Tag Archives: Béal Feirste (Belfast)

Fianna Fáil Moves North – Again

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Fianna Fáil, back from the dead ( (Íomhá: Séamas Ó Sionnaigh, Binn Éadair, Cúige Laighean, Éire, Meitheamh 2012)

Fianna Fáil, back from the dead ( (Íomhá: Séamas Ó Sionnaigh, Binn Éadair, Cúige Laighean, Éire, Meitheamh 2012)

Will this be another false dawn for Fianna Fáil’s oft promised yet rarely materialised intention to organise as a political party in the north-east of Ireland?

“Thirty Fianna Fáil members met last night to launch a new Belfast unit. The inaugural meeting took place at The Pavillon, Stormont Estate, Belfast.

Peter Armstrong, an IT entrepreneur from South Belfast, was elected acting Chairperson of Belfast Fianna Fáil. He explained: “Fianna Fáil has a growing membership throughout Northern Ireland, particularly young people involved in our youth group Ógra Fianna Fáil. Ógra have a very active cumann at Queen’s University that meets once a week during term time. We’re now establishing a senior party unit so we can retain university members after they’ve graduated, and so we can continue to recruit new members from across society in Belfast.”

“There is a growing frustration across the north that the current political establishment in Belfast, the DUP and Sinn Féin, are more interested in playing to their political bases than they are in addressing the big challenges facing our community . Fianna Fáil can bring fresh policies and new thinking to the north of Ireland, we can develop new policies that will work right across the island, we can bring our communities closer together and we can further the causes of peace, integration, prosperity and unity, in line with our republican values. We welcome new members of all ages from all communities throughout the greater Belfast area.”

“Fianna Fáil had a very successful Ard-Fheis last weekend at the RDS Dublin attended by more than 4,000 delegates and the largest ever northern contingent. Key motions were passed that will see Fianna Fáil create a northern roadmap with a view to developing the party structure across Northern Ireland. We will work with Party Headquarters in Dublin to move this forward and bring the Fianna Fáil message to more and more communities.”

Another empty announcement to add to a decade of such empty announcements? One would hope not but we will have to wait and see (and wait, and wait, and wait…).

Interestingly Hoboraod draws attention to a claim in the Irish News that Fianna Fáil’s new leader in Belfast, Peter Armstrong, is the son of Rankin Armstrong, the current editor of the Unionist-leaning Belfast Newsletter.

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Margaret Thatcher And The Irish

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The UDR - British terrorists in uniform

The UDR – British terrorists in uniform

The would-be “Hammer of the Gael”, Margaret Hilda Thatcher, has been laid to rest and still the revelations about her true nature come tumbling out through the British media blizzard of obfuscation and adulation. I already highlighted her preferred “solution to the Irish problem” – a little bit of 17th century ethnic cleansing updated for the 20th century. Fortunately for the people of Ireland she didn’t get her way, talked out of her blood lust by shocked colleagues in government and worried officials. However the next best thing was the death squads of the British terrorist gangs and their military allies let loose upon the people of Ireland. And boy did she love them. The ones out of uniform: the UDA, UFF, UVF, RHC, UR. And the ones in uniform: the RUC, UDR, FRU, SAS, BA. All the anodyne acronyms of British terror in Ireland.

Even out of office she could not stop herself counselling those who succeeded her on the evils of the perfidious Irish. Including those who were nominally her political enemies (though at least they weren’t Irish, hey, Maggie?). From the New Statesman and the Irish Times newspaper:

“Former Northern Ireland secretary Peter Mandelson said today the only thing Margaret Thatcher ever told him was that the Irish were “all liars” and not to be trusted.

He revealed the 1999 exchange as he explained why he did not want to attend the former prime minister’s funeral service.

“Although I helped to organise the Labour Party’s opposition to her policies throughout the 1980s, I only ever met her once. It was the day I was appointed Northern Ireland secretary and our paths crossed,” he said.

“She came up to me and she said, ‘I’ve got one thing to say to you, my boy … you can’t trust the Irish, they are all liars’, she said, ‘liars, and that’s what you have to remember, so just don’t forget it…””

Margaret Thatcher touring the British Occupied North of Ireland in 1981 wearing a beret of the UDR, an infamous British Army militia responsible for scores of terrorist attacks during the 1970s, '80s and '90s

Margaret Thatcher touring the British Occupied North of Ireland in 1981 wearing a beret of the UDR, an infamous British Army militia responsible for scores of terrorist attacks during the 1970s, ’80s and ’90s

However, on Black Mountain in County Antrim, it is the Irish who are passing judgement on the former British prime minister and writing her epitaph for the world.

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The McGurk Bar Massacre – British Bombers In Irish Cities

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13 year-old Irish child James Cromie murdered by British state-controlled terrorists in the McGurk Bar Bombing, Belfast, Ireland, 1971

13 year-old Irish child James Cromie murdered by British state-controlled terrorists in the McGurk Bar Bombing, Belfast, Ireland, 1971

Two reviews of the ground-breaking investigative book “The McGurk’s Bar Bombing: Collusion, Cover-Up and a Campaign for Truth” by the Irish author and campaigner Ciarán Mac Airt. The first is from the news and current affairs blog Its A Political World and the second is from the journalist and screenwriter Viv Young in The New York Journal of Books.

For more on the McGurk Massacre and the campaign of terrorist bombings carried out in Ireland by the British military and intelligence services and their paramilitary allies in the 1970s please see here.

Please Tweet at #deathsquadbritain

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Counter-Gangs – The Origins Of British Terrorism In Ireland

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12 year old Maria McGurk, murdered by British state-controlled terrorists in 1971 at McGurk's Bar, Belfast, Ireland. Another victim of Britain's dirty war in Ireland.

12 year old Maria McGurk, murdered by British state-controlled terrorists in 1971 at McGurk’s Bar, Belfast, Ireland. Another victim of Britain’s dirty war in Ireland.

I’ve devoted considerable space on An Sionnach Fionn to cataloguing Britain’s dirty war in Ireland highlighting a wide range of evidence gathered over the last forty years by human rights organisations, journalists and historians. Now the independent news and current affairs site Spinwatch has worked with the Pat Finucane Centre to publish a new study, “COUNTER-GANGS: A history of undercover military units in Northern Ireland 1971-1976“, a comprehensive investigation into the origins of British state-terrorism in Ireland.

The author of COUNTER-GANGS is Margaret Urwin, the secretary of Justice for the Forgotten, a branch of the Pat Finucane Centre which works with victims of Britain’s bombing campaigns in Ireland during the 1970s. Her report is based on years of work including interviews with former members of the British military and intelligence services and extensive documentary research. The publication presents evidence proving:

  • that senior British Army officers stationed in the North of Ireland during the early years of the conflict developed close contacts with various British terrorist factions in Ireland as part of a wider counter-insurgency war against the Irish Republican Army and Irish civilian population in general.
  • that the British Army created a special forces intelligence group, the Military Reaction Forces (MRF), in late 1971 and that the public exposure of the MRF as a death squad led to their replacement a year later by a larger organisation: the Special Reconnaissance Unit (SRU).
  • that the SRU relied heavily on members of the Special Air Service (SAS) for special forces manpower. Successive British governments went to enormous lengths to conceal this fact from the British parliament and media, denying the role of SAS death squads in Ireland.
  • that deliberately misleading information about British special forces and intelligence units in Ireland was fed to the British and international press as part of a black propaganda campaign. One resulting media story included information that would have enabled the Irish Republican Army to identify Louis Hammond as an MRF agent in their ranks. Hammond was shot shortly afterwards.

