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 		 R E L A N D benediction of the 51st state. DoD photo by Helene C. Stikkel Pentagon 1.26.00 NATO HQ Illuminatissimus. DoD photo by Helene C. Stikkel Pentagon 11.19.98
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BELFAST   Britain & Ireland on Wednesday launched a new package to get N.Ireland peace talks back on track, promising a new look at paramilitary disarmament, police reform and security, including British troop numbers. The document, which is intended to breathe new life into the landmark 1998 Good Friday peace agreement, insists that "the agreement can only succeed if all parts of it are implemented together." It emphasizes that the two governments see guerrilla disarmament as an "indispensable part" of the agreement.
But it avoids setting any date for the start or completion of disarmament by the Irish republican IRA, an omission likely to infuriate pro-British Unionists who have demanded fast action from the guerrillas. Politicians from the British province's Protestant majority and Roman Catholic minority are deadlocked over the lack of guerrilla disarmament, over police reforms to bring more Roman Catholics into the Protestant-dominated force, and on the size of Britain's military presence in the province.
David Trimble, leader of the Ulster Unionist Party -- the main Protestant party, resigned as head of Northern Ireland's government in June in protest at the lack of disarmament. Britain, which has sovereignty over the province, must decide by August 12 whether to suspend the home-rule government and reimpose direct rule from London or call fresh elections, both moves likely to plunge the process into fresh crisis. The latest package was presented on a "take-it-or-leave-it" basis and a response was demanded by next Monday. Trimble again called on the IRA to disarm and said his party would examine the new blueprint on Monday.
"The crisis will only be resolved by republicans fulfilling their obligation (to disarm). The paper's other proposals will be irrelevant in the absence of decommissioning," he said. Gerry Adams, head of Sinn Fein, the IRA's political ally, said in a statement: "Sinn Fein is coming to this document critically but in a constructive frame of mind." He added that his party's executive would meet on Friday to study the package.

"fair, balanced and justified"
The 2 govts described it as a "fair, balanced and justified package of proposals" which would help deliver the "full and early implementation" of the Good Friday Agreement. Britain & Ireland are desperate to keep the province's power-sharing government running because it embodies hopes for a permanent end to 30 years of conflict which cost 3,600 lives. But the agreement has staggered from crisis to crisis for three years and the August 12 deadline looms large. "No one should underestimate the serious consequences for the stability of the agreement and for the future of N.Ireland if we can't find an agreed way forward before that date," Britain's Northern Ireland Secretary John Reid said.
There were some new elements in the document, firstly the prospect of an amnesty for fugitive guerrillas. "The governments accept that it would be a natural development...for such prosecutions not to be pursued," it said. Promised changes in policing, which have upset both sides of Northern Ireland's sectarian divide, will be looked at afresh. Sinn Fein's demand for plastic bullets to be banned will also be considered. If the security threat from guerrilla groups proves to have diminished, Britain has promised to demolish an army base and two large watchtowers as part of a "progressive rolling program" of reducing the number of troops and installations. The 2 govts also pledged to appoint judges to look at allegations of security force involvement in several high-profile murders, including the killings of two human rights lawyers in recent years.

Sinn Fein disparages peace plan
8.3.01   AP

CASTLEBELLINGHAM, Ireland   Sinn Fein leaders said Friday they were "not impressed'' with a joint British-Irish plan to inspire Irish Republican Army disarmament, the long-unresolved issue unraveling Northern Ireland's 1998 peace accord. Discussing strategy for several hours at a village hotel north of Dublin, the IRA-linked party said Britain hadn't promised enough cutbacks in military bases & troops, particularly along the highly militarized border with the Republic of Ireland. "At first glance, I am not impressed by what I see on demilitarization. It's not what was promised three years ago, and it's not likely to impress the people I represent," said Conor Murphy, the party's senior official in South Armagh, a Catholic border region where British forces maintain a network of watchtowers to monitor IRA activity.

In the complex document unveiled Wednesday, Britain pledged "a progressive rolling program reducing levels of troops & installations in Northern Ireland", if the threat of terrorism declined. Instead, armed hard-liners on both sides of the Northern Ireland divide have spent the past week increasing their violence. An overnight car-bomb attack blamed on IRA dissidents wounded seven people in London. On Wednesday, soldiers defused another car bomb at Northern Ireland's major airport.
The menace posed by anti-Catholic extremists - also supposed to be observing cease-fires in support of the N.Ireland peace deal, was demonstrated again Friday as police seized five pipe bombs, a homemade grenade and 300 rounds of ammunition in Ballysillan, a hard-line Protestant neighborhood in Belfast. Police have linked the major outlawed Protestant group, the Ulster Defense Association, to the killings of two people last month and scores of pipebomb attacks on Catholic homes.

N.Ireland's power-sharing govt, a fruit of the 1998 peace agreement, faces suspension or collapse by Aug. 12 because leaders of the major Protestant party, the Ulster Unionists, are no longer willing to share power with Sinn Fein. Ulster Unionist leader David Trimble, who triggered the crisis last month by resigning as the administration's senior Protestant, insists he would seek re-election by the Aug. 12 deadline only if the IRA starts to scrap weapons, as a series of earlier agreements envisioned should happen.
An Ulster Unionist delegation met Britain's secretary of state for N.Ireland, John Reid, Friday to discuss British plans for reforming the province's mostly Protestant police force, another key Catholic demand. "The amount of stupidity that I have heard talked about policing in recent months is the worst I have ever heard," said Reg Empey, a senior Ulster Unionist, who argued that recent violence made it a poor time to shake up the police dept.

WESTON-UNDER-LIZARD, England   Outlawed anti-Catholic militants withdrew their support for Northern Ireland's peace pact Tuesday as negotiators tried to salvage the Catholic-Protestant administration at the heart of the deal. The Ulster Defense Association, which had supported the 1998 accord because it freed hundreds of its members from prison, said it could no longer back a deal that leaves Irish Republican Army supporters in the four-party Cabinet governing Northern Ireland. The smaller Ulster Volunteer Force said that it was also withdrawing support for the pact and would steer clear of future negotiations, but would continue to meet a commission created to oversee disarmament of outlawed groups.
Commanders of the UDA and UVF emphasized they would maintain their cease-fires, which predate the Good Friday pact and have greatly reduced terror attacks on Northern Ireland's Catholic minority, though these have increased in recent weeks. The statements underscored deepening despair as the British and Irish governments pressed for a breakthrough among Northern Ireland's chief power-sharing parties.

The British & Irish prime ministers, Tony Blair and Bertie Ahern, led the second day of negotiations at Weston Park, an isolated 17th-century mansion in central England. Officials from both governments predicted the diplomatic push would go on into the night. Hopes of movement on the most pressing issue, IRA disarmament, were running low. Ahern, who has emphasized that the IRA must act quickly to keep the Protestants in the Cabinet, said there had been "no progress so far.'' Gerry Adams, leader of the IRA-linked Sinn Fein party, said the governments and other parties in Northern Ireland's four-party administration were wrong to be demanding any disarmament now.
Sinn Fein said any IRA action must be accompanied by more British military cutbacks and tougher plans for reshaping Northern Ireland's mostly Protestant police force. Britain has already withdrawn several thousand troops, closed more than two dozen bases, and passed police-reform legislation that Catholic politicians refuse to support. Politicians linked with the UDA and UVF were involved in Monday's negotiations at Weston Park, but Blair and Ahern dismissed them in order to concentrate on the three parties present from the province's administration: Sinn Fein, the moderate Catholics of the Social Democratic and Labor Party, and the Protestants of the Ulster Unionist Party.
The fourth coalition member, hard-line Protestants from the Democratic Unionists, oppose the 1998 pact and weren't invited. Like the IRA, the UDA and UVF were supposed to scrap weapons in support of the Good Friday pact and have refused, insisting the IRA go first. Unlike Sinn Fein, which in recent years has grown to represent half of Northern Ireland's Catholics and holds two of the Cabinet's 12 posts, politicians linked to the UDA and UVF win too few Protestant votes to hold influential positions. The UDA said its roughly 2,000 members had privately opposed much of the 1998 deal for a long time and claimed most Protestants "have grown to despise'' the direction of peacemaking in Northern Ireland.
A UVF-linked politician, David Ervine, said he had asked a series of questions to the Sinn Fein delegation Monday but received no straight answers. "They are snake-oil salesmen. They don't deal honorably with us, and neither do the British and Irish governments,'' Ervine said. "It has made it impossible for me to tell my people that this peace process can include us as equals.'' In Washington, the Bush administration cautiously welcomed an effort by former President Clinton to help salvage the Good Friday pact, which he had a major role in putting together. White House spokesman Ari Fleischer said Clinton, who is in England on private business, had met with Blair and Ahern "in his capacity as a private citizen.'' Fleischer said Clinton had contacted the State Department about a possible trip to Ireland for peace talks. Adams, the Sinn Fein leader, said he talked to Clinton on the telephone in England.

WASHINGTON   Gerry Adams, president of N.Ireland's Sinn Fein political party, expressed optimism for the peace process on Thursday despite renewed violence in Belfast. "By any standards at all, the situation, notwithstanding the current difficulties, is much better than it has been last year or the year before or the year before that," Adams said at a news conference. "Overall, unlike the Middle East, the process in Ireland is moving forward, that's the general momentum; ... overall this process is going to succeed," Adams said, speaking to reporters after meeting with members of the U.S. Congress. Adams said he was headed to Ireland for meetings on Friday with Richard Haass, the State Dept's director of policy planning, who is traveling to London, Dublin and Belfast this week.
"(Haass's) trip will underline U.S. support for the London and Dublin-led process for implementing all elements of the Good Friday Agreement," a State Dept spokeswoman said. Adams discounted press reports that rioting in Belfast on Wednesday was caused by rival Roman Catholic and Protestant mobs. "This has been portrayed as Catholics and Protestants fighting," Adams said. "That is not the case. This is a loyalist paramilitary group trying to ratchet up tension," he said. He called on British Prime Minister Tony Blair to act. "It wouldn't be allowed to happen in Britain and Mr. Blair needs to very clearly say no, that he is not going to let it happen in Belfast today," Adams said.
The rioting followed 2 days of sectarian violence in north Belfast and coincided with the annual "marching season," when parades by Protestant groups commemorating battlefield victories over Catholics heighten sectarian tension. The clashes began after schoolgirls and their parents were stoned by Protestant youths on Tuesday as they left a Catholic school and a pipe bomb was thrown at a house. Britain & the Irish Republic are trying to get the stalled peace process back on track, but a dispute over disarmament continues to simmer despite cease-fires by mainstream guerrilla groups like the Irish Republican Army. Sinn Fein is the political wing of the Irish Republican Army. Adams said he believed the disarmament issue would be resolved.

