the libel laws and, maybe, the constitutional
protection of privacy.

That a huge media conglomerate should be permitted to
enrich itself at the expense of ordinary citizens (and yes,
it is fair to characterise the bereaved Lawlor family as
such) is outrageous.

Manifestly - separately from any initiative on the reform
of the libel laws - procedures must be established to deter
this.

The obvious procedures should come by way of a statutory
press council, independent of the media and the government.

The media organisation of Tony O'Reilly will be the first
to invoke the traditional doctrine of a free press to
oppose this - as though it were concerned with the values
inherent in the free press doctrine.

The reality is that we do not have a free press.

We have a press that is owned and controlled, for the most
part, by corporations owned or controlled by powerful
individuals who expect the media under their control to
further their corporate and personal interests - not
blatantly in all circumstances, but essentially.

There is freedom of the press only for the owners of the
press - and their primary regard is not for the freedom of
citizens, but their own freedom to maximise profitability.

The maximisation of profitability may be laudable
generally, but in relation to the media there are obvious
problems unless safeguards are introduced - and this should
happen now, smartly, via a press council.

The press council should comprise nominees of a judicial
commission (that is supposed to be established anyway), the
Equality Authority (that proposal would stick delightfully
in the craws of O'Reilly and his hangers-on), the
Commission on Human Rights, trade unions involved in the
media and one nominee of the media.

It should have powers to draw up a code of practice
dealing, among other things, with invasions of privacy,
access to the media and media dominance.

The code should require the media to adhere to basic
journalistic standards, as outlined in the NUJ code of
conduct (but ignored by almost everyone, including the
NUJ).

It should also have powers of fines, sequestration and, if
necessary, suspension of publication, subject to High Court
approval.

That should put manners on them.

sbpost@iol.ie

******************************************

http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/1/hi/world/europe/4389566.stm

Irish Turf Club HQ Ruined In Fire

The headquarters of the historic Turf Club - Irish horse
racing's regulatory body - have been destroyed in a fire.

Six fire crews battled to put out the blaze at the building
on the Curragh racecourse, Co Kildare, which started
shortly after 1900 GMT.

Cliff Noone, press officer of the Turf Club, said the
building had been destroyed and the roof had collapsed.

About 85% of historical racing form books, dating back to
1790, had been saved, he added.

"It was a pretty extensive fire, the roof on the building
has completely collapsed and as we are speaking I am
standing across the road, and the back of the building is
still ablaze," Mr Noone said on Saturday night.

"There are several fire crews and many garda around, but it
is under control," he added.

Records saved

Mr Noone said there was no indication as to how the fire
started but that an investigation would be launched.

There were no injuries in the fire, he said.

Fire crews from Kildare and Naas rushed to the scene after
security staff were alerted to the blaze at about 0715 BST.

The Turf Club, founded in 1790, is responsible for both
flat and national hunt racing in Ireland.

Mr Noone said that a high percentage of the racing records
had been saved because they were kept behind a fire proof
wall.

The form books carried the records of every race run in
Ireland, he added.

"We have lost a lot of paperwork and files - we don't know
the extent of it yet. Whatever is lost, is lost."

Story from BBC NEWS:
Published: 2005/10/29 23:29:19 GMT
© BBC MMV

******************************************

http://www.sundaylife.co.uk/news/story.jsp?story=667245

Keenan Sister Fights For Life

Exclusive by Stephen Breen
30 October 2005

THE sister of former Belfast hostage Brian Keenan was last
night fighting for her life after she was involved in an
horrific car crash.

Elaine Spence, who campaigned to have her brother released
after he was kidnapped by Islamic militants in 1986, is in
intensive care at the Ulster Hospital, in Dundonald.

It is understood she suffered serious injuries to her head
and body in the accident near Comber, on Tuesday.

The Co Down woman's sister, Brenda Gillham, who also
campaigned for over four years for the release of her
brother, spoke of her horror when told of the accident.

Mrs Gillham, from Ballybeen, has been maintaining a bedside
vigil ever since.

She said: "We still don't know what happened to Elaine and
all we can do is wait and hope and pray.

"We are really too upset to make any further comment at the
minute and just want to be left alone."

