Irish Independent 12th September
Irish bigotry rears its ugly head at solemn ceremony

IT WAS no less ugly for its fleeting brevity, but an incident outside a
New York church honouring victims of September 11 served as a reminder
that 3,000 miles is no barrier to Irish quarrels.

On Tuesday night, five officers of the Police Service of Northern
Ireland (PSNI) were told they would not be welcome at the Irish
Community Mass in Holy Trinity Church.

It was just one individual who took it on himself to offer a sign of
hatred at a most moving and sacred occasion. One of the officers, to
whom I had been talking, called me aside and said: "There might be a bit
of a problem. We have just been told we are not welcome."

The officer and his colleagues, with whom I had been speaking on first
name terms, asked that their names not be used in any newspaper article.

Alerted to a potential problem at a Mass jointly sponsored by the Consul
General of Ireland in New York, a senior Irish diplomat spoke to the
five officers.

After an exchange, two of the PSNI constables stood at the rear of the
church. After Mass, they left to join their three colleagues outside and
were driven away in an NYPD car.

The officers had been invited by Msgr Tom Leonard, who celebrated the
Mass. The Irish tenor, Ronan Tynan, sang Panis Angelicus and the
Minister for Foreign Affairs, Brian Cowen, read from the Book of the
Prophet Micah.

The PSNI officers had come from another memorial service honouring the
dead of September 11 in the Anglican cathedral, St Thomas' on Fifth Avenue.

This was an intensely moving occasion, where friends and relatives of
many of the firemen and police of Irish descent who perished a year
before were remembered and honoured.

Meeting Msgr Tom Leonard later, it seemed inappropriate to tell him of
the gross insult to himself, the PSNI officers and the friends and
relatives who offered signs of peace in the Holy Trinity Church.

It was also a slap in the face to the Irish Government and the diplomats
who have done Trojan work in securing a peace agreement in Northern Ireland.

Before the Mass, chatting outside the church, the five officers looked
dapper in the new dress uniform of the PSNI, and having buried 303
murdered RUC colleagues in the Troubles, they had more experience of
collegiate grief than the NYPD officers who accompanied them.

After the incident, the PSNI officers appeared tense and awkward, more
concerned about the potential embarrassment on an occasion designed to
comfort the grieving.

The ancient enmities of home were all the more ugly at a Mass in New
York, where one Irish bigot brought his own pristine sectarianism to an
occasion honouring the dead of 26 countries.

The total of Irish-born victims of the September 11 atrocities was
seven, although the number of dead who held dual Irish-American
citizenship runs to three figures. Some 20pc of the 2,801 who died that
day are said to have Irish ancestry.

While President Mary McAleese observed one minute's silence at
Enniskillen yesterday, the Governor of New York, George Pataki, was
preparing to deliver the Gettysburg address at Ground Zero. Seeing the
families of the dead, the grieving widows and sobbing orphans gave the
dead a living presence.

Families held up photographs of departed loved ones, and their killers
didn't discriminate between Muslim, Jew, Christian, Hindu, Sikh,
Buddhist, dissenters and those of no religion. It took nearly four hours
to read out the names of the 2,801 dead.

You could comfortably bury Croke Park in that enormous gouge in the
earth where the World Trade Centre (WTC) stood until a year ago.

Some 2,000 children lost a parent, and the New York Fire Department lost
343 firefighters, almost half the number of deaths-on-duty in its 100
year history.

But at the Mass dedicated to the memory of those who perished, a bigot
with peculiarly Irish prejudices shamed us all outside a Church where
they read about forgiveness from the gospel according to Matthew.

"Jesus said to his disciples: 'You have heard it said, An eye for an eye
and a tooth. But I say unto you, offer no resistance to one who is evil.
When someone strikes you on the right cheek, turn the other one to him
as well'."

Sam Smyth in New York

Telegraph 07 Aug. 03
By Brendan McDaid.

A Londonderry family today spoke of their horror at being plunged back into
"a living nightmare" of sectarian violence and petrol bomb attacks.

Lifelong Fountain resident Grace Curry spoke out after petrol bombs lobbed
over an interface fence by nationalist youths narrowly missed an oil tank at the
rear of her home.

The mother of three vowed however to stay put despite a campaign of terror
that has seen her teenage daughter set on fire and beaten with hurley sticks.

In a defiant message to those who carried out the attacks she said "I wont
give up my house. I was born and reared in the Fountain and if I have to fight
to stay in my house, then that is what I will do".

Three years ago Mrs Curry witnessed her then 13 year old daughter set on fire
by a petrol bomb thrown by nationalists. The girl had been battered by hurley
bats getting off a school bus six months earlier.

Last nights attack comes amid rising tensions ahead of this weekends August
12 celebrations.

DUP councillor Willie Hay said those that carried out the attack had
"intended to kill". He said "there is good work being done to try and stamp out these
attacks and I am appealing for calm among residents and urging them not to
react.

BBC
Airport row over 'shirt ban'

Officials at Dublin Airport have launched an inquiry after a group of teenagers alleged that they were told to remove their Rangers shirts.
David Annett, 18, and three friends from Belfast said they were ordered to change their shirts but people in Celtic shirts were not subjected to the ban.

AerRianta, the company which owns and operates the airport, said it was carrying out a "thorough investigation" into the claim.

Mr Annett and his friends said they were going to board a flight to Tenerife on 13 July when they were stopped by a security guard.

If it is found that anything inappropriate happened, severe disciplinary action will be taken

He said: "A security guy said 'excuse me, lads, would you remove your Rangers shirts'.

"We asked why and he said 'just do it, or you're not getting through.

"We didn't know what was going to happen and were scared we would miss our flight."

Mr Annett said the group covered up the shirts and went on through security.

However, they decided to wait to see if any people in Celtic shirts were allowed access.

Mr Annett said the group approached the security guard and asked him why the people in Celtic shirts had been allowed through.

'Full investigation'

"He said, 'we have a lot of Celtic fans down here'," said Mr Annett.

"We were taken aback by this, we couldn't believe it. It's an international airport and we didn't expect to be treated like that."

Vincent Wall, director of communications with AerRianta, said the company was still gathering information about the alleged incident.

However, he said: "If that happened, it was absolutely incorrect and (the guard) behaved totally inappropriately.

"I can assure that young man that we are carrying out a full and thorough investigation of what happened.

"If it is found that anything inappropriate happened, severe disciplinary action will be taken."

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/northern_ireland/3096507.stm

Londonderry Journal
Stop Atacking The Fountain
Feb 17 2004

THE REAL IRA in Derry have issued a call to young people to cease attacks on what they described as 'ordinary Protestants' in the Fountain area.

The group said: "While we will defend the right of anyone to attack the forces of British occupation we are calling on young people to stop attacking the Fountain.

"All they are doing here is attacking ordinary Protestants and this is something that we urge them to cease immediately."

It is believed that the republican group has approached several groups of young people in the Bishop Street and Bogside area to impress upon them the need to stop attacking the remaining unionist enclave on the west bank of the Foyle.

The Real IRA's call comes after a series of attacks on the Fountain in the last number of weeks.

