Posted by admin on September 21, 2013
by Roger Casement
The Irish diaspora looking afar at the mayhem caused by marauding loyalists in Belfast during the summer over the flying of British flags and rerouting of Orange parades must wonder: fifteen years on from the signing of the Good Friday Agreement, just what progress is being made toward a United Ireland?
The British Secretary of State have rejected Sinn Fein’s call for a Border Poll as envisioned in the Good Friday Agreement, showing once again where the real power lies in the British occupied six counties. The Good Friday Agreement, St Andrews Agreement and Weston Park Agreements had at their basis, equality between the political spectrums in the North of Ireland; The results speak for themselves. Fifteen years on, there has been no Bill of Rights, no Irish Language Act, no agreement on the past and no agreement on a shared future. Irish symbols are reduced to sitting atop loyalist bonfires. The DUP seemingly have wiped the floor with Sinn Féin on the Long Kesh peace center project. Despite Loyalist propaganda that Republicans are getting all the spoils, Nationalists are still more likely to be unemployed and living in poorer social conditions than Unionists. The British refuse to allow independent investigations into state murders, destroy and withhold any evidence that incriminates their armed forces and government officials in running loyalist death squads. Internment without trial and incessant harassment of Irish Republican political activists by MI5 agents and rehired RUC protagonists has shown once again the futility of trying to make the six counties work. One could say the Orange State has never appeared stronger. Many now believe that a United Ireland has never appeared further away.
A number of local Irish diaspora are addressing this issue in a new way. Roger Casement Society SoCal is the first chartered 1916 Societies within the US. The basis of the group’s outreach is the 1916 Proclamation and at the core of their objectives is petitioning for One Ireland, One Vote. Whereas the Good Friday Agreement needs the consent of the British Government to hold a Border poll, and then a 50% plus one vote in the North to agree to it, the Societies believe that only the Irish people voting as a whole are entitled to and can deliver Irish Unity. The 1916 Societies are growing at an amazing rate all across Ireland’s 32 counties as many alienated Irish Republicans return to the principles of the Irish Proclamation.
Roger Casement Society SoCal plans educational events, discussion of Irish Republicanism, commemoration of historical events, and promotion of Irish culture, language and sport. The 1916 Societies are an independent organization which gives no allegiance or favor to any political organization. Individual members my favor or indeed be involved with political organizations, but the 1916 Societies as a collective body will remain independent. Membership of the 1916Societies is open to any Irish Republican regardless of race, age, gender, sexual orientation or ability, except to those who endorse British rule and accept crown forces as a legitimate force in any part of Ireland.
An introductory and informational event is being planned for Sunday 29 September, 2013 at 1:00PM, 8176 Atlanta Ave, in Huntington Beach, CA. (see attached flyer)
Upcoming events are being planned for Temecula and San Diego in the next two months for anyone interested in hearing more and revitalizing their interest in Irish Republicanism.
We encourage and offer our assistance with the formation of other 1916 Societies across the USA.
For further information contact us at 1916societies@gmail.com, Like us on facebook at: facebook.com/rogercasementsocietysocal and follow us on Twitter at @RCasementSoCal
Please RSVP to 1916Societies@Gmail.com if you would plan to attend the September event, or would like more information about the 1916Societies.
Posted by Jim on September 17, 2013
Four Irish TDs – Clare Daly, Eamon O Cuiv, Martin Ferris and Mick
Wallace – recently visited the prison MI5 sting victim Michael Campbell
is being held in in Lithuania, and were horrified by the conditions he
endures.
A campaign is underway to apply pressure on the 26 County Department of
Justice Alan Shatter and the Dept of Foreign Affairs, as well as the
Lithuanian authorities, for some resolution to this horror.
Campaigners for Michael have urged concerned people to sign a petition
on his behalf at http://chn.ge/VscyyT and tyo write letters on his
behalf.
“We were years in the silent dark now that chinks of light illuminate
this issue please don’t let that light go out. Ordinary people, the
Citizens of Ireland and many abroad with no flags or banners just the
surrounds of decency brought us here – lets go forward still.”
—————————
TEXT OF PETITION/SUGGESTED LETTER
To:
Human Rights Supporters
BRING HIM HOME -Support the repatriation of Michael Campbell to Ireland
Michael Campbell has been held captive in the Lithuania prisons since
January 2008. As such he is the only Irish Republican Political Prisoner
being held in a foreign prison.
Despite being convicted and sentenced to 12 years imprisonment in
October 2011, Michael continues to be held in the most horrific
conditions imaginable, thousands of miles from his home, wife and his
family.
Michael is not deemed eligible for repatriation to Ireland until all
legal affairs in Lithuania have been concluded. Each day that passes,
Michael’s human rights are violated as he is subjected to severely
overcrowded and unsanitary conditions. These are the same conditions Mr.
