Posted by Jim on July 3, 2018
Our Nation shares the sorrow of those affected by the shooting at the Capital Gazette newspaper in Annapolis, Maryland. Americans across the country are united in calling upon God to be with the victims and to bring aid and comfort to their families and friends. As a mark of solemn respect for the victims of the terrible act of violence perpetrated on June 28, 2018, by the authority vested in me as President of the United States by the Constitution and the laws of the United States of America, I hereby order that the flag of the United States shall be flown at half-staff at the White House and upon all public buildings and grounds, at all military posts and naval stations, and on all naval vessels of the Federal Government in the District of Columbia and throughout the United States and its Territories and possessions until sunset, July 3, 2018. I also direct that the flag shall be flown at half-staff for the same length of time at all United States embassies, legations, consular offices, and other facilities abroad, including all military facilities and naval vessels and stations.
IN WITNESS WHEREOF, I have hereunto set my hand this third day of July, in the year of our Lord two thousand eighteen, and of the Independence of the United States of America the two hundred and forty-second.
Posted by Jim on June 30, 2018
The widow of murdered Belfast defence lawyer Pat Finucane has said she
is optimistic that the Supreme Court in London will finally rule in
favour of a full public inquiry into her husband’s death.
Mr Finucane was shot dead by loyalist paramilitaries at his north
Belfast home in 1989 in front of his three children and his wife,
Geraldine, who was also injured during the attack. Several members of
the death squad are understood to have acted in concert with British
military intelligence.
Speaking as she and her children arrived at the court, Geraldine
Finucane said she wanted the court to decide that there should be an
inquiry, saying it was a promise made to her and her family, and to the
Dublin government.
Speaking outside the court with sons John and Michael, daughter
Katherine and 15-year-old grandson Piaras by her side, Mrs Finucane said
governments should be held to account.
“They can’t just change their minds when it suits them to prevent
justice,” she said. “So we are here for justice, and the inquiry.”
Peter Madden of Mr Finucane’s old law firm,
Madden and Finucane Solicitors, has said the only way that the full truth
about the murder can be firmly established and the extent to which a
policy of extra-judicial assassination was
authorised by government, is by a “full transparent public inquiry” where
witnesses and documents are subject to intense scrutiny.
“We will seek to persuade the Supreme Court at the hearing of this
appeal that David Cameron acted unlawfully in refusing a public inquiry
and that the court should quash his decision.”
The Supreme Court will examine a number of issues including whether the
failure to establish a full inquiry contravenes European human rights
legalisation.
In 2011 the then British Prime Minister David Cameron commissioned a
review of Mr Finucane’s death.
The Finucane family dismissed the findings of the review as a whitewash
and accused the British government of reneging on previous commitments
to hold a full tribunal into allegations of state collusion in Mr
Finucane’s murder.
Mrs Finucane was granted permission in July 2017 to appeal to the
Supreme Court against the decision of the Court of Appeal to hold a full
inquiry.
A panel of five Supreme Court justices, headed by the court’s president
Lady Hale, considered her appeal against that ruling during a two-day
hearing.
Opening Mrs Finucane’s case at the Supreme Court, Barry Macdonald QC
said the background to the proceedings was “complex and sinister”.
The case, he said, was “notorious for good reason”, and was one which
had attracted widespread local and international concern.
He added: “The available evidence suggests that agents of the state
responsible for law enforcement devised and operated a policy of
extra-judicial execution, the essential feature of which was that
loyalist terrorist organisations were infiltrated, resourced and
manipulated in order to murder individuals identified by state agents as
suitable for assassination – in other words, a policy of ‘murder by
proxy’ whereby the state itself engaged in terrorism through the agency
of loyalist paramilitaries.”
Mr Finucane, who enjoyed a reputation as a committed human rights lawyer
prepared to challenge perceived abuses of state power “was a victim of
this policy”.
The QC said: “All investigations into Patrick Finucane’s death have
clearly established that he was no more than a solicitor intent on doing
his job and doing it very well, albeit at the expense of attracting the
adverse attention of elements of the state.”
In written argument before the court opposing the appeal, the British
Direct Ruler in the north of Ireland insisted that the lower courts
considered the case correctly and that the decision-making process
relating to the public inquiry was a “thorough, genuine and lawful” one.
Posted by Jim on June 29, 2018
Victims campaigner to appeal judgment
Alan Erwin. Belfast Telegraph.Thursday, June 28 2018
A victims campaigner has lost his legal battle to have the British Government compelled to put in place a policy for holding a border poll in Northern Ireland.
Lawyers for Raymond McCord claimed the current criteria for calling a referendum on Irish unity is too vague.
But a High Court judge ruled that it is a matter for the Secretary of State to make a decision on the appropriate circumstances.
Sir. Paul Girvan said he was “wholly unpersuaded” by any suggestion she should be bound by a policy on such a politically sensitive issue.