There have been several petrol bombings of houses in the Fountain and when the PSNI showed up to investigate they too came under attack.

It is believed that the attacks on the Fountain were being used to entice the PSNI into the area.

Local public representatives were united in their condemnation of the attacks and called on young people to end their actions immediately.

In recent years attacks on the Fountain had decreased thanks to the actions of local community workers on the ground trying to prevent incidents.

After the most recent attacks DUP councillor William Hay said that he was convinced the attacks were a ruse to lure the PSNI into the area.

http://icderry.icnetwork.co.uk/news/localnews/

http://www.reform.org/angelus.htm
Article by Bruce Arnold in the Irish Independent on 21st September 2002.

Time to ring the changes on the Angelus bell so we are more inclusive of all Beliefs.

RTE'S broadcasting of the Angelus has long been the subject of controversy. The actual broadcast, twice a day, at noon and at six o'clock in the evening, is treated by our broadcasters as an act of worship for which everything else stops.

We are invited, in reverential tones quite different from those used at any other time, to "pause for the Angelus" and then, with a supposed nationwide acceptance of its legitimacy and what it means, the rather off-key triplet of peals from a recording of only God knows what church bells rings through the land.

It is more rigid in its timing than anything else broadcast by RTE. The news may be late, the taped interviews may be mixed up, we may have altered arbitrarily the time for the weather forecast and to have turned into a music hall comedy act where the forecaster is asked what he is going to give us today - as though the weather were at his disposal - but the Angelus brooks no such modification. It is relentless and unchanging.

It is a religious "act" by RTE to broadcast the Angelus. It is not a religious service but a religious declaration, quite evidently directed into the airwaves and onto our television screens for the purpose of identifying the station and the listeners or viewers as to their "faith".

It has little to do with the "truth" about the faith of the station. As Mary Kenny said, in a recent article about the Angelus, one would be more likely to encounter "a sticky form of Marxism" in the corridors of Montrose than Catholic triumphalism. But by broadcasting it, RTE conceals reality behind a numb and relentless act of sectarianism.

The station claims that it keeps its broadcasting of the Angelus "under review". It claims, as a balancing factor, the broadcasting of worship by other Christian denominations, adding that this is done "with greater frequency than their size would strictly merit."

If RTE means by this the size within the 26 counties, they may be right. However, as with the rest of us, there is the Belfast Agreement, and there are a million in the wider Irish population of this island to whom the Angelus is an exclusive "act", not applicable to them.

I use the word "act" for the Angelus because it is not worship in the sense in which services broadcast under the remit of public service belong. It is more central and far more implacable than that. And it is deliberately persuasive of a particular creed, making that creed central, and thereby pushing into second, third or other places, the other creeds.

This week RTE used, as its justification for refusing the Bernhard Langer advertisements, Section 65 of the Broadcasting Act, which precludes "persuasion" from matter broadcast by the Station, including advertisements. There is a distinct possibility, given the fact that the the Zion Trust campaign led by Bernhard Langer includes the distribution of a CD and literature, that the court hearing on Monday will lead to a judgment in favour of RTE.

Yet the Station itself continues relentlessly to use "persuasion" of a single religious point of view on a twice-daily basis, every day of the year. It does so, arguably in direct breach of the principal piece of legislation covering what it does. And the only way it can be conclusively challenged is in the courts, a circumstance unlikely at the present time.

RTE claims that it keeps the broadcasting of the Angelus under continuing review, and the points made about it are used as part of that process. Two more distinct attitudes than those of Mary Kenny and Robin Bury would be hard to find.

Mary Kenny's defence of the Angelus, in an article in the Saturday Weekend magazine at the beginning of September, was based on folk traditions and the emotive portrait of peasants standing barefoot in the fields "when it was forbidden to toll a Catholic chapel bell."

She went further: "It was recited by the monks in barren windswept fjords off the south and west coast at a time when it seemed Ireland had been forgotten by civilisation, and Christianity forgotten by the world."

Images of penal times, yet again, were raised in defence of the B Flat Bell, and Mass rocks, and almost everything else that could be thrown into the argument.

Then along came Robin Bury, whose earlier letter had provoked Mary Kenny's article. This time, in a well researched and lengthier response, he points out that the Angelus was essentially a product of the 19th century, and had become part of our folk culture well after the emancipation of the Roman Catholic Church in 1829. Before that, as Cardinal Wiseman made clear, it was unknown in Ireland.

So bang go the barefoot peasants, the folklore and tradition, the idea of the mellow church bells echoing across the countryside. The "poignant, meaningful and beautiful ritual" defended by Mary Kenny was a Roman Catholic Church introduction of the second half of the 19th century.

Moreover, Bury suggests, with quite good supporting evidence, that the strengthening of it as a practice, made increasingly more solid by regular broadcasting in the second half of the 20th century, is consistent with "Catholic triumphalism in a State where the few Protestants left had to batten down the hatches." And Robin Bury goes on: "They have been treated with 'barely repressed tolerance', in the words of FSL Lyons, the eminent historian, and ex-provost of Trinity College, Dublin. In 1984, the ex-Cabinet minister, Dr Noel Browne, a Catholic, wrote: 'The south of Ireland is a Catholic Nationalist State, a state where no Protestant need apply.', It is a State now, of course, that has been legally and constitutionally changed by recent acts and a referendum. Within the past decade we have altered the text of the defining Articles Two and Three in the Constitution and we have become part of the Belfast Agreement.

We have changed the ratio of Catholics to the members of other religions in the territory that is now meant to matter to us all - the 32 Counties - and we have specifically undertaken a new approach. At least, we say we have, and our politicians are attempting to honour their pledges on this.

Not so RTE. What should be a changed agenda for the Station is not reflected in the continued and relentless observance of a specifically Roman Catholic ritual, twice a day, every day, by the national broadcaster. The Station, as Robin Bury claims, is not honouring the Belfast Agreement and the Constitution either in the spirit or the letter of those fundamental documents.

David Trimble, at today's meeting of his party's council, has sterner issues to fight than this one of the Angelus, even though it represents just how little we have moved towards pluralism.

Yet there is something wooden and pitiless in the distance between ourselves and that Protestant and unionist tradition represented by the midday dirge in B Flat.

Bruce Arnold

Criticism of parades decision
By Suzanne McGonagle

THE Parades Commission has drawn criticism from both sides of the community
on the eve of a nationalist parade in Kilkeel.
Five nationalist bands are set to march through the Co Down town tomorrow
morning, but have had their route restricted after a review by the Parades
Commission last week.
The commission prohibited the bands from playing music as they pass Mourne
Presbyterian Church, and prohibited followers from taking the route.
On the return journey, four of the bands have been prohibited from entering
Greencastle Street, while one band - Banna Fluit Naiomh Phadraig has been
ordered to disperse at the entrance to the former Mourne Hospital.
Sinn Fein councillor Martin Cunningham said that he was appalled by the
decisions.
"I was a bit surprised by the Parades Commission's decision, and I was also
disappointed by the decision not to allow one of the bands to carry the Irish
national flag," he said.
"It is a church holiday, and not about making a bold political statement, it
is purely a day out for the people in the area."
However, former DUP assemblyman Jim Wells said "nationalists are given all
they want".
"We had a parade recently in Downpatrick which was banned from getting into
the town. There was exemplary behaviour and there was no incident of note.
"It is OK for Catholics to walk through a 90 per cent Protestant area, yet
Protestants cannot walk through Downpatrick which is around 70 per cent
Catholic."
The Parades Commission declined to comment on the matter.

the Irish News Thursday, 14 August 2003

Newsletter
13 Aug 2003

AOH annual demo

The Ancient Order of Hibernians will hold its annual August demonstration in Ballycastle on Sunday.