The report is the first of the State Violence and Collusion Project, an online research collaboration between SpinWatch and the Pat Finucane Centre, established with funding from the respected British-based Scurrah Wainwright Charity.

For more information please download the free PDF booklet “COUNTER-GANGS: A history of undercover military units in Northern Ireland 1971-1976” (verified virus-free). I also recommend the use of the independent wiki Power Base for more to the background of Britain’s thirty-year war in Ireland.

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Dolours Price

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Dolours Price, Irish political activist and former Volunteer of the Irish Republican Army, 1951-2013

Dolours Price, Irish political activist and former Volunteer of the Irish Republican Army, 1951-2013

Just a quick post to note the passing of Dolours Price, veteran Republican activist and a former Volunteer of the Irish Republican Army, who died at her home in Mullach Íde on Wednesday. While much of the British news media and their parasitical sycophants in the Irish press have taken a certain delight in her passing those who knew Dolours and the personal price she paid for her commitment to the cause of Irish freedom will not forget her. Journalist Ed Moloney and author Anthony McIntyre have written a short tribute and addressed the issue of Dolour’s contribution to Boston College’s “Belfast Project”. In a different vein Irish blogger Fitzjames Horse has posted probably the best summation of the places and times that shaped Dolours Price and an entire generation of Irish men and women who grew up beneath the shadow of the British and Unionist regime in the north-eastern corner of Ireland. Britain reaped what it sowed and in the Price sisters it sowed a whirlwind.

My thoughts are with her children, sisters and broader family and friends. Ar dheis Dé go raibh a hanam uasal.

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Democracy Doesn’t Work – So Speaks Unionism

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Local government regulations in the North of Ireland during the 1950s - when the British national flag flew for 15 days a year from government buildings not the present 17 days - let alone 365 days a year!

Local government regulations in the North of Ireland during the 1950s – when the British national flag flew for 15 days a year from government buildings not the present 17 days – let alone 365 days a year!

From the cheeky lads at “Loyalists Against Democracy” the image above details local government rules in “Northern Ireland” during the 1950s – when the British national flag flew for fifteen days a year from government buildings (not the present seventeen designated days).

Anti-democracy protesters from the British Unionist minority in Belfast, Ireland - "Democracy Doesn't Work"

Anti-democracy protesters from the British Unionist minority in Belfast, Ireland – “Democracy Doesn’t Work”

Jenny Muir Quits The British Labour Grouping In The North

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Green Party in Northern Ireland

Green Party in “Northern Ireland”

A minor political event which has probably passed most observers by. Jenny Muir, long-time left-wing Belfast blogger and would-be British Labour Party activist in the North of Ireland has formally quit Labour. This follows many years of campaigning to have the British political party expand from Britain to Ireland to organise and stand in the north-east of the country. Thankfully the London leadership of Labour repeatedly rejected these attempts at anschluss from the UK but its interesting to see where Jenny Muir has gone: the Green Party “of Northern Ireland”. The northern Greens are officially a regional branch of Comhaontas Glas – the Green Party of Ireland – and since the 1990s have supported an All-Ireland policy (later modified through support for the 1998 Belfast Agreement). As a left-of-centre ecological party they have been moderately sucessful with environmentally-focused Nationalist voters and liberal Unionists agnostic on continued British rule.

However of late the internal-consensus on the party’s ultimate national affiliations have been under pressure. In 2011 the  Antrim branch of the party introduced a motion to the annual general meeting in Belfast to sever relations with the southern wing of the organisation (a move which some represented as stemming from the party’s embarrassment over links to their badly discredited southern counterparts in the aftermath of the fall of the Celtic Tiger economy of Ireland). This was rejected by a majority but party tensions have been evident since then, most recently in the reluctance of party leader, Stephen Agnew, to press for civil rights legislation for Irish-speakers in the North of Ireland. These disagreements can also be seen in the very public criticisms of (former) Green councillor Cadogan Enright.

Muir, who regards the centre-left and Labour sister-party of the SDLP as another player in “sectarian politics” (and I hope I don’t misrepresent her in this summation), seems comfortable enough with the Greens’ All-Ireland status, and she will certainly be a highly valuable activist for the party. But I wonder will this and other changes pull the party in a more “Pro-Union” (if not Unionist) direction?

UPDATE 19/01/13:  Jenny Muir replies below in the Comments clarifying some points.

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That Infamous Nolan Show

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Well a lot of people have been discussing last night’s highly controversial Nolan Show from the BBC in Belfast which debated the anti-democracy protests by the extreme of the British Unionist community in the north-east of Ireland. I say “debated” when I probably mean “fought over” as the show descended into chaos with a Unionist-dominated audience attacking virtually every speaker and every non-Unionist contributor to the programme. It may have made for car-crash TV as a baying mob took over a prime time BBC regional news and current affairs show but it was certainly illustrative of the attitudes and politics of the Unionist mob.

Above is a YouTube video of the 16.01.2013 Nolan Show. Watch it while you can!

Nick Greger, a leading British fascist, poses with the infamous Johnny Adair, a former senior British terrorist with the UDA-UFF terror group

Nick Greger, a leading British fascist, poses with the infamous Johnny Adair, a former senior British terrorist with the UDA-UFF terror group

Meanwhile a report from Niall O’Dowd in the Irish Central on some of the Far Right and Neo-Nazi elements in Britain who are supporting the Unionist anti-democracy demonstrations in the North of Ireland. Frequently led and directed by members of the British terrorist group the UVF these protests have drawn allies from the British fascist party, the BNP, as well as sundry extremist groups like Britain First. Of course the close ties between separatist British terrorism in Ireland and the Far Right in Britain go back many decades as I examined in a lengthy post here, which takes in everything and everyone from Apartheid-era South Africa to the British Army killer Johnny Adair.

The Ballot-Box And Petrol-Bomb – Unionism In Action

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Irish communities under British siege - the Short Strand, Belfast, Ireland 2013

Irish communities under British siege – the Short Strand, Belfast, Ireland 2013

The best of British – in Ireland.

The Violence Of The British Anti-Democrats In Ireland

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Northern Ireland - The Last Remnant Of The British Colony In Ireland

Northern Ireland – The Last Remnant Of The British Colony In Ireland (Original Photo: The Five Demands)

Well the worse weekend yet of rioting and violent attacks by anti-democracy protesters from the British Unionist monitory in the north-east of Ireland. Days (and nights) of sustained disturbances in several areas, notably the city of Belfast, dozens injured, homes and businesses damaged, hijacked cars set alight, roads and streets blockaded, and as always assaults on the Irish Nationalist communities of the North, in particular the besieged enclave of the Short Strand.