Mr. McCord immediately declared his intention to mount an appeal against the verdict. “I’m disappointed but the fight will go on,” the Belfast man vowed outside court.
“I still strongly believe there’s a real need for a border poll to take the fear factor out of politics here.”
The staunch unionist has been mounting separate challenges in Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland over the current arrangements for going to the public.
His case against the British administration questioned the legality and transparency of the provisions for holding a border poll.
Under the 1998 Good Friday Agrement a referendum can be called if the Secretary of State believes a majority of people in Nothern Ireland no longer want to remain part of the United Kingdom.
Mr McCord, an outspoken critic of loyalist paramilitaries since a UVF gang beat his son Raymond Jr to death in 1997, is not pressing for such a poll.
But he believes authority for calling such a significant ballot should not rest with one individual. His lawyers insisted a policy must be implemented to remove any uncertainty.
The court was told current arrangements are too broad, giving the Secretary of State an unfettered discretion on the principle of consent and self-determination.
Irish Senator Mark Daly also attended the case in Belfast in support of Mr McCord.
The Fianna Fail representative, who served in the Good Friday Agreement implementation committee, has warned that without clarity any future vote could be open to manipulation.
But dismissing the challenge, Sir Paul held there is no legal obligation on the Secretary to have a defined policy in place.
Mr McCord’s solicitor, Ciaran O’Hare of McIvor Farrell law firm, also indicated the judgment may be appealed.
He said: “We will closely examine today’s ruling and, ultimately, the border poll question might have to be looked at by the highest court.”
Posted by Jim on
RADIO FREE EIREANN will broadcast this Saturday June 30th on WBAI Radio 99.5FM or WBAI.ORG at 12 noon-1pm New York time or 5pm-6pm in Ireland or anytime after the program on WBAI.ORG – Archives
MICHAEL FINUCANE, son of Irish civil rights lawyer Pat Finucane will give a first hand report on this week’s dramatic hearing at the London Supreme Court and explain why almost 30 years later, the FINUCANE family is fighting for an Independent Judicial Inquiry as the only way to get to the truth about British state collusion in the brutal murder.
DAN DENNEHY,National Director of the AOH and leading American immigration activist, will discuss current immigration problems and the impact on the Irish community as well as take part in a discussion about the surprising primary defeat of Congressman Joe Crowley, a champion on Irish issues.
John McDonagh and Martin Galvin co-host.
Posted by Jim on
Letters to Editor. Irish News. Belfast.Published Friday, June 29, 2018.
By Fr Sean McManus, President, Irish National Caucus. Washington DC.
Arnold Joseph Toynbee (1889-1975), one of the most eminent English historians, explained how England used the Bible in its genocidal, racist, and – after the English Reformation – anti-Catholic oppression of Ireland.
Sadly, today there is still a residue of that deep-seated anti-Catholic mindset in a significant section of the Protestant community in Northern Ireland. (Can any informed, objective person really deny this?) And – since the six counties were torn away from the other 26 counties of Ireland by the 1920 British Government of Ireland Act – every time any unionist/loyalist/Protestant leader makes a gesture of reaching out to nationalists/republicans/ Catholics, the Bible is sacrilegiously deployed to reject that gesture.
Some might see the latest melancholic example of this as being Ballymoney councillor John Finlay’s over-the-top attack on Arlene Foster’s attendance at the Ulster GAA final.
Was this attack out of concern for the Lord’s Day – which, by the way was changed from Saturday to Sunday by the Catholic Church at the Council of Laodicea in A.D. 364 – or could it be seen as a dog whistle? Might some, with good reason, see Cllr Findlay’s attack as a not too subtle attempt to rally the extreme, fundamentalist, ultra-Orange base of the DUP – to show disrespect not only to Catholics, but also to all things Irish (as personified by the GAA)? Just like Gregory Campbell’s disgraceful attack on the Irish language.
A few misguided individuals may think the best way to counter anti-Catholicism, anti-Semitism, or anti-Black racism is to ignore it – just don’t acknowledge it and it will disappear. History and human nature prove otherwise. Right now, Blacks in the US quite correctly call out anti-Black racism. And I back them 100 per cent. The same as I back Jewish-Americans who are not silent about some re-emergence of anti-Semitism in the US.
Any time the Word of God is used directly or by dog whistle to cause division and hurt, we can be certain it is not God’s will. As I said recently in a speech at the headquarters of the AFL-CIO (the federation of 55 national and international labor unions that represent 12.5 million working men and women):
“People of faith can be certain that working for justice is doing God’s work on earth. And people of no faith can be certain that working for justice is doing the decent and loving thing. And all of us can be certain that anything that does injustice – anything that marginalises, demeans, devalues and disrespects human beings – cannot be God’s work, or cannot be the decent and loving thing to do.”