The mum-of-one is expected to be transferred to the Royal
Victoria Hospital next week.

The 45-year-old and a friend were rushed to hospital after
she appeared to lose control of her car outside Comber in
the early hours of last Tuesday morning.

She suffered serious injuries to her head, body and arms.

The hospital confirmed that the Co Down woman was in a
critical condition.

Added the spokesman: "Mrs Spence remains in a critical
condition and is currently in intensive care.

"Doctors have, so far, been unable to establish the full
extent of her injuries."

A pal of Mrs Spence was also rushed to hospital and is
believed to be in a stable condition.

It is understood the vehicle may have skidded on wet
leaves, before veering off the road.

A police spokeswoman appealed for anyone who may have
witnessed the incident to come forward.

East Belfast community worker, Frankie Gallagher, who is a
friend of Mrs Spence, hopes she will make a full recovery.

Said Mr Gallagher: "I have worked with Elaine before and
know her quite well. Everyone in Ballybeen is shocked at
this news.

"We just hope she gets better and everyone is praying for
Elaine's family at this difficult time."

******************************************

http://www.sundaylife.co.uk/news/story.jsp?story=667207

Tory Golden Boy Cameron Supports Review Motion

By Stephen Breen
30 October 2005

TORY golden boy David Cameron is among 112 MPs who have now
signed a Commons motion calling for a new inquiry into the
Chinook helicopter tragedy, on the Mull Of Kintyre.

Mr Cameron, the favourite to become the next Conservative
Party leader, has thrown his weight behind demands for Tony
Blair to overturn verdicts of "gross negligence" against
the two pilots involved in the crash.

The motion has gained support from across the political
spectrum, from Labour left-wingers like Clare Short and
Chris Mullin to Tories like Anne Widdecombe and Oliver
Letwin.

The DUP's entire Westminster team has also signed the
motion, as has the sole Ulster Unionist MP, Lady Sylvia
Hermon and SDLP leader, Mark Durkan.

The development comes after Conservative MP Henry
Bellingham claimed new RAF rules on fatal accidents, mean
that if a similar crash happened today, the pilots would
not be blamed.

In light of the rule changes, Mr Bellingham put forward the
motion calling on the Ministry of Defence to re-open its
inquiry into the Chinook crash, which claimed the lives of
many of Ulster's top terrorism experts.

Twenty-nine people, including senior MI5 and RUC officers,
were killed when the aircraft crashed on June 2, 1994 - the
RAF's worst peacetime disaster.

The senior members of the intelligence community were
travelling from RAF Aldergrove to a security conference, at
Fort George, near Inverness.

A 1995 RAF Board of Inquiry report blamed the crash on
"gross negligence" by the pilots, Flight Lieutenants
Richard Cook and Jonathan Tapper.

But, an all-party House of Lords select committee
unanimously concluded, in February, 2002, that the MoD's
finding of "gross negligence" was not justified.

Mr Bellingham, who represents some of the families of those
who died in the tragedy, told Sunday Life: "The RAF's rules
on fatal accidents have now changed, and the Chinook pilots
would never have been blamed for the crash, if they had
been in place a decade ago.

"The MoD has already made its findings, but there's no
reason why they can't re-investigate the crash in light of
these new rules.

"The families of the pilots will never believe that they
caused the crash, and they have been given some hope now
with these changes.

"I'm delighted the campaign is now gaining momentum and
pleased so many MPs, who sit on opposite sides of the
house, now want the MoD to re-investigate the tragedy."

? Tory leadership favourite David Cameron is also
supporting a campaign to retain Northern Ireland's grammar
schools. He has signed a petition calling on the government
to "ensure that the present ethos, structure and standards
of education in Northern Ireland are preserved".

******************************************

http://www.nuzhound.com/articles/irish_news/arts2005/oct28_past_not_done_with_us__Editorial.php

Opin: The Past Is Not Done With Us

(Editorial, Irish News)

Two important developments over the last 48 hours have
again highlighted the challenges involved in unresolved
investigations from the past.

A new report from the police ombudsman, Nuala O'Loan, has
implicated six members of the former RUC special branch in
the cover-up of at least 12 loyalist murders during the
1990s.