New Bombing After N. Ireland Riots
6.21.01   Reuters

BELFAST   Tension mounted in N.Ireland on Thursday after a blast bomb exploded at the back wall of a Roman Catholic house. The explosion followed some of Belfast's worst rioting for years in which thirty-nine police officers were injured as they kept rival Catholic and Protestant factions apart. A shockwave from the blast, when a bomb was hurled over the peaceline, separating Catholic and Protestant homes, around 11:15 a.m. EDT on Thursday, blew a child against a fence and an elderly woman was treated for shock. It occurred as nationalist community leaders met after children were again prevented from going to school by Protestant hard- liners, who mounted a protest outside Holy Cross Girls' Primary School. 5 Protestant families were moving out of their homes along the Alliance Avenue interface, police said.
"Obviously, it's very tense," said Ann Tanney, head of Holy Cross school, which lies inside the Protestant zone and was forced to close after the trouble. The blast follows a night of unrest in which police, backed by British troops, fired plastic bullets to restore calm when hundreds from rival sides hurled petrol bombs, acid bombs, stones and bottles. Police said 100 petrol bombs were thrown, cars were set on fire and nine gun shots had been fired at them from both sides. Five of the injured officers were taken to hospital. Protestant hard-liners tried to bomb the ambulance as it left. "I think this is some of the most serious rioting that Belfast has seen for several years. We have had crowds of up to 600 involved at different times," Alan McQuillan, assistant chief constable of the province's police force, told Reuters.
… Clashes came after Catholic pupils and their parents were stoned by Protestant youths on Tuesday as they left the school and a pipe bomb was thrown at a house. Protestant politicians blamed republicans for the unrest,

Peace process in crisis
The riots erupted as the fragile peace process in the British province faced a fresh crisis over a long-running dispute on guerrilla disarmament between politicians from the Protestant majority and Catholic minority. British minister for the province, John Reid urged both sides to pull back from the brink and "to take stock because there can be no justification for the kind of violence that leaves 39 officers injured." Britain and the Irish Republic have launched a new push to get the stalled peace process back on track but the disarmament issue remains as thorny as ever despite cease-fires by mainstream guerrilla groups such as the Irish Republican Army. Irish Republic Prime Minister Bertie Ahern said on Thursday that "difficult days" lay ahead and a move by the IRA was crucial within the next 10 days if N.Ireland's peace process was to survive.

The IRA has opened up some of its dumps for international inspection, but unionists say this is not enough. N.Ireland's power-sharing assembly, set up under the landmark 1998 Good Friday peace accord,

IRA promises to resume arms talks
3.8.01   Reuters

LONDON, England   The IRA is to renew discussions with an intl arms decommissioning body, the republican organisation has said. Thursday's announcement by the Irish Republican Army came as UK Prime Minister Tony Blair and his Irish counterpart Bertie Ahern prepared for new talks on the Northern Irish peace process in Belfast. The last contacts between the IRA and the decommissioning body were in June 2000. Blair is due to meet Ulster Unionist leader & N.Ireland's First Minister David Trimble (Nobel Peace Prize), Deputy First Minister Seamus Mallon and Sinn Fein President Gerry Adams at Hillsborough Castle in an attempt to end the deadlock over decommissioning. They will also discuss policing in N. Ireland and demilitarisation, which is threatening the future of the 1998 Good Friday peace agreement.

In a statement on Thursday morning, the IRA said the British Govt was not prepared to uphold commitments made over the last few years, which the republicans said was "totally unacceptable." Despite this, the IRA leadership said it remained committed to the quest for a lasting peace, but added that it could only be achieved if everyone played their part. The statement added: "The record shows that the IRA have honoured every commitment we have made including the opening of IRA arms dumps to inspection by the agreed intl inspectors Cyril Ramaphosa (6.23.00) & Maarti Ahtisaari (10.26.00).   [ lampoons 1 •2 ]   We have done so despite the abuse of the peace process by those who persist with the aim of defeating the IRA and Irish republicanism and the obvious failure of the British Govt to honour its obligations. The political responsibility for advancing the current situation rests with the 2 govts, especially the British Govt, and the leadership of the political parties."
Earlier, a spokesman for Blair said Thursday's talks would be held first on a bilateral basis leading, hopefully, to round-table meetings. "There is a real determination to make progress on the outstanding issues but there is no guarantee of outcome," he said. On Tuesday, Ahern said a stopgap formula was needed to keep the 1998 Good Friday agreement afloat over coming months. "What I do think is possible if everyone puts in the required effort ... is that we could get a process that would allow us manage those issues over perhaps a difficult summer," he told parliament in Dublin. In London security chiefs were braced for more bombings by dissidents hostile to the landmark accord after Sunday's car bomb outside the BBC's London offices. Police suspect the Real IRA, a group opposed to the peace process, was behind the attack. Blair's office said the fresh peace impetus was not a response to the BBC bomb attack.

    Adams Blasts British on IRA Weaponry
    3.10.01   Shawn Pogatchnik AP
… Following 13 hours of negotiations Thursday involving the British and Irish govts, Sinn Fein and the Ulster Unionists, Britain indicated it was willing to give ground on Sinn Fein demands, particularly on further troop withdrawals and base closures, but only if the IRA finally began disarming. Adams, reputedly once a senior Belfast IRA commander, dismissed this as a back-to-front approach and insisted Britain needed to keep scaling down its military presence regardless of IRA actions. "There is no place in Ireland for the British army," Adams declared to applause from the 200-member crowd of Dublin party activists. … A dissident group called the Real IRA has bombed several military bases and civilian rail lines in N.Ireland in the past year, and is believed to be responsible for last weekend's car bomb outside British Broadcasting Corp. studios in London. The dissidents accuse Adams' Sinn Fein of betraying their past sacrifices. …
    Provos happy to play a game of charades
    3.9.01   David Sharrock Telegraph
… In spite of a Herculean charm offensive, what has Mr Blair extracted from Gerry Adams? The truth is that the Provos have no intention of decommissioning their weaponry - the tons of material provided by Libya's Col Gaddafi and stored in purpose-built bunkers in the Irish Republic. … Double message strategy which has sustained the republican 'peace strategy' since 1995.
will be plunged into a crisis at the end of this month if Trimble carries out a threat to quit as first minister if there is no IRA disarmament. Trimble, the main Protestant leader backing the peace process, has been weakened by electoral setbacks and his resignation would come at an unstable time of the year in N.Ireland when Protestants stage annual marches across the province to celebrate centuries-old battlefield victories over Catholics. BELFAST   Belfast's worst riots in 3 years may have been encouraged by Catholic & Protestant paramilitary groups, police said Thursday. 39 officers were injured, and five were treated at hospitals, police said. Police in helmets & shields moved into the Ardoyne district, a Catholic enclave surrounded by similarly hard- line Protestant neighborhoods, Wednesday night to separate several hundred young men and teen-agers from both sides of the divide. The crowds threw stones and bottles at each other as well as at police. Police returned fire with plastic bullets. Police said the disturbances appeared to involve an element of organization on both sides.
"Last night we had 6 shots fired at us from the loyalist (Protestant) side, we had 3 shots fired at us from the nationalist (Catholic) side, we had over 100 petrol bombs thrown, acid bombs. Clearly this was, to some degree at least, organized rioting," assistant chief constable Alan McQuillan said in an interview with British Broadcasting Corp. radio. McQuillan said the rioting was the worst in the city since 1998.

Sectarian passions first flared in the area Tuesday when Protestant militants began throwing rocks and bottles at Catholic girls leaving their Ardoyne school, which lies on the far side of a high steel wall designed to keep the two communities apart. Gerry Kelly, a senior member of the IRA-allied Sinn Fein party, accused loyalist paramilitaries of stirring up tension in advance of the summer marching season - which each year produces confrontations between Protestant fraternal groups and Catholic protesters determined to stop their marches through Catholic areas.
But Billy Hutchinson, a leader of the Progressive Unionist Party, which is associated with Protestant paramilitiaries, linked the trouble to the IRA's refusal to disarm. "Are they trying to create a situation where the IRA are made to hold on to their guns?" Hutchinson said. John Reid, Britain's senior official in N.Ireland, said the violence was "a reminder to all of us of what is at stake in this peace process." That process, which produced a peace accord in 1998, is now grinding toward another crisis on the intractable issue of disarming the Irish Republican Army.

David Trimble, the Protestant leader of N.Ireland's new regional govt, says he will resign on July 1 if the IRA doesn't take concrete steps to dispose of its weapons. The IRA issued a statement Wednesday saying it would not meet the deadline. The arms issue "will not be resolved by (Protestant) unionist ultimatums or on British terms," the outlawed group said in a statement to news media. Reid spoke in London at a news conference with Richard Haass, the U.S. special envoy for N.Ireland. Haass said the United States supported the 1998 agreement, but said there was "no secret plan in Washington" to solve the remaining problems. "I don't think that American mediation or something of that sort is called for," Haass said. post-partum parliament

Speaker Lord Alderdice :
… travel tomorrow to Washington with members of the Business Committee invited to meet with members of new Bush Administration, with business managers in the Congress and with others. …
Deputy First Minister Mallon :
… Yesterday the First Minister introduced the motion to endorse the Programme for Govt agreed by the Executive and outlined its significance in relation to the new politics of the agreement. He also spoke about the valuable interaction between the Executive and the Assembly and its Committees in debating and scrutinising the programme. I want to join with him in thanking the Assembly for the very positive and constructive way in which it undertook this task and is continuing to do so in this debate. I also add my thanks to the Civic Forum and to more than 150 outside bodies and inviduals who provided comment during that consultation on the draft programme.
Finally, I wish to pay tribute also to the talented and committed officials who have helped us to construct a Programme for Govt from scratch, at the same time as we put our first Budget together. … It will be a significant moment when the Assembly endorses the Programme for Govt and takes co-ownership and co-responsibility for it. Here lies the importance of the public service agreements now annexed to the main programme for they are the means by which we will give a detailed account of ourselves, the means to allow the Assembly effective monitoring of the implementation of the programme.