Justice Burgess highlighted in his decision to block the extradition of
Michael’s brother, Liam Campbell. Justice Burgess communicated that the
jail conditions in Lithuania presented a risk of inhuman and degrading
treatment. His decision was based on a published report by Professor Rod
Morgan, an independent expert in criminal justice and the former head of
Britain’s Youth Justice Board.
Professor Morgan’s report noted conditions in the Lithuanian prison to
be ‘totally unacceptable’, including cells in a poor state of repair and
filthy, little or no access to natural light, inadequate artificial
lighting, lack of ventilation, unhygienic toilets, inadequate drinking
water provision and absence of outdoor exercise facilities.
If the extradition of one Political Prisoner to Lithuania was blocked
due to the fact that such action would breach his right to freedom from
torture, inhuman and degrading treatment or punishment under European
law, how is it then legally or morally acceptable for Michael to
continue to be imprisoned there?
The conditions of the jail in Lithuania are in violation of the human
rights standards and sanitation regulations due to overcrowding. The
conditions are in direct contravention of prisoners’ human rights. In
Article 5 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, it clearly
states, “No one shall be subjected to torture or to cruel, inhuman or
degrading treatment or punishment”. These are basic rights all human are
entitled to.
Michael’s rights are not being recognized or upheld. International human
rights law lays down obligations which are bound to respect. There are
obligations and duties under international law to respect, to protect
and to fulfill human rights. The obligation to protect requires the
protection of individuals and groups against human rights abuses. The
obligation to respect means refraining from interfering with or
curtailing the enjoyment of human rights. The obligation to protect
requires the protection of individuals and groups against human rights
abuses. The obligation to fulfill the duties under the law includes
positive action to facilitate the enjoyment of basic human rights.
On 05 Dec 2011 the EU Prisoner Transfer Agreement was entered into force
to govern the transfer of prisoners between member states of the
European Union to ensure foreign national prisoners serve their
sentences in their own country. Why then has Michael not been returned
to his own country?
Given Michael has no voice of his own, it is on HIS behalf we, the
undersigned, beseech you to act without delay to uphold his human and
legal rights and petition to have him extradited to Ireland to serve out
his sentence.
Sincerely,
[Your name]
—————————
Helpful addresses to support Michael
Department of the Taoiseach
Government Buildings
Upper Merrion Street
Dublin 2
Ireland
taoiseach@taoiseach.gov.ie
Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade
80 St. Stephen’s Green
Dublin 2
Ireland
tanaiste@dfa.ie
Department of Justice and Equality
94 St. Stephen’s Green
Dublin 2
Ireland
minister@justice.ie
The Irish Embassy in Lithunia:
Irish Embassy in Vilnius,
Lithuania
Gedimino pr. 1
01103 Vilnius
Lithuania
Telephone (+370) 5 2699460
Telefax (+370) 5 2699462
Lithuanian Embassy Dublin
LIETUVOS RESPUBLIKOS A
MBASADA AIRIJOJE
47 Ailesbury Road,
Ballsbridge, Dublin 4
IRELAND
Tel. +353 1 2035757
MICHAEL CAMPBELL
Pravieniskiu Pataisos
Namai-Atuiroji Kolonlja
2-oji Valdyba
Pvavieniskiu # 1x
Kaisiadoriu
LT-56552
Lithuania
LITHUANIAN PROSECUTOR.
Gedgaudas Norkunas
Prosecutor
Vilnius regional
prosecutor’s office
Rinktines str. 5a
09233 Vilnius
Lithuania
Posted by Jim on
By Eamonn McCann
The death last week of retired British army officer Edward Loden –
murdered by intruders at his son’s home in Nairobi – means that we may
never fully know how or on whose instructions the initial cover-up of
the Bloody Sunday killings was organised. We do know that, on the basis
of the evidence in the public domain, the two soldiers most intimately
involved were Loden and Michael Jackson, who was subsequently to rise
through the ranks to become Britain’s top soldier, the chief of the
general staff.
Jackson was a captain and second in command of the first battalion of
the Parachute Regiment in the Bogside on the day. Loden was a major and
commander of the battalion’s support company, the unit which fired all
the fatal shots. The fact that the chairman of the Bloody Sunday
tribunal, Lord Saville, accepted the account of their roles which
eventually emerged from the two men’s evidence was crucial in allowing
David Cameron to make the much-praised Commons statement in which he
hailed the report and declared the massacre “unjustified and
unjustifiable”.
DIFFICULT TO DENOUNCE
Had Saville cast doubt on the Loden/Jackson narrative, Cameron would
have found it difficult to denounce those who had fired the fatal shots
while maintaining that no stain attached to the British army generally.