It has also emerged that Westminster legislation dealing
with 'on-the-run' paramilitary figures is likely to be
introduced before Christmas.

The collusion allegations, revealed in the Irish News
yesterday (Thursday) and later raised in the Dail, centre
on the activities of a north Belfast UVF leader who was
also a police informer.

It has been suggested that some detectives placed their
agent above the law by allowing him to take part in
paramilitary attacks without fear of criminal charges.

The amount of detail which is understood to be included in
Mrs O'Loan's report places the case at a particularly
alarming level.

Many nationalists believe that police officers have
frequently escaped prosecution in similar circumstances
over the years.

The 'on-the-run' debate has been on the political agenda
for some time, and concerns the possibility of individuals
who absconded finally being allowed to return home.

Almost all the suspects are from a republican background
and unionists are likely to feel that the British
government's initiative represents a virtual amnesty.

The Stormont secretary of state, Peter Hain, has
acknowledged the difficulties linked to conflict resolution
issues, and it needs to be accepted on all sides that
further dilemmas can be expected to follow.

It is therefore essential that increasingly serious
consideration is given to the launch of some form of truth
commission in Northern Ireland.

The South African model is only one option and other
alternatives from different parts of the world are
available.

If a viable structure cannot be found, it will be almost
impossible to decide which matters are inside or outside
the criteria for inquiries and tribunals.

Unless these issues can be properly addressed, they could
cause upset and instability for decades to come.

October 30, 2005

******************************************

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2091-1849228,00.html

Opin: Liam Clarke: The DUP Should Emulate Sinn Fein And
Play A Smarter Game

The biggest problem facing unionism as it drifts towards
2006 is finding a new definition of success. So far,
triumph has been defined as halting political change, and
so has proved elusive, leading to deep disappointment among
the unionist population.

The career of Ian Paisley is a case in point. Throughout
his adult years, he has talked about Ulster being sold down
the river. Every step towards our present political
position has been portrayed as a step backwards that he was
powerless to resist.

Evelyn Waugh once remarked that, for all its vaunted
success, the Conservative party had not managed to turn
back the clock by a single minute. The same could be said
of the DUP.

Over the years Paisley has vowed to resist the disbandment
of the B Specials, the opening of playgrounds on Sundays,
the fall of Stormont, the ending of majority rule, the
implementation of the Anglo-Irish agreement and most other
political initiatives taken by the British government. He
has never once succeeded in stopping the change taking
place, yet he does not consider himself a failure.

The strange thing is that, at the end of 30 years of
sellout by weak unionist leaderships and treacherous
British governments, the DUP speaks of improved relations
with the Irish government, a better understanding between
north and south and the prospect of power-sharing between
the two communities. Paisley is making plans to meet
Archbishop Brady, the Roman Catholic primate, and he is a
regular in the taoiseach's office. He even found a few soft
words to say on the death of the Pope.

He looks happier and he is claiming that, despite the
continuous betrayal of its principles, unionism has never
been stronger and more confident than it is now.

You might imagine that this would give him pause for
thought. He might, for instance, consider whether it was
worthwhile continuing to cast himself in the role of King
Canute, attempting to hold back every new development, when
things have turned out so well. Might he not, in fact, do
better working with the grain of history rather than
against it?

Recent statements show that Paisley is still in Canute
mode. Take the issue of on-the-run terrorists (OTRs). On
April 1, 2003, as an annex to a joint declaration, the
British and Irish governments set out their plans to let
OTRs return home without facing imprisonment.

It clearly stated that the provisions would extend to
people who supported paramilitary groups who were on
ceasefire and would cover all offences committed on behalf
of those organisations before the signing of the Good
Friday agreement. Those who benefited would have findings
of guilt recorded against them but would be released on
licence without serving a prison sentence. The governments
stated that these provisions would come into force for
republicans once the IRA had disarmed and ceased all
violent activity.

Politics unfolded on that basis and the DUP offered to
enter government with Sinn Fein last December knowing this
would be the outcome. Yet last week we have Paisley talking
about the OTR proposals as if they had just cropped up,
accusing the government of "bowing to the atrocious
demands" of a disarmed IRA and of setting out to "trample
the unionist population".