The event is normally held on August 15, the feast of the Assumption in the Roman Catholic Church, but this year has been moved to August 17.

Up to 50 AOH branches and bands from around Ireland and Scotland will take part.

The Parades Commission just getas sillier and sillier. Why wasnt this issue dealt with in the Good Friday Agreement and a set of guidelines and rules agreed between all parties?

So long a certain guidelines and code of conduct are adhered to people should be free to parade peacefully where they want to



Newsletter
14 Aug 2003

Parade restricted

The Parades Commission has placed restrictions on a nationalist parade in Kilkeel tomorrow.

The five bands are permitted to march past Mourne Presbyterian Church at Greencastle sTreet in the town centre in the morning, but music and followers are prohibited from that part of the route.

St Patrick`s Flute band will only be allowed to carry band bannerettes and the four provincial flags.

Orange peelers

CURIOUS, isn't it? It is possible for an Orange display to be mounted in Dundalk Garda station with nary a concerned citizen in sight and nobody travelling miles in order to take offence. The Dublin government can go out of its way to facilitate use of the Boyne battlefield for commemorative purposes and be applauded for its trouble.

Yet it is necessary for representatives of the Orange tradition to confront the PSNI to protest over the requirement that members register their commitment, almost as if it were some sort of quasi-criminal disqualification.

http://www.reform.org/pr271100.htm
Attack made on Republic's attitude to North
Paul Tanney, The Irish Times, Monday, November 27, 2000

Society in the Republic is ignorant, intolerant, apathetic and narrowly nationalist in relation to the North, a report has found.

The report by the Irish Peace and Reconciliation Platform, which will not be published until next month, was leaked to the Observer newspaper and seen by The Irish Times.

The platform is made up of 16 Southern-based peace and reconciliation groups including Co-operation Ireland, the Glencree Centre for Reconciliation in Wicklow and the Peace Train Organisation.

Among those who helped with the paper were Mr Chris Hudson, the Irish Government envoy who opened talks with loyalists in the early 1990s, and the former education minister, Ms Niamh Breathnach.

The report lists obstacles in the Republic to a lasting peace.

Since 1922, it says, there has been "little attempt to address the fears and apprehensions of unionists in the context of possible new political dispensations".

It adds that anti-British attitudes have helped "restrict the creation of trust-building with the unionist community" in Northern Ireland.

It says there has been "a fostering of selective cultural and historical amnesia", which led to the "airbrushing" out of history those "Irish people who fought on the British side in the World Wars, and a mistaken belief that only Catholics suffered in the 19th-century famines."

"Rigidly nationalist and majority-religion mindsets have prevailed since the State's inception", the report claims.

"Non-Catholic interests and culture have been excluded" by the State's support for the majority religion's role in education and medicine.

Even in the wake of the Belfast Agreement, the report says, there has been a failure among State institutions "to tackle the obstacles to peace-building and reconciliation in any serious way.

In wider society, it says, "there has been a pervasive readiness to scapegoat Northern Ireland and its people and to hold them responsible for their own misfortune.

"The media have, in general, underemphasised the integrity of the unionist position and have portrayed the people of that tradition in selective and oversimplified terms," it adds.

Balancing act
Continuing our series on political theatre, Gary Mitchell asks why plays
about Ulster Protestants are so often accused of bias
Gary Mitchell
Saturday April 5, 2003
The Guardian

My play Trust has a universal theme: parenting. Geordie and Margaret disagree
over how their son should grow up. Geordie believes the boy should learn to
stand on his own two feet and be a man. Margaret reckons it is the parents'
job to protect their children at all costs and punish anyone who upsets them.
They each attempt to undermine the other's authority, and eventually the
trust of the title is betrayed and destroyed.
When Trust was performed in San Francisco in 1999, it was beautifully
directed and superbly performed by an American cast. It received great
reviews (as when it was produced in London). Nevertheless, the theatre was
not full and people were not booking in advance: you might say that they were
queuing up to miss it.
One problem is that Trust is set in Northern Ireland - Geordie is a UDA
godfather. And we all know that the words Northern Ireland are enough to make
many people switch off the television, tear up a newspaper and run out of a
theatre or cinema.
In San Francisco, however, something else was happening. A quiet, unassuming
American called Pat took me for a drink and informed me that there were
political problems affecting the ticket sales. He added that there were no
posters in any of the Irish pubs or cafes for a reason, and as he was
advising Bill Clinton on the Northern Ireland problem, he needed to know if
the rumours about me were true.
He went on to inform me that Sinn Fein had a big following within the city's
Irish community, and that they were advising everyone to boycott this
"British play" because it was written by a sectarian bigot who would not
allow Catholics to perform, direct or produce any of his work.
This wasn't the first time I had experienced something like this. When I
wrote my first play, I was warned I would never get it on stage because
nobody wanted to know anything about the Prods in Northern Ireland - too
political.
That play was called The World, the Flesh and the Devil; in my opinion, it
depicted a person's war against the threefold enemy of mankind. The central
character was a Protestant because almost every person I knew happened to be
Protestant.
The play was set in a Loyalist working-class community because I had lived in
one all my life. In order to give an accurate account of this tragedy, I had
to rely heavily on my own knowledge, experiences and observations. None the
less, the warnings were justified: I never did get that play staged, although
I did get it on the radio, where it won a young playwright of the year award.