The reasons for all this? Because the British Unionist minority in Ireland says’s no to democracy, as they have always done so, and through violence and the threat of violence they attempt to enforce their political views on everyone else in the country. Several weeks ago a majority of the elected members of Belfast City Council voted to reduce to the number of days the British national flag would fly from the rooftop of the city hall. From an original motion of no flags at all the council agreed a compromise motion of seventeen designated days when the British flag could be flown, thanks to discussions with the liberal Unionists of the small Alliance Party. These days were generally ones deemed to be of special significance to the city’s British Unionist community: the official birthday of Britain’s head of state, royal births and marriages and other ceremonial events.

Most councillors clearly believed that this was a fair compromise that generously favoured the Unionists since it gave no room for the majority Irish Nationalist community in Belfast to display their national identity in the city’s official architecture. But for the Unionist mob, initially urged on by the political leaders of Unionism in the form of the DUP head Peter Robinson and UUP boss Mike Nesbitt, even this half-hearted equality was too much to stomach. They wanted continued Unionist domination in Belfast and were quite prepared to risk anarchy on the streets to get it. And anarchy is what they achieved.

As the result of over a month of civil unrest by a militant minority from the British Unionist population in the north-east I have learned that further attempts to place both main communities in the city of Belfast on an equal footing have now been shelved. In particular private discussions between Sinn Féin and SDLP councillors to agree a motion to be submitted to the council’s policy and resources committee calling for the Irish national flag, the Tricolour, to be flown beside the British national flag on Saint Patrick’s Day (the 17th of March ironically being one of the “designated days”) have been suspended for fear of drawing even further Unionist violence.

So the anti-democrats of Unionism have won the flags’ issue in a sense. On March the 17th 2013, the feast-day and holiday of Ireland’s national saint, the British national flag will fly once again from the rooftop of Belfast City Hall. But the Irish national flag will not do so. For as usual, violence and the threat of violence by the British Unionist minority on the island of Ireland will have succeeded.

UPDATE: FJH has his own take on the rumours around the flying of the Tricolour on St. Patrick’s Day in Belfast.

The Endgame For The Anti-Democrats

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The British Occupied North of Ireland or the real Northern Ireland 48% Protestant, 47% British

The British Occupied North of Ireland or the real Northern Ireland 48% Protestant, 47% British

Excellent opinion piece over on the Irish news-blog Slugger O’Toole from Gerry Lynch, a former Executive Director of the Alliance Party, a liberal Unionist group that receives limited electoral support from both communities in the North of Ireland. Lynch, who writes and blogs under the nom de plume “sammymorse”, could have been best described as a small “i” Irish Unionist. That is, he was someone who broadly favoured British rule over the north-east of Ireland for a number of political, economic or social reasons while expressing a mixed Irish and British identity of his own. The very type of person some Unionists claim first declared themselves ”Northern Irish” in the 2011 census of “Northern Ireland” (though, as I and others have cogently pointed out – and as some British Unionists fear – the emphasis is clearly on the “Irish” in that declaration).

Now he seems to have abandoned Unionism – and Britishness. While initially stating his belief that the so-called “Union” (i.e. British rule in the north-east of Ireland) is or was safe, he goes on to state the following:

“Sorry to be so blunt, but I want out of the United Kingdom as quickly as possible. I know it’s lovely when you have a decent income in London or Surrey. I have spent and continue to spend an enormous part of my adult life there. But if Unionism means anything it means that Belfast is as British as Finchley. And frankly, on that score, Britishness #epicfails.

Many people I respect will disagree with me, and I mean no disrespect to them or their country – I realise that real existierender Britishness falls well short of what many Britishers would like it to be. I rejoice as much as anyone at what it is and means for Mo Farah to carry the Union Flag as he celebrates Olympic Gold, when English Cricketers stuff the arrogant Aussies and, by God, I fall to my knees in honour of what it meant for my partner to fight frightened skirmishes with the Japanese in Burma as a young man and sleep standing up exhausted against a tree, night after night. I have no wish to disrespect the flag he fought for as he himself fought death from malaria and dysentery on a Bangladeshi beach in 1943. There is a best of British – from Rolls-Royce jet engines to The Italian Job. As an Irishman of nationalist and anti-monarchist instincts, neither I nor my views have been treated with anything less than respect and willingness to understand in the deepest Home Counties Shires. Sadly, that is not what I get in Belfast. There is a worst of British and it is right on my doorstep.

So, when the inevitable border poll inevitably comes, I will be voting for a United Ireland. Of course, it won’t be an actually united Ireland, and it will have new stupidities foisted on it by Gombeen men, but could it really be any worse than this?”

That is just a snippet of a far more detailed and nuanced article that deserves a full reading. But when even a dyed-in-the-wool Alliance supporter and culturally British voter in the North of Ireland can see that the writing is on the wall is it not time to face up to the fact that we are now truly in the end game?

As I said before, “Northern Ireland” is 48% Protestant, 47% British, and that is the real motivation behind the anti-democracy protests by the separatist British Unionist minority in the north-east of the island of Ireland. Not the flying of national flags.

“Northern Ireland” 48% Protestant, 47% British – So Why Is Ireland Still Partitioned?

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Jamie Bryson, a very public voice of the Ulster People's Forum and the flag protests marching in a quasi-military band (Photo: Ulster Band Scene)

Jamie Bryson, a very public voice of the Ulster People’s Forum and the flag protests marching in a quasi-military band (Photo: Ulster Band Scene)

Several weeks ago the elected members of Belfast City Council voted by a majority to end the year-round flying of the British national flag from the rooftop of the city hall. Councillors agreed instead to reduce the number of days the flag was flown to certain “designated days”; essentially those periods during the year held to be of special significance to the British Unionist minority in the city (for instance the “official” birthday of Britain’s monarch). However the reaction from the more extreme elements of the British separatist population across the North of Ireland was one of outrage and fury at this “compromise” with the political representatives of Belfast’s Irish Nationalist majority.

In answer to the calls by Unionist political and community leaders to defy the decision street demonstrations and rioting have been combined with attacks on perceived symbols of Irishness in the north-east of the country (Roman Catholic churches, non-state schools as well as sports and community centres belonging to the GAA). Dozens of people have been injured so far, and at least two attempts to murder have been carried out by British terrorist groups (in particular by the UVF, a terror organisation which was formerly part of Britain’s counter-insurgency war in Ireland during the long struggle with the Irish Republican Army that preceded the Peace process of the late 1990s and early 2000s).

Now mainstream Unionist politicians, which have traditionally made common cause with their compatriots on the militant edge of Unionism (including the terrorist factions), are finding that they have released forces over which they can exercise scant control. In a strange repetition of the early and middle 1960s when the conservative one-party Unionist regime found itself challenged by more extreme Unionist demagogues from below, a new wave of would-be leaders are emerging from within the British separatist minority in the north-east of Ireland. Many are linked to movements which combine militant Protestant fundamentalism with extreme British nationalism under the guise of a shared British colonial identity or “heritage” on the island of Ireland. A colonial heritage much of which is built upon a hatred or contempt for all things Irish.