He vowed to orchestrate "the greatest possible resistance"
and spoke again of "betrayal". He went on to say that "in
no way must these serious surrenders be allowed to come to
fruition".

The one safe prediction is that Paisley will fail to halt
the OTR legislation and afterwards he will, like a dog
barking at passing cars, lose interest and move onto some
new sellout. That is why the loyalist paramilitaries
lampoon him as the grand old Duke of York, who marches up
to the top of the hill and then marches down again.

In the process, he has lost the ability to influence the
legislation that could go before parliament as early as
next week. There were, for instance, proposals put forward
by some in the establishment and the police stating there
should be a fixed time frame for availing of the amnesty
provisions, say a year. Those who did not admit to their
offences within that time would, under this variant, have
been subject to the full rigours of the law.

This would at least have had the advantage that victims
could have known who the perpetrators were and the
perpetrators, members of the security forces as well as
paramilitaries, would have had to make a clean breast of
the past or risk arrest.

As things stand, the British government will try to push
through the law without any of these safeguards or
sweeteners. The reasoning is that, since the DUP will
scream the house down whatever happens and then accept it
later, there is no point in trying to please them. It is
better to give Sinn Fein what it wants and keep them firmly
onside.

The result is that nobody need own up to anything unless
they are caught by the police and charged with it.

The failure of the DUP to get its hands dirty by engaging
in the detail of proposals it doesn't like writes it out of
a great deal of decision making. It reduces its influence
rather than increases it. The OTR legislation will pass as
surely as day follows night, but unless it engages in a
more nuanced way, the DUP will have no opportunity to limit
its scope.

Many in the party and the wider unionist community will see
this as no more or no less than taking a principled stance.
It's the same attitude that drove the Orangemen to batter
their heads against a brick wall and take on the RUC at
Drumcree rather than engage with residents' groups. It is
an attitude that prefers failure to compromise.

Asked if a strategy is working, Sir Hugh Orde, the PSNI
chief constable, usually replies: "What does success look
like?" He then goes on to define it in terms of objectives
that he thinks he can reach. It is a modern management
technique, outlined in many text books, that is designed to
get the best possible outcome from any situation. It avoids
outright failure and allows the person adopting it to stay
in the game. It's another way of saying that politics is
the art of the possible.

Sinn Fein has often snatched victory from the jaws of
defeat. In the years since 1969 the Provisional IRA,
supported by Sinn Fein, has set out to drive the British
from Ireland vowing it would never stop until there was at
least a declaration of intent to withdraw. It has now stood
down and disarmed even though British soldiers remain on
Irish soil and the border is not only intact but guaranteed
by an international treaty. The right of Northern Ireland
to exist as a separate state is accepted in the Good Friday
agreement, a document that republicans present as the key
to progress.

This could easily be seen as failure but, unlike Paisley,
Sinn Fein never speaks of sellout. Instead, it redefines
success in terms of the best achievable outcome given the
circumstances.

That is not the unionist way, or has not been so far. The
unionist strategy has been to play a zero sum game,
resisting every change that is proposed and embracing
defeat. As a result of their inability to tack to the wind
they have found it very hard to formulate demands.

Once republicans accepted that the IRA campaign would have
to end without meeting its objectives they began to bargain
for the release of prisoners. They then presented that as a
victory, never mentioning the fact that the prisoners would
not have been in jail in the first place but for the failed
campaign. The same is true of the OTRs, who are forced to
seek clemency from the British state they vowed to
overthrow, but it will be presented as a victory by Sinn
Fein and accepted as such by the DUP.

The right wing of the DUP seems incapable of allowing the
party to adopt the sort of strategic thinking that can put
a constructive face on change. As a result, the DUP is
trapped in a cycle of protest that makes it look
ineffectual and has failed to formulate demands that will
build confidence among voters. Last week, for instance, it
succeeded in ensuring that the new victims' commissioner
was an RUC widow, something that showed its influence, yet
it lacked the emotional clout republicans achieved when
they succeeded in getting prisoners freed and OTRs being
allowed to return home.

