43015 (Terrorism in Europe), страница 5

Calls from Sinn Fйin have lead the IRA to commence disarming in a process that has been overviewed by General John de Chastelain's decommissioning body in October, 2001. However, following the collapse of the Stormont power-sharing government in 2002, which was partly triggered by allegations that republican spies were operating within Parliament Buildings and the Civil Service, the PIRA temporarily broke contact with General de Chastelain. It is expected that, if and when power-sharing resumes, the PIRA disarmament process will begin again, though it is already considered by some to be behind schedule. Increasing numbers of people, from the Ulster Unionists under David Trimble and the Social Democratic and Labour Party under Mark Durkan to the Irish Government under Bertie Ahern and the mainstream Irish media, have begun demanding not merely decommissioning but the wholesale disbandment of the PIRA.

In December, 2004, attempts to persuade the PIRA to disarm entirely collapsed when the DUP, under Ian Paisley, insisted on photographic evidence. The PIRA stated that this was an attempt at humiliation and so the attempts collapsed.

At the beginning of February 2005, the PIRA declared that it was withdrawing from the disarmament process.

Activities

The Provisional IRA's activities have included bombings, assassinations, kidnappings, 'punishment beatings' of civilians accused of criminal behaviour, robberies and extortion. Previous targets have included the British military, the Royal Ulster Constabulary, and Loyalist militants – against all of whom PIRA gunmen and bombers fought a guerrilla war.

PIRA has also targeted British Government officials, Unionist politicians and certain civilians in both Northern Ireland and Great Britain. Many Protestant civilians perceived to have been assisting the British were killed in Northern Ireland, whilst many British civilians were killed during the IRA bombing campaign in England, which was often directed against civilian targets such as pubs, as well as targets of an economic significance.

One of their most famous victims was Lord Louis Mountbatten, killed on August 27, 1979, by a PIRA bomb placed in his boat.

Also many Catholic civilians have been killed by PIRA in Northern Ireland for alleged "collaboration" with the British security forces (i.e. the British army or the RUC). The IRA has also summarily "executed" or otherwise punished suspected drug dealers and other suspected criminals in the past, sometimes after kangaroo trials. IRA members suspected of being British or Irish government informers were also executed, often after interrogation and torture and a kangaroo trial.

Members of the Garda Sнochбna (the Republic of Ireland's police force) have also been killed; most notorious was the killing of Detective Garda Jerry McCabe, who was shot and killed after the commencement of the IRA ceasefire, while escorting a post office delivery. PIRA bombing campaigns have been conducted against rail and London Underground (subway) stations, pubs and shopping areas on the island of Great Britain, and a British military facility on Continental Europe.

It has recently been claimed that elements of the PIRA have been involved in a spate of bank robberies throughout the island of Ireland, allegedly to build up funds to 'pension off' PIRA members and so facilitate disbandment.

The PIRA has been officially on ceasefire since July 1997 (although hardline splinter groups such as the Continuity IRA and so-called Real IRA continue their campaigns). It previously observed a cease-fire from 1 September 1994 to February 1996, after the Downing Street Declaration, although this was ended when the British government refused to talk to Sinn Fein.

c) Sinn Fein

Sinn Fein used to be widely regarded as the political wing of the IRA, but today the party insists that the two organisations are completely separate.

A republican party devoted to establishing a united Ireland, Sinn Fein advocates strong cross-border bodies as a step towards achieving that goal and the maintenance of the Irish Republic's territorial claim to Northern Ireland.

It is a strong supporter of the Good Friday Agreement, but accuses unionists of undermining the deal in the months since it was signed.

The original Sinn Fein campaigned for an independent, united Ireland before and after the First World War. The current form of the party dates back to 1970 when Provisional Sinn Fein split away from Official Sinn Fein, which became the Workers' Party. This split mirrored the split in the IRA into Official and Provisional wings.

Since the early 1980s, Sinn Fein has slowly gained strength and political power. At the 1997 general election, it won 16% of the vote. Its two MPs, party president Gerry Adams and Martin McGuinness, have never sat at Westminster as they refuse to take the oath of allegiance to the Queen.

Sinn Fein has 18 seats in the Northern Ireland Assembly and two seats on the executive.

Sinn Fein was angered by the refusal of First Minister David Trimble to allow it to take up its executive seats until the IRA began to disarm, arguing that the Agreement gave it an automatic right to attend regardless of the IRA's actions.

In November 1999, however, Sinn Fein made a statement reaffirming its beliefs in decommissioning as an essential part of the peace process and in the IRA's commitment to a permanent peace. That statement - and similar declarations from the Ulster Unionists and the IRA - were seen as a breakthrough in the decommissioning deadlock.

Three months later, however, it became apparent that no decommissioning had taken place. Sinn Fein was angered by unionist pressure on the government and the suspension of the executive, arguing that this amounted to a unionist veto.

Sinn Fein welcomed the IRA's announcement in May 2000 that it was ready to put its weapons beyond use.

Latest Developments

When Sinn Fйin and the DUP became the largest parties of the two communities, it was clear that no deal could be made without the support of both parties. They nearly reached a deal in November 2004, but the DUP's insistence on photographic evidence of the decommissing, as had been demanded by Rev. Dr Ian Paisley, meant the failure of the arrangement. The robbery of Ј26.5 million from the Northern Bank in Belfast in December 2004, in which two staff members were forced to participate under threat that their families would be killed if they refused, further scuppered chances of a deal, as PSNI Chief Constable Hugh Orde blamed the IRA. This assessment was echoed by the Garda Siochana Commissioner, Noel Conroy. The two governments, and all political parties bar Sinn Fйin itself have publicly accepted this assessment, with the Police Constable and the Garda Commissioner jointly scheduled to brief the British Prime Minister, the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, the Taoiseach, the Minister for Justice and the Minister for Foreign Affairs, at a meeting in Downing Street in early February.