After a few more radio plays, I wrote another play for the stage: Independent
Voice. An actor who had changed his name so people would think he was an
Irish Catholic instead of a British Protestant advised me to change
Independent Voice for the same old reason. When I countered that Graham Reid
wrote plays about Protestants and they were on TV, I was told that it was
because he made them look so bad.
When my play was staged in Belfast, I was told that it made Protestants look
bad and that I was following in a long line of playwrights who did the same
thing. I disagreed vehemently: audiences liked my play, I argued, because it
wasn't about Protestants, it was about people, human beings, in a
predicament.
It took me four years to get another play on stage and I had to go to Dublin
to do it. The Abbey Theatre produced In a Little World of Our Own and even
toured it back to Northern Ireland - to the very theatre that had originally
turned it down.
The artistic director there had advised me to set the play in Birmingham
rather than Belfast. At least he understood that the play was essentially
about the relationship between two brothers. Unfortunately, I had never set
foot in Birmingham in my life.
My experiences since then have led me to believe that there is room for all
types of theatre - not just commercial, and equally not just political. And
yet the same attitudes seem to persist. I went into a bar in Dublin and
overheard a couple of actors talking about performing in my plays: they loved
it because they got to make the Prods look so bad.
When I wrote a screenplay about a character who was a Protestant loyalist
from Northern Ireland, I was told that the audience would not have any
sympathy for him because, unlike Catholic nationalists, he didn't have a
legitimate cause to fight for.
Some of my neighbours have threatened me because I criticise the Protestant
people. I can only offer that if I am being critical, then I am criticising
the human experience and not the Protestant community of Northern Ireland
alone.
There are political reasons that prevent certain plays and films from being
performed. Would a script about Jesus written by a born-again Christian be
produced today? Would a political play written by a member of the Monster
Raving Loony Party or the Conservative Party be turned down because it was
dreadful - or would it be because the politics of the piece were not popular,
or conflicted with the sensibilities of the theatre's board, or the agenda of
the artistic director?
Back in San Francisco, Pat has brought together the main critics and my
accusers to give me an opportunity to defend my work. I explain that there
are no Catholic actors in this production of Trust because it is playing in a
Jewish theatre and all the actors and the female director happen to be
Jewish.
I tell them that Patrick O'Kane, who performed in the London production of
Trust, won best supporting actor for playing Freddie in my play As the Beast
Sleeps. I am asked what relevance this has to the debate and I say: "Guess
what? Patrick O'Kane is a Catholic. The name kind of gives it away a bit."
They refuse to believe me.
I tell them to ring the Irish Times, who will confirm that Paddy won the
award, but they drop a bombshell on me: the Irish Times apparently is the
biggest Protestant newspaper in Ireland!
So I give them a list of all the Catholics who have acted in, directed or
worked on my plays - a list that exceeds the number of non-Catholics by about
90%. I even mention the famous Catholics I have been fortunate to work with:
Colin Farrell, Ciaran Hines, Lorcan Cranitch and many more.
Compare that with famous Northern Ireland Protestants: Stuart Graham and...
that's it. I don't know if they checked out the names or not, but from that
day on Trust sold out until the end of its run. Could have been a
coincidence, I suppose.
To this day, I am asked in interviews to cough up the solution to the
Northern Ireland problem, as though I were deliberately and selfishly keeping
it to myself. Another question I am asked is: will I always write about
Northern Ireland? My answer remains the same. I don't write about Northern
Ireland. I write about people.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/arts/features/story/0,11710,929911,00.html

Newsletter
10 Sep 2003
http://www.icnorthernireland.co.uk

Bigots smash windows at rural school

By IAN STARRETT
i.starrett@lineone.net

TWO Protestant communities on both sides of the border were attacked yesterday.

The Church of Ireland in Castlebar, Co Mayo, was daubed with republican graffiti and a number of graves were damaged.

In Dungiven, Co Londonderry, 27 windows were smashed in the Protestant school, where just 26 pupils remain in the nationalist town.

This is the latest of a series of attacks on Dungiven Controlled Primary School. Earlier this year, the WELB erected a new security fence around the building.

Headmaster Geoff Madden said: "They're just scum. I shudder to think what type of adults that they're going to turn into when you see what they can do to a school. A school is a very easy target. I would like to think it wasn't sectarian but I'm just beginning to change my views."

Councillor Boyd Douglas said: "Unfortunately, there appears to be an element that are determined to force the remaining Protestant people out of Dungiven."

Mr Douglas said the principal "has been under immense pressure in recent months because of these attacks by having to remain at the school late at night just to protect the property".

The councillor said that he had been contacted by many parents who are deeply concerned for the safety of their children and the possible traumatic effect it will have on their lives.

Former UTJP East Londonderry Assembly member David McClarty said: "People who are carrying out incidents like this should be severely punished. Those who smashed windows have no thought for the inconvenience they have caused, let alone the hurt and frustration for staff and pupils.

"This was an act of mindless people which has also served to divert already limited funding from where it is most needed to cover repairs."

Newsletter
Confidence Key for Border Protestants Apr 9 2003

By Christina O'Rourke


PROTESTANTS living in border areas will only become involved in community development activities when they are confident about their own identity, according to a new report compiled by the Rural Community Network (RCN).

"An emphasis has to be put on single identity work within Protestant communities to develop confidence and self-esteem before cross-community development could begin in these areas,'' said RCN's Marion Green.

"There is a history of 30 years to deal with and border Protestants have been silent for a long time."

Four communities participated in the research, all from areas in which the Protestant population decreased during the Troubles.

Eight workshops documented views and opinions to produce Border Protestants and Community Development.

"There are specific border areas where Protestants have not become involved in community development for fear of having attention drawn to them,'' said Ms Green.

"It came out very strongly in the report that many would not become involved for security reasons.''

Also revealed is the assumption among border Protestants that community development activity is ''a Catholic thing to do''.

Ms Green said: ''There is not the same tradition of community activity for Protestants as there is for Catholics."

Lack of community development activity was attributed to the lack of leaders, but Ms Green says the community needs to look further than the Orange Order and the Churches for leadership.

"There are other types of non-traditional leadership. This is what we have been looking at throughout our research - empowering people and building their confidence.''

The report found a recognition that the border Protestant community is in decline but Ms Green added: ''The community is not declining in all border areas, it is a very diverse community.

"Tullyvallen in South Armagh has a thriving Protestant community. It is growing all the time and Protestants are moving back there from other areas.''

Another factor in Protestant community involvement is powerful feelings against Sinn Fein, expressed in all workshops, with participants saying they do not make a distinction between voters and members - if people are known to be Sinn Fein voters it is sufficient deterrent.

On funding, Ms Green said: "It is sometimes expected by funders that projects should be cross-community, but the reality is that unless border Protestants feel secure and confident, they won't take part.''

http://icnorthernireland.icnetwork.co.uk/news/local/content_objectid=13268036_method=full_siteid=91603_headline=-%2DBoyne%2D%2DMemento%2Din%2DGarda%2DStation-name_page.html
'Boyne' Memento in Garda Station Aug 8 2003

VISITORS to a Garda station are being met by the surprising sight of a Battle of the Boyne display.

Gardai in Dundalk have taken the unusual step of commemorating the famous battle by putting up a framed picture of an Independent Orange Order parade at the Boyne.

The photograph was spotted by victims' group campaigner Willie Frazer on a recent visit to the Co Louth town.

He said: ''It was a bit of shock. In fact, it was the last thing you'd expect to see inside an Irish police station, really.

"I mentioned it to the guy behind the desk and he said it was nothing unusual to them.

"It just seemed so ironic that they would want to do it, or could do something like that in Dundalk of all places, and, yet, if it was a PSNI station up here there would be all sorts of laws against it.''

The framed photograph is of marchers commemorating the tri-centenary of the battle in 1990, at which Gardai from the station were on duty.

Insp Leo McGinn, who is based at the station, said: ''It's here along with several other pictures of events that have happened over the years.

"There are pictures of bombs going off, murder investigations, station parties based here over the years.

"It's nothing out of the ordinary to us. It doesn't make a lot of difference to us who comes through the doors here.''

Independent Orange Order Grand Master George Dawson said: ''It shows just how nonsensical current arrangements in Northern Ireland are."

Belfast Telegraph
Open door on Partition
History of turmoil in border communities

By Ciaran O'Neill
coneill@belfasttelegraph.co.uk

01 October 2003
A new study is to be carried out into the impact Partition of Ireland had on the Protestant community in the North West.