Next month it will be Eileen Paisley in the House of Lords
and rate relief on Orange halls. Is that what success is
going to look like for the DUP?

******************************************

http://www.thesnapper.com/media/paper142/news/2005/10/27/News/Diplomatic.Representative.From.Northern.Ireland.Speaks.At.Mu-1038262.shtml

Diplomatic Representative From Northern Ireland Speaks At
MU

Sectarian strife and conflice has beset Northern Ireland
for years; diplomat sheds light

By Colleen McMullogh
Published: Thursday, October 27, 2005

There is a place where hope is seen as well as talked
about. There is a place to see the formation of positive
change. There is a place where the promise of peace dashes
the darkness of violence.

Tim Losty, Northern Ireland Bureau Director, presented the
path traveled that is leading to a rebirth of peace in an
area previously plagued by violence and separation
Millersville University last Tuesday.

"The peace movement is from the bottom up," Losty said,
adding, "People have to want it. If they don't want it, it
won't happen."

The people of Northern Ireland have suffered from
separation due to the question in sovereignty and national
identity since the beginning of the twentieth century.
Tension mounted when Northern Ireland was given the option
of remaining part of the United Kingdom or joining the
Republic of Ireland.

During that time there was tension between the nationalists
(mainly Catholic) and unionists (mainly Protestant).
Nationalists wanted government to return to Dublin while
the unionists wanted to remain part of the UK.

"It (the conflict) has been going on for 700 years. It's an
evolving process," Losty said, "It is difficult when both
groups are minorities. The Catholic group is a minority and
so is the Protestant group. The Middle East suffers from a
minority and minority situation as well."

The Belfast Agreement was signed in 1998. This agreement
included the Principal of Consent, which states that no
change in the sovereignty of Ireland could occur without
the consent of all the people. It focused on the
relationships between the two communities of Northern
Ireland, between Northern Ireland and the Republic of
Ireland, and with Ireland and the United Kingdom.

"Many people refer to the Belfast Agreement as the
solution, but it is the start of the solution," Losty said.
"You have to live peace out. It doesn't come from a piece
of paper."

Today Northern Ireland is made up of six countries in the
north east of Ireland with a population of 1.7 million. Of
that 53 percent consider themselves Protestant, 43 percent
consider themselves Catholic, and four percent are not
affiliated with either group.

"The biggest statistic is that Northern Ireland is made up
of a very young population with 66 percent under 45," Losty
said.

To help its young people Northern Ireland invested large
amounts of time, energy, and money into education. The
results were profound. 60 percent of their students stay on
for further education and the people with degrees doubled
in ten years. Northern Ireland also scores higher grades in
standardized exams than in many other regions in the UK.

"We invested a lot in education during the past 30 years of
trouble. Education to help them get out of here or to help
them get jobs that are here," Losty said.

The economy in Northern Ireland is also flourishing.
Unemployment is almost half of what it was ten years ago,
and Northern Ireland's GDP had the largest increase between
1990 and 1999 of all the UK regions.

Northern Ireland is still in a peace process with work to
do. Losty says that there are two processes going on now:
the peace process and the political process. "I think the
peace process is stable, but the political process is
always one step forward and two steps back," Losty said.

Current issues that need to be addressed in Northern
Ireland include policing and police boards, north and south
relations, equality and justice, marching season which
Catholic groups oppose, criminal activities including gang
activity, and community leadership.

"We need to get across that peace and government movements
are a win-win situation," Losty said, adding "We also need
to increase communication between the groups and increase
the number of leaders in disadvantaged communities."

The wall murals show connections to various groups in
Ireland. They show conflict and community identity. Murals
are more positive in the Republican community, but they
continue to be aggressive in the Loyalist community because
they feel left out. The murals show the need for the
process to continue.

Losty credited former President Clinton with many of the
positive steps taken in Northern Ireland. "It would have
been more time consuming and difficult without President
Clinton's efforts. He invested a lot in Northern Ireland,"
Losty said.

Jeffery Cox, Student Ambassador for the British Council,
said, "I thought that Tim Losty gave a well organized
presentation on contemporary Northern Ireland. He did a
good job of helping people to understand the complex
dynamics of Northern Ireland's government, people, and
economy."

