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May 29, 2007

Bloody Sunday Victims Innocent

News about Ireland & the Irish

BT 05/29/07 Bloody Sunday Victims 'Innocent'
DJ 05/29/07 Sunday Victim's Brother Welcomes Innocent Admission
BN 05/29/07 McGuinness Calls For Joint Move Against 'Peace Walls'
DJ 05/28/07 SF Outreach Plan Doomed To Failure - Claims Campbell
NY 05/28/07 Irish Classic Is Still A Hit
IN 05/29/07 Ervine’s Family See Funny Side Of RTE Comedy

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http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/uk_news/northern_ireland/6699729.stm

Bloody Sunday Victims 'Innocent'

The former head of the British Army has said he believes innocent
people were shot on Bloody Sunday.

General Sir Mike Jackson made the comments in an interview with
BBC Northern Ireland's Spotlight programme.

He is among former soldiers who gave their views to mark the end
of the Army's role in supporting the police in Northern Ireland.

Sir Mike, who served in NI for seven years, was a captain with
the parachute regiment on the day.

He said people must wait for the outcome of the Saville Inquiry
before drawing any conclusions.

The tribunal investigated the deaths of 14 civilians shot by
soldiers during a civil rights march in Londonderry on 30 January
1972.

It was established in 1998 by Prime Minister Tony Blair after a
campaign by families of those killed and injured.

Its findings will not be published until at least the end of next
year.

"I have no doubt that innocent people were shot," Sir Mike said.

"We have had two formal judicial inquiries, one of which is yet
to report.

"There has been many journalistic examinations of what happened.

"(The) Saville Inquiry has been somewhat lengthy, but my goodness
it has been thorough, and we will see what it has to say."

Liam Wray, whose brother Jim was one of the 14 civilians killed
on Bloody Sunday, said he welcomed the general's admission.

"I think it's significant that the retired top soldier in the
British Army has come to the point in time where he is accepting
that innocent people were shot on Bloody Sunday," he said.

"It is regrettable that he didn't give that evidence to the
Widgery Inquiry in 1972."

Story from BBC NEWS:
Published: 2007/05/29 08:06:27 GMT
c BBC MMVII

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http://www.derrytoday.com/journal-news?articleid=2912303

'Sunday' Victim's Brother Welcomes 'Innocent' Admission

A BROTHER of a man shot dead on Bloody Sunday has welcomed an
admission by a former head of the British Army that innocent
people were shot that day.

General Sir Mike Jackson made the comments in an interview with
BBC Northern Ireland's 'Spotlight' programme.

He is among former soldiers who gave their views to mark the end
of the Army's role in supporting the police in Northern Ireland.

General Jackson, who served in the North for seven years, was a
captain in 1 Para which gunned down 13 unarmed civilians in Derry
on January 30, 1972.

He insisted that people must wait for the outcome of the Saville
Inquiry before drawing any conclusions. Its findings are not
expected to be published until at least the end of next year.

"I have no doubt that innocent people were shot," Gen. Jackson
said. "We have had two formal judicial inquiries, one of which is
yet to report.

"There has been many journalistic examinations of what happened.
"(The) Saville Inquiry has been somewhat lengthy, but my goodness
it has been thorough, and we will see what it has to say."

Liam Wray, whose brother, Jim, was among those shot dead by 1
Para on Bloody Sunday, said he welcomed the general's admission.

"I think it's significant that the retired top soldier in the
British Army has come to the point in time where he is accepting
that innocent people were shot on Bloody Sunday," he said.

Regrettable

"It is regrettable that he didn't give that evidence to the
Widgery Inquiry in 1972."

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

http://www.breakingnews.ie/ireland/?jp=312869&rss=rss2

McGuinness Calls For Joint Move Against 'Peace Walls'

29/05/2007 - 15:46:49

The North's politicians should be able to work together to
dismantle the walls which physically divide loyalist and
republican neighbourhoods in Belfast, Martin McGuinness insisted
today.

As his party Sinn Fein launched a new document at Stormont on how
it will engage with the unionist community, the Stormont Deputy
First Minister hoped the leadership he was providing with the
First Minister Rev Ian Paisley was giving the right example to a
society moving away from conflict and sectarianism.

And he also dismissed some unionists' claims that in reaching out
to their community Sinn Fein should drop its goal of achieving a
united Ireland.

The Sinn Fein MP said: "I think as a result of the work we are
engaged in in this Assembly and the work that is being engaged in
on the streets that it is an eminently achievable objective to
see the peace walls in Belfast go down.

"But I think it will be a tremendous job of work to bring that
about.

"I will be engaging with both communities and with others who
have an interest in society to see how that project can be
realised because it is, as we all know given the length of these
peace walls, a massive challenge to all of us."