The division of Ireland in 1921, and the subsequent creation of the Northern Ireland and Republic of Ireland states, resulted in particularly major upheaval for people living in border areas.

Among those most affected were Protestant communities in Londonderry, Donegal and Tyrone.

And now a local group plans to publish a booklet highlighting the stories of people who lived in the North West through one of the most turbulent periods in Irish history.

The booklet, entitled Partition and Protestants, will be co-ordinated by Derry & Raphoe Action, an organisation set up in 1997 to encourage Protestants in Londonderry, Tyrone and Donegal to raise awareness of their culture and encourage others to participate more in their communities.

Funding for the new publication has been secured from the European Union.

DRA development officer Derek Reaney said he was delighted that the booklet was to be published.

"It is important that these stories of Protestant people who lived through partition are told," he said. "No project of this type has ever been carried out before.

"Anyone who was alive at the time will, obviously, be quite elderly now and we believe it is important to get their stories down in print.

"There will be negative and positive stories but we plan to have a balanced view of this time."

Research on the booklet will begin in the new year and it is expected to be published next summer.

The project is one of a number of initiatives which DRA is involved in the North West.

The group also organises a cultural roadshow, called What Makes A Protestant Tick?, which aims to raise awareness among other communities of the Protestant culture.

Anyone who was alive at the time will be quite elderly and it is important to get stories down in print'

- Derek Reaney

http://www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/news/story.jsp?story=448740

http://www.reform.org/demography.htm
Letter to "Church and State"
of 12th March 2003
Dear Sir or Madam
Decline of the Protestant Population
Mr Pat Muldowney's article on the decline of Protestants has little in it to support his conclusion that, "The theory that the IRA conducted a campaign of national cleansing against Protestants by means of sectarian terror, and that this explains the decline if the Protestant population in the South of Ireland, is wide of the mark and does not stand up to scrutiny."

This sweeping statement ignores important recent historical research undertaken by Peter Hart and Marcus Tanner, and details given by the Church of Ireland Gazette in 1922. His conclusion is based on narrow grounds. It would be untenable to use the findings of two Canadian historians in the parish of Thomastown to apply to the twenty-six counties as a whole. This approach "does not stand up to scrutiny" in terms of the methodology of historical research. It also casts a slur on the Protestant community as a whole.

I have already quoted extensively from two books that make the indisputable case that between 1920 and 1924 there was a mass exodus of Protestants, particularly in Munster and Connaught, caused by the activity of the IRA. Let me add further information to support the conclusions of Hart and Tanner. Peter Hart writes in, "The Protestant Experience of Revolution in Southern Ireland" in Unionism in Modern Ireland, MacMillan Press Ltd 1996, that there was "what might be called ethnic cleansing in parts of King's and Queen's counties, South Tipperary, Leitrim, Mayo, Limerick, Westmeath, Louth and Cork." Hart is a professional historian and would not use the words "ethnic cleansing" lightly. I note Kilkenny is not mentioned.

Marcus Tanner refers to a widespread and organised campaign against the southern Protestants and he uses the word "pogrom", saying it was similar to the pogrom Catholics suffered in Belfast.

On 16th June the Church of Ireland Gazette reported when writing about ethnic cleansing in Ballinasloe, that Protestants first received anonymous letters ordering them to leave by a certain date. If they ignored the letters, the threat was followed up by bullets through the windows and, "bombs are thrown at his house, or his house is burnt down…If the campaign against Protestants which has been carried out on there since the end of last month is continued in similar intensity for a few weeks more, there will not be a Protestant left in the place. Presbyterians and members of the Church of Ireland, poor and well-to-do, old and young, widows and children, all alike have suffered intimidation, persecution and expulsion. In one case, an old man who had not left when ordered to do so was visited by a gang, who smashed everything in his cottage - every cup and every saucer, and then compelled him to leave the town, with his crippled son, the two of them destitute...The list of those proscribed is added to constantly, and every Protestant is simply waiting for his turn to come."

It went on, "…disgraceful scenes in Mullingar when the business premises of nearly all the Protestant residents were attacked…Furthermore, a large number of the Protestants throughout the County Westmeath got notice to 'quit' ".

The Church of Ireland Gazette on 22nd June 1922 reported, "Be this as it may, the fact remains that in certain districts in Southern Ireland inoffensive Protestants of all classes are being driven from their homes, their shops and their farms in such numbers that many of our little communities are in danger of being entirely wiped out…the small Protestant minority is at the mercy of local bands of lawless men who have learnt the use of the revolver for obtaining the property of others which they covet…The small Protestant communities in the towns and the isolated Protestant farmers whose industry and character have developed comparative prosperity, are considered "fair game…to cover sheer covetousness and personal dislike".

On 21st July, the Gazette reported, "They (the clergy) have seen, in some cases, their flocks reduced to vanishing point." On 6th October it reported, "Protestants and loyalists are being expelled from their homes, which are being ransacked and destroyed…there is a very large exodus to England…undoubtedly a campaign of persecution is in progress". It added, "We are Irish and Ireland is our home." The Bishop of Cashel said on 13th October, "…the Government have been unable to prevent brutal tyranny to many of our people and wholesale destruction of property".

In Co Cork between 1920 and 1923 the IRA shot over 200 civilians "of whom over 70 (or 36%) were Protestants: five times the percentage of Protestants in the civilian population". Hart writes. He continues that "whole communities" were deported. In north Tipperary, the Church of Ireland bishop of Killaloe wrote, "There is scarcely a Protestant family in the district which has escaped molestation...Altogether a state of terrorism exists."

Like Mr Muldowney, Irish nationalist historians explained the drastic fall in Protestant numbers in all sorts of ways other than the real one: widespread ethnic cleansing.

His statement that Protestants were a "British settler group" which did not "develop a strong affinity to the society in which they settled" casts Protestants as colons, on a level with the French in Algeria. Many Protestants stayed aloof and felt superior, but after Catholic emancipation and the nineteenth and twentieth century land acts, their position changed politically and economically and a sense of superiority was often replaced by a sense of paranoia. If they were a "transient population" they would have left. But most loved Ireland and regarded it as their home, whether they were small or large farmers, tradesmen and artisans or professionals. The vast majority had lived here for hundreds of years. In the words of an editorial in the Church of Ireland Gazette on 21st June 1922, "We are Irish and Ireland is our home". However, after 1916, they did feel increasingly alienated in a country where Sinn Fein took control. In this new Ireland, Irishness was increasingly defined as being Catholic and nationalist. The concept of a sovereign people seized on by Sinn Fein to justify their position to represent the Irish people, was by definition exclusionist. After 1922 they were largely ignored and went underground. "Amiable inertia" defined their attitude, as Hubert Butler wrote, himself from near Thomastown where the Canadians did their research.