Dr. Scott is taking a group of Millersville students
through a tour of Northern Ireland this summer to see these
changes.

Kelly Adomshick, who went with the group last summer, said,
"The people of Ireland struck me the most. Everyone has an
opinion and knew the histories of all the groups not just
in Northern Ireland and Ireland but around the world."

Another student participating in last summer's trip, Jen
Powell, said her misconceptions of Ireland were exposed
that summer and realized "what they are doing for peace is
extraordinary." Powell said, "Ireland made me look at our
culture in America because in Ireland they are centered on
tradition such as folk music, but we are focused in pop
culture and that is what drives our society."

When asked what peace processes Cox saw in his trip to
Ireland in 2000 he said, "A growing prosperity and a new
optimism are the most obvious signs of the 'peace
dividend.' Ireland now has a mission to spread its
knowledge of peace and reconciliation throughout the world.
This has given Ireland a belief in itself and its place in
the world."

Cox added, "Throughout history, it has been very hard to
find peace; modern times are no exception. A chance to
study a 'peace process' is a once in a lifetime
opportunity. There is a lot we can learn from Northern
Ireland, and Millersville's Study Tour is perfect for
anyone interested in witnessing a society that is working
toward peace."

******************************************

http://books.guardian.co.uk/reviews/biography/0,6121,1604349,00.html

Come Up And See Her

Simon Louvish's sparkling new life of Mae West points up
the serious side of the queen of the double entendre, says
Philip French

Sunday October 30, 2005
The Observer

Buy Mae West at the Guardian bookshop
Mae West: It Ain't No Sin
by Simon Louvish
Faber £20, pp512

Those formidable feminist icons, Mae West and Rebecca West,
were both born in 1892 and lived through a century of
astonishing change to die in the 1980s. The former was a
voluptuous presence on stage and screen, her imposing bust
giving its name to the inflatable lifejacket issued to RAF
aircrew in the Second World War. The latter, handsomely
austere, took her name from a theatrical character (the
heroine of Ibsen's Rosmersholm) but was a serious literary
lady, one of the finest prose writers of her time.

Both had big secrets that, for contrasting reasons, they
went to law in order to protect. Mae concealed her brief
1911 marriage for 25 years until her deadbeat husband
emerged in the 1930s, attempting to cash in on her
Hollywood success. Rebecca obtained an injunction in the
1950s to prevent Anthony West, her illegitimate son by HG
Wells, from publishing his autobiographical novel,
Heritage.

The two Wests met only once - over lunch in postwar London
- but frequently rubbed shoulders on the same page of
reference books. Surprisingly, or perhaps not, it is the
wisecracking vaudevillian Mae who wins out in The Oxford
Dictionary of Modern Quotations against the elegant
wordsmith Rebecca. Mae has 15 sparkling citations while
Dame Rebecca has a mere four, one of them (her description
of Michael Arlen as 'every other inch a gentleman') often
wrongly attributed to Mae. It is certainly the case that at
the end of Simon Louvish's biography of Mae, most readers
will think her contribution to liberation and
libertarianism is at least as substantial, and as
courageous, as that of Rebecca.

Following books on Mack Sennett, WC Fields, Laurel and
Hardy and the Marx Brothers, this is the fifth of Louvish's
scrupulously researched studies of celebrated comic figures
who started out early in the 20th century in vaudeville and
made it big in Hollywood. As with its predecessors, the
style is jaunty, and as all of these subjects are wreathed
in myth, often of their own creation, he takes great
pleasure in laying out and sifting the conflicting evidence
on the page.

Mae was born in Brooklyn to an Irish-American ex-boxer,
'Battling' Jack West, and his genteel, French-born wife.
Around both she wove romantic stories and, not long after
getting into showbusiness via unpaid work in a local stock
company, she knocked eight years off her age, declaring
1900 the year of her birth. She also claimed to have
moonlighted as a private detective during her early years
on the stage.

Very early on, she developed her sultry drawl and
provocative posture and when she moved from itinerant
vaudeville to Broadway, she began writing her own material,
first songs and sketches for revues and musicals, then
full-length plays, all rich in innuendo and double
entendre.

