Official Communication from the UFA

Posted by Jim on May 15, 2018

May 15th

Official Communication from the UFA

Posted by Jim on

May 14th

Loughgall documents point to war crime

Posted by Jim on May 12, 2018

Loughgall documents point to war crime

Members of the IRA unit shot dead in a British Army ambush at Loughgall
had been under surveillance for weeks, it was confirmed this week.

A lawyer for the father of one of the eight republicans killed at
Loughgall in County Armagh in 1987 said the new information is a major
development in the case.

Relatives of the dead men and legal representatives point out that the
disclosure proves that the men should have been arrested and their
deaths prevented.

‘Elite’ SAS soldiers wiped out the IRA’s East Tyrone unit as it was
preparing to mount an attack against Loughgall RUC barracks in May 1987.
It has thought the orders for the massacre, the North’s most notorious
‘shoot-to-kill’ act of targeted assassination, came directly from the
British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher. It was the IRA’s single
largest loss of life during the conflict.

Declan Arthurs’ father, Patrick, is suing the Ministry of Defence (MoD)
over the ambush, as well as the PSNI (formerly RUC), who took part in
the operation.

Partially censored documents have now been disclosed by the PSNI as part
of his legal action. Mr Arthurs’s barrister said they revealed an SAS
operation had been watching eight of those who ended up dying for a
number of weeks prior to the ambush.

Mairead Kelly of the Loughgall Truth and Justice Campaign said: “It has
long been suspected by the bereaved families of Loughgall that the SAS
shoot-to-kill operation did not have to happen.

“This recent raft of discovery shows that the state authorities had
sufficient information to effect arrests long in advance but instead
undertook a premeditated shoot-to-kill strategy.”

Ms McKeegan, of KRW Law, said the new material from the PSNI “proves
that the security services not only could have prevented the ambush but
that the MoD have not been up-front in relation to their disclosure
obligations in this case”.

She said that previous disclosure from the MoD made no reference to SAS
surveillance of the IRA men in advance of the shootings.

Funding for outstanding inquests from the conflict, including the
Loughgall massacre continue to be blocked by government officials
despite a recent court ruling that former First Minister, DUP leader
Arlene Foster, had illegally withheld the cash.

Ms McKeegan said the new evidence “further highlights the need for the
fresh inquests and the need for the money to be released from the
[British] government immediately so that all victims of the conflict can
obtain the answers that they so greatly need and deserve.”

Francis Hughes – Hunger Striker

Posted by Jim on

Francis Hughes: Scourge of the UDR

A contemporaneous account of the life of Francis Hughes following his
death on May 12, 1981 while on hunger striker against the Tory
criminalisation of republican prisoners. From the Starry Plough.
 

The name of Francis Hughes will surely continue to stick in the throats
of British military and political hawks.

Unlike many of those who make the ultimate sacrifice Francis Hughes had
already become a legend in his own lifetime and amongst his own people
as one of the most capable guerrilla fighters Ireland has produced in
the long war against British Imperialism.

Having put Francis Hughes “safely away” in 1978 the British assumed that
his name would no longer strike terror in their own hearts and a chord
in the minds of people in South Derry.

The British were exultant at his arrest following a gun battle in which
Francis and a comrade killed an SAS man and wounded another. Despite an
awesome wound he refused to answer his interrogators who later described
him as “totally uncooperative”. After the usual mockery of a Diplock
trial British soldiers felt slightly more relaxed in South Derry and
surrounding areas. Very foolish of them of course but then the British
military mind has never understood the collective spirit of solidarity
engendered by individually brilliant revolutionary soldiers like Francis
Hughes.

And brilliant he was. His exploits are legion and legendary spreading
through areas of Tyrone, Derry and Antrim. They are too numerous to
recount here. Suffice it to say that all the normal cliches like
dedication, bravery, military skill and the like are inadequate to
describe a man who caused the British military machine as much grief as
most guerrilla fighters from Tom Barry, Michael Collins and through to
the modern breed of fighters.

