Ireland after Hillsborough By DAVID MOSS Withdrawing Consent Any illusion election results would Paisley and obtaining intended to the defeat has been the government" hand of the militant Loyalists. continuing was not "the politicians" virtual standstill, road blocks. Unionist By DAVE MILES voters TWO things made me feel as the as I arrived in Dublin on the morning of Saturday April 5. numbers of palm trees in the prosperous neighbourhoods and find a monument to an to attempted insurrection against British imperialism. Viewpoint had joined a group Nationalist Street which was seized as the headquarters of the Rising, and ended with a rally. people came on the march.
Othe constitutional Loyalists may have held that the British government was dispelled by
Molyneux's fruitless meeting with Thatcher on February 25. The next phase of resistance
"withdraw the consent of the people of Northern Ireland from
strengthened the
The March 3 strike showed that it
who were in control, as pickets of the Ulster Clubs and UDA brought the province to a eventually
attacking Nationalist workers and throwing up A trip to Dublin though I was in a foreign country
One was the presence of large alongside the road from the port to the city. The other was to go to the General Post Office for stamps
Three supporters of Socialist going over for the demonstration marking the 70th Anniversary of the 1916 Easter Rising. It was the Post Office building on O'Connell where this year's demonstration
Between five and ten thousand organised by Irish Republicans.
File and drum bands and colour
parties made up of young people
were a strong part of the march,
and came from all over Ireland. Socialist Viewpoint No. 12 May 1986p10
At Lurgan, 250 women textile workers were stoned and their factory
set on fire. Another factory was beseiged at Moira and a bus burnt while the nationalist areas of Portadown were virtually cut off by
Although the Easter Rising was one of the landmarks in the history of Irish nationalism and the eventual founding of an Irish state, this was no official state occasion. The event was organised by Sinn Fein and the great majority of the banners belonged to their branches. Meanwhile the "republican" parties which alternate in government were presumably skulking at home, hoping that the commemoration would pass off as quietly as possible.
Speeches at the rally reflected the divergent attitudes within Sinn Fein, with some contributions proudly reiterating the history of armed struggle both against the British and the Irish state, and others raising the issues of exploitation, oppression and poverty which the party has increasingly organised around in recent years.
The trip also gave us a chance to talk to members of Sinn Fein and organisations of the Irish far left in informal circumstances both about the struggle in Ireland and our own experiences.
roadblocks.
Across the province, nationalists were stopped by tractor muckspreader barricades across the roads and workplaces and businesses forced to close by mobs. Meanwhile the RUC did not show the same enthusiasm for "allowing those to work who wanted to work" as their British counterparts did in the miners' strike.
RUC officers stood by as intimidation occured at Loyalist roadblocks and confrontations could not be avoided, as in Derry where a Nationalist mobilisation forced the RUC reroute a Loyalist march, the RUC response exhibited the glove approach against Loyalists as they used last year at Portadown. The Sectarian Statelet The strike re-emphasised that the Agreement has done nothing to alter the sectarian bias of the RUC and the "alienation of the population" which results from daily harassment, raids and beatings as in the case of Edward McFadden in Derry or Martin Sweeny in Armagh.
Nor, despite the complaints of the SDLP and Dublin, has anything been done to curb the UDR. continued with their policy against unarmed nationalists who are not even involved in the Republican movement. were wounded near January 27 when their car was fired on. The UDR men concerned were merely relieved of patrol duties.
The British army also claimed a victim in similar circumstances when Francis Bradley was shot dead
ULSTER AYS NO Toomebridge on February intimidatory mass RUC presence at his funeral, despite the fact the IRA and disclaimed him as a member, served as a reminder that even in Nationalists are treated as enemies of At the the state. volunteer Tony Gough, action in Derry on February 22, not only were the security forces present sported but some their showing killing, although request no Republican ceremony was even where to be held. However the total inability Dublin to in any way to minority trapped within the sectarian statelet, same kid- demonstrated by the revival killings. sectarian have victims paramilitaries in Nationalist enclaves in North Belfast while a failed attempt was made in the physical safety of the Nationalists Nationalist hollow rings safeguarding cultural identity. Armed Struggle They have shoot-to-kill and from Two men has been Cookstown on have beginning of the year. RUC, at
and mortars. Flats, Gough MACGIES LEAP February 11. clash between called for an "Ulsterisation", stationed in this role. An 18. death, IRA funeral of killed in white ribbons Unionists. satisfaction at the the parents' at of little the protect operation. is most Perilot system This year three fallen to loyalist Short Strand. Agreement which cannot guarantee out. talks of when it human rights and the committed While the British government comes under pressure from supporters of the Agreement to make it appear to work Loyalists to scrap altogether, the IRA has continued to US aid demonstrate, almost daily, that there the no Improvement in "security" situation. The state forces stop trading sustained casualties at the average of three a week since the State will deeper into UDR and British soldiers have come under regular attacks Socialist Viewpoint No. 12 May 1986 pll
from automatic fire, mines, bombs
Operations include a 20 minute gun battle with an undercover SAS unit at Minogue, the shooting of Plated a bar bone late a
Ta car attack on a RUC/Army checkpoint at Clady, and a daring attack on an Army base in Derry in which IRA Volunteer Tony
was shot. In County Fermanagh a UDR man was killed by a mine on February 3 and an RUC detective shot dead in a bar on
The success of IRA attacks has shaken RUC morale and led to a
RUC Chief John Hermon and the head of the Police Federation Alan Wright who made public the condition of the RUC and
Tend of the policy of , whereby the RUC is meant to take over the security role of the British Army. In fact already this year a further 1,000 troops have been
Tin the 6 countles ostensibly to guard RUC barracks.
Clashes with Loyalists over the rerouting of marches at Easter and in July will only further undermine RUC morale. The question is how far the British are prepared to use the Army But to at he any do to te but, more significantly. during the Ulster Workers Council strike against power sharing in 1974 it did not intervene. It would be very dangerous politically for the government to attempt to use troops against large scale Unionist resistance, only serving to further alienate and unite the Irish Neutrality Even confronted with these problems the British government has offered
Tin return for Dublin's coIt was soon made clear that the Free State government would have no say in the security or judicial
Tin the six counties. Even limited reforms like the ending of exclusion orders under the Prevention of Terrorism Act or the policy of strip searching of former Armagh women prisoners transferred to Maghaberry gaol have been ruled
The release of Evelyn Glenholmes showed that Dublin is also unable to deliver the goods, even after signing
European Convention on Terrorism. A future government not
Wto the acreement may prove unwilling as well as unable.
In order to avert this, a down payment has been made on Irish neutrality in the form of a proposed
package. Pressure had
already been placed on Dublin to
with Libya even before
the Gulf of Sirte provocation. The
rowing economic crisis in the Free
throw its government the grip of Anglo-
American imperialism.