Census of “Northern Ireland” 2011, Aggregate Nationalities, Irish, Northern Irish, British

Census of “Northern Ireland” 2011, Aggregate Nationalities, Irish, Northern Irish, British

In two recent articles I have pointed out that the so-called “flag protests” in the north of the country by militant demonstrators from within the breakaway British Unionist community have very little to do with the issue of the flag flown from the top of Belfast City Hall. Instead they are simply symbolic of wider changes in the last remnant of the British colony on the island of Ireland. Where once a local British and Protestant ethno-national majority existed, and indeed upon which basis the nation of Ireland was forcefully partitioned and the statelet of “Northern Ireland” created, we instead have a nearer balance of British and Irish nationalities. The excuse for the establishment and continued existence of “Northern Ireland”, in British and Unionist eyes, can no longer be said to have any great force.

In 2011 some 47.74% of the population in the North of Ireland described themselves as “British” while 48.36% described themselves as belonging to a Protestant denomination. This means that at the start of the 21st century those who self-identify as British and Protestant are no longer in a regional majority in the north-east of Ireland and so goes the very reason for the existence of “Northern Ireland” as argued at the start of the 20th century.

Fear Manach – Fermanagh – the irrelevance of “partition” and the end of “Northern Ireland”

It is the change in population, evolving demographics, that is the cause of the renewed ”troubles” in the North. And the separatist British Unionist minority can see it all around them. Bangordub links to an article featured on his blog which highlights this. From the Unionist-leaning Impartial Reporter newspaper:

“AN Ulster Unionist assembly member has claimed protestant employees of Fermanagh District Council are fearing “verbal and physical abuse” over the use of the Irish language on Council-owned vehicles.

But the chief executive of Fermanagh District Council, Brendan Hegarty, says he is “not aware” of any employees raising concerns, despite what Tom Elliott is claiming.

Mr Elliott is angry that the policy, passed by the Council in June of last year to include Irish graphics on the passenger’s side and the back of its electric vehicles, was not ‘vetted’ by the equality commission first and “bemused” by the Council’s decision not to carry out an equality impact assessment before implementing it.

The politician says he has received complaints about the matter from members of the public and Fermanagh District Council employees.

He wrote: “Members of the public have indicated that while they do not want to have [the] Irish language on the Council vehicles, if that is to happen then there should be equality by also having other languages, including Ulster Scots. I also have a complaint from a member of the Polish Community living in Fermanagh who is complaining that there is no equality in the policy for him as he has a very limited knowledge of English and no knowledge of Irish.”

The pathetic nature of Unionist bigotry is plain to see in the reaction of Tom Elliot, a recent leader of the UUP or the second largest Unionist political party on the island of Ireland. A bigotry that is based upon a British colonial heritage on the island of Ireland that is so imbued with anti-Irish sentiment that it would rather, apparently, see any language on public signage in the statelet of “Northern Ireland” than the indigenous language of the country it exists in.

UPDATE: Thanks to Bangordub for pointing out the typo on what was originally the “Impartial Informer newspaper” ;-)

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Death Squad Britain

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12 year old Maria McGurk, murdered by British state-controlled terrorists in 1971 at McGurk's Bar, Belfast, Ireland. Another victim of Britain's dirty war in Ireland.

12 year old Maria McGurk, murdered by British state-controlled terrorists in 1971 at McGurk’s Bar, Belfast, Ireland. Another victim of Britain’s dirty war in Ireland.

Two weeks ago the British prime minister, David Cameron, apologised in the UK parliament on behalf of the British nation for the assassination of the Irish civil rights lawyer Pat Finucane by gunmen from the UDA-UFF, a British terrorist organisation in the North of Ireland under the control of Britain’s paramilitary, military and intelligence services.

An official report into Pat Finucane’s murder by the former UN war crimes’ investigator Desmond de Silva, released the same day, catalogued the contributions made by various terrorist factions from the British Unionist minority in the north-east of Ireland to Britain’s counter-insurgency war against the Irish Republican Army and the Irish population in general, north and south of the border. In particular the report focused on the relationship between the terror gangs and the Royal Ulster Constabulary or RUC, the notorious British paramilitary police force disbanded by Britain as part of the Irish peace process, British Military Intelligence and its various secret armies (including the infamous Force Research Unit or FRU), as well as the British Security Service or MI5.

In one day some four decades worth of accusations and claims by politicians, lawyers, journalists, historians and human rights activists from Ireland, Britain, Europe and the United States were given vindication. There was now a de facto acknowledgement by the London authorities that Britain’s counter-insurgency war in Ireland consisted of a military strategy based upon state-terrorism, by and on behalf of the state, which traced its roots to the very start of the conflict. Since the publication of de Silva’s report, despite the hostility, resentment or indifference of some in the British media, many other stories from Britain’s “Dirty War” in Ireland have come back under the spotlight or started to leak out.

In an unusual move, and perhaps indicative of how much the recent revelations have shook the British establishment, the deeply conservative and jingoistic right-wing British newspaper, the Mail on Sunday, has a feature story on the earliest of Britain’s modern secret armies in Ireland, the Military Reaction Force (or MRF). In the early 1970s this band of out-of-uniform soldiers terrorised Irish Nationalist communities in the North of Ireland, in particular the city of Belfast, carrying out or organising random drive-by shootings of civilians, murders, kidnappings and bombings.

McGurk's Bar in Belfast on the 4th of December 1971, destroyed by a bomb that left dozens dead and wounded which was placed by British terrorists controlled by British Military Intelligence

McGurk’s Bar in Belfast on the 4th of December 1971, destroyed by a bomb that left dozens dead and wounded which was placed by British terrorists controlled by British Military Intelligence

In its most infamous operation the MRF arranged for terrorists from the British UVF to attack McGurk’s Bar in Belfast on the 4th of December 1971 with a parcel bomb that demolished the building killing fifteen, including 12 year old Maria McGurk, and wounding seventeen others. In the aftermath of the atrocity the British Forces used the excuse of “follow-up operations” to swamp local neighbourhoods with troops and paramilitary police who carried out destructive house-raids and multiple arrests or detentions.

Now the Mail has one of the MRF’s members apparently speaking on record:

“A former British soldier who belonged to an undercover unit in Northern Ireland has claimed he and his colleagues resorted to ‘murder and mayhem’ during a secret campaign against the IRA.

Simon Cursey was a member of a 30-man team which would ‘shoot first and ask questions later’.

Cursey says these shootings were carried out by the Military Reaction Force (MRF), a clandestine Army team sent into Republican neighbourhoods to eliminate IRA gunmen.

His accounts are being studied by detectives from the Police Service of Northern Ireland’s Historical Enquiries Team (HET), which was set up to re-examine suspicious deaths over  the course of ‘The Troubles’. More than 2,260 cases are on its books.

Cursey’s devastating disclosures include the claim that he never once cautioned a terror suspect or fired a warning shot before himself engaging with lethal force. He said he and his colleagues shot at least 20 men, though he could not say how many died.

‘The Rules of Engagement in Northern Ireland were very clear: you were only allowed to open fire at a person actively shooting at you or someone you are with. Also, you could open fire at someone aiming a weapon but who hadn’t fired yet. We had our own slight variation on these rules. We opened fire at any small group in hard areas, neighbourhoods that even looked suspicious, armed or not – it didn’t matter. We targeted specific groups that were always up to no good. These types were sympathisers and supporters, assisting the IRA movement.