W B Yeats wrote "In dreams begins responsibility".
The Programme for Govt sets out the policies and objectives we have identified as our main priorities for the years ahead. It does so in a way which links vision to practicality, setting out not just what we aspire to but also the steps we need to take to get there. Our vision is of a peaceful, inclusive, prosperous, stable and fair society, firmly founded on the achievement of reconciliation, tolerance and mutual trust, and the protection and vindication of human rights for all. It is a vision also based on partnership, equality and mutual respect as the basis of relationships within N.Ireland, between North and South, and between these islands. To achieve that vision requires a commitment to the prosaic but necessary pursuit of effectiveness, efficiency and economy within each Govt Dept. … Mr Neeson also called for proofing that promotes sharing over separation. I would point out to him page 195 of the Programme for Govt, which deals with the obligations under section 75 of the N.Ireland Act 1998. That includes not only obligations of equality of opportunity but also the requirement to have a regard for the desirability of better community relations. … The new Executive programmes are a practical means of enabling us to carry out more effective cross- cutting work. We are pleased that the concept of cross-cutting funding received strong endorsement during the consultation on the draft Programme for Govt. We are currently considering the first bids from Depts and expect to take decisions on the first tranche of allocations in the coming weeks.
The advice again is that if you think separately as a Department you will not fully realise those funds' potential. I would like to refer to inclusivity in relation to the Executive rather than the community. It is a shame, and I say this with great sincerity, that one of the parties to the Executive still feels it necessary for some arcane reason to work outside the Executive's collective approach.
Mr McCartney :
Does the Deputy First Minister consider it an arcane principle to refuse to work with the political representatives of terrorists determined to remain armed?

President Bush yesterday endorsed the idea of a European defense force after winning assurances from British Prime Minister Tony Blair that the separate force would not undermine NATO. Though some policymakers have seen the move to establish a European military force capable of acting independently as a threat to exclude the United States from European security issues, the two leaders issued a communique from Camp David stating that as long as "NATO will remain the essential foundation of trans-Atlantic security," the United States "welcomes the European Union's European Security and Defense Policy." "He assured me that NATO is going to be the primary way to keep the peace in Europe," said Bush
… Blair, who met earlier in the day in Washington with VP Cheney, also received an offer from Bush of assistance in negotiations over N.Ireland, although Bush said he would "wait to be asked." UK has finally lifted its derogation from Article 5 of the European Convention on Human Rights, which was necessitated by the fact that the UK did not want to comply with the ruling of the European Court of Human Rights in the case of Brogan v UK concerning prolonged detention under Prevention of Terrorism (Temporary Provisions) Act. The reason for lifting the derogation is the coming into force on 19th February of the Terrorism Act, which contains a mechanism for judicial sanction of prolonged detention. BELFAST   The Irish Republican Army has suspended negotiations with N. Ireland's disarmament committee. It follows a decision by Britain to suspend the province's new govt, in which Catholic and Protestant factions share power. That decision was made because of a report by the disarmament commission. It said there was no sign the IRA was giving up its weapons under the terms of the peace accord. The IRA accuses Britain and the Protestant Ulster Unionists of seeking a military victory over the paramilitary group.

IRA statement

9 weeks after self-rule was given to N.Ireland, the British govt has introduced legislation suspending governing institutions in the British province. The House of Commons is expected to debate the emergency legislation during the next few days; at the end of the week, N.Ireland could be once again ruled directly from London. …
[ So much for leaky U.S. Sen. Geo.Mitchell ]
About a week ago, an intl commission headed by retired Canadian Gen. John de Chastelain reported the IRA failed to begin handing in its weapons. That prompted N.Ireland's Chief Executive David Trimble, leader of the pro-British Ulster Unionist Party, to threaten to resign as N.Ireland's Chief Executive. In order to prevent that move, the British govt was forced to contemplate reintroducing direct rule, resulting in the legislation before Parliament.

[ précis: cradle of democracy U.K. uses non-jury trial courts, secret police, & grandfathered minority rule allies to fight vestigal rebels in a distaff subdivision of a medium size island that won imperial independence decades ago. Both sides employ terrorism. Oil profits & black market drug revenues are at stake. ]

Libyan munitions 12.10.99 IICDecommisioning report

… In recent months, the two main dissident IRA groups, the Real IRA and the Continuity IRA have joined forces to bring in new weaponry from the former Yugoslavia where they are reportedly able to acquire rocket launchers for as little as $40 (£28) a piece. The sophistication of the weaponry that they have acquired and the expertise they have in using it has caused considerable concern amongst British security officers. They had been expecting some sort of terrorist action to proceed or accompany today's South Antrim by-election, which is regarded as a referendum on the Good Friday peace process. …
Launching a missile at a building as large as MI6's headquarters was never going to do more than damage a small area of masonry and shatter some windows. The RPG7, and subsequent versions such as the RPG18, have been used by terrorists around the world but have never before been fired by Irish terrorists in mainland Britain. The Provisional IRA acquired RPG7s from Libya in the 1970s. An arms shipment for Irish republican dissidents opposed to the N.Ireland peace process has been seized by police in Croatia. An undisclosed number of men have been arrested for questioning about the incident in the Adriatic city of Split. Another man has been held by Irish police close to the border with Ulster. Details of the consignment have still to be clarified, but it is understood to have included anti-tank machine guns, ammunition, plastic explosive and detonating cord and equipment. Similar weapons were discovered in the Irish Republic's Co Meath in October last year, indicating that earlier shipments from Croatia may have reached Ireland.
The arms in the latest find are thought to have been bound for a group linked to both the Real IRA & Continuity IRA breakaway republican factions. The Real IRA, who are officially on ceasefire, were responsible for the mass murder bomb attack on Omagh, Co Tyrone, nearly two years ago, when 29 people died and more than 200 injured. Their Continuity IRA allies, the alleged military wing of Republican Sinn Fein, who split from the mainline party over its increasingly political stance in 1986, have been behind a series of other incidents.

Irish police special branch officers went to Split soon after the weapons find and arrests, which followed months of activity by detectives in the eastern European state, to aid investigations by their Croatian counterparts, and further arrests in Ireland are expected. Cash for the arms is reckoned to have been raised through smuggling cigarettes and other goods by gangs on both sides of the Irish border. The amount involved in the Split consignment was today estimated to run into hundreds of thousands of pounds.

Miami   … Prosecutors said that they were happy to win convictions on the weapons charges, though they added a warning that Florida's lax gun laws were an encouragement for anyone to buy weapons there. "He [Claxton] came to Florida to buy guns because it's like buying a car. The laws make it so easy," one prosecutor said. According to federal agents, South Florida's air and sea ports make it a favorite smuggling haven. "South Florida is a gateway for anything illegal, coming and going," Zach Mann, a spokesman for the US Customs Service, said. Prosecutors also said that they believed jurors may have let the recent progress in the peace process influence their ruling, despite a judge's instructions that they should avoid paying attention to world news during the course of the month-long trial.

AT FIRST it appeared a ramshackle operation: guns and ammunition hidden in children's toys and sent by post from America to Ireland. It seemed too basic to be the work of the IRA. But closer inspection and an international police operation revealed a $2 million plan by the IRA to get guns into Ireland in the middle of its supposed ceasefire. … parcel containing .357 Magnum revolver en route to the Irish Republic from the US went astray and was detected by X-ray at Coventry airport. An alert was sent out and within days 23 packages had been found in Ireland, England and the US, all containing guns and all addressed to people in the Irish Republic.
From West Belfast, Claxton, 27, was ordered by senior IRA figures to go to the US to buy arms. Claxton was sent to the US with a letter of introduction from Seamus Moley, a senior IRA member jailed ten years ago for trying to smuggle a stinger missile into N.Ireland. Claxton presented the note saying: "Help this guy out. Seamus" to Larry Flint, an American drugs and arms smuggler who had met Moley in prison in Arizona. Flint, who helped to procure arms for the terrorists, pointed Claxton towards gun dealers and steered him away from places where the authorities are alert to republican activity.
Claxton … admitted membership of the IRA, telling a Florida court of missions to South Africa, Sierra Leone and Kurdish areas. … tapped into the small but affluent Irish community around the stylish coastal town of Ft. Lauderdale and linked up with two IRA "sleepers", Smyth & Mullan, bought weapons from dealers & posted them back to Ireland. … bought hundreds of weapons, direct from dealers and by mail order, spending anything from £200 on a second- hand Magnum revolver to thousands of pounds on sophisticated weaponry.

[ Unlikely to be air launched intelligence, surveillance & reconnaissance (ISR) drones optimized to conduct multiple advanced sensing modalities integrated into an extremely long endurance airframe for continuous & detailed theater air & ground target detection, identification & tracking. This is an old war of the flea. ]
Progressive Unionist Party office in Ballymoney. photo PAUL FAITH / PA POLICE in N.Ireland seized weapons including a Browning .30 machinegun and a sniper's rifle with telescopic sights from the office of a leading loyalist political party yesterday. The breakfast-time raid at offices used by the Progressive Unionist Party in Ballymoney, Co Antrim, came as the main Ulster Unionist Party remained deeply split about whether to return to power-sharing with Sinn Fein next week. The arms discovery at the offices of the PUP, which has two members in the suspended N.Ireland Assembly and close links with the outlawed Ulster Volunteer Force and Red Hand Commando, provoked an outcry across the political spectrum at a time when communal friction is rising in anticipation of the summer marching season.
Ian Paisley Jr, of the rival Democratic Unionist Party, said the discovery made a "mockery" of the UVF ceasefire, which has been in operation since 1994, while the nationalist Social Democratic and Labour Party said the arms find raised "very grave concerns" and an explanation was needed. Mr Paisley said: "Police have found the trappings of terrorism in this office, as opposed to what you would expect to find in the office of a normal political party. The RUC should now search PUP offices across the Province and investigate the party's links with punishment attacks and terrorist-related crime." Booby trap components, a stun gun, ammunition and three replica guns were also seized, as well as balaclavas, combat jackets and baseball bats of the type used in punishment beatings.
THE IRA is rearming with a deadly arsenal, including high-velocity sniper rifles previously used by the terrorists to kill British soldiers and members of the Royal Ulster Constabulary. Mo Mowlam, the N.Ireland secretary, has been warned by MI5 that the IRA has a stockpile of hundreds of "unattributable weapons" that do not appear on inventories held by the authorities. In an assessment presented to Mowlam at a briefing earlier this month, the security service said it had compelling evidence that an American arms smuggling operation uncovered last month was run by the Provisional IRA and not by terrorist dissidents, as many had believed. One of the guns ordered was a Barrett sniper rifle of the type used to kill Lance Bombardier Stephen Restorick and eight other soldiers and policemen. Police said that the terrorists had already imported at least 20 weapons this year and up to 200 in total.
Mowlam is also under pressure from within the RUC, where senior officers are threatening a campaign of disobedience over proposed reforms to the force, including changes to its name, uniform, badge and oath. "This smacks of disbandment and many of us will refuse to do it," said one officer. "They'll find it hard to implement change without our co-operation." Mowlam surprised many last week when she declared that the ceasefire was intact despite a string of shootings in Northern Ireland and the attempted assassination of an IRA informer in Britain.
The MI5 assessment, which also went to the prime minister, said the IRA had established a network in America to buy "clean" guns that could be used without jeopardising the release of IRA prisoners. It said the Provisionals also wanted new weapons so that they could offer up older ones in any decommissioning process. The smuggling operation was uncovered in July, when a Magnum revolver was found at Coventry airport, bound for Ireland. Seven other packages were also found to contain weapons. Three men and a woman were later arrested & charged by the FBI in Florida and Philadelphia. … Conor Claxton, a Belfast man arrested in Florida, allegedly told the FBI that the weapons were to be used on British troops and the RUC. His lawyer later denied this in court. Senator Greorge Mitchell … alarmed by the number of official leaks coming out of both Dublin and London during the peace process. The two main sources of weaponry for the IRA have been the USA and Libya. The main gun-running network in the USA was controlled by a veteran Irish Republican called George Harrison. He supplied arms not only for the 'Border Campaign' (aka 'Fifties Campaign') of the IRA, which was conducted for a number of years up to 1962, but also for the campaign that started in 1969. His network was finally broken up in the early 1980s by the FBI but it is believed that weapons supplied by him are still in use. Other gun-running attempts were made in the USA, but many ended in failure. … U.S. federal agencies, especially the FBI, have become increasingly proficient at disrupting IRA arms procurement activities in the USA. The FBI formed a special unit to concentrate on Irish paramilitaries.
It is believed that the bulk of the material presently in IRA arsenals was shipped from Libya in the mid-1980s with the aid of a skipper, Adrian Hopkins, hired for the purpose by the IRA. However, in the early 1990s Libya's Colonel Ghadaffi decided to give no further aid to the IRA and has informed the UK authorities as to what material was shipped to the Provos. … Morover, the estimated three tonnes of Semtex in IRA possession is also sufficient to allow the organization to continue indefinitely with a bombing campaign The Govt said today it was satisfied with answers given by the Libyans over their arms shipments and funding for the IRA. But the Foreign Office said it remained committed to the United Nations sanctions on Libya because the regime had failed to comply with UN resolutions following the Lockerbie bombing. In particular Libya had failed to hand over the men suspected of planting the bomb on the Pan Am flight which exploded over Lockerbie and led to 270 deaths in December 1988. The suspects are wanted for trial either in Scotland or the U.S.. Colonel Al-Qadhdhafi's regime was a main source of weapons for the IRA, sending a massive arsenal including Semtex explosives, rifles, pistols, ammunition, detonators and timing devices. Tripoli also sent millions of pounds to support the terrorist campaign against British rule in Ulster and there were reports that top IRA men were trained in special camps in Libya. Some of the arms shipments were seized, but there is no doubt that a great deal got through. Britain has sent Libya five sets of questions over its links with the IRA in a bid to ensure that the connection is severed. In a statement today, the Foreign Office said there remained gaps in the information over IRA links. "But when the Libyan disclosures are considered in their entirety, we are satisfied that they have largely met our expectations. "We acknowledge that the Libyan readiness to answer our questions is a positive step towards its implementation of the relevant (UN) Security Council resolutions, in particular towards its renunciation of terrorism, a path which we hope it will continue to follow."

