Posted by Jim on November 1, 2018
ALLISON MORRIS
01 November, 2018 01:00
A LAWYER representing veteran republican Marian Price has said she “vehemently denies” allegations contained in a recently published book that link her to the murder of Jean McConville.
Say Nothing, A true story of murder and memory in Northern Ireland, by New York Times journalist Patrick Radden Keefe, is based largely on the PSNI investigation into the 1972 murder of the mother of 10, kick started by the controversial Boston College project.
IRA woman Dolours Price, who died in 2013 and republican Brendan Hughes who died in 2008, both gave lengthy interviews to the so called Belfast Project, copies of which were later passed to the PSNI.
Based in large parts on the testimony of Dolours Price, which was given to the author by the project’s director Ed Moloney, the book follows the story of Mrs McConville’s murder and the secretive IRA unit responsible.
Billy McConville will be remembered as a ‘courageous’ campaigner for abuse victims
Dolours Price previously admitted to the Irish News that she drove Mrs McConville across the border to her death, but in a second interview with Moloney admits that along with two other people she had been present when the murder took place.
Piecing together information provided by Moloney and Boston College researcher and former IRA prison Anthony McIntyre, as well as a third unnamed source, the author makes a previously unheard allegation about Price.
The book claims Marian Price fired the fatal shot that killed Mrs McConville, before she was secretly buried in an unmarked grave in Co Louth. Her remains were discovered in 2003.
The author says after joining together information contained in transcripts provided by Moloney, he asked a third, unnamed’ person about the theory.
“This person confirmed she (Marian) had, that Dolours had said the execution of Jean McConville was ‘something the sisters had done together’, Mr Radden Keefe states.
Convicted along with her sister, for the bombing of the Old Bailey in London in 1973, Ms Price was released from prison in 1980 on a Royal Prerogative of Mercy, due to her deteriorating health.
She returned to public eye in the late 1990s as an opponent of Sinn Féin’s political strategy.
In 2014 she was sentenced to 12 months in prison, suspended for three years, for offences connected to a 2009 RIRA attack, in which two British soldiers were killed at Massereene barracks in Antrim.
Price admitted purchasing a mobile phone used to make a number of calls to the media in which the Real IRA claimed responsibility for the attack.
Judge Gordon Kerr QC said at the time he was suspending her sentence on account of medical reports warning that further imprisonment would damage her mental health.
Since then the west Belfast woman has rarely been seen in public.
Jean McConville’s son Michael said this week he is asking for an urgent meeting with the PSNI to discuss the latest allegations.
Marian Price’s solicitor Peter Corrigan of Phoenix Law said yesterday: “My client, Marian Price vehemently denies any involvement in the murder of Jean McConville.
“She outright refutes any assertion to the contrary. We have now been instructed to review the publication in question, and the appropriate action will follow if necessary.”
Say Nothing, by Patrick Radden Keefe, published by Harper Collins goes on sale this week.
Posted by Jim on
“Enda Kenny, who did nothing for Northern nationalists during his time as Taoiseach, but allowed the British government a free hand to sideline the Good Friday Agreement….Here before them[ the current Irish government] is a concrete opportunity to maintain the rights of EU citizens in The North which is legally entirely in the gift of the Irish government, yet they have ignored the case that has been presented to them.”
Irish government ignoring concrete opportunity to maintain rights of EU citizens in The North
Brian Feeney. Irish News. Belfast. Wednesday, October 31, 2018
THE Taoiseach confirmed on Friday in Derry that he intends to hold a referendum to extend voting rights for electing the president.
The plan is that the referendum will coincide with the vote for the European Parliament next May. That’s five years after the original proposal of the Constitutional Convention in 2013.
That proposal was scuppered by the Labour party, junior partners in Enda Kenny’s coalition. Labour feared that expanding the franchise to include the 1.73 million living abroad – most in the US – would mean a Sinn Féin president.
Enda Kenny, who did nothing for Northern nationalists during his time as Taoiseach, but allowed the British government a free hand to sideline the Good Friday Agreement. He put the project on the long finger which guaranteed no vote for Northerners, never mind Irish-Americans, until 2025. That’s where we are now.
The project got little traction during Liadh Ní Riada’s dreadful presidential election campaign where she made it one of her campaign issues, one of the many stupid decisions in her campaign. The Irish president has no legislative power and can therefore do nothing about who votes for a president. A president couldn’t even make a speech about the matter. It was pointless raising it. The electorate ignored the issue.
Far more urgent is the right of Irish citizens in The North, who are also automatically EU citizens, to vote in next year’s European election. That’s one of the many rights Irish citizens here will lose after 29 March. Yet Ní Riada missed a huge opportunity to make human rights, and the damage Brexit will do to them, the central item in her campaign.