‘As far as we were concerned they were guilty by association and party to terrorist activities, leaving themselves wide open to the ultimate punishment from us. If someone was picked up and it was discovered that they were illegally armed, or that they were on our “special” wanted list of IRA killers, they could be dealt with right there in the countryside: neutralised.’”

In other words the MRF was a British military death squad. Its purpose was simply to cause murder and mayhem in the Irish communities of the north-east that continued to live under the British Occupation by killing innocent and “guilty” alike. However the MRF’s reckless nature eventually brought about its own downfall and it’s operations were uncovered by the Intelligence Unit of the Belfast Brigade of the Irish Republican Army in mid-to-late 1972. After extensive surveillance units of the 2nd and 3rd Battalions of the Belfast Brigade attacked soldiers of the MRF at two different locations in the city on the 2nd of October 1972, killing or wounding several and causing panic in the British Army as intelligence operations over the following weeks effectively collapsed.

By early 1973 the now discredited MRF was disbanded but its tactics, techniques and most of its personnel went on to become part of the Special Reconnaissance Unit (or the SRU though it was also known by the cover name of the 14th Intelligence Company) and the Force Research Unit (FRU). All of them contributed to the evolving culture of Death Squad Britain.

Tweet at #deathsquadbritain

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People Power – Taking Back The North

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Census of “Northern Ireland” 2011, Aggregate Nationalities, Irish, Northern Irish, British

Census of “Northern Ireland” 2011, Aggregate Nationalities, Irish, Northern Irish, British

Sometimes the sheer two-faced hypocrisy of the average Unionist media sympathiser leaves one dumbfounded. And none more so than the ever-so flexible opinions of the Neo-Unionist apologist-writer Ruth Dudley-Edwards. As a “commentator” Dudley-Edwards has spent decades excoriating Irish Nationalism and Republicanism throughout the British and Irish media with repetitive allegations of tribalism, sectarianism, fascism and half-a-dozen other –isms. Yet a phrase frequently comes to mind when viewing her opinions: “…considerest not the beam that is in thine own eye?”

Her latest propagandist nonsense on behalf of the British Unionist minority in Ireland follows weeks of violent protests in relation to the decision by Belfast City Council to restrict the number of days the British flag flies from the roof of the city hall to periods deemed to be of special significance to the Unionist minority in the city. A compromise readily agreed to by Irish Nationalist and liberal Unionist councillors following precedents established elsewhere across the north-east of Ireland (including the northern regional legislature at Stormont where sits all the main Nationalist and Unionist parties).

Most intelligent observers know full well that the rioting and threats by extremists from the Unionist minority following the vote have nothing to do with the actual flying of the British national flag from Belfast City Hall. The issue goes far beyond that. For two centuries and more the city of Belfast was at the heart of “British Ulster”. It was a colonial city in a British colonial plantation, the most thorough and long-lasting such plantation in Ireland. Nowhere else, outside of Dublin, did British rule in Ireland grow such deep and pernicious roots. Yet the city of Dublin and its colonial hinterland (the Pale) fell to Irish Nationalism over a century ago through the political, cultural and economic changes that stemmed from changing demographics in the region (principally as a result of An Gorta Mór or the Great Famine of the mid-1800s and the influx of monolingual or bilingual Irish-speakers from the rural heartlands of north Leinster, south Ulster and Connacht).

Over the last twenty years a similar phenomenon has been observable in the North of Ireland, the last remnant of the British colony on the island of Ireland. As those with an Irish identity have grown in number those with a British identity have retreated into a tighter and tighter cluster of communities centred around the east coast and the city of Belfast in particular. Yet that city has seen its own growth from within as the dominant Unionist majority has been supplanted by a narrow Nationalist majority, the vote by the city council reflecting that sea-change in population and allegiances.

That is the real story behind the flags’ issue. The “rivalry” between two national communities in the north-east of the country and the slow move towards demographic equilibrium. Rather than dam the Nationalist tide through the Peace Process and Belfast Agreement, which all-but ended forty years of military struggle, if anything the new power-sharing arrangements have accelerated the changes. The Irish Nationalist community, however one defines it, is in the ascendant across the greater part of the north-east of Ireland, in the process making many of the old statistical justifications for the British-imposed partition of the island irrelevant. If the country was to be partitioned today in order to appease the violence of the British minority on the island of Ireland, that minority would find itself retreating into a redoubt consisting of slivers of land taken from north Down, north-east Armagh, south and west Antrim, and eastern Derry. Belfast would find itself a candidate to become the new “West and East Berlin” of Europe; a city divided between the two nation-states of Ireland and the UK.

It is this dawning reality that is driving Unionism, giving it the new impetuous and purpose that sympathisers like Dudley-Edwards crave.

It’s not about a flag – it’s the demographics, stupid.

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A Fourth Green Field?

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Census of “Northern Ireland” 2011, Aggregate Nationalities, Irish, Northern Irish, British

Census of “Northern Ireland” 2011, Aggregate Nationalities, Irish, Northern Irish, British

Several days ago I posted some thoughts on the first round of figures released from the top-level results of the 2011 Census of “Northern Ireland”. The headline news was the linked revelation that those who declared they were of a Protestant background and those who identified as British now made up less than half the population of the north-east of the country. Considering the sectarian and ethno-nationalist origins of the British-imposed partition of the island of Ireland and the creation of the apartheid-state of “Northern Ireland” this was something of a political earthquake, the ramifications of which are now being played out in northern politics.

At the time I made some quick calculations in relation to the numbers released, not to be taken too seriously, and came up with a suggestion for the overall figures on national identity in the North:

2011 Census Result – Religion: 

48.36% = Protestant / Other Christian

45.14% = Roman Catholic

00.92% = Other Religion

05.59% = No Religion

2011 Census Result - National Identity: 

39.89% = British only

25.26% = Irish only

20.94% = Northern Irish only

00.66% = British and Irish only

06.17% = British and Northern Irish only

01.06% = Irish and Northern Irish only

01.02% = British, Irish and Northern Irish only

05.00% = Other

2011 Census Result – An Aggregate Of National Identities?: 

47.26% = Irish (Irish and/or Northern Irish)

47.74% = British (British and Northern Irish/Irish)

05.00% = Other

Interestingly the 2011 election to the regional assembly in the north gave the following result (from Wikipedia):

First Preference Votes:

29.3% = DUP

26.3% = Sinn Féin

13.9% = SDLP

12.9% = UUP

7.7% = APNI

2.4% = TUV

0.9% = Green

0.8% = PBP

0.6% = UKIP

0.2% = PUP

0.2% = BNP

0.2% = WP

0.1% = SP

2.3% = Independents

A Suggested Aggregate Of Voters:

42.2% = Irish Nationalist (SF/SDLP/Green/PBP/WP/SP)

53.3% = British Unionist (DUP/UUP/APNI/TUV/UKIP/PUP/BNP)

2.3% = Independents

2.2% = Other

Now Colm Ó Broin in Gaelscéal has done a far more detailed analysis and arrived at the following conclusions (via Slugger O’Toole):

“One of the most interesting results of the census published last week was the number of people describing themselves as ‘Northern Irish’.

Based on analysis done by Gaelscéal, it seems that most of them are from a Catholic background and that they vote for nationalist parties.