Belfast solicitor Patrick Finucane was murdered 2.12.89 by Ulster Freedom Fighters (UFF). In 11 years since his death, evidence emerged, confidential report Deadly Intelligence to British & Irish govts & United Nations, which strongly suggests there was official collusion in his murder on the part of British army intelligence and the RUC. This evidence also calls into question the role of the Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) and of a govt minister. …

2.2001 … Sunday Times was in court to challenge the injunction taken out against it by the Ministry of Defence, who sought to suppress the paper's coverage about the Force Research Unit, British army intelligence unit that British Irish Rights Watch has alleged was responsible for a number of deaths.

Amnesty Intl summary re
Apr.98 UN HRts Comm report
 … The legislation governing the holding of public inquiries, the Tribunal and Inquiries Act of 1921, primarily deals with the powers of the inquiry once it has been set up. The Salmon Commission of 1966 and the criteria of previous inquiries provide a guideline as to when a public inquiry should be called. The commission stated that an inquiry should be called in response to " nationwide crisis of confidence." Since 1921, the British govt has invoked the act around 20 times and the focus of these inquiries has been allegations of serious misconduct by the govt or public officials. These inquiries have included investigations into allegations of political corruption, police brutality, the Aberfan landslide disaster and the events of Bloody Sunday.
In 1998, when the British prime minister Tony Blair tabled a resolution to establish the current inquiry into Bloody Sunday, he stated that the particular circumstances of Bloody Sunday merited the establishment of a judicial inquiry. Campaigners on behalf of Pat Finucane believe the case meets the same criteria as that evoked by Blair in relation to Bloody Sunday. "Where the state's own authorities are concerned we must be as sure as we can of the truth," said Blair. The crisis of confidence provoked by the killing of Pat Finucane, and further intensified with the 3.15.99 murder by bomb of Lurgan defence lawyer Rosemary Nelson … who testified Sept. 1998 before U.S. Congress House Intl Relations Committee

CAJ Jan.2000 on Diplock courts

Last November, the world watched in wonder as Roman Catholics in N.Ireland worked side by side with the Protestants and the British govt to form a power-sharing assembly for the first time. But the peace process ground to a halt Friday when Britain suspended the new govt because of failure by the participants to reach an accord on how the Irish Republican Army would disarm. Britain's decision to strip the N.Ireland govt of its power came in the face of a last-minute disarmament offer by the IRA. Despite the offer, Britain's ( ex ) N.Ireland Sec. Peter Mandelson said he had no option but to suspend the Cabinet's power after an independent commission told the British and Irish govts that the IRA had not made any firm disarmament commitments.
Britain suspended the new govt in order to prevent the ruling body from collapsing altogether. Mandelson says Britain's hope is that, by withdrawing powers now, it will decrease the risk that the coalition's major Protestant party, the Ulster Unionists, will resign their posts. Restoring power to the four-party coalition, Mandelson said, depends on resolving the long- running argument between the Ulster Unionists and the Sinn Fein, the political arm of the outlawed IRA, over when the group will disarm in support of the 1998 Good Friday peace accord.

U.S.-brokered deal Nov. 1999 resulted in the power-sharing assembly had appeared to resolve the stalemate between the two groups. Protestant Ulster Unionists agreed to drop their demand for some IRA disarmament in advance of the Cabinet's formation, and the IRA pledged for the first time that disarmament was "essential", finally opening talks with an independent disarmament commission. Leaders of Sinn Fein angrily accused the British and the pro-British Ulster Unionists of unfairly blaming the recent crisis on the IRA.
"I mean, it's just not physically, mentally or intellectually or emotionally possible for me to keep teetering, running after a process which doesn't have the engagement of the other players," said Sinn Fein President Gerry Adams." The other players are going to say, 'Oh no, try again, try again.'" Adams said in a statement Friday that the proposal by the IRA on disarmament was "a major breakthrough" that had emerged after two weeks of exhaustive talks with the British and Irish prime ministers, political parties and the IRA. Although Mandelson welcomed the recent moves, he said they did not reflect "sufficient progress to withhold suspension at this stage." RUC

England makes all of the laws, which may not have the same relevance in Northern Ireland. England also appoints court judges, which limits or restricts their accountability to the citizens. Further, for security purposes, the police must use radios with scrambled frequency and employ ear speakers to avoid unauthorized monitoring. Many police officers cannot discuss where they work for fear of harm to themselves or their families, & each police station must have a cafeteria because police personnel cannot eat safely in public. Since 1969, the Royal Ulster Constabulary has had over 300 members killed and nearly 10,000 members injured in the line of duty, all from a total sworn membership of approximately 13,000.
It was never supposed to be like this. By the time the Patten report was due for publication, the main elements of the Belfast Agreement should have been implemented, including the all- important political institutions: the North/South Ministerial Council, the (N/S) implementation bodies, the British/Irish Council and the govt of devolved functions within N.Ireland itself through a twelve-member Executive Committee answerable to an Assembly. While some provisions of the Agreement were in place by the summer of 1999 - the Human Rights Commission, the Equality Commission, prisoner releases, new victims' policies and commissions reviewing criminal justice and now the Patten Commission on policing (published 9.9.99), the governing institutions were not established until December 1999.

The Patten Report "A New Beginning: Policing in N.Ireland. The Report of the Independent Commission on Policing for N.Ireland" was always predicted to be the most controversial element of the Agreement due to the one-sided nature of policing historically and the strong sense of ownership of the Royal Ulster Constabulary by unionists. The Report should have been published in an atmosphere of political consolidation but instead it arrived at a time of political crisis, a crisis so deep that the Agreement itself came close to collapse. The Belfast Agreement (made 10th April 1998) was endorsed in Ireland North and South by a referendum held on 22nd May 1998. The 71% majority in favour of the Agreement in the North (and over 90 % in the South) comprised almost universal support by Irish nationalists but unionists were split about 52/48 for and against.
The Agreement envisaged rapid movement on the establishment of the political institutions. Elections for the Assembly were held in June 1998 and a First and Deputy First Minister elected (David Trimble, Ulster Unionist Party and Seamus Mallon, Social Democratic and Labour Party).
The Agreement assumes that a transitional Executive would be formed, using the D'Hondt system (Ministers selected in proportion to party strength) immediately following the election, with govt devolved in a matter of months. … Trimble's party continued to insist that they would not enter an Executive with Sinn Fein (due two ministries) unless the IRA begins to hand over weapons and explosives. The IRA has stated on a number of occasions that it will not do this, and Sinn Fein maintains the position that it does not speak for the IRA. Furthermore Sinn Fein claims to be honouring the Agreement which commits parties to "reaffirm their commitment to the total disarmament of all paramilitary organisations … (& to) confirm their intention to continue to work constructively and in good faith with the Independent Commission, and to use any influence they may have, to achieve the decommissioning of all paramilitary arms within two years following endorsement in referendums North and South of the agreement and in the context of the implementation of the overall settlement."

… failed to convince the Ulster Unionist Party, however. The Unionists refused to turn up at the Assembly, leaving the SDLP and Sinn Fein as the only parties to nominate ministers. The Executive was then dissolved because it failed to contain at least three Unionists. Seamus Mallon (SDLP) promptly resigned as Deputy First Minister, but David Trimble felt no need to resign and continued to draw his First Minister's salary of £60,164.
The two govts then pulled back from the process and asked George Mitchell (the US Senator who brokered the original Agreement) to see if he could make any progress. After talks held in Belfast and London, Trimble went to the 860-strong Ulster Unionist Council (the ruling body of the Ulster Unionist Party) on 27 November, and secured narrow majority support for a motion backing the setting up of an Executive but subject to a commitment to return to the Council in February. Trimble is committed to resigning and collapsing the Executive if the IRA fails to commence decommissioning by February.

