Posted by Jim on October 13, 2018
Over 120,000 people joined a march for Scottish independence through
Edinburgh last Saturday in the largest ever march about the issue.
A sea of blue Scottish flags stretched for well over a mile from
Edinburgh Castle down into Holyrood Park, where local officials had
attempted to ban the rally from gathering.
The ban on the post-march rally for being “political” backfired when it
became clear the marchers would still head to the public park ‘for a
picnic’.
As a debate raged over the numbers, some estimates reached up to
150,000. Supporters pointed out that an equivalent march in London would
would be over a million.
Despite marchers chanting “Are you watching BBC?”, the government-run
channel failed to cover the event in its news programming. A tiny
counter protest of about thirty Scottish loyalists was given equal
billing to the giant march in the mainstream media.
“This was nothing more or nothing less than a rising, an outpouring of
the people’s dissatisfaction at Scotland’s status quo within the Union,”
wrote Martin Hannon, a columnist for ‘The National’.
Among the scores of groups participating under the theme ‘All Under the
One Banner’ was one representing ‘English Scots for Independence’. A
choir sang Hamish Henderson’s alternative national anthem, the ‘Freedom
Come All Ye’, as the crowd took two hours to assemble in the park.
Addressing the rally, the Deputy leader of the Scottish National Pary,
Keith Brown condemned Westminster’s “unfolding disaster of a shambles
that is Brexit”.
He praised the men and women who had come from distant islands and
highlands, including a number who had walked 500 miles for independence
from the Isle of Skye to Edinburgh.
The All Under One Banner group is to hold a further eight marches and
rallies for independence across Scotland next year.
The group said it hopes it will not have to keep marching for
independence but said they would do so “forever” if necessary.
Scottish author and blogger Paul Kavanagh wrote: “Scottish independence
is nothing more than the radical and dangerous idea that Scotland can
and will be a normal country. It’s an idea whose time is here. We are
the tide that cannot be stopped.”
Posted by Jim on October 12, 2018
Courts Call Bullshit On Paramilitary Crime Task Force
Thursday, October 11, 2018
Tarlach MacDhónaill is scathing of a PSNI scam in West Belfast.
Detective Superintendent Bobby Singleton was once literally a ‘Bobby’, patrolling the Lower Falls area of West Belfast and getting to know, no doubt, all the main names of the ‘underground’ world in that district.
In all likelihood then, the well-groomed PSNI golden boy knew full well, that none of those arrested in his old stomping ground on September 30th, (one of whom was charged with possession of a large amount of Cocaine) had any connection to the Irish National Liberation Army.
Yet Bobby Singleton now leads the PSNI’s ‘Paramilitary Crime Task Force’ which has been granted £25 Million over the period of five years as part of the Fresh Start Agreement, such figures demand results or at least the perception of results.
In a bizarre sequence of events on Tuesday last, charges against three Belfast men of ‘Conspiracy to rob a Boojum burrito bar’ were shot out of the sky by a Judge at first hearing due to the absence of that most basic Judicial requirement called evidence. One of the three was then remanded on a separate charge of possessing Cocaine with intent to supply. £140 000 worth of Cocaine.
The Irish Republican Socialist Party then released a statement in which they stated their belief that the PSNI had concocted a ‘sham charge’ against all three men and in so doing had dragged “two unconnected individuals into the dock, alongside a person separately charged with possession of Cocaine”, all in an attempt to create the impression of a collective conspiracy to supply Class A drugs in West Belfast.
In a PSNI press statement released on the morning of the arrests, Singleton had claimed that his force had been involved in an operation ‘focused on the criminal activities of the Belfast INLA.’ It succeeded in creating banner headlines and no doubt gave large sections of the public the general impression that the Belfast INLA was somehow and somewhere involved in the supply of Class A drugs.
Such an allegation would have had an obvious negative impact on the IRSP in West Belfast. Some weeks earlier their activists had made the front page of the local Andersonstown News for smashing a Cocaine supply operation in the same Divis area in which the latest Drug find in question had occurred.
Within that article, concerned parents of several local youths (victims of a predatory West Belfast drugs ring) claimed to have turned to the IRSP for help as they had (in their own words) ‘absolutely no faith’ in the PSNI.
The IRSP clearly believe now that Bobby Singleton has attempted to smear Republican Socialism in the Divis area by wrongly implicating the INLA in the very activity that the party were claiming to successfully oppose in the absence of local support for the PSNI – Drug dealing.
Their theory holds (at the very least) as much credence as the conspiracy charges which Singleton unsuccessfully tried to put before Judge Fiona Bagnall during his now doomed operation. The pressure which his ‘Paramilitary Crime Task Force’ no doubt comes under to be seen ‘balance the books’ following months of high-profile actions against Loyalist paramilitaries, gives further weight to IRSP suggestions that in the absence of genuine Republican ‘Paramilitary Crime’, Bobby Singleton has instead taken an ‘Any Taig will do’ attitude towards the latest wave of arrests and raids on their members houses and offices. Indeed, what better Taigs to raise headlines with than suspected supporters of the INLA?