If you add the number of people who said they were British under the various headings, the total is almost identical to the number of Protestants.

The number of Catholics is also similar to the number of people who said they were Irish only, Northern Irish only or Irish and Northern Irish only.

There is also a strong correlation between the number of Catholics, Irish and Northern Irish and the nationalist vote.

So then, why are people who vote for United Ireland parties describing themselves as ‘Northern Irish’?

According to Belfast SDLP Councillor, Colin Keenan, ‘Northern Irish’ is a geographical term, not a political statement.

“In terms of people I speak to they don’t see a big difference between Irish and Northern Irish, it’s a subcategory of Irish.”

A Sinn Féin constituency office worker told Gaelscéal that she and many others in her town would call themselves Northern Irish.

The views on the Republic are of particular interest given the survey published by the Irish Times recently showing that 88% of people (excluding don’t knows) support a United Ireland, and that 77% would vote for unity even if they had to pay more tax to fund it.”

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Flying The British Flag – To Threaten Irish Schoolchildren

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Holy Cross Girls Primary School, Belfast, under siege by British Unionist gangs, 2001 (Photo: Justin Kernoghan)

Holy Cross Girls Primary School, Belfast, under siege by British Unionist gangs, 2001 (Photo: Justin Kernoghan)

So, yet another night of low-level violence and rioting from the extreme of the British Unionist minority in the north-east of Ireland. That would be more or less the fifteenth night in a row since Belfast City Council voted by a majority to reduce the number of days the British national flag will fly over the council hall after decades of disputed display. The reduction is from a year round flying of the banner to 17 “designated days”, ones of particular importance to the British minority, and was agreed as a compromise gesture to the Unionist community despite the city’s now Irish Nationalist majority. In contrast no proposals were put forward by any party for the flying of the Irish national flag despite the presumed wishes of many in the city to see it alongside (or instead of) the British one.

For Unionists in the north-east of the country the agreement to make Belfast City Hall and other municipal buildings politically neutral and open to all communities was a direct threat to the public face of their centuries old hegemony, held since the heyday of British colonial rule. The truth of course is that their absolute power in the “Northern Pale”, the last remnants of the British colony in Ireland, has long since faded. Well, not quite. While some politicians from the British minority protest at the alleged loss of their “Britishness” (by which they mean, privileges) there is another story. Despite the fact that those who profess or stem from families with a Roman Catholic faith are now in the majority in the North of Ireland, they remain subject to ongoing institutionalised discrimination in employment, education, state services, the courts and, as always, even in the prisons.

The Irish Times reveals that the annual report issued by the statutorily independent Criminal Justice Inspection group (CJI) into the notorious Maghaberry Prison states that there had been:

“…no progress to address the long-standing issue of disparity in treatment between Catholic and Protestant prisoners, with Catholics not faring as well.

The unequal outcomes primarily related to the granting of benefits or application of sanctions where staff had a measure of discretion.

This equality issue has been identified in all Northern Ireland’s prisons since the CJI began its inspection work in 2004.

“Maghaberry’s own statistics have confirmed that in terms of equality there were still unequal outcomes for Catholic prisoners in several important areas,” said Mr McGuigan.

“Yet this sensitive issue was not being addressed and we have recommended the Northern Ireland Prison Service to take action to deliver equality of outcomes for all prisoners.”

He added: “It’s been a feature of prison inspections since we started them in 2004.””

So, despite the claimed loss of Unionist (or Protestant) power over the last decade the facts on the ground prove that Roman Catholics (or Irish Nationalists) remain subject to continued discrimination in all sectors of society. However the Unionists are still seeking a mechanism to “defend” or “restore” their supremacist days. And it’s an old one. If threatening the adult members of the community you perceive as the enemy seems to be getting you nowhere, don’t worry – just threaten their children instead. From the Irish News:

“UNION flags have been erected outside Holy Cross Girls Primary School – the scene of a bitter Loyalist protest a decade ago which made headlines around the world.

Flags were also flying yesterday outside two other Catholic girls’ schools within a small area of north Belfast as the dispute over the removal of the Union flag at the city hall intensified.

Our Lady of Mercy Secondary School at Bilston Road near Ballysillan was adorned with flags, as was Mercy Primary girls school on Crumlin Road.

There are fears that the development will lead to heightened tensions in the area.

During the Holy Cross dispute of 2001 riot police had to escort schoolgirls and their parents past hate-filled protesters on the journey to the Catholic school through the Protestant Glenbryn estate.

Loyalists claimed they had picketed Holy Cross after a parent attacked a man putting up a loyalist flag on a lamp-post opposite the school.

Urine-filled balloons were pelted at the little girls.

At one point a blast bomb was thrown at the pupils and their parents.”

Intimidating Irish schoolchildren. British nationalism at its finest.

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Pat Finucane – A Victim Of Britain’s State-Sponsored Terrorism In Ireland

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A memorial to Pat Finucane, the Irish human rights lawyer assassinated by British state-sponsored terrorists in the Occupied North of Ireland, 1989

A memorial to Pat Finucane, the Irish human rights lawyer assassinated by British state-sponsored terrorists in the Occupied North of Ireland, 1989

On the 12th of Februaray 1989 the respected Irish civil rights lawyer Pat Finucane was sitting down to a Sunday dinner in his north Belfast home with his wife Geraldine and their three young children. Pat was a northern Roman Catholic from a large working-class Nationalist family and Geraldine a northern Protestant from a middle-class Unionist background both of whom had met and fallen in love while attending Trinity College in Dublin. Suddenly there was a hammering at the front door of the house as two masked gunmen used a sledge-hammer to smash their way in. Both men were members of the Ulster Freedom Fighters (or UFF), the largest British state-sponsored terrorist group in Ireland which operated under the legal cover of a militant Unionist group known as the UDA which the British government refused to declare illegal until 1992, two decades after it began a campaign of terrorism against the Irish people.

Pat and his wife rose from the table but as he stepped into the doorway of the kitchen a series of loud bangs rang out. The impact of two bullets striking his torso slammed the 39 year old father of three back into the room and he dropped helpless to the floor as Geraldine, also wounded, fell into an adjacent corner of the kitchen. As the screaming children, two boys and a girl, scrambled under the table to hide themselves the British terrorists rushed forward firing a total of twelve rounds into Pat’s face at almost point blank range from a Browning 9mm automatic pistol taken or supplied by the British Army, rendering his head virtually unrecognisable. The gunmen then ran from the house leaving the slain lawyer, his injured wife and traumatised children behind lying in a pool of blood and gun smoke.

Within hours of Pat Finucane’s death political and media circles in Belfast and Dublin were awash with rumours and accusations of British state involvement. The speedy declaration by the UFF that they had murdered the lawyer simply added to the rumour-mill, as the terror-gang’s role in Britain’s counter-insurgency war in Ireland was common knowledge. Soon the lengthy record of death threats against Pat by members of the Royal Ulster Constabulary (RUC), the notorious paramilitary police force the British government later agreed to disband as part of the Peace Process, became known.