If the unionists continue to have serious doubts about the Agreement, then The Report of the Independent Commission on Policing for N.Ireland only adds to them. The Commission was chaired by Chris Patten, a cabinet Minister in the Thatcher administration and former Governor of Hong Kong, and it had 7 other members with very different backgrounds. There were only three people who worked in N.Ireland, … The RUC, which costs over £600 million per year, currently has nearly 13,000 officers made up of 8,500 regular officers, a full time reserve of 2,900 and a part-time reserve of 1,300. In addition, there are 3,000 (full time equivalent) civilians. There is therefore one full-time officer for every 140 people in the population compared with one officer for every 422 people in England and Wales. N.Ireland therefore has three times as many police officers per head.
The Special Branch is made up of 850 officers, some 10 per cent of the total regular force strength. Catholics make up fewer than 8 per cent of uniformed officers. The Commission's Report contains a large number of criticisms of the RUC and the way that it is controlled. These are spread throughout the report but taken together they amount to an extensive indictment.
The Commission is highly critical of the management system and suggests that the force is, in fact commanded, rather than managed. … It also notes the failure of the RUC to keep basic information on its activities. For example, while there is no actual legal requirement for records to be kept of roadblocks, stops and searches, no such records are kept so it is impossible to judge how such policies work in relation to sectarian geography or assumed threats. There is a distinct absence of community policing and this, the Commission claimed, cannot be laid entirely on the security situation.

… The Commission's recommendations on transparency are far-reaching and it appears to be unaware of the extent to which they challenge the thinking of the current Home Secretary on freedom of information. … However, any good that may come from these proposals are immediately countered by the failure to oppose not only existing N.Ireland -based "emergency" anti-terrorist law but also the new UK-wide implementation of the Lloyd Report (which seeks to unify anti-terrorist law throughout the UK and make it compatible with current rulings by the European Court of Human Rights). At the same time, Patten makes no suggestions whatsoever about how to deal with officers, who in the past, have been responsible for human rights abuses. …

set up 6/3/98 by the U.K. Govt. It came out of the Good Friday Agreement … that stated the independent commission … would be "broadly representative with expert & intl representation amongst membership" and would consult widely & report no later than summer 1999" :
POLICING IN A PEACEFUL SOCIETY On 9.4.92, two British soldiers, Jas. Fisher & Mark Wright, shot 18 yr old Peter McBride in the back on the streets of Belfast. In 1995, a British court convicted the two soldiers of murdering McBride. … McBride spent the summers of 1985 & 1986 in Liverpool NY near Syracuse … sponsored by Project Children, which has tried to give N.Ireland children from both communities some respite from the conflict. Peter's respite was all too brief. … British Army has reinstated Fisher and Wright into the ranks of the British Army, despite expressions of disapproval by a court and even by British N.Ireland (ex)Sec. Mandelson. Guidelines for the deployment of plastic bullets to police forces in England and Wales have been relaxed in new rules drawn up by the Association of Chief Police Officers (ACPO) at the beginning of August. A ban on the use of the lethal ammunition was recommended by the European parliament in 1982 and 1997 because it was considered to represent "excessive force" and breached the United Nations code of conduct for law enforcers. 17 people, many of them children, have been killed by the baton rounds in N.Ireland.

… 3.5.98 report by Param Cumaraswamy, U.N, Special Rapporteur on independence of judges and lawyers from Oct. 1997 fact-finding mission to U.K. The report highlighted the lack of safeguards for suspects arrested under emergency legislation, including restrictions on access to legal advice, and made a number of recommendations aimed at ensuring respect for the rule of law and human rights. … recommendations on the independence of judges and lawyers … continued abrogation of basic human rights in N.Ireland played a central role in the conflict in N.Ireland. Previous U.K. govts have hidden behind secrecy & internal inquiries to avoid being accountable for human rights violations by its agents in N.Ireland. They ignored recommendations of intl treaty bodies as well as their own internal inquiries. The protection of fundamental human rights has been seen as secondary to the maintenance of a high level of security. … less human rights protection for people in N.Ireland than in the rest of the UK. The lower standards in the administration of justice have resulted in a lack of accountability and impunity. …
  Special interrogation centers
There is no statutory basis for the existence of the special police interrogation centres in Northern Ireland, which are used for the detention of suspects arrested under emergency legislation, most notable being Castlereagh Holding Centre in Belfast. They have been the subject of many allegations of police ill-treatment and torture since the 1970s. Although the number of complaints of ill-treatment in the interrogation centres have decreased, in 1995 there were 80 formal complaints of assault lodged against the interrogating officers out of a total of 191 cases of complaint and in 1996 there were 26 out of a total of 85 cases. In many instances people have alleged that they were forced into making an involuntary or untrue confession because of ill- treatment or under duress. … complaints that detectives made comments about the suspects' lawyers which amount to harassment and intimidation, including deaths threats.
  Diplock Courts
Established under emergency legislation in 1973 to try serious offences linked to alleged terrorist activities. These single-judge and juryless courts do not exist in England, even though people in England are tried for the same offences. There are a number of people who have been convicted in these courts who claim to be victims of miscarriages of justice. Amnesty Intl has been concerned that lower standards for the admissibility of confession evidence, lack of full disclosure by the prosecution to the defence of crucial evidence, and the curtailment of the right of silence have resulted in unfair trials.

"How can you expect me to condemn human rights abuses in Algeria and China and elsewhere when the United Nations themselves are responsible for the worst situation in Iraq. It's part of my job to bring to public consciousness the incredible suffering of Iraqi society."
2.1.98   Mary Robinson,
UN High Commissioner for HRts, President of Ireland & honorary Choctaw
per UK MP Henry Cohen
Refugee index   202 543 5697 Gavan Kennedy exec.dir. Irish American Information Service INTRODUCTION
IAIS was founded in 1991 to foster knowledge and understanding in the United States of the root causes of conflict in N.Ireland. Our founders believed that the diplomatic and economic resources of the United States could be utilized to focus greater attention on the sources of conflict, i.e.; inequality, division, and injustice, such that they would be addressed, resolved and consigned to the past. The IAIS has been providing coverage of the search for peace and justice in N.Ireland to US media and Congress since 1991. Since the GFA was signed in 1998, the IAIS has monitored and reported on the implementation of the Agreement.
The Agreement focused on creating a future for N.Ireland featuring: the protection of human rights for all, equality, reform of the police force and judicial system, decommissioning of paramilitary weapons, and demilitarization by the British Army. This May, three years will have passed since the people of Ireland overwhelmingly endorsed the GFA in referenda, north and south. Not since 1918, when 74% ?? of the electorate on the island voted for independence from Britain, has there been such a mandate for an agreed future in Ireland.
But, while devolved govt returned to the north, there remain three major interlocking aspects of the Agreement that have yet to be fully implemented. They are: reform of policing; decommissioning of paramilitaries' weaponry; and demilitarization by the British Army.
BACKGROUND
POLICING
The Royal Ulster Constabulary (police service) has traditionally been viewed by the nationalist community as being the private army of a unionist-dominated state. Republicans point to human rights abuses, which are numerous and well documented, incidents of collusion between the RUC and loyalist death squads, and the 92% Protestant make up of the force as reasons to disband the RUC entirely. On the other hand, unionists viewed the RUC as having been the bulwark between anarchy and order during 25 years of conflict in the North and argued strenuously for its retention. Indeed, the issue of police reform proved so intractable in negotiations leading up to the signing of the Agreement that it was agreed by the participants that an independent international commission would be established to address this issue.
Former Hong Kong governor Chris Patten, who now serves as Britain's European Union Commissioner, was nominated to chair the body whose task was to make recommendations for future policing arrangements in N.Ireland. The Patten Commission presented its wide- ranging report in accordance with its remit in September of 1999. His report served as the compromise between radically opposing views on the future of the RUC.

DECOMMISSIONING
In the negotiations leading up to the GFA, all participants agreed that the resolution of the paramilitary weapons issue was "an indispensable part of the process of negotiation". An International Commission on Decommissioning chaired by General John de Chastelain was established to monitor, review and verify progress on decommissioning of illegal arms. Accordingly, all signatories to the GFA committed "to work constructively and in good faith with the Independent Commission (on Decommissioning), and to use any influence they may have, to achieve the decommissioning of all paramilitary arms within two years following endorsement in referendums North and South of the agreement and in the context of the implementation of the overall settlement".
While paramilitary organizations, such as the Irish Republican Army, were not parties to the Good Friday Agreement and there is no specific requirement in the Agreement for actual decommissioning, all parties to the Agreement have recognized that decommissioning is an essential element to the success of the peace process.

DEMILITARIZATION
In the section of the GFA entitled "Security", the British Govt committed itself to: "the objective of as early a return as possible to normal security arrangements in N.Ireland, consistent with the level of threat and with a published overall strategy, dealing with:
(i) the reduction of the numbers and role of the Armed Forces deployed in N.Ireland to levels compatible with a normal peaceful society;
(ii) the removal of security installations;
(iii) the removal of emergency powers in N.Ireland; and
(iv) other measures appropriate to and compatible with a normal peaceful society."

THE BATTLE FOR DEVOLUTION
On December 2, 1999, power was devolved from Westminster to the N.Ireland Assembly. The multi-party power-sharing Executive finally sat at Stormont for its inaugural meeting, nineteen months after the Good Friday Agreement was signed. The reason for the 11/2-year delay was that First Minister David Trimble, who is also leader of the Ulster Unionist Party, had refused to set up power-sharing govt with Sinn Fein until the IRA had begun the process of decommissioning its arsenal of weapons.
The deal on devolution, brokered by the chairman of the original peace negotiations, Senator George Mitchell, involved paramilitary organizations appointing interlocutors to deal with the International Commission on Decommissioning which was chaired by General John de Chastelain. In his report on December 10th 1999, eight days after the Executive's inaugural meeting, General de Chastelain stated:
"We have noted elsewhere our belief that decommissioning cannot be imposed. But we believe that the above-mentioned achievements provide the context for the voluntary decommissioning of arms. In our 2 July report to the govts we noted that a timetable for decommissioning is best agreed with the representatives of the paramilitary groups. We believe that still to be the case."
However, devolution was short-lived. Eight weeks after power was transferred to the Northern Ireland Assembly, First Minister Trimble, under pressure from hard-line elements within his own party and ignoring General de Chastelain's caution that decommissioning "cannot be imposed", threatened to bring down the power-sharing Assembly. His reasoning was that the IRA had failed to fulfill an Ulster Unionist Party-imposed deadline of January 30, 2000 to decommission weapons.

SUSPENSION OF DEVOLUTION
In order to prevent Mr. Trimble's resignation, the N.Ireland Secretary at that time, Peter Mandelson, suspended the democratic institutions set up under the Agreement. Mr. Mandelson did so even though General de Chastelain had issued a positive report on the prospect of decommissioning prior to Mr. Mandelson signing the suspension order. De Chastelain's report, issued on February 11, stated: "The [IRA] representative indicated to us today [Friday] the context in which the IRA will initiate a comprehensive process to put arms beyond use, in a manner as to ensure maximum public confidence."
The report ended by saying the Commission believed that this commitment held out the real prospect of an agreement that would enable the decommissioning body to fulfill the substance of its mandate. Following its meeting with the IRA's interlocutor, the decommissioning body said it was "particularly significant" that the IRA would consider how to put arms and explosives beyond use in the context of the full implementation of the Good Friday Agreement and the removal of the causes of conflict.