One or two examples of his coolness and ingenuity would make even
Collins look like a novice. The night he was surrounded by British
soldiers in one of the numerous “safe houses” in his area of operation
he simply grabbed his rifle and weaved his way through the tightening
circle stopping occasionally to mumble a few familiar words with the
professionals of the British Army whose perception of the “stupid Irish”
has often been a weapon in our favour. He got away then as on many other
occasions.

Behind his folk hero status in South Derry, however, lies the fairly
typical story of a young Irish man who was not allowed to grow up
normally in the artificial police state called Northern Ireland. It was
not for want of trying.

Showing an aptitude for history and woodwork at school he started an
apprenticeship as a painter and decorator at the age of 16 years which
he completed shortly before becoming a full time revolutionary. Shortly
after he became a painter he and a friend receive a brutal beating from
British soldiers on a lonely country road one night. The experience was
to prove more painful to the Brits than Francis himself over the next
few years.

Responsible for more attacks on British forces than the combined
strength of many other units put together he became the “most wanted
man” in the Six Counties. So feared was he that his comrades recalled
recently in Republican News one UDR patrol recognised him once at a
checkpoint but fearful (wisely) of a shoot-out they waved him through.

Francis Hughes is now doubly famous and revered. His hunger strike to
the death was just the ultimate proof, if any were needed, that his
determination and actions in the field were inspired by a profound
political motivation.

If the entire body of self-seekers now scrambling to retain their seats
in the Dail possessed between them just a portion of the guts and
conviction that Francis showed there might not be the need for the
ending of many young Irish lives.

British Soldiers Gloat Over Massacre

Posted by Jim on

Former members of the British Crown Forces have been sharing photographs
of the assassinated IRA Volunteers of Loughgall and gloating about how
they held “parties” in the van in which three of the martyrs were
killed, it has emerged.

Pictures of the dead Volunteers in the bullet ridden van have been
posted on the Facebook page of the ‘Hereford Veterans Association’.
Hereford is home to the British Army’s SAS regiment, which carried out
the ambush.

The IRA men who died in the pre-planned massacre in 1987 were Jim
Lynagh, Padraig McKearney, Gerard O’Callaghan, Tony Gormley, Eugene
Kelly, Patrick Kelly, Seamus Donnelly and Declan Arthurs. They men were
preparing an attack on a nearby RUC base at the time. Civilian Anthony
Hughes, who was travelling through the village in a car with his
brother, was also shot dead by British soldiers.

Two pictures were posted on the page under the name of Ernie McGookin, a
former British soldier and former cartoonist for the Belfast Telegraph
group. They appear to show three of the victims lying in blood on the
ground beside the van. A number of other former British soldiers clicked ‘like’
on the images.

Another photograph appears to show the rusting van, which was struck by
more than 125 bullets, pictured sitting in Gough Barracks in Armagh
around 10 years after the ambush.

Comments on the photos, as reported by the Irish News, include one by a
former RUC policeman, who claimed that he and colleagues held “parties” in the
van.

“During continuity training in 1988 we’d have parties in the back of
it,” he said. “The orange lights of HG (Gough Barracks) made for an
interesting spectacle as they shone the very many bullet holes…..”

Several other posters to the page also gloated about the deaths of the
men, while one appeared to admit direct involvement.

A former soldier, who says he drove two dog teams into the area in a van
on the night of the ambush, describes it as “one of the best nights of
my army career playing a little part in the night….”

Unionists have again this year erected SAS flags close to where the nine
men died in an annual attempt to provoke local nationalists.

Patrick Kelly’s sister Mairead said she was shocked by the latest
development.

“If you make fun of people who are killed it shows the nature of the
people doing it,” she said.

“Nobody with common decency would make fun of anybody who was killed.

“From a personal point of view it is absolutely disgusting and it is
depraved, there’s no other way to describe it.”

Former republican prisoner Brian Arthurs, whose brother Declan was
killed, said “any loss of life is regrettable in war or otherwise. These
men gave their lives in a struggle for the freedom of their country.”

He said the actions showed the sectarian nature of the RUC and “the
dehumanisation of a whole race of proud honourable people.”

“We look on this behaviour with contempt and it reflects the true nature
of the state they profess to protect.”