After years of high-profile scandals the pressure from human rights groups (including Amnesty International), the government of Ireland, the United States’ Congress and other International partners, forced the British state in 2001 to arrest and try a suspect for the killing, one William Stobie. This former British soldier was already known to be a UFF armourer and supplier of weapons but he was also revealed as an agent of the RUC liaising within the UFF on their behalf. His eventual trial for participating in Pat Finucane’s murder collapsed in chaos and embittered by the process he pledged to publicly name the RUC police officers behind the UFF terror campaign. Within months he was dead, shot down outside his home in December of 2011 before he could give any further details. Various British terrorist factions claimed credit for his assassination though many questioned the true identity of his killers.

Nick Greger, a leading British fascist, poses with the infamous Johnny Adair, a former senior British terrorist with the UDA-UFF terror group

Nick Greger, a leading British fascist, poses with the infamous Johnny Adair, a former senior British terrorist with the UDA-UFF terror group

In contrast a second man suspected of involvement in the killing, the infamous British terrorist Johnny “Mad Dog” Adair, managed to escape arrest for the murder despite evidence of his participation. Adair, a former skinhead and Neo-Nazi who boasted of deriving sexual pleasure from killing Irish men and women, fled to Britain in 2003 as his opposition to the Peace Process and push to control the lucrative drugs trade in the north-east of Ireland led to internecine warfare amongst the British terror gangs. There he became a close associate of a number of Far Right extremists, including leaders of the National Front, Combat 18 and the BNP. However before his exile a British government investigation by the London Metropolitan Police Commissioner Sir John Stevens revealed that Adair had become close friends in the 1990s with the then head of British Army Intelligence in the North of Ireland. Through this relationship British Intelligence officers passed on dozens of files to the Unionist death squads, as well as weapons and financial ”assistance”. For many years after fleeing Ireland, despite no employment or visible means of income, Adair and his family continued to live in relative affluence and safety in Britain.

A third suspect, Ken Barrett, was arrested and charged in 2004 for the murder of Pat, some fifteen years after the assassination. However the PR disaster for the British state deepened when it was revealed that Barrett was a former RUC police officer and another serving agent of the RUC in the UFF terror group. His previous open boasts to the media of having been directed and assisted by the paramilitary police in the murder only added to the British government’s woes. In 2006, after serving just two years of a 22 year sentence for Pat’s murder, Barrett was released from prison in the North of Ireland and immediately travelled to an unknown destination in Britain.

But now it seems that one of the darker episodes of Britain’s “Dirty War” is being brought a little further into the light after a bilateral agreement between Ireland and Britain forced the British government to initiate and publicise the findings of a new report by an internal investigative panel led by Sir Desmond de Silva, a former United Nations’ war crimes investigator.

Though, as will be seen, the report still manages to conceal more than it reveals.

Joint footpatrol of British UDA terrorists and British Army soldiers, British Occupied North of Ireland, 1970s

Joint footpatrol of British UDA terrorists and British Army soldiers, British Occupied North of Ireland, 1970

The key conclusions include the following acknowledgements:

  • There was a continuous supply of information from the British state to the British terrorist groups in the North of Ireland over a period of many years. In fact, concludes the report, by the mid-1980s up to 85% of all intelligence information gathered by the UFF / UDA alone was supplied to them by the RUC, British Army and the British Security Service (MI5).
  • The British authorities took no action in relation to numerous intelligence reports which outlined a number of future terrorist attacks by the Unionist gangs, with the paramilitary police and Intelligence services ignoring or concealing such information.
  • British agents employed or working on behalf of the RUC, British Army and MI5 played “key roles” and actively “furthered and facilitated” the murder of Pat Finucane and others.
  • Following the murder there were no attempts by the RUC or British authorities for a long period of time to investigate or arrest known suspects belonging to the UFF / UDA for their participation in the assassination.
  • Serving or former members of the RUC, British Army and MI5 Army persistently lied or attempted to deceive investigators. Several senior British Army officers provided  highly misleading and inaccurate information.

From RTÉ:

“A review into the murder of Belfast solicitor Pat Finucane in 1989 has found that actions by employees of the British state “actively facilitated” the killing.

Mr Finucane was shot dead by loyalists [British terrorists] in front of his wife and children in February 1989.The report by Desmond de Silva concluded that there was no “adequate framework” for the police and security forces running agents in loyalist and republican gangs.

Mr de Silva said people whom the RUC Special Branch viewed as “thorns in the side” were not warned when threats were made against them.

It found that the British army and Special Branch had advance notice of a series of planned UDA [UFF] assassinations, but nothing was done.

Mr de Silva found that employees of the state and stage agents played “key roles” in Mr Finucane’s murder.

Mr de Silva said “agents of the state were involved in carrying out serious violations of human rights up to and including murder”.

He wrote that while there was no “over-arching state conspiracy to murder Patrick Finucane,” there was collusion in his killing in terms of the passage of information from members of the security forces to the UDA, the failure to act on threat intelligence, the participation of state agents in the murder and the subsequent failure to investigate and arrest key members of the West Belfast UDA.

The publication of a report provides “the fullest possible account of the murder of Mr Finucane and the extent of state collusion”, British Prime Minister David Cameron said.

He added: “It cannot be argued that these were rogue agents.”He said the degree of collusion exposed was “unacceptable” and said in a message to the family: “I am deeply sorry.” Last Sunday, RTÉ News published details of a 2003 inquiry which showed the RUC had recovered the murder weapon and gave it back to the British army to facilitate its destruction.”

The government of Ireland, whose constitutional duty is to protect the life and property of the citizens of Ireland, has pledged to push for a full independent and international enquiry into the assassination, as also outlined by RTÉ:

“Tánaiste Eamon Gilmore has told the Dáil that the Government will continue to call for a public inquiry into the murder of Pat Finucane.

Mr Gilmore said that Mr Finucane’s widow Geraldine has worked tirelessly on uncovering the truth in her husband’s murder.

The Tánaiste said British Prime Minister David Cameron had shown determination to get to the truth and that his apology to Mrs Finucane followed on from his apology in the wake of the Lord Saville Inquiry.

He gave credit to the acknowledgement by Mr Cameron of the systematic failures in the murder inquiry.

He said that an inquiry need not be open-ended but could be done in a timely fashion.

The Finucane family have said “the dirt has been swept under the carpet” and described today’s report as a sham and a whitewash.

The family said the worst thing about the Desmond de Silva report is that it is a “suppression of the truth”.

The family again called for a public inquiry, and said the case was the “most controversial”, demonstrated the most state collusion and was a case the British “state had most to hide”.

PSNI Chief Constable Matt Baggott is to discuss the de Silva report with the Police Ombudsman and the Public Prosecution Service to see if more people should be held to account for the murder of the solicitor.

He said: “The murder should never have happened. There was a catalogue of failure which needs to be assessed to see if people should be held accountable.”

In a statement, Taoiseach Enda Kenny said the de Silva report and David Cameron’s statement acknowledge the “shocking extent of state collusion in the murder of Pat Finucane and the efforts to subvert and frustrate subsequent investigations into that murder”.

He welcomed Mr Cameron’s “clear condemnation of the nature and scale of collusion, and his firm public apology to Geraldine Finucane and her family for all they have endured”.

He continued: “I note that the Prime Minister has indicated that various authorities in Britain and in Northern Ireland are expected to consider the report.”The murder of Pat Finucane was one of a number of cases which gave rise to allegations of collusion by the security forces.