Thus, despite the Decommissioning body's positive report, and against the protestations of the Irish Govt and nationalist parties in the North, Northern Secretary Peter Mandelson proceeded to unilaterally suspend devolution in the North and power was returned to Westminster. Devolution had failed. Speaking in the Irish Parliament one week later, Irish Premier Bertie Ahern said unilateral suspension was not something the Irish govt supported, "because it was in breach of the British-Irish Agreement".
Following suspension, the IRA withdrew its interlocutor from talks with General de Chastelain's independent decommissioning commission. In a statement on February 15, 2000, the IRA said that the Ulster Unionists and the British govt had rejected the proposals it made on February 11 which were outlined in General de Chastelain's most recent report on that same date.

Efforts to Return to Devolution: POLICING
Following the failure of Devolution, the governing body of the Ulster Unionist Party backed a motion on March 25th 2000 linking the return to the power-sharing executive with the retention of the name and symbols of the Royal Ulster Constabulary. The RUC's name was due to be changed, one of the many reforms recommended by the Patten Commission on Policing. The then Chairman of the House International Relations Committee, Ben Gilman (R) NY, strongly condemned the Ulster Unionist Council vote. He said the vote showed that the UUP "aren't truly interested in shared governance".
Congressman Gilman called on the British Govt and Northern Secretary of State, Peter Mandelson, to "move forward expeditiously with all of the Patten Report's RUC reforms". "The Patten Commission reforms are needed and are independent of any power-sharing arrangement. Clearly it is time to end the unionist veto of long-overdue reforms and power-sharing in the North of Ireland. The Irish people deserve nothing less.".

HISTORIC COMPROMISE: THE MAY 5-6th STATEMENTS
Following two months of political stagnation, the British and Irish govts met with the pro- Agreement parties in the beginning of May last year in an effort to save the peace process. The Patten Report on Policing was still on the shelf, there had been no meaningful progress on decommissioning, and the British govt had yet to publish a timetable on its plans for demilitarizing in heavily fortified areas such as South Armagh.
What emerged from the series of meetings was an historic compromise that ostensibly could resolve the three key areas of the GFA that were preventing N.Ireland from realizing the hope engendered by the Agreement. The deal emerged in a series of carefully choreographed and interdependent statements agreed between the IRA, and the British and Irish govts between May 5 and 6.
The catalyst for the long-sought-after breakthrough was an offer from the IRA on May 6 to "completely and verifiably put arms beyond use" and to resume contact with the Independent International Commission on Decommissioning . The IRA also agreed to the regular inspection of a number of its sealed arms dumps by two international inspectors who would report to the Independent International Commission on Decommissioning. President Clinton hailed the statement, praising the IRA for "reaching out" to unionists. It was a very good day, he said. Irish Premier Bertie Ahern called the statement "unprecedented". Dublin's Irish Times newspaper said the move was 'a departure of historic dimensions'.

GOING FORWARD: THE IMPLEMENTATION PLAN
However, the IRA's "unprecedented" offer was made in a very specific context. That was: "The full implementation, on a progressive and irreversible basis by the two govts, especially the British govt, of what they have agreed will provide a political context, in an enduring political process, with the potential to remove the causes of conflict, and in which Irish republicans and unionists can, as equals, pursue our respective political objectives peacefully"6. The 'political context' in the IRA's statement refers to explicit guarantees given by the British govt in a letter sent to the political parties, also dated May 6th. The letter committed the British govt to action on four specific issues it had committed to under the GFA but had not yet completed.
The four areas were:
Policing and justice,
Security (including demilitarization),
Rights, safeguards and equality of opportunity, and
Prisoners.
Devolution returned to the North on May 30th 2000 amid growing tensions between the nationalist parties and the Northern Secretary, Peter Mandelson, over reform of the RUC. The Deputy First Minister and SDLP deputy leader, Seamus Mallon, said that Mr Mandelson was refusing to discuss the policing issue with the SDLP and had failed to act as an honest broker.

PROMISES KEPT OR PROMISES BROKEN?
Policing and Justice
The British govt promised, in the letter to the parties on May 6th 2000, to enact legislation to implement the Patten Report's recommendations on Policing by November 2000. However, within the week the promise was in jeopardy. The Ulster Unionist Party's expressed its opposition to the British govt's decision to change the title of the Royal Ulster Constabulary in accordance with the Patten report recommendations. It was an issue which UUP leader David Trimble said may prevent him from recommending a return to power sharing with Sinn Fein.
On July11th 2000, MPs at Westminster backed the proposed legislation to create a new policing service. However, it is on the record in this Committee that the proposed legislation fell well short of implementing what the Patten Commission had recommended. A September 7th 2000 resolution in this House's International Relations Committee supported a resolution to Congress demanding the full and unequivocal implementation of the Patten Recommendations on policing in N.Ireland.
At the resolution's mark-up, Congressman Smith NJ (R) spoke of the bipartisan support for a new policing service and said that the Policing Bill clearly fell short of what was needed to produce a policing service supported by nationalists. "The RUC is not acceptable," he said. Congressman Peter King NY (R) made the point that policing was a metaphor for the entire peace process. The real importance of the legislation and the whole debate was to send the message "that both US political parties were united behind the Patten Commission". "Americans see the whole issue of policing as being a metaphor for what's wrong in N.Ireland and what can be good about N.Ireland," he said. In a statement, Senator Ted Kennedy MA (D) said that, while welcoming Patten's "sensible agenda for reform", the report "shouldn't be watered down under unionist pressure".

PATTEN REPORT 'GUTTED'
Perhaps the most powerful analysis of the proposed legislation to enact the Patten Report's recommendations comes from actual members of the Patten Commission itself: Gerald Lynch, president of John Jay College, testifying before Helsinki Commission here on Sept 22nd 2000 said it was crucial that the recommendations of the Patten Report "not be cherry picked but be implemented in a cohesive and constructive manner". The people of N.Ireland "deserved no less than this new beginning for policing" he said, and "any significant modifications will deprive them of this long awaited police service capable of sustaining support from the community as a whole".
In an article in the Manchester Guardian newspaper, another member of the Patten Commission, Professor Clifford Sheering said that the Patten Report had been gutted. He said that the British Govt's policy had failed to fulfill the hopes and vision of the Good Friday Agreement. The Police Bill "dismantles the foundations" on which the Patten Commission's plans were built, he said. Professor Shearing said he subjected the Police Bill to a line-by-line analysis to prove it "bore little relation" to the original recommendations. "The Patten report has not been cherry- picked, it has been gutted. The Bill does not fulfill the hopes and vision of the Belfast Agreement. Nor does it satisfy the very clear mandate set out in the commission's terms of reference," he said.
In spite of these protestations, the Police (NI) Bill passed the House of Commons and became law. Testimony given to the Helsinki Commission in this House gives great detail into how the legislation had departed significantly from the Patten Report's recommendations. Four days later, Irish premier Bertie Ahern said he could not recommend that nationalists should join the new Police Service of N.Ireland as it stood. On this analysis, it would be difficult to argue that the British govt had lived up to its promise to implement the Patten Report by November 2000. The cornerstone of the May 5-6th deal had crumbled.

Security
(1) Demilitarization
The British govt promised, in the letter to the parties on May 6th 2000, to "progressively take all the necessary steps to secure as early a return as possible to normal security arrangements in N.Ireland, consistent with the level of threat" . The participants to the GFA recognized that the development of a peaceful environment on the basis of the agreement could and should mean a normalisation of security arrangements and practices . Since the May 5-6th deal, troop numbers have been reduced and a number of security bases have been closed. But republicans argue that the movement has been minimal.
The British Security forces argue that dissident groups, intent on destroying the GFA, make widespread demilitarization more difficult. On December 19th 2000, N.Ireland Secretary Peter Mandelson said he had to balance the calls to dismantle security installations "against society's need for protection". "The price of getting it wrong could be another Omagh" he said. However, republicans argue that the failure of the British Govt to establish a precise timetable to achieve "normalization" of the security situation by expressing "an exaggerated fear" of the threat posed by dissident groups is unacceptable.
Republicans question what branch of the British military or security establishment decides, on behalf of the people of N.Ireland, what exactly constitutes a credible threat? Given the suspicion with which the nationalist community views the security establishment in the North, many are skeptical of such a process of decision-making. They wonder what is there to prevent scare tactics being used to indefinitely block progress on a substantive process of normalization.

(2) Emergency Legislation
The British govt agreed in the GFA to reform emergency legislation laws such as trial without jury and abrogation of the right to silence. Specifically, the govt promised to "the removal of emergency powers in N.Ireland." However, instead of bringing criminal law and procedure into line with accepted human rights norms, Britain has enacted some even more repressive laws, made some of the laws permanent, and applied some of those laws to Britain, as a whole.
Among other things, the "Terrorism Act of 2000" continued Britain's power to "derogate" or exclude itself from selected rights contained in the European Convention on Human Rights, shifting the presumption of guilt to defendants in certain cases, and extended police power to arrest people and hold them incommunicado. Amnesty International described the situation: "This Act effectively takes emergency powers that were conceded to deal with the situation in Northern Ireland and puts them permanently into legislation." The Committee on the Administration for Justice said the opportunity for eliminating the non-jury Diplock courts had "been squandered" . Britain has broken the promise in made to remove emergency legislation in N.Ireland.