The Bloody Sunday issue could not have been disposed of in a way that
satisfied the needs of the British political and military authorities.
Jackson had just recently been appointed chief of staff when he came to
give evidence in London in April 2003. He said that although he had been
in the Bogside and in the vicinity of the shooting, he had seen little
of what happened. He made no mention of compiling a list of the shots
fired or of writing any other description of events. A different version
emerged the following month when Loden described how, late in the
afternoon of Bloody Sunday, he had taken statements from the shooters
and plotted map references showing in each case the location of the
shooter and of his target. He said that he had interviewed the soldiers
one by one as he sat in the back of an armoured vehicle with a map
spread out on his lap and by the light of a battery-powered lamp. He
listed 14 “engagements”.
But when the original of the “Loden list” was produced, it turned out to
be not in Loden’s but in Jackson’s handwriting. How could this have come
about? “Well, I cannot answer that question,” Loden replied.
None of the shots described in the list conformed to any of the shots
which evidence told had actually been fired. Some trajectories took
bullets through brick buildings. In their evidence, none of the soldiers
said to have been debriefed by Loden recalled this happening.
Other documents in Jackson’s handwriting came to light – personal
diaries of the day by Wilford, the three para company commanders and the
battalion intelligence officer. The transcription of this dossier of
documents must have been a lengthy and wearying exercise.
Recalled to the stand in October 2003, Jackson said that he had had no
memory of any of this when first giving evidence but had recovered a
“vague memory” after learning that the documents had subsequently been
produced and put to Loden. Under questioning, the chief of staff seemed
hampered by poor memory, on more than 20 occasions using phrases along
the lines, “I cannot remember,” “I do not recall,” “I have only a very
vague memory.”
Saville accepted both Loden’s original claim that he had personally
written out the shot-list and Jackson’s subsequent explanation that he
must have copied out by hand both Loden’s list and the other documents,
although he could offer no explanation of why he might have done this or
on whose orders. No original of Loden’s list has ever been found.
In volume eight of the report, Saville rejected suggestions from the
families’ lawyers that “the list played some part in a cover-up to
conceal the emerging truth that some innocent civilians had been shot
and killed by soldiers of 1 Para, although it is not explained exactly
how this conspiracy is said to have worked”.
AFTER THE MASSACRE
Saville went on to cite an interview on BBC on the day after the
massacre in which a British army spokesman used the list as his basis
for explaining the “shooting engagements”. The report also acknowledged
that the shot-list had been distributed to British diplomatic missions
around the world by British Information Services as the “official”
account of the killings.
Saville did not refer in his report to the possibility that here we had
not just evidence of a conspiracy to cover up the truth of “unjustified
and unjustifiable” killings of unarmed civil rights demonstrators but
clear sight of the conspiracy in action, with Jackson and Loden at its
heart.
It is widely assumed that the Bloody Sunday matter is over and done
with. But it isn’t.
Posted by Jim on September 13, 2013
Constitutional convention seeks input from global Irish diaspora on overseas voting rights
Irish citizens resident outside the Irish state will be asked to make submissions later this month to the Convention on the Irish Constitution on the subject of “giving citizens resident outside the state the right to vote in presidential elections at Irish embassies, or otherwise.”
It’s the first time an Irish government agency has directly sought the opinion of the global Irish diaspora on the question of whether they should be allowed to vote to chose an Irish president while living overseas.
“The convention is actively seeking submissions from Irish people around the world,” Peter Ryan, New York deputy consul general told the Irish Voice. “We’re asking people to make a submission online via the website or by emailing the Convention Secretariat directly.”
“Should citizens around the world have the right to vote in presidential elections or not? It’s a great opportunity for Irish citizens around the world to have their views heard,” Ryan continued.
“There’s nothing that we shouldn’t be able to discuss about Ireland, whatever it is. Don’t just give your views around your kitchen table or community center, share them. Maybe others haven’t heard what your view on a particular topic is. You have to add to the debate.
“The idea of a vote in the presidential election is something that has been widely debated and I think it would be great to get as much feedback from Irish citizens as possible on it now.”
Tom Arnold, the Convention on the Constitution’s chairman, was formerly global CEO of Irish aid group Concern Worldwide before heading up this groundbreaking initiative. His experience stands to him, Ryan says.
“Tom’s very sensitive, given his own history, to the needs and opinions of the Irish diaspora around the world,” Ryan added.
Whether you came to the U.S. in the fifties, sixties, seventies or even more recently, you’re welcome to share your views Ryan said.
“There’s an online survey on the Convention on the Constitution which is very easy to fill out and very quick, you can answer it anonymously in a couple of minutes. That will help to guide the conversation, which will be held live online and will be easily accessible.”