Angela Clifford rightly points out that Protestants did not have to marry Catholics. I know many who did not, but as there were so few Protestants left in the country areas, many ended up unmarried. Surely the point is that the ne temere was strictly enforced in the South where the Protestant bloodpool was very small (5% of the population by 1926). It was less strictly enforced in Northern Ireland and in Great Britain. Here the Protestant partner had to sign a document undertaking to raise ALL the offspring of the marriage as Catholics. Mr Keenan is right to say that in less triumphalist days, the girls followed their mother's and the boys followed their father's religion. The Protestant demographic situation was so serious that by the 50s and 60s Protestants were not replacing themselves. Dr Garret FitzGerald was so concerned that he raised this matter in an audience with the present Pope, only to be firmly rebuffed.

Writing in Untold Stories, the Liffey Press 2002, Robert Abbott, a lay Methodist preacher comments on the ne temere as follows:

"The strains on mixed marriages was awful. From the wedding day, and even earlier, families and whole communities were pulled apart and even broken up in pieces in an effort to meet the rigorous Catholic demands. Then when the children came, there was more trouble, more grief and more conflict."

Attitudes have changed today, though the Catholic partner must promise to raise all the children in his/her religion, increasingly it is a promise that is not kept. Protestant numbers are at last increasing slightly as a result.

http://icnorthernireland.icnetwork.co.uk/news/local/content_objectid=13183082_method=full_siteid=91603_headline=-Protestants%2D%2DLiving%2Din%2DFear%2D%2DAfter%2DAttacks-name_page.html
Protestants 'Living in Fear' After Attacks Jul 16 2003

By Ian Starrett


AN arson attack on a Donegal Presbyterian church hall may have been carried out to instil fear into small Protestant communities along the border, a leading Ulster Unionist warned yesterday.

Former Foyle MLA William Hay said that Monday's torching of the 100-yearold Greenbank Presbyterian Church Hall at Quigley's Point and the blaze at Victoria Masonic Hall at Culmore have focused attention and heightened concerns among the community.

"These areas have very small Protestant communities and these attacks do nothing to instil confidence in these communities to remain there,'' he said. "Whoever did this set out to frighten the Protestant community. It's totally sad.''

The Rev Gilbert Young, minister of Greenbank Presbyterian Church, said last night that his congregation was "not happy".

He said that they are now getting used to what had happened but repairing the damage will be a long-term project. He said they all hoped "the Troubles were near an end and not at the beginning".

The Rev Young said that people would feel sorry about what had happened the Presbyterian congregation and there would be an "enormous fellowship'' from them.

Derry and Raphoe Action Group estimates that there are 14,000 Protestants living in Co Donegal.

A report by the group found that Protestants who live in Donegal kept a relatively low profile in public life there because they belong to a minority culture and religion.

However, the report found that 96 per cent of Donegal Protestants mixed socially with the Catholic community.

Victoria Masonic Hall, at Culmore on the Londonderry side of the border, partially damaged by fire the same night, is also patronised by many community organisations.

PSNI and gardai are trying to ascertain whether there was a link between both the fires.

Both police forces yesterday appealed for anyone who saw suspicious activity in Quigley's Point or Culmore around the time of the fires to come forward.

Mr Hay suspects the two fires were connected.

"These were very well planned initiatives,'' he said. ''I don't believe there is any support in the Roman Catholic community for these gangsters."

Londonderry-based Sinn Fein chairman Mitchel McLaughlin has appealed to the local population at Quigley's Point "of all denominations'' to come together in support of the Greenbank Presbyterian congregation.

i.starrett@lineone.net

Newsletter
16 Oct 2003
http://www.icnorthernireland.co.uk

'Shameful' Protestant exodus

A LEADING Londonderry republican has branded the drift of thousands of Protestants from the west bank of the River Foyle as a "national scandal".

Terry Harkin, spokesman in the city for the IRSP( Irish Republican Socialist Party ) spoke out for the first time since it was announced by Education Minister Jane Kennedy that Foyle and Londonderry College will be relocating in the Waterside.

The move of the last, second level state school from its present site at Duncreggan is being seen by many as yet another symbolic sign of the disappearance of Protestants from west bank life and culture.

Mr Harkin said that this brings shame on the city and that the decision for Foyle and Londonderry College to "up sticks" and go to the Waterside was the fault of Assembly politicians.

"This is all down to the Good Friday Agreement. This has copper-fastened sectarianism in our community," he said.

He also hit out at recent stoning and petrol-bomb attacks on the Fountain estate, the last loyalist enclave on the west bank of the River Foyle.

The Foyle and Londonderry College move to the Waterside has been defended by its principal Jack Magill, who said the move is a "simple financial necessity".

http://www.unison.ie/irish_independent/stories.php3?ca=9&si=1030423&issue_id=9663

Irish Independent

18 Aug 2003

Protestants 'wiped from culture'

NORTHERN Protestants suffer the same social and historical exclusion as refugees and asylum seekers in the Republic, Glencree Summer School in Wicklow heard over the weekend.

Shockingly, Protestants have been "air brushed" from the Republic'sculture as though they never existed- and a visit to any museum here will underline the point graphically,Frankie Gallagher of Ulster Policy Research Group told the school.

Rarely, if ever, will an exhibit show over 1m Protestants live on this island, with little to illustrate the common if parallel histories of the peoples living on it, said Mr Gallagher. This "exclusion" reinforced North Protestants' siege mentality and although the cultural deficits of museums here might be minor in the scale of the Northern question and unintentional by curators, it did little to ease the paranoia and defensiveness with which Protestants there viewed the Republic.

"We have a responsibility to live together on this island - yet we ignore our common history and culture," Mr Gallagher declared.

"There will be no solutions until these barriers are broken down."

The delegates, who included PUP deputy leader David Rose, Sinn Fein politicians Sean Crowe and Marylou McDonald and Alliance Party and Women's Coalition chairwomen Jane Dunlop and Betty Gibben, heard papers from former Israeli political negotiator during the Begin regime Moty Cristal on sustainable negotiation, and from Mary Jane Collier, professor of communications at Denver University, Colorado on creating a "third space" for conflict resolution.

Northern delegates rejected a 'demographic endgame' to the Irish question whereby a united Ireland would follow once Catholics there had reached 51pc of the North's population.

Ken Whelan

Protestants in the Free State got a raw deal
Letters, Irish News, 23.01.2003

In response to Mr B Smith's (January 7), it is misleading to compare the
Penal Lawsof the 18th century to the situation that existed in Ireland from the 1920's
on.

To raise this as a comparator also invites a spirit of seeking revenge.
This "Look Proddies, you got off lightly" approach is not conciliatory.
The Penal Laws were made at a time of great religious intolerance and
persecution in Europe and were designed to protect the English throne from a
Jacobite challenge.

They were relaxed after the failure of 1745. In the words of Stephen Howe in Ireland and Empire, they were "unenforceable
and unenforced."
They were not "designed to destroy Catholicism as such, but to exclude
Catholics from political office and largescale landholding".
They failed in many of their objectives and Howe writes that 18th century
Ireland was "economically more dynamic, socially and culturally more variegated,
politically more pluralist, with fewer effective discriminations against
Catholics? than had previously been believed".

In contrast, it has now been established that there was a pogrom of southern
Protestants after 1920 when over 80,000 Protestants were forced to flee.
I refer to peter Hart's essay The Protestant Experience of Revolution in
Southern Ireland in Unionism in Modern Ireland (MacMillan Press) where he
explains that between 1911 and 1926 there was a decline of 34 per cent of the
Protestant population.