It was highly unusual, indeed unheard of for any Judge to summarily dismiss allegations of the PSNI in a remand hearing allegedly involving Anti-Good Friday Republican ‘Paramilitaries’. It may indeed be the first case of its kind since 1998.
Yet the PSNI, until now, have relied upon both a compliant judiciary and a compliant press to create and promote narratives that they wish to be accepted in the public eye, the IRSP’s rebuffing of Bobby Singleton’s grandiose claims is unlikely to attract any mainstream press interest whatsoever and the IRSP will no doubt suffer negative public perceptions as a result.
Bobby Singleton is aware of this uneven power dynamic. He (and MI5 who command the Police service of which he is a part) is also aware of the growing support which a rejuvenated IRSP are gaining in communities such as Divis and the Lower Falls, the product of a wave of local, national and international political activities which the party has recently undertaken in what can be described as a ‘Peace Process’ of their own liking.
This is not the first time that the ‘Paramilitary Crime Task Force’ has used such broad stroke tactics against the Republican Socialist Movement. During the past year in both Derry and Belfast, targets of seemingly Bona Fide Policing operations have been arrested and had their homes searched simultaneously to members of the IRSP, with following far stretched press releases enough to brand the operations in questions “Investigations into the Criminal activities of the INLA”.
A modus operandi is being firmly established as are twin aims, the undermining of a political movement which the state has hated since its inception and (Just as importantly for Bobby Singleton) the public perception of a crack down on Irish Republicans, as opposed to ‘just Loyalists’.
Had the individual arrested for possession of Class A drugs been charged and remanded alone, it would have been viewed publicly as just another drug arrest in West Belfast. Yet a few more Catholics in the back of police cars, along with the right type of press briefings, were all that were needed to make this a political publicity coup for the ‘Paramilitary Crime Task Force’.
All the usual pieces of the Jigsaw were in place for Bobby Singleton in this instance. Wth the headline already floated by the Press, all that was required was the rubber stamping of a Judge and the appearance of an INLA criminal clampdown would be complete. In most cases the PSNI can rely on such rubber stamps without question.
Unfortunately for Bobby Singleton, it appears that a feisty female Belfast Judge had other ideas and put the requirement for evidence before the prominence of one department’s financial and political agenda.
Bullshit was called on the political antics of the Paramilitary Crime Task Force, and now inevitable questions around abuses of power, abuse of public funds, possible sectarianism and blatant lies told to the West Belfast community, will increasingly come to the fore.
➽Tarlach MacDhónaill is an activist with the North Belfast IRSP.
Posted by Jim on
“ This is a useful reminder for Members of Congress about the strange arrangement between the DUP and the British Government of Prime Minister May.”—Fr. Sean McManus
Tory-DUP deal was doomed
Irish News Editorial. Belfast. Friday, October 12, 2018
When Theresa May signed up to a confidence-and-supply deal with the DUP following the Westminster election in 2017, she must have known that at some point the priorities of both sides would no longer converge.
The prime minister had been left with few options after her dreadful showing in that snap election and needed the 10 DUP MPs to keep her government going.
For their part, the DUP drove a hard bargain, securing a £1 billion cash injection for Northern Ireland and for a while all seemed harmonious.
However, such forced political relationships rarely run smoothly and we are at the stage where suspicion and distrust is poisoning the atmosphere.
There was a wobble in December when the prime minister had to make a humiliating climbdown on the backstop wording in the face of DUP anger.
That episode will have told Mrs. May that the largest Unionist party is not afraid to flex its muscles if it believes there is any movement outside its “blood red lines”.
In recent days we have seen the rhetoric stepped up as the crunch time nears when the prime minister will either find an agreed outcome or walk away without a deal, something that is generally accepted would be disastrous.
The DUP this week threatened to vote against the budget later this month if Mrs. May concedes to a deal that treats Northern Ireland differently to Britain.
And to show that it is serious, the party abstained from a vote on an amendment to an agriculture bill on Wednesday night.
This was a warning shot which did not impact on the overall outcome but the stakes will be much higher if the DUP helps to defeat the government on the budget, which could lead to a no-confidence motion.
Sammy Wilson has made it clear the party is prepared to see Mrs. May jettisoned if she does not take their concerns on board.
The party seems to think the worst that could happen is a change of Tory leadership but that ignores the real possibility of another election which could result in Jeremy Corbyn arriving in Downing Street.
Are the DUP really prepared to take that chance?
It is a big gamble and obviously the stakes are high as we enter the end stages of negotiations.
Theresa May, who met key cabinet colleagues last night to rally support, has some tough decisions to make in the coming days and weeks.
The DUP is playing its strongest card, but the prime minister, in the middle of finely balanced negotiations, may not appreciate being held to ransom by the party.
Posted by Jim on October 10, 2018
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