She pretended to knock off scripts overnight and to spend
her time partying. In fact, she neither smoked, nor drank,
though she did devote an astonishing amount of time to sex,
claiming in an interview given at the age of 78 that in one
marathon session with her bodyguard, she made love 26 times
in a single day.

But Louvish establishes her as a serious author staying at
home to write, constantly revising and polishing her work,
as her archives, recently presented to the Motion Picture
Academy, make clear. Over the years, she assembled volumes
of jokes, mostly traditional, but many of them her
coinages.

From 1925, she concentrated on plays with titles like Sex
and The Wicked Age, designed to offend the prudish and the
censorious upholders of public morality. In addition to the
raunchy content and exposure of bourgeois hypocrisy, they
took a liberated view of racial and sexual relations in
their often frank approach to homosexuality and
miscegenation. Constantly denounced by the conservative
press, pursued by police and censors, she became a leading
symbol of the Roaring Twenties and made numerous
appearances in the criminal courts, on one occasion
receiving a 10-day jail sentence.

By the late 1920s, her public persona was established as an
independent, self-confident blonde bombshell in thick make-
up, large, feathered hats and fancy gowns, dripping with
diamonds and ever ready with a wisecrack or neatly turned
epigram. The 24-hours-a-day act never changed (she
apparently went to bed in make-up in case there was a fire
alarm), though in her seventies and eighties, she became
grotesquely self-parodic.

The coming together of the Wall Street crash, which, for a
while, doused the lights on Broadway, and the arrival of
the talking picture took her to Hollywood for what proved
to be the peak period of her career. Virtually her first
line in her debut film, Night After Night (1932), was her
response to the hat-check girl who remarked: 'Goodness,
what beautiful diamonds!' 'Goodness had nothing to do with
it, dearie!' was Mae's immortal reply.

The course was thus set for a succession of dazzling,
highly popular comedies at Paramount and a running battle
with the censors, whose powers (as well as their prudery
and prurience) grew as the Hays Office Code was enforced
with increasing severity. This is hilariously recorded by
Louvish. So is her radio appearance in the 1930s in a
Garden of Eden sketch as Eve with ventriloquist Edgar
Bergen's dummy Charlie McCarthy as the Snake, which
resulted in her being banned from further broadcasting -
'The only proper protection for the homes of decent
American citizens', according to Hearst's Los Angeles
Examiner.

The rest of her life, from the late Forties to her death at
the age of 87, by which time she was obsessed with mediums
and ESP, is a sad, dying fall. It's the story of a woman
trapped in a myth of her own creation, though in her final,
scarcely seen picture, Sextette, the 85-year-old Mae did at
last get to use the line: 'Is that a gun in your pocket or
are you just glad to see me?' But there is a charming
moment in 1941 that presents Mae and her admirers at their
best.

Expressing her continuing concern for the proper treatment
of prison inmates, she wrote a letter to the governor of
California praising the work of Clinton Duffy, the
reforming warden at San Quentin. 'I hope your excellency
will feel as I do and let Warden Duffy continue making bad
men good, while I continue making good men bad - I mean in
the movies,' she said. The governor invited her to 'come up
and see me sometime' at the state capital, Duffy asked her
to visit San Quentin, and the prison's inmates sent her a
collective Valentine.

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Posted by: Unknown / 7:00 AM
Comments:
A lot of speculation without much substance. Those of us who actually live in Northern Ireland know the real truth. If I said that an American soldier would be killed in Iraq this coming week, does this show prior knowledge? Collusion? The insurgents in Iraq are currently infiltrated by USA agents - is this collusion?
Don't believe anti-British propaganda - make up your own mind.
# posted by Anonymous Anonymous : 2:47 AM
 
The lack of proof is due to the refusal of the English government to allow full & impartial inquiries into the allogations of collusion.

Both Stevenson & Cory (and others) have found plenty of evidence to indicate collusion between the RUC & British Army and loyalists. Neither of them would be considered 'anti-British' propagandist.

Jay
# posted by Blogger Unknown : 8:40 AM
 
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