Not everyone is impressed with the move, however. Fergus Scannell, an Irish emigrant based in Woodlawn, told the Irish Voice, “This is just talks about talks. They’re asking us if we’d like to vote in the election, they’re not actually setting up the means to do so.
“I’ll participate and tell them I want to vote for the president, but I want to be able to vote in the election while living in New York too. I’m back all the time. I send money home. It’s my country too. I should be able to vote.”
Eileen Duggan, an undocumented mother of two in Woodlawn says it’s a welcome start.
“I’ll definitely email the convention with my views. I think it’s a good sign that they’re finally beginning to notice we exist. If we were smart we’d make use of the diaspora, rather than ignore it. It’s very promising that they’re finally seeking our views,” she said.
The global network of Irish embassies and organizations has a direct line to the wider Irish diaspora, Ryan added. “We do try to keep in touch so we are aware of the challenges people are facing. It’s important to keep those channels open because they’re absolutely critical to the life of the nation.”
The Convention on the Constitution’s brief is to examine aspects of the Irish Constitution to ensure it is equipped for the 21st century. It will also make recommendations to the Dail (Irish Parliament) on future amendments to be put to the people in referendums.
The convention has already received submissions on the possibility of votes for the diaspora in the presidential election on its website, but is keen to ensure that as many Irish citizens as possible are made aware they are being asked to give their input to the convention’s deliberations.
Making a submission on-line is easy with the full details available on the website located at www.constitution.ie. You can also email the Convention Secretariat directly with your suggestions at submissions@constitution.ie.
Irish citizens abroad are also being asked to participate in an online survey that’s been set up to give the members of the convention a greater understanding of the issues facing the diaspora. The deadline for receipt of the completed surveys is September 18 at: https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/ConventionontheConstitution
The plenary convention meeting will be streamed live on the www.constitution.ie website starting at 9:30 a.m. on Saturday, September 28 and concluding with the result of the vote by the convention at 1 p.m. the following day.
Posted by Jim on September 12, 2013
The British government has refused calls for a public cross-Border
inquiry into the 1998 Omagh bombing.
The decision announced this morning preempted high-profile multi-party
talks on the past by US envoy Richard Haass due to begin on Tuesday.
The announcement came in a statement by British Direct Ruler in
Ireland, Theresa Villiers, and in a letter to members of the Omagh
Support and Self Help Group.
In the letter, Ms Villiers said the British government had “after
consultation and careful consideration” concluded that such an inquiry
“is not in the public interest”.
She said there were not sufficient grounds to justify a further review
or inquiry beyond the current Police Ombudsman’s investigation.
She added that there was support for an inquiry among a number of
survivors and families of those killed in the bomb, but �others felt
that a further inquiry would cause them considerable trauma�.
�All these views were weighed against other factors, including the
series of previous inquiries into the Omagh bomb and the current
investigation by the Office of the Police Ombudsman for Northern
Ireland,� it said.
Last month just ahead of the August 15th fifteenth anniversary of the
bombing the families said documents they presented to the Dublin and
London governments over a year ago showed there was substantial
evidence of foreknowledge state security forces of an attack on Omagh.
Those documents came on top of evidence that a British Army
communications team had been closely monitoring the mobile phones of
the breakaway ‘Real IRA’ unit responsible for transporting the bomb,
and had even hidden a tracking device inside the car being used.
But on the day, the attack proceeded without any intervention. Two
warning calls failed to clear the town centre area, and the bomb
exploded, killing 29 people and two unborn twins.
It was the most devastating loss of life since the Dublin and Monaghan
bombings in 1974. The two attacks are often compared as possible
British attempts to discourage support for the Provisional IRA and Real
IRA, respectively.
The families said last month that if necessary they were prepared to go
to the courts to try to compel the British and Irish governments to
hold and inquiry.
Michael Gallagher, whose son Aiden was among the victims, condemned
today’s decision, describing the reasons given by Ms Villiers for
ruling out a public inquiry as �trivial�.
The families would be seeking recourse, he said. �Should we be denied
truth and justice because other people don�t want it?�
He said he was �disappointed but not surprised� by the decision. �The
reality is that Aiden need not have died.�
Referring to British condemnation of the Syrian government, he said: �I
think it�s important to note that this is a government who are actually
holding other governments to account over human rights abuses.
�Both the British and Irish governments failed to protect the human
rights of those people.�
He added: “We gave both governments a document over a year ago that
shows that both the British and Irish government could have done
something to prevent the Omagh bomb.
“We have the result now – it’s not the result we wanted but at least we
can move forward. We can go to the courts and that’s exactly what we
will do.”