The Mid Ulster MP was commenting a week after a school which
educates Catholic and Protestant pupils in north Belfast was told
a 25 foot wall will be erected on its grounds to prevent youths
from using the site to launch sectarian attacks.

The Council for Integrated Education said the Northern Ireland
office decision to erect a peace line in Hazelwood Integrated
Primary School had come as a bolt out of the blue.

The number of concrete, iron and steel peace lines separating
loyalist and nationalist communities have risen from 18 in the
early 1990s to around 40 today and stretch around 13 miles.

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http://www.derryjournal.com/ViewArticle.aspx?SectionID=3421&ArticleID=2910229

SF Outreach Plan 'Doomed To Failure' - Claims Campbell

SINN FEIN's Charter for Unionist Engagement - a key element of
the party's unionist outreach project - is "doomed to failure"
while fronted by Derry MLA Martina Anderson, the DUP's Gregory
Campbell claimed last night.

Mr. Campbell's remarks come as Sinn Fein today launches the
Charter at Stormont. The event will be attended by the North's
Deputy First Minister Martin McGuinness.

Martina Anderson, who heads up Sinn Fein's "Unionist Outreach"
programme, says today's launch is "very important ".

She said: "The development of our Unionist engagement is about
trying to build up a better understanding of people from the
different parts of our community and their experiences.

"It is a two-way street and a slow process but there is
significant engagement between ourselves and people right
throughout the Protestant, Unionist, and Loyalist community."

Gregory Campbell, however, claims the initiative is destined to
fail while Ms. Anderson - a former republican prisoner -
spearheads it.

He said: "I understand it may be difficult in an organisation
like Sinn Fein to select someone without such a past but, surely,
they could have found somebody.

"They may argue that it is not for the DUP to select its
representatives, and in that context they are right. However, in
selecting the type of person they have, they need to understand
that, equally, they have no say in the selection by the DUP of
those whom we choose to lambast the hypocrisy and sheer
effrontery of them carrying out an exercise in the way they are
so doing."

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http://www.nytimes.com/2007/05/28/world/europe/28kells.html?ex=1338004800&en=bba259824b8bbae4&ei=5090&partner=rssuserland&emc=rss

Irish Classic Is Still A Hit (In Calfskin, Not Paperback)

By Eamon Quinn
May 28, 2007
Dublin Journal

DUBLIN, May 27 - For a manuscript written 1,200 years ago and
revered as a wonder of the Western world practically ever since,
little is known about the Book of Kells and its splendidly
illustrated Gospels in Latin. But the book may be about to
surrender a few of its many secrets.

Experts at Trinity College in Dublin, where the Book of Kells has
resided for the past 346 years, are allowing a two-year laser
analysis of the treasure, which is one of Ireland's great tourist
draws.

The 21st-century laser technology being used, Raman spectroscopy,
encourages hopes among those with a romantic view for an
ecclesiastical intrigue like "The Da Vinci Code" or "The Name of
the Rose."

But the precise subjects are more mundane. The laser will study
the chemicals and composition of the book, its pigments, inks and
pages of fine vellum. Experts estimate that 185 calves would have
been needed to create the vellum on which the art and scriptures
were reproduced.

Pending the laser analysis, experts assume that expensive
materials for some of the blue pigments came from the gemstone
lapis lazuli, mined in northeast Afghanistan. Yellow pigments are
believed to have been made from arsenic sulfide and, bizarrely,
reddish Kermes pigments from the dried pregnant bodies of a genus
of Mediterranean insect, suggesting extraordinary trade routes
for the ninth century.

Some techniques will help to analyze the pigments made from
vegetable matter; others will be used to examine the inks.

"A lot of what we have done before has been based on anecdotal
reports of the materials that were used," said Robin Adams, the
librarian of Trinity College, who hopes the exacting dot-by-dot
analysis by laser will unlock secrets and help his staff preserve
the book. "Essentially the laser bounces back, and you get a
spectrum. That spectrum tells you whether this pigment is lead,
copper or whatever. We haven't got the reports yet, but we very
much expect it to tell us new information about what the monks
used."

Mr. Adams hopes that Trinity's manuscript research will answer
some of his own questions about the book: "I would like to find
out whether this work can tell us its relationship with other
manuscripts. Is the material used in Kells the same as might be
used in England or France? It could tell us a bit about the
movement of materials around the monastic houses. We would love
to find out how these monastic houses worked as communities, and
whether the techniques were the same. Or whether they developed
techniques because of the raw materials they had at hand. That
would tell us new information about the times."