12.23.00   Rep. IntlRelations Subcomm. testimony 2/26/97 House Intl Relations Committee
CAJ Paul Mageean testimony to Commission on Security and Cooperation in Europe
3.14.00   Congressional Hearing WashDC
Rep. McKinney   9.24.99 IOHR Subcomm hearing re Patten rpt
H.R.   S.R.   lobby

Arms Trade News (CLW) : FY99 U.S. Weapons Export Licenses for Ireland $3,246,938
FY99 Export Licenses for Manuf. & Technical Assistance Agreements Ireland $2,300,000 Washington   N.Ireland is to be downgraded as a policy issue by the Bush administration. It will return responsibility for it from the White House to the State Department. According to British & Irish sources, Richard Haass, nominated as director of policy planning under Gen Colin Powell, the new Secretary of State, will be given responsibility for the N.Ireland portfolio. Under Pres. Clinton, the National Security Council handled Irish matters from the White House. President George W Bush has made clear that he will not take the same close interest. Haass, former Rhodes Scholar at Oxford, is a Middle East specialist thought never to have visited N.Ireland. He was a member of the National Security Council under Pres. Geo.Bush Sr. Haass stressed at a conference last year that Mr Clinton had "gone to and fro and been attracted to issues of second order importance and ignored issues of first order importance".
The Bush administration has indicated that it views N.Ireland as a secondary matter and would not appoint a special envoy. American Sinn Fein supporters were dismayed when Mr Bush indicated to Tony Blair that he would intervene in N.Ireland only at Britain's request. After Irish govt pressure, the White House has added a reception to the St Patrick's Day events next week and Gen Powell has said that Mr Bush would listen to Bertie Ahern, the Irish Prime Minister, when deciding whether to engage in N.Ireland.
more diplomatic vacillation

3.5.01   Richard J. Egan (with Maureen) … donated more than $500K to RNC, top fundraiser in Massachusetts for G. W. Bush (who) appointed Egan to Technology Advisory Council … Egan also reportedly in running for Ireland ambassadorship.
xSec.State Albright 1.18.01 Ireland statement

U.K. SecState forN.Ireland John Reid
formerly Armed Forces Minister 5.5.97-7.27.98, deputy to the Shadow Secretary of State for Defence in 1995.
Following 12.2.99 devolution of power to New N.Ireland Administration, Secretary of State retains responsibility for constitutional & security issues as they relate to N.Ireland, in particular law & order, policing and criminal justice policy.

Dr. Stoate: To ask Sec.State for N.Ireland if announcement about Independent Commissioner for Holding Centres.
Mandelson: Dr. Wm Norris accepted appt to post of Independent Commissioner for Holding Centres on 10.1.00   I am grateful to him for accepting appt and confident he will provide valuable contribution monitoring care & treatment of detainees held in Holding Centres for as long as the Centres remain open and will produce well informed annual reports. Appreciation & thanks to his predecessor Sir Louis Blom-Cooper for … past 8 years and reassurances he provided the Govt and public that detainees have been treated fairly & properly.
[ According to Patten report, he didn't. ]
Mr. Barron: To ask Sec.State for N.Ireland who for Independent Assessor of Military Complaints Procedures when present term ends 8.24.00
Mandelson: Govt continues to value highly the work of the Independent Assessor of Military Complaints Procedures. I have today re-appointed Mr. Jim McDonald as Independent Assessor of Military Complaints Procedures in N.Ireland until 24 August 2003. PM Blair lost his top man in N.Ireland Wed. as Peter Mandelson resigned from the Cabinet following controversy over his involvement in wealthy Indian's citizenship application. Mandelson's departure created a vacuum at the heart of Britain's effort to promote peace in N.Ireland and left Blair vulnerable to attacks about his own judgment in trusting Mandelson, who orchestrated Blair's election as Labor Party leader and the party's 1997 landslide election victory. 47-year-old Mandelson insisted he had done nothing improper in contacting a Home Office minister about the successful citizenship application of Srichand Hinduja, who is facing allegations in India that he and his brothers illegally accepted payments in arms deal.
Wed. morning's Sun : "Mandy told a porky"

1.20.98   Ray Seitz, former amb. to Britain, alleges information wrongly leaked to IRA … member of Parliament said end result … is that some people wound up dead.
"Immigrant trafficking"   labor diaspora

Guardian
issue focus Foreign Media Reaction US State Dept WashDC Off. of Research
State Dept 1999 Human Rights, Trade, Narcotics , Terrorism & Intl Religious Freedom reports re

Statewatch   FCO Minister Peacekeeping budget
Wash.Rpt

Brid Rodgers   Irish Ag•Min, first woman to chair an Irish political party (1978)

Alexander's Oil&Gas
1.22.98 Reuters   N.Ireland Greenpeace said Thursday it had blockaded a British Petroleum offshore oil vessel in Belfast harbor in its first non-violent action against new oil exploration since the Kyoto climate summit. The activities, supported by three inflatable boats and a team of eight including two divers, stopped the vessel, Schiehallion from leaving the port. Schiehallion, a Floating production, Storage and Offloading vessel (FPSO) was to have sailed to the Atlantic Frontier, north of Ireland
DOE country report   Oilwatch Europe

About £75 million per year over five years has been agreed with the European Union under the EU Progrmme of Support for Peace & Reconciliation.

Corporate Europe Observatory   Transnational Inst.   Ex-Im Bank

THE loyalist terrorist Johnny "Mad Dog" Adair failed to win his freedom yesterday because of "damaging information" linking him to attempted murders, drugs and gun- running. N.Ireland's Sentence Review Commission turned down his appeal to be released from jail after examining evidence that he was organising killings, stirring hatred against Roman Catholics and dealing in guns and drugs. … The commission said it had received "damaging information" from Peter Mandelson and the Royal Ulster Constabulary about Adair's behaviour since his early release from the Maze prison in September 1999 under the terms of the Good Friday agreement. The N.Ireland Secretary told them that Adair, a convicted leader of the Ulster Freedom Fighters, had authorised a number of attempted murders and so-called punishment shootings. He was procuring & distributing guns and ammunition and dealing in drugs, paying terrorists from the profits. …
The RUC had been monitoring Adair since his release and compiled video evidence and intelligence about his movements, which were presented to the Commission. Much of the evidence centred on his activities at Drumcree, when Sir Ronnie Flanagan, the RUC Chief Constable, publicly warned him that he was being watched, and in Belfast, at the height of the feud last summer between Adair's terrorist group and the Ulster Volunteer Force. … He had expected to walk free, as the commission indicated last month that it thought his rearrest last August on the orders of Mr Mandelson unjust. The committee reversed its decision after evidence presented by the Govt and Sir Ronnie during a closed two-day hearing last week in Maghaberry jail, where Adair is being held. Belfast   THE NORTHERN ASSEMBLY: The RUC is losing the battle against an increasing drugs trade in the North, an Assemblyman has said. Mr Seamus Close of the Alliance party made the claim during a presentation by members of the RUC and Northern Customs to an ad-hoc Assembly committee considering legislation that would allow the proceeds of criminal activities to be confiscated. Earlier, Det Supt David Thompson, head of the Economic Crime Bureau, said the Financial Investigation Order (NI) 2001 would help the force clamp down on the North's leading criminals by extending the powers of investigation into their finances.
Customs officials told the committee there was evidence criminals were moving away from banks and making greater use of solicitors and real estate to launder the proceeds of crime. The new measures took account of this and other developments. Mr Close said, however, that "even the proverbial dogs in the street" could point out drug dealers who were ostensibly on benefit driving cars worth £20,000. He put it to Mr Thompson that the measures employed by the RUC were not working. "If we were cracking down we would not be seeing increases in drugs seizures."
Mr Thompson said the police had to have evidence before they could satisfy the courts that a confiscation order should be put into effect. As a criminal conviction was necessary, they had to have evidence that would prove guilt beyond a reasonable doubt. "The difficulty is in getting that evidence." Mr Close said only an agency following the lower, civil standard of proof, like the Criminal Assets Bureau in the South, would have any real success in seizing criminal assets. 1.25.99 FBI Natl Press Office
This week, officers from the national police agencies of N.Ireland, the RUC, & the Republic of Ireland, Garda, are participating in an unprecedented training program at the FBI Academy at Quantico, Virginia. The joint FBI/State Department Office of Anti-Terrorism Assistance-sponsored program brings together key middle- and upper-level officers from the Royal Ulster Constabulary (RUC), the national police of N.Ireland, and the Garda Siochana (Garda), Ireland's national police, for the first time in a joint training setting in the United States. The attendees are considered to be among the future leaders of the law enforcement community in both parts of Ireland. Much of the program will address the new challenges that societal changes are having on law enforcement in the region. In particular, the officers will discuss the changing needs of the community and the interaction between the police and the public in this new environment. Experts will lead discussions on a range of topics such as human rights, the recognition of diversity, stress management, and anti-terrorism and anti-crime strategies.
US DoJ Foreign agents registration per N.Ireland Sean MacBride Peace Prize London   The U.K. has significantly reduced the value of its arms sales abroad, but continues to sell weapons to countries that are involved in internal repression and regional wars, non- governmental groups here say. Commenting on the British govt's second annual "Report on Strategic Export Controls" released last week, the independent foreign policy think-tank Saferworld said that arms are being sold to countries in Africa, Asia, South America and the Middle East, many of them considered to be "sensitive" areas.
This is happening in spite of British Foreign Secretary Robin Cook's commitment to pursue an "ethical" foreign policy, Saferworld said. The value of the arms being sold abroad in 1998 decreased from $5.4 billion in 1997 to $3.2 billion in 1998, but the groups accused the New Labor govt of Prime Minister Tony Blair of blurring details essential for an effective public scrutiny.

AMONG the most sinister remnants of the Cold War are caches of arms, explosives and radio equipment buried all over North America, Western and Central Europe, Israel, Japan and other countries once seen as enemies of Russia. These caches were hidden as emergency arms supplies to be used by Russian agents to sabotage Western pipelines, bridges, railways, electrical sub-stations and oil refineries. Thousands of weapons were wrapped and sealed in waterproof containers and buried in woods and fields, beside railways lines and even schools. They were booby-trapped to explode and kill anyone who stumbled across them without KGB instructions on how to disarm them. Now, years later, these caches are decaying and unstable, likely to explode without warning if disturbed. Records of the exact location of some, scattered acrossGermany, Italy, Switzerland and Belgium, have disappeared.
… The KGB even sent a senior agent to N.Ireland & Scotland in1963 to spy out sabotage targets, prepare large dead-drops for explosives and weapons, and select and train agents to wreck pipelines, bridges and railways. Vitali Voytetsky, codenamed Paul, also selected sites for airborne and maritime landings by DRGs - the acronym of the Soviet sabotage and intelligence groups. Throughout the 1960s and 1970s, the KGB spent huge sums preparing for campaigns of sabotage in the West. …

liberation movements
USIS USArmy In 1998 U.S. troops in
armed forces
Global Intell. Update tease
Covert Action Qtrly re N. Ireland : #8 March 1980

HRts Watch on N.Ireland detention, prosecution & policing abuses under emergency laws
U.S. based re-unification org
As the oldest colony of the world's first capitalist country, Ireland shares many linkages with Third World nations. This is why, at independence in 1947, emerging India chose the tricolors of green, white and orange for its flag, the only other nation in the world to share the same colors as the independent Republic of Ireland. Likewise, the African National Congress of S.Africa and Sinn Fein of N.Ireland continue to have many close bonds. The centuries-old anti-colonial conflict on the island and the more recent "Troubles" in N.Ireland are based on territory, power and privilege reinforced through force (resulting arms transfers) & economic factors (corp complicity), not religion.
The April, 1998 Good Friday Peace Agreement took 18 months just to begin to be implemented. Governmental institutions were dissolved after only 74 days, and were restarted in June of 2000. The new governmental structures are in constant danger of collapse, and, some would say, sabotage. … ong Kesh Prison (aka The Maze) political prisoners, Irish language school, megalithic sites. … intense militarization and sophisticated surveillance of whole communities. …
[ militarization of N.Ireland (pacification) v. Op.Gatekeeper militarized TJ border (immigration). N.Ireland is England's U.S. Cuba analog, Scotland its Canada, Wales its Mexico ]

Norwegian Initiative on Small Arms Transfers (NISAT)
arms trade forum

International Peace Research Institute in Oslo, & British American Security Information Council (BASIC),
Irish Northern Aid Commitee L.A.