It is a matter of public record that the Irish Government disagrees strongly with the decision by the British government last year not to conduct a public inquiry into the murder of Pat Finucane.

Mr Kenny said the Government’s position “has consistently been in accordance with the all-party motion adopted in the Dáil in 2006 which called for a full, independent, public enquiry, as recommended by Judge Cory.”That position is unchanged”, he said.

He said the Government has also supported the Finucane family in their efforts “to ascertain the full extent of collusion behind Pat Finucane’s murder and the subsequent investigations”.

Mr Kenny said he spoke with Mr Cameron this morning before the House of Commons statement, and repeated these points to him once again.

He said he had also spoken to Mrs Finucane today, adding that he knows the family are not satisfied with today’s outcome.”

Of course, despite all the evidence presented, some people are still prepared, eager even, to defend or excuse away the murder of an Irish citizen and a member of the Irish legal profession. Can there be anything more degenerate than the perverse views of the Neo-Unionist apologist historian Ruth Dudley Edwards in the Telegraph?

“…let’s bust the myth that Finucane was a human-rights lawyer.  A human-rights lawyer is someone who disinterestedly protects people from abuse by the state or by terrorists.  Pat Finucane didn’t do that.  He was an IRA lawyer who worked for terrorists against the interests of justice.

The early 1970s in Northern Ireland were terrible times that pushed towards violence many who in a normal world would have led peaceful lives.  Finucane was one of those.  Although Northern Irish, at the expense of the British taxpayer, he studied law at Trinity College, Dublin.

After his death he was canonised by republican propagandists and turned retrospectively into a human-rights lawyer.  It turns my stomach that this man was murdered, that members of the security forces colluded with it and that the murder was carried out in front of his family.   But journalists and commentators should not carelessly adopt the language of propagandists.  Finucane was a lawyer who was a faithful servant of a terrorist group that carried out in his lifetime many hundreds of vicious murders that he himself condoned.

The British state has admitted its wrongdoing.  It’s time to close the book on Pat Finucane.”

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Crisis? What Crisis?

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British Unionist protesters besiege the offices of the liberal Unionist Alliance Party in east Belfast, Ireland 2012 (Photo: The Five Demands)

British Unionist protesters besiege the offices of the liberal Unionist Alliance Party in east Belfast, Ireland 2012 (Photo: The Five Demands)

Peter Robinson, the DUP leader and regional Joint First Minister of the North of Ireland, recently claimed that Irish Nationalism was in “crisis” and that his party could reach out to “Catholics” in the north-east of the country, a statement that was greeted with loud acclaim from the British Unionist minority in Ireland and their fellow travellers in the British and Irish media.

Unfortunately for Peter hard on the heels of his grandstanding speech comes the news that Belfast City Council has voted to remove the British flag from its permanent position atop City Hall, a once unassailable bastion of British (mis-)rule in Ireland. Now Unionists are turning on each other in a vicious round of the blame-game with the “liberal” Unionists of the Alliance Party feeling the pressure from both the mainstream and extreme of their community.

The latest from the Guardian:

“A young councillor in Northern Ireland has been forced to flee her home because of Ulster loyalist threats against her for voting to reverse the policy of flying the union flag at Belfast city hall 365 days a year.

After a night of violence in the city, Alliance councillor Laura McNamee, 27, said she believed hardline loyalists who abused her on Facebook are linked to the Ulster Volunteer Force in east Belfast and were picketing her party’s constituency headquarters in the east of the city.

McNamee and several party colleagues have been warned of threats against them by a new extremist loyalist faction enraged over Belfast city council’s decision on Monday night to only allow the union flag to be flown for up to 20 designated days.

The 29-21 vote in favour of changing the flag-flying policy provoked a riot in the grounds of city hall that left 15 police officers injured, at least one council security guard hurt, and an Associated Press photographer beaten over the head by a police baton.

The loyalists opposed to any change in the flag policy are targeting prominent Alliance members because the party holds the balance of power on the council. It was their compromise motion – that the union flag would be still be flown on top of city hall on days such as the Queen’s birthday – that led to the union flag no longer being a permanent fixture on the council building.

The Alliance representative, who was elected to council two years ago, said she has been told members of the militant East Belfast Battalion of the UVF were orchestrating the violence and the intimidation.

She confirmed that it was “highly unlikey” she could return to her home for the foreseeable future and would spend Christmas elsewhere.

While condemning the violence outside city hall on Monday evening, mainstream unionist politicians have continued their verbal onslaught on the Alliance party.”

Crisis, Peter? What crisis?

The Anti-Democrats – The British Unionist Minority In Ireland

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Protesters from the British Unionist minority demonstrate at the end of the flying of the British flag from the roof of Belfast City Hall, Ireland 2012 (Photo: The Five Demands)

Protesters from the British Unionist minority demonstrate at the end of the flying of the British flag from the roof of Belfast City Hall, Ireland 2012 (Photo: The Five Demands)

The democratically elected local government council of Belfast City has voted to remove the British flag from the masthead on the roof of Belfast City Hall in a city shared by Irish Nationalist and British Unionist communities. And the reaction of Unionists?

A thousand-strong demonstration outside Belfast City Hall punctuated by screams of “No Surrender”, the burning of the Irish flag, an attempted storming of the civic building, injured civilian security guards and PSNI paramilitary police officers, a beaten press photographer, smashed cars, rioting in central and east Belfast, and attacks on St. Matthews, a Roman Catholic Church in a besieged Nationalist enclave in the east of the city.

This is what the British Unionist minority in Ireland call’s “democracy”.

The same in 2012 as it was in 1912.

UPDATE 1.00am 04/12/12: The DUP’s Tom Haire, a Belfast City councillor and member of the Protestant fundamentalist Orange Order, has issued a tweet about last night’s vote that some have interpreted as a crude attempt to draw a reaction from Resistance Republicans to the agreement by Sinn Féin and the SDLP to the compromise motion passed by Belfast City Council.

Tom Haire of the DUP issues a tweet in a crude attempt to draw a reaction from Resistance Republicans?

Tom Haire of the DUP issues a tweet in a crude attempt to draw a reaction from Resistance Republicans?

UPDATE 2.00am 04/12/2012: Video of the rioting by members of the British Unionist minority outside Belfast City Hall in protest at the city council’s equality vote over national flags at the city hall.

Gráinne Holland – Teanga na nGael

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Gráinne Holland – Teanga na nGael – Language of the Gael

In a shameless rip-off of the Cedar Lounge Revolution here (with apologies) is my own “Something For The Weekend“.

Belfast’s Gráinne Holland is one of Ireland’s most talented new musical artists. Her innovative 2011 album Teanga na nGael (“Language of the Gael”) combines traditional Irish music with a European sound that echoes elements of pop, jazz and several other influences. Its say’s much for her talent and breadth of artistic vision that even non-Irish speakers have given her work rave reviews, proving yet again that music can be a truly international language.

She typifies in many ways the new generation of Gaeilgeoirí or Irish-speaking citizens in Ireland: self-confident in their language, culture and identity. In Gráinne’s case this has allowed her to take Irish traditional music and craft it into something both new yet old that has gained a wide appeal beyond these shores.

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