For a religious work, the book has a rather exciting history, but
its hazier aspects are unlikely to be discovered by a laser. It
was created around the year 800 to honor the achievements two
centuries before of Columb, also known as Colm Cille. He was an
Irish nobleman who in Ireland and Scotland founded one of the
world's earliest Christian monastic traditions dedicated to
learning and devotion.

Irish legend relates that Colm Cille, after losing a bitter legal
ruling over his right to make copies of books, went into exile on
Iona, the Scottish isle where the Book of Kells is thought to
have been written.

But Dutch or Norse Viking raiders landed in 806, and Irish monks
evidently removed the book for safekeeping. Eventually it made
its way to the Kells in County Meath, a monastery outside Dublin.

There it survived new waves of raids, including one by bandits
who made off with the book in 1007, according to contemporary
chronicles. It was recovered two months later, under dirt,
stripped of its gold covering.

The book stayed in Kells until Cromwell's wars in the 17th
century. A senior Protestant clergyman, Henry Jones, who had
served as a quartermaster general for the invading army, is said
to have "donated" the book to Trinity College sometime after
1661.

With the original binding lost, the book was split over the years
into four volumes. Two are now on display in "Turning Darkness
Into Light," an exhibit at Trinity College, while the others are
being analyzed.

The enduring mystery about whether the book was written on Iona,
Kells or at another Colm Cille monastic site will likely endure.
Maybe only a testing of the DNA of the vellum would reveal the
age and source of the calfskins used at that time and reveal the
place of the book's manufacture. Mr. Adams would like to know if
such an analysis could unlock that secret.

"I have always wondered whether a technique could tell us where
the cattle were and where they came from," Mr. Adams said. "Did
the skins move around - was there a trade in the skins or were
they produced locally? That would add to our knowledge. But that
is what we are doing in applying these new techniques."

There is no doubt about the book's appeal in the present day: it
attracts more than 550,000 visitors annually, vying with the
Guinness Brewery tour up the road in central Dublin as Ireland's
most popular site.

Its popularity leads to crowds during the summer, and there are
plans to expand its display area in the college library building,
which dates from 1732. It has yet to be decided whether the book
will need to be removed during any building work.

Other academics vouch for the book's world importance. "It is one
of the most precious books on the planet," said Terry Dolan,
professor of English at University College Dublin. But Professor
Dolan said the book had another secret that technology would not
reveal.

"Little is documented about how the book came to be removed from
Kells in the first place and how it ended up in Trinity," he
said. "There is yet another fascinating mystery story there."

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http://www.independent.ie/entertainment/tv-radio/ervinersquos-family-see-funny-side-of-rte-comedy-on-the-late-loyalist-686462.html

Ervine's Family See Funny Side Of RTE Comedy On The Late Loyalist

By Aoife Finneran
Tuesday May 29 2007

THE late Progressive Unionist leader David Ervine is to return to
TV screens in a laugh-a-minute episode of the comedy show
Anonymous

.Ervine, who passed away on January 8 following a heart attack,
took part in the RTE series shortly before his death.

And now his wife Jeanette and family have given their consent for
the episode to be screened on RTE 2 next Monday night.

The popular loyalist politician was one of three political
representatives in the North who agreed to take part in the
programme fronted by comedian Jason Byrne.

Unwittingly, they were interviewed by Belfast comedian Patrick
Kielty, who was cleverly disguised as a spoof New York TV
reporter, Betty Silverman. This is the second series of the show
which features well-known celebrities taking on various disguises
and using them to fool their own family, friends and general
public.

Funnyman Patrick Kielty agreed to transform himself into the
character of Betty, an eccentric TV reporter on a mission to
uncover some truths about Ireland.

On a trip to Belfast, "she" interviewed various people in order
to define a true northern sense of humour and to find out whether
Catholics or Protestants have the better sense of humour.

Despite Patrick's masculine frame, he managed to fool his victims
and even affected a throaty voice which his interviewees accepted
as being female.

Show producers had also arranged for him to speak with a number
of northern political representatives, including Paul Maskey of
Sinn Fein, John Dallat of the SDLP and David Ervine.

The trio were all asked to explain the Northern sense of humour,
with Ervine maintaining his professional manner despite the
obvious questions surrounding Betty's authenticity.

The result is an engaging and hilarious picture of the late
politician, credited with playing a critical role in the peace
process.

His family's decision to allow RTE to screen the comic piece six
months after his passing proves that they have put the appalling
incident of the incorrect reporting of his death behind them.

Mr Ervine was wrongly reported dead by RTE on Sunday, January 7,
after suffering two massive heart attacks and a stroke.

He had been admitted to the Ulster Hospital in Dun-donald and RTE
reporters revealed on the station's main news bulletin that he
had died. However, he did not pass away until the following
afternoon.

- Aoife Finneran

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