NGOs & PVOs
Ctr for Intl Policy Demilitarization

Council on Foreign Relations   Ctr for Strategic & Intl Studies
NED   ICG   Corp
WorldBank AP

govt   D.C. embassy   practical timeline 8/29/00 Sunshine Project 7/27/00 State Dept 1999 Military Expenditures annual report re
IPS Press Review
Time

Jan.01   A Farewell to Arms? From Long War to Long Peace in N.Ireland
Michael Cox, Adrian Guelke ed., Fiona Stephen ed.

relocation

Spatial ambivalence of England's neighbouring territories is demonstrated by the slippages that could occur in contemporary references to national geography. In John of Gaunt's vision of a "sceptred isle," perhaps the locus classicus of such geographical distortions, divine favour and cartographic vision combine to produce the "island" of England as a "blessed plot" (II, i, 50), effacing all traces of Scots and Welsh. In a gesture at once more expansive and even less interested in geographical fact, Wm Cuningham declared in his Cosmographical Glasse that "vnder the name of Englande, I comprehende the whole Ilande conteyning also Schotlande, & Irelande", a memorable passage in a book entirely concerned with technical precision in measuring land, reading the sky and producing accurate maps.
Comedy of Errors (c. 1594) opens the set of references to Ireland in the Shakespearean canon. In Act 3, a comic exchange between Dromio and Antipholus of Syracuse is structured around the image of a terrestial globe. Prompted by Antipholus, Dromio practises his misogyny on the kitchen maid Nell: "She is spherical, like a globe. I could find out countries in her." "In what part of her body stands Ireland?" "Marry, sir, in her buttocks. I found it out by the bogs." (III, ii, 113-7)

I want to thank Chairwoman Ileana Ros-Lehtinen for recognizing the importance of this crucial period in the history of N.Ireland. I also want to praise the Vice Chair of this Subcommittee, Chris Smith, for his passion and work to bring true justice to the people of N.Ireland. Today is a very special day of remembrance, as it was 2 years ago to this day, March 15, 1999, that Rosemary Nelson, a leading human rights lawyer in N.Ireland, was killed by a car bomb. Ms. Nelson had been consistently exposing the corruption of the Royal Ulster Constabulary. A brilliant human rights lawyer, she had been involved directly in a number of key human rights cases. The sympathy notices in the local newspapers the day of her murder in that region clearly indicated the wide range of causes she had taken up. We must not forget Rosemary's work. Indeed, we must make sure that Rosemary's work continues. We must also see to it that an authoritative international tribunal be put together to investigate this freedom fighter's murder.

I have advocated civil rights in N.Ireland during all my years in Congress. Nationalists in N.Ireland have identified with black American civil rights activists for years. Ties between the two struggles go back for over a century, from the time escaped black slave Frederick Douglass arrived in Ireland in 1845 to campaign for support for the antislavery movement in the U.S. Douglass addressed a political meeting with Daniel O'Connell at Liberty Hall in Dublin, and rallied support for the abolitionist cause in Tipperary, Wexford, and Belfast. By the mid-1960's, many young Nationalists in N.Ireland drew parallels between their struggle and the push for civil rights by blacks in the United States. In many ways the two movements have faced similar challenges-both grappling with the limits of non-violence.
Protestors at the first filmed civil rights march in N.Ireland, Derry on October 5, 1968, echoed the demands of black Americans in calling for police reform, in chanting "One Man, One Vote," and in singing "We Shall Overcome." Two weeks after Bloody Sunday in 1972, the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, founded by Dr. Martin Luther King, dispatched the senior officials to Belfast to take part in protest marches and to speak at a N.Ireland Civil Rights Association (NICRA) meeting. Bernard Lee, a veteran of the Atlanta sit-ins and a close associate of Dr. King's, was part of the group which included Juanita Abernathy, wife of the Rev. Ralph Abernathy, another key King confidante. Juanita Abernathy told the NICRA conference that "the struggle for Irish freedom is the same struggle as that going on in the U.S."

The April 1998 Good Friday Peace Agreement took eighteen months just to begin to be implemented. Governmental institutions were dissolved after only seventy-four days, and were restarted in June of 2000. The new governmental structures are in constant danger of collapse, and, some would say, sabotage. When the people of Ireland endorsed the Good Friday Agreement they did so in the belief that it would be a charter for change and that a range of measures including the equality agenda and a new beginning to policing would be delivered. The policing issue was always a cornerstone issue. The Good Friday Agreement is very clear on the mandate for fair and impartial policing. The referendum also endorsed these terms. But, sadly, these terms of reference were not implemented. As a result, the Royal Ulster Constabulary remains 93% Protestant and 90% white male with little community input and no affirmative action.
Indeed, the British newspaper, The Guardian, comments in November of last year at the close of the legislative processing of the British Govt's "Police Act," that "the core elements of the Patten Commission's report have been undermined everywhere. The district policing partnership boards that are so vital to the Patten Commission's vision have been diluted. So have its recommendations in the key areas outlined in its terms of reference composition, recruitment, culture, ethos, and symbols. The Patten report has not been cherry picked-it has been gutted." The Patten Commission Report would, if implemented, parallel the historic Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965 in which the United States took important first steps toward ending legal segregation-U.S.-styled apartheid-and second-class status for African-Americans. Now the question is: Will Parliament in N.Ireland change this abomination and grant full civil rights to Irish Catholics or are they to remain second class citizens in their own land?

When good and decent people live in fear of the very instrument created to protect them, then there is a major violation of freedom for everyone in that nation. The Royal Ulster Constabulary and their tactics of violence have been likened to Bull Connor and George Wallace in Alabama during the Civil Rights movement. And just as justice soon overtook even Bull Conner and George Wallace, I'm sure that oppression and illegitimacy are not sustainable in N.Ireland. The Royal Ulster Constabulary should be part of the solution, not part of the problem. This is a very important issue. I understand the solidarity that the IRA has demonstrated in my own struggle as an African- American to be free-a full citizen in my own land-as they have also stood in solidarity with my brothers and sisters on the African Continent to be free of colonial rule-something they both, sadly, know too much about.

… I have advocated civil rights in N.Ireland during all my years in Congress. Today in this world, N.Ireland represents a Human Rights debacle that has been festering for hundreds of years. Yet N.Ireland, today is at the threshold of a new day when Catholics and Protestants can live together in religious harmnoy.
Honorable Chris Patten, … commended for the work accomplished … This is a START for solving the human rights atrocities committed by the RUC to the Irish Roman Catholic minority. I emphasis start because there is a long way to attain a true harmony between the Irish Protestants and Catholics, the Orangeman & the Nationalists. This Commission with the Good Friday Accords, signed a year and a half ago, should serve as a beacon of change in the history of this embattled province. This would be a first step to reproachment of these divided religious groups. This Commission Report would, if implemented, parallel the historic Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965 which in the United States was the first step forward to end the legal segregation and second class status of African-Americans. In the U.S., African-Americans still had and have far to go, but we made a step, we changed the law. Now the question is: Will Parliament in N.Ireland change this abomination and grant full civil rights to Irish Catholics or are they to remain second class citizens?

When good decent people live in fear of the very instrument created to protect them, then there is a major violation of freedom for all in that nation. In the U.S. today, there is an increase in police brutality especially directed to young people and African Americans as evidenced in New York City in recent months. No person whether black or white, Catholic or Protestant or Muslim or Jewish could live in fear that the people who are supposed to protect them should turn their fury and hatred upon them. In setting up the RUC, Her Majesty's Govt in Parliament did just that. The RUC & their tactics of violence & racism remind me of Bull Conors and Geo. Wallace in Birmingham, Alabama during the Civil Rights movement or even Daryl Gates and the police officers in Los Angeles that beat Rodney King. Bull Conors, George Wallace, and Daryl Gates hid behind the legitimacy of law and order to systematically deny millions of African-Americans their civil rights.

[ Neither Gates nor Wallace & Conors(sic) targeted dissidents by using military intelligence support; Hoover's FBI support, maybe, but not secret police on military payroll. Neither did they engage in torture sanctioned by emergency powers legislation. They murdered volunteer advocates, but never defense attorneys. ed. ]
These men and the people they represented used the law to deny right to march and protest peacefully and the human right to not live in fear of being beaten or killed for just being different. The British Govt has for centuries denied Irish Roman Catholics the same civil & human rights as Irish Protestants. Irish Protestants were, in many cases, allowed to murder, rape, and starve thousands of the Irish Catholic minority. Their land was stolen, the economy stifled, and there character beaten down & trampled and yet the law favored these Irish Protestants and their British protectors.
Yet there is a chance for a change, The Patten Commission calls for a reform of the RUC, but we need to go farther. The Patten Reprt outlines 175 recommendations that if implemented may change this climate of hatred. I must say that this is a good beginning. yet in speaking with the Irish Catholic Community, I see there is farther to go. The RUC is in need of a complete and total reform, first with the step of allowing Catholics to join the force. Right now the RUC is at a strength of about 13,500 officers. The full-time force is 92 percent Protestant. The full-time reserve is 93% Protestant and the part time reserve is 95% Protestant. How can a people trust the RUC when then are not allowed to serve in it. This kind of racism must stop.
[ Theism, nationalism, and certainly class oppression, but N.Ireland "troubles" are not racism. ]
I stand for diversity & that is what we need to have, a fair balanced force policing Northern Ireland. The new RUC must have international human rights training. The new training should include sensitivity training, diversity training and courses that teach non-judicial resolution of local community disputes. The RUC should also be purged of those that have in the past participated in hazing and beating of Irish Catholics should be removed from the police force and placed behind bars. Morality and ethics should guide this police force not centuries of racism. They are not an army of paratroopers meant to kill, they are men and women called to serve. The RUC should value every citizen and protect them. The Royal Ulster Constabulary should be part of the solution not part of the problem which they have been for the last 25 years.
In conclusion I want to thank Mr., Patten for his service to the minorities of N.Ireland and the others testifying today. I believe from this point on we can more to start to bring a change to the people of N.Ireland. Mr. Patten has shown that we can all work together and I hope that we can continue and move on to more changes to the system.
[ The Loyalists manning the RUC are the minority. ]
presented by §
OCIAL
JUSTICE  
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