Michael D Higgins has majored on human rights concepts in numerous speeches in the last seven years. In many ways it’s not a political matter. Who in Europe is going to object to the concept of human rights, apart from the DUP?
What is political matter, however, is how they’re [ human rights are] implemented and enforced. One central right of EU citizens is to vote in Euro elections and here the Irish government is in the process of letting down Northern nationalists. The UK is losing its 73 MEPs next May and 27 have been allocated among 14 member states considered to be under-represented: Ireland got two.
There was an obvious chance to award the two to The North. The Irish government set the Constituency Commission to work. Sinn Féin submitted a proposal to give The North the two, and subsequently sent a legal opinion supporting their case. The Constituency Commission ignored them and awarded the extra seats to Dublin and Ireland South.
There’s no reason why the seats can’t be allocated to The North. The Republic has one of the most restrictive voting systems in the world when it comes to citizens living outside the jurisdiction – as exemplified by the presidential election. Over 100 states around the world provide for voting rights of non-resident citizens; 74 per cent of EU states have such a provision, including Belgium, France, Germany, the Netherlands and the UK. France has created eleven constituencies around the world for its citizens, Italy has four. Ireland none.
There’s obviously no EU rule to prevent the Republic following suit and it’s still not too late for the government to do so, for the recommendations of the Constituency Commission have to be ratified by the Oireachtas.
The UK has facilitated voting for other non-residents. For example, they used the Chinese Welfare Association offices in Belfast for Polish elections in 2010 and the Latvian consulate in Newry for Latvian elections in 2011. So there’s nothing in principle against facilitating EU elections here.
The only block is the Irish government which is loud in its protestations about defending the rights of Irish citizens in The North but so far has done nothing practical about it. Their position seems to be that they will take the matter up bi-laterally with the British after Brexit. Good luck with that. The ship will have sailed.
Here before them is a concrete opportunity to maintain the rights of EU citizens in The North which is legally entirely in the gift of the Irish government, yet they have ignored the case that has been presented to them.
Posted by Jim on October 31, 2018
October 31, 2018
Dear Member of the Family of the Archdiocese of New York:
I regret once again having to be the bearer of bad news, but I write to inform you that the archdiocese has received an allegation of sexual abuse of a minor brought against Bishop John Jenik, an auxiliary bishop of the archdiocese.
The Lay Review Board has carefully examined the allegation, which concerns incidents from decades ago, and concluded that the evidence is sufficient to find the allegation credible and substantiated. Although Bishop Jenik continues to deny the allegation, he has stepped aside from public ministry and has moved out of his parish.
For additional information, please see my letter to Bishop Jenik’s parishioners, along with a letter from Bishop Jenik, on the archdiocesan website at https://archny.org/news/bishop-jenik.
Please keep all those whose lives have been touched by the crime and sin of sexual abuse in your prayers.
Faithfully in Christ,
Timothy Michael Cardinal Dolan
Archbishop of New York
Posted by Jim on
October 31, 2018
Dear Member of the Family of the Archdiocese of New York:
I regret once again having to be the bearer of bad news, but I write to inform you that the archdiocese has received an allegation of sexual abuse of a minor brought against Bishop John Jenik, an auxiliary bishop of the archdiocese.
The Lay Review Board has carefully examined the allegation, which concerns incidents from decades ago, and concluded that the evidence is sufficient to find the allegation credible and substantiated. Although Bishop Jenik continues to deny the allegation, he has stepped aside from public ministry and has moved out of his parish.
For additional information, please see my letter to Bishop Jenik’s parishioners, along with a letter from Bishop Jenik, on the archdiocesan website at https://archny.org/news/bishop-jenik.
Please keep all those whose lives have been touched by the crime and sin of sexual abuse in your prayers.
Faithfully in Christ,
Timothy Michael Cardinal Dolan
Archbishop of New York
Posted by Jim on
Dear Member of the Family of the Archdiocese of New York:
I regret once again having to be the bearer of bad news, but I write to inform you that the archdiocese has received an allegation of sexual abuse of a minor brought against Bishop John Jenik, an auxiliary bishop of the archdiocese.
The Lay Review Board has carefully examined the allegation, which concerns incidents from decades ago, and concluded that the evidence is sufficient to find the allegation credible and substantiated. Although Bishop Jenik continues to deny the allegation, he has stepped aside from public ministry and has moved out of his parish.
For additional information, please see my letter to Bishop Jenik’s parishioners, along with a letter from Bishop Jenik, on the archdiocesan website at https://archny.org/news/bishop-jenik.
Please keep all those whose lives have been touched by the crime and sin of sexual abuse in your prayers.
Faithfully in Christ,
Timothy Michael Cardinal Dolan
Archbishop of New York