He describes this as a catastrophic loss and "unique in modern history, being
the only example of the mass displacement of a native group within the
British Isles since the 17th century".
He explains that the reasons for this loss were murder and intimidation by
the IRA.

Mr Smith should also read Marcus Tanner's Ireland's Holy Wars (Yale
University press) where Mr Tanner says about the period 1920-1930 that "by
the end of the decade the Protestant population in the 26 counties had
collapsed".

There was an exodus.
He explains that the biggest fall was in Munster where Protestant numbers
were halved as "entire local communities were driven out". Dublin lost
"practically the whole of the Protestant working class" - some 10,000
artisans who fled in the 1920s.

It is estimated that the withdrawal of the British Army accounted for at most
15,000 people, including wives and children.
This "story went largely unreported", in Mr Tanner's words.
Then followed a period when Protestant numbers were further drastically
reduced by the cruel blackmail of the ne temere decree in mixed religion
marriages when all the children were raised as Roman Catholics.
As a result of this, Protestants have lost numbers, influence and affluence
since the Free State was established. In contrast, Catholics have gone from
strength to strength in the north.

In the first Irish government there were 14 Protestant deputies. Today there
is one.
In Donegal, a recent study established that 78 per cent of Protestants think
they" are not fairly represented" politically. And the views of Catholics anxious
to have closer relations within our islands and who want us to join the
Commonwealth, are generally not well received in the south.
It is surely time for the Irish government to initiate a positive action
programme in education, aimed at reversing a century of indoctrination in
anti-British thinking.

After all, the British are now our friends.
ROBIN BURY
The Reform Movement
Killiney, Co Dublin

Nationalists blamed for attacks
Petrol bombs were thrown at two houses in Glenbryn
Petrol bomb and paint attacks on three homes in north Belfast have been blamed on nationalists.

Billy Hutchinson of the Progressive Unionist Party says the petrol and paint attacks were an attempt to raise sectarian tensions in the Ardoyne area.

The petrol bomb attack happened in the Protestant Glenbryn area at about 2145 BST on Tuesday.

Damage was minor, but local people said the attack would raise tension between the two communities.

"There is no question about it, it is nationalists," said Mr Hutchinson.

"I am not sure if it is republicans, but it is certainly Catholics or nationalists from Ardoyne.

Billy Hutchinson blamed nationalists for attack

"I think it is a strategy to try and bring loyalist or Protestants in upper Ardoyne, Glenbryn and Alliance Avenue, to attack others.

"People in that area should be very conscious that this is someone's strategy to draw them into attacks.

"They should desist and not be drawn into someone else's strategy."

In a separate attack in the nearby Woodvale area, a bottle which had been filled with paint was thrown through the window of a house at Ohio Street.

Paint was also thrown at a mural on a nearby wall.

Police have appealed for anyone with information about the incidents to come forward.

Meanwhile, Royal Mail has told staff that it has received threats against two Protestant workers in west Belfast from a group calling itself the Catholic Reaction Force.

The company said it would not send any workers into an area if their safety was at risk.

However, it has promised there will be no disruption to postal services.

Sunday Independent
Soccer bigots a national disgrace

Soccer bigots a national disgrace IRISH soccer fans have been rightly praised for their sense of fun, and their spirit of sporting fairness. Those qualities have won them a high reputation abroad as supporters whose pride in the game is matched by pride in their country. They are fine ambassadors for the sport and for Ireland. And they set a standard of behaviour that other countries would like to see supporters of their own national teams emulate.

So why not maintain those same high standards at home, one might well ask. Many, either at Lansdowne Road last Wednesday night for the European cup game between Ireland and Georgia, or who watched the match on television, have since asked that question.

The cause for public concern was the reaction from sections of the crowd to one Georgian player, Shota Arveladze. When not playing for his country, he plays for his club, Glasgow Rangers. That latter association, it seems, proved too much for some to tolerate last Wednesday. So every time Arveladze touched the ball, he was booed by sections of the crowd; and not because he is a Georgian, but simply because he happens to play for Glasgow Rangers.

Such a display of boorish intolerance, is not, unfortunately, an isolated occurrence in Irish soccer. Some weeks ago a similar incident occurred during a friendly international match between Ireland and Norway. There the player, Tore Andre Flo, received the same hostile treatment as Arveladze. He too was booed, and verbally abused by sections of the crowd. The Norwegian was not, however, a Glasgow Rangers player. In fact, he plays for Sunderland, but he had once played for the Scottish team.

Glasgow Rangers and Glasgow Celtic are soccer clubs whose origins reflect the sectarian divisions within Northern Ireland. Some of their supporters, however, seek to perpetuate those divisions abroad, and so they channel the destructive energies of sectarianism into sport. In doing so, they maintain the integrity of an old historical quarrel, and just when those old divisions are narrowing in the North, with the implementation of the Good Friday Agreement.

Such supporters are bigots, a blight on the game, and a disgrace to their clubs. And, given the signs at soccer international matches here of similar displays of intolerance from sections of the crowd, this is a matter of broader public concern. The very positive image and broad public appeal that Irish soccer and the national team have built up over many years, could be badly damaged as a consequence.

If Irish soccer supporters contract the Celtic strain of the Glasgow sporting virus, bigotry and intolerance, then the national team will be the loser. It will forfeit its broad sporting appeal to the public, national pride expressed in the form of sectarian prejudice is, quite simply, unacceptable. It should not be tolerated. And those who boo and verbally abuse all present and past Glasgow Rangers players who may be playing for their country at Lansdowne Road are merely sowing the seeds for future acts of greater intolerance.

How can the contagious virus of sectarianism in sport be contained before it spreads, and before it does more serious damage? For a start the silent majority at soccer internationals who acquiesce in such behaviour could register their disapproval.

Certainly the Irish supporters of a foreign team, Glasgow Celtic, should not carry their club prejudices and their bigotry with them when they come to support the national side. By doing so they disgrace the game and the country, and they risk destroying what Irish soccer supporters have built up over many years, an international reputation for good behaviour, for tolerance and for fair play.

Irish soccer has no place for sectarian bigots, either on the field or on the terraces. At a time when racism is emerging as a serious problem in world soccer, the mindless sectarianism of some fans at home international matches needs to be checked before it becomes a more sinister and serious sporting problem.

http://www.unison.ie/irish_independent/stories.php3?ca=44&si=993040&issue_id=9347

Sunday Life
Oct 26 2003
http://www.sundaylife.co.uk

US pizza man wants a slice of the Knights' elite
By JOHN HUNTER


A RECRUITMENT 'Holy War' may be on the cards in Ulster, after last week's launch of an United States-inspired group, which aims to recruit elite Catholic businessmen.

The new Legatus group is aiming to recruit the type of Catholic high-flyers who have. traditionally been the backbone of the secretive Knights of Columbanus.

Legatus was launched at Dublin's plush Berkley Court hotel where Dublin Archbishop, Dr Uiarmud Martin, was a guest.

A similar event is expected to be held in Belfast, in the near future.