In late January 2005 Gerry Adams met separately with prime ministers Tony Blair and Bertie Ahern. Both men reportedly forcefully told the Sinn Fein leader of their conviction that the IRA were involved and warned that the IRA's alleged actions could scupper hopes of a re-establishment of the power-sharing government.

In the aftermath of the row over the robbery, a further controversy erupted when, on RTE's Questions and Answers programme, the chairman of Sinn Fein, Mitchel McLoughlin, insisted that the IRA's controversial killing of a mother of ten young children, Jean McConville, in the early 1970s though "wrong", was not a "crime". Politicians from the Republic, along with the Irish media strongly attacked McLoughlin's comments.

In the Dail on 26 January 2005, when challenged by Sinn Fein TDs over his insistence that the robbery was the work of the IRA, Bertie Ahern listed off punishment beatings that had been carried out in Northern Ireland, and which he blamed directly on the IRA. He accused Sinn Fein of stopping the IRA from carrying out punishment beatings (in which a civilian was beaten with a bat and had their legs broken, or was shot in the knees or sometimes in the hands) at sensitive times in negotiations in Northern Ireland, with the beatings beginning again once the negotiations had been completed. Sinn Fein TDs denied the allegation and called the claims "outrageous".

On 10 February 2005, the Independent Monitoring Commission reported that it firmly supported the PSNI and Garda assessments that the Provisional IRA was responsible for the Northern Bank robbery and that certain senior members of Sinn Fein are also senior members of the Provisional IRA and would have had knowledge of and given approval to the carrying out of the robbery. The political consequences of this are likely to involve further cuts in the salaries and expenses of Sinn Fein members of the Northern Ireland Assembly and exclusion from ministerial office should the Assembly be restored in the near future.

Gerry Adams responded to the report by challenging the Irish Government to have him arrested for conspiracy.

On 20 February 2005, Irish Minister for Justice Michael McDowell publicly accused three of the Sinn Fйin leadership, Gerry Adams, Martin McGuinness and Martin Ferris (TD for Kerry North) of being on the seven-man IRA Army Council. Gerry Adams denied this at an address in Strabane, on the occasion of a ceremony commemorating three IRA men killed by the SAS 20 years ago. Martin McGuinness denied the allegations in a TV interview on RTЙ.

On 27 February 2005, a republican demonstration against the IRA's murder of Robert McCartney on 30 January 2005 is held in East Belfast. Alex Maskey, a former Sinn Fein Mayor of Belfast, told relatives to “stop making stupid comments” to the press following Gerry MacKay's demand that Mr Maskey “hand over the 12” IRA members involved .

d) The Real Irish Republican Army is a paramilitary group founded by former members of the Provisional IRA before the signing of the 1998 Good Friday (Belfast) Agreement. The Real IRA is opposed to the Provisional IRA's 1997 cease-fire and acquiescence in the accord.

It originally attracted disaffected IRA members from the Republican stronghold of South Armagh, and some member in Derry. Its first leader was Michael McKevitt, a former quarter master general of the Provisional IRA, but he has since been imprisoned on charges of directing terrorism. Shortly after its formation, the Real IRA began attacks similar in nature to those conducted by the Provisional IRA prior to its ceasefire. However, it lacked a significant base, and was heavily infiltrated with informers, leading to a series of high profile arrests and seizures by British and Irish police in the first half of 1998. Despite this, the Real IRA succeeded in bombing Omagh town centre on August 14 1998, killing 29 people. This caused a major outcry in Ireland. Many of its members abandoned the organisation, and British and Irish police co-operated on an unprecedented scale to destroy the movement.

The Real IRA called a ceasefire in the winter of 1998, but this was broken after less then two years when the organisation conducted a number of attacks on the island of Great Britain, including a taxi-bomb attack on the BBC Television Centre in West London, and a rocket propelled grenade attack on the headquarters of MI6. Since then, it has become weaker and weaker. Infiltration has continued, and the movement has been unable to conduct a noticeable bomb attack. In the fall of 2003, its imprisoned leaders called for an unconditional ceasefire, citing alleged misuse of funds and the futile nature of their resistance to the British presence in Ireland.

In recent times, the Real IRA has continued to be a thorn in the side of both the British and Irish authorities. December 2004 saw 15 fire bomb attacks against premises in Belfast attributed to the breakaway faction. Many see this as a sign of growing support for the group, in light of failed attempts to rescue the Belfast peace accord.

The Real IRA is distinct from the Continuity IRA, another Provisional IRA splinter group founded in 1986.The 32 County Sovereignty Movement is perceived to be the political wing of the Real IRA.

e) The Continuity Irish Republican Army (CIRA) is an Irish republican paramilitary group that split from the Provisional IRA in 1986 in a dispute over the attendance of the elected representatives of Sinn Fйin (the political party affiliated to the Provisional IRA) at Dбil Йireann (the lower house of parliament of the Republic of Ireland). The CIRA also styles itself simply as the 'Irish Republican Army' or Уglaigh na hЙireann, but both of these names are also claimed by other groups, including the Provisional IRA.

At the 1986 Sinn Fйin Ard Fheis (annual party conference) it was decided to discontinue the party's long held policy of abstention from the Dбil but this decision was rejected by a minority of members who walked out of the conference to form a new political party--Republican Sinn Fйin--and a new paramilitary group: the CIRA. The dispute within Sinn Fйin was also seen as one between the Northern Ireland leadership of the party under Gerry Adams, who remained within 'Provisional Sinn Fйin', and the party's southern leadership under Ruairн У Brбdaigh, who was among the defectors.