Issue 064, Saoirse : Irish Freedom (August, 1992)

              uimh 64 lonasa - august 1992 40p usa 24 per year 3921 00 unemployed unemployment in july rose by 10,300 in the 26 counties and 800 in the six counties making a total of 392,100 in the whole of ireland in the south statistical changes in may removed 7,500 people from the un employment register if they were added the total would be just short of 400,000 si british pressure mounts unionists demand dublin concedes the three weeks of the talks between the british the unionist parties the sdlp and the dublin administration beginning on july 6 and ending on july 24 has seen the dropping of all pretence by the british side that they are merely disinterested facilitators british direct ruler sir patrick mayhew has clearly been playing the old imperial game indicating to the unionist leader james molyneaux by letter on wednesday july 1 that he backed their plan for a new stormont in order to gain their agreement to a beginning of the north/south or strand two talks • the twelfth march past sean graham s betting shop where five innocent nationalists were killed - unionist negotiation at work the sdlp of course placed no cred ence on these reports including a sun day times article july 5 quoting from mayhew's letter to the unionists and continued to maintain that the british have not shown any preference ! in his opening address to the talks in lon don on july 6 mayhew said that the talks are likely to take place on the premises that any new political instit utions in northern ireland would be based on the structures outlined in the sub-committee report ie the model of a new stormont agreed by the uup dup and the alliance party it is rather late now for the sdlp to be publicly concerned about the key role played by mayhew as leader of the british team in strand two when he is clearly working to an agenda dictated by whitehall this aims to get dublin to drop articles 2 and 3 of the 1937 constitution and set up another stormont the leaking of his letter to the sunday times is part of the process of mounting pressure on the sdlp and dublin to bend them to the british will not difficult the second feature that has been evident from the talks during july is that getting the dublin ministers to con cede to the overt demands of the union ists for the scrapping of articles 2 and 3 is not proving very difficult while the unionists zeroed in on dessie o'malley and david andrews presenting them with their own record of opposition to articles 2 and 3 the british piled on the pressure through the media again with the sunday times reporting on july 19 that dublin had succumbed to unionist demands on the articles similarly dup leader ian paisley speaking on rte radio on july 25 insisted that the dublin administration must firstly announce their intention to hold a referendum and secondly actively campaign for the constitutional change if this was not done the talks will be over he insisted what the unionists want is to return to the position of the boundary agreement in 1925 which agreed to the partitioning of ireland and the existence of the border fox the unionists the 1937 constitution broke the boundary agreement position if the dublin administration accedes to their demands they should surely also delete article 1 which refers to one irish nation and article 4 which describes the state as eire or ireland 26 counties is not ireland and neither is it the irish nation to use their own much-abused phrase they should face reality and call the 26 counties the irish free state as it was in 1925 meanwhile in the six counties the nationalist people have faced the other side of the coin of loyalist negotiating during july — the loyalist death squads at night and the intimidatory orange parades through nationalists areas during the day beaten to death 3 5 year-old kieran abrams of leeson street belfast was beaten to death with cudgels outside the british army barracks in north howard street early on july 5 by a loyalist mob which went unhinder ed by the british crown forces the next day a 62-year-old nationalist was shot and seriously wounded by a loyalist death squad near a chinese takeaway restaurant on the ormeau road the car used was found burned out in the loyalist annadale area on wednesday july 8 a uff gang broke into the home of nationalist cyril murray 51 in kerrsland drive belfast and shot him dead the same day the people of the lower ormeau road had to endure an orange parade past graham's betting shop where five men were shot dead by a loyalist death squad on february 5 last during the course of the march hundreds of loyalists danced and chanted uff and five-nil as they passed the spot where relatives of the dead men were among those local people who tried in vain to have the parade re-routed away from the nationalist area for their trouble they were pushed into a side road by the ruc as the orangemen marched this triumphalist display was repeated on monday july 13 a uff loyalist death squad broke into the home of the mckenna family in springfield park belfast at lam on july 28 but failed to murder their intend ed victim when he pushed a chest of drawers against the bedroom door the ruc took 20 minutes to respond to the incident which took place a short distance from their new bamsley barr acks afterwards the uff warned they would intensify their murderous campaign against innocent nationalists the events in the past week in lan caster house london stormont and on the streets and in the homes of belfast are striking examples of unionist negot iation by threats on the one hand and by terror on the other backed up by british intrigue how is this going to deliver a lasting peace ? x.1xa1 rwmwj annual hunger-strike martyrs commemoration hn sat 29th august assemble east end at 3pm