Legatus — Latin for ambassador — offers membership to Catholic company chairmen, chief executives and other high flyers, and their spouses.

Lower ranks will find the door shut firmly.

The organisation was founded in the United States some years ago. by leading Irish-American businessman, Tom Monaghan, who made his cash in pizza parlours.

According to Mary Mulhall, a Legatus spokesperson, their international focus is on "the employers of the world", with the aim of recruiting top people who can apply gospel-values in a corporate context.

Regular monthly prayer-meetings and conferences of the Catholic business-elite will be held.

Ms Mulhall. a public relations executive, said the group is different from the Knights of Columbanus in Ireland, because spouses are involved.

The Knights, a secretive organisation, was established a century ago by Belfast Canon James O'Neill, as a Catholic laymen's organisation, aimed at counteracting alleged employment discrimination by the Masonic and Orange Orders.

Led by prominent Catholic professionals and businessmen, it now has major influence within the Catholic Church, in Ireland and abroad.

Commenting on Legatus, last week, one Belfast Knight declared acidly: "This crowd are very much the shiny new-kid-on-the block, as far as I'm concerned.

"The central strength of the Knights in Ireland, north and south, is that basically we're a low profile, local organisation, devoted to doing good works as leading members of the Irish

Catholic laity, if that doesn`t sound too pompous.

"We don't fix a membership cut-off point, depending simply on your company rank. In my opinion, that sounds like aggressive, hard-sell American business methods."

Belfast Telegraph
Three schools are cleared in bomb alerts

By Marie Foy
mfoy@belfasttelegraph.co.uk

01 October 2003
SECURITY alerts caused disruption at three schools in Belfast and Dungannon this morning.

Students at the Boys' Model School in north Belfast were evacuated for a short time into a nearby church hall. And there was also a brief alert at the nearby Girls' Model.

Boys' Model principal Jim Keith said a television station had received a letter claiming a bomb had been left on the premises.

After checking the area, police declared the alert a hoax and the children were ready for lessons by 9am.

"It is very sad that there are people in our society who are intent on disrupting the education of schoolchildren and once again I would appeal to all sections of the community to leave schools out of political and religious arguments," Mr Keith said.

"The education of our children, on whom all of our futures depend, should be sacrosanct."

It is the second time the schools have been targeted in recent weeks. Last Friday several girls were taken to hospital after stones were thrown at their bus.

Meanwhile, almost 500 pupils from Dungannon Integrated College were evacuated after a suspicious object was found taped to the railings.

The children congregated at the town's leisure centre while technical officers investigated the device.

The Gortmerron and Moy road junction was closed during the alert.

Principal Aidan Dolan said the school had never had any problems of this kind since it opened in 1995.

"We regret and fail to understand this incident. We provide an environment where our young people chose to play and be educated together."

http://www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/news/story.jsp?story=448800


Newsletter
PSNI Escort Eases School Bus Tensions
Oct 1 2003

By Richard Sherriff


PARENTS of Girls' Model school pupils said they were happy with the security operation as buses carrying their children were escorted home along part of the Crumlin Road yesterday afternoon.

After the debacle of Monday when the city's education board rerouted the buses without informing either the police or the parents, the reinforced police presence ensured that the journey went ahead smoothly.

The extra security was promised after a sustained attack on buses on Friday afternoon saw students taken to hospital after bricks and breeze-blocks were hurled at a bus.

After years of such attacks angry parents sought a meeting with senior police officers on Sunday night where they threatened to walk their children past the Ardoyne if effective and security was not provided.

However, the first day of the operation went wrong on Monday when the buses were re-routed by the Belfast Education and Library Board without warning and the children were sent down the Antrim Road instead.

Yesterday, as the buses approached the Ardoyne Road, police and Army Land Rovers were positioned in front and behind until the buses reached the Shankill and Twaddell Avenue areas.

One mother expressed satisfaction but warned that the effort would have to be maintained.

"I am happy that at last they're listening but how long is it going to last? Is this just a show because we're out on the streets?'' said Eileen Morrison.

"We'll be here until the end of the week and we'll be back on Monday but we've been asking for this for years and years.''

The operation followed an earlymorning arson attack on Ligoniel Primary School, where the attackers attempted to smash a window and pour flammable liquid into the assembly hall.

Only slight damage was done to the exterior of the building but the incident was condemned by MP Nigel Dodds.

"This whole situation is in danger of spiralling out of control,'' he said.

''It is outrageous that our children should be subject to such attacks. All children have the right to be educated in a safe and protected environment.

"The tit-for-tat attacks of the last two weeks must stop for the sake of our children and their future.''

r.sherriff@newsletter.co.uk

http://icnorthernireland.icnetwork.co.uk/news/local/content_objectid=13466682_method=full_siteid=91603_headline=-PSNI%2DEscort%2DEases%2DSchool%2DBus%2DTensions-name_page.htm

Arab Times.

DUBLIN, Ireland (AP): Politicians began their annual exodus Friday to the United States for St Patrick's Day-related events - and an anticipated week of arguments focused on Northern Ireland and Sinn Fein, the Irish Republican Army-linked party. The Irish government, led by Justice Minister Michael McDowell, has raised its criticism of Sinn Fein in advance the National holiday. McDowell on Friday suggested that Sinn Fein leader Gerry Adams has "lied and lied again" about his IRA involvement.

Ulster Unionist Party leader David Trimble, the Protestant moderate who led the failed power-sharing administration in Northern Ireland, blasted Sinn Fein for maintaining links with ETA, the Basque separatist organization accused of killing nearly200 people in Spain on Thursday. Before boarding his flight bound for New York and Philadelphia, Adams said Britain and Ireland shared blame for the deadlock in month-old negotiations trying to revive power-sharing.

Adams said both governments were refusing "to deliver on their obligations" under the Good Friday peace accord of1998 . These include more British military cutbacks, more severe police reforms, new investigations into disputed killings, and an amnesty for IRA fugitives. But other leaders rounded on Sinn Fein's support for a still-active IRA, and its refusal to support the Northern Ireland police force as the Good Friday pact envisioned. Both issues undermined a joint Catholic-Protestant administration that fell apart in October2002 .

The terrorist atrocity in Madrid - and Sinn Fein's longtime support for the Basque separatist group ETA - are overshadowing the Northern Ireland debate. "One day Sinn Fein is supporting ETA; the next they are appalled at the effects of terrorism," Trimble said in a speech before his own departure to Washington. Trimble noted that Sinn Fein had cheered an ETA-linked guest and called for a boycott of Spanish imports at its party conference last month. "Mr Adams must end this hypocrisy - pretending to be a man of peace at the same time as his organization is consorting with international terrorists," he said.

Analysts here expect the St Patrick's Day luncheon, hosted by US President George W. Bush, to focus pressure on the question of when, if ever, Sinn Fein will opt to support the Northern Ireland police. The Northern Ireland police commander, Chief Constable Hugh Orde, has been invited to the White House for that event. Orde recently angered Sinn Fein by declaring that the IRA has either shot or broken the limbs of about 50 people in the past year and also tried to abduct a prominent IRA dissident - actions that Sinn Fein's critics say violate the IRA's6 -1/2-year-old truce.