The Badger's Sett

It's all over

Sun, 11 Apr 2004 16:24:40 GMT

Well my prepaid annual hosting will expire in a couple of days. As you may have noticed, I haven't updated the site for almost a month, and updates have been extremely irregular. Rather than pony up another $40 for another year and continue to post once ever six weeks, I'm just going to wind the site up. It's been a good two year run (or a good 18 month run and a bad six month run). Please visit me over at my other weblog, the Proceedings of the Radial Symmetry Institute. I'll transfer the Republican Prisoner Roll of Honor over there soon. Yours, the badger

1980 Hunger Strike Remembered Part 3

Sat, 13 Mar 2004 11:54:50 GMT

The following is one response regarding the Hunger strike of 1980 from a man who participated: Tommy McKearney, now editor of Fourthwrite magazine. It is taken from a volume of Republican literature, Republican Voices. Information on purchasing this book can be found here. I strongly recommend buying this book, as it is a vital piece in understanding current "dissidents" who were loyal members of the Provisional Movement. [Random Ramblings From A Republican: 1980 Hunger Strike Remembered Part 3]

Stormont crisis peaks

Thu, 11 Mar 2004 11:49:11 GMT

The culmination of an ongoing crisis in the failed Stormont Agreement was surely indicated by the call on March 7 by the British supremo in the Six Counties, Paul Murphy, for people to bombard heaven with prayer for the revival of the current process.

[Saoirse: Stormont crisis peaks]

The Enforcers

Thu, 11 Mar 2004 11:42:09 GMT

Anthony McIntyre

I had never met Geordie McCaul before, having only spoken to him for the first time twenty-four hours earlier when he contacted The Blanket by phone to arrange an interview. I was aware of who he was and had earlier written about an attack on him at his mother's home in Belfast's Twinbrook estate in January. If what he and his friends had stated publicly was true then he was the latest to be targeted in a focussed series of Provisional attacks on those republicans who disagree with Sinn Fein's etatism.

[The Blanket: The Enforcers]

Politics of exclusion will not work

Thu, 11 Mar 2004 11:39:18 GMT

Joanne Corcoran

In my view, the Irish government is actively considering the exclusion of Sinn Féin from the political process in the north as an option, said Sinn Féin President Gerry Adams as he addressed a packed community meeting in Ballymun, Dublin, on Wednesday afternoon.

[AP/RN: Politics of exclusion will not work]

A Malignant Menage d'trois

Sat, 21 Feb 2004 11:41:43 GMT

Anthony McIntyre

Next Monday shall see UTV's Insight, with typical investigative skill, unpick the threads that have been weaved together post-Patten to fashion a renamed garment now termed the PSNI. While we do not yet know either Insight's contents or conclusions, the very nature of the issues it intends to confront may lead some viewers to conclude that behind the facade of a name change, buttressed by RUC front men and women immersed in a discourse - although crucially not a culture - of human rights, sits the real policing agenda in the North. Whatever the new gloss, the nervous over-the-shoulder glance at Nuala O'Loan, the reworded title, the primary function of policing here is essentially what it has always been - political rather than civic. The PSNI, no less than the RUC, is both the cutting edge of the British state's willingness to maintain the union and the guarantor of the state's own skewed application of the consent principle. The police will of course pursue firemen who murder their lover's husband, arrest drug dealers - if they are not in the UDA, and crack down hard on those who violently prey on the elderly. Just as they have always done. Equally so, they will treat with absolute contempt legal safeguards put in place to protect the citizen from the type of police abuses that were so frequent in the past; and which some would hope to bamboozle us into believing exist only in the past.

[The Blanket: A Malignant Menage d'trois]

Who do you think you are kidding Mr Murphy?

Tue, 17 Feb 2004 12:09:38 GMT

Joanne Corcoran

It seems to be the habit now of British representatives in the Six Counties to send letters of denial to committees in the 26 Counties investigating British collusion. When, during the course of his investigation, Justice Henry Barron requested some of the 68,000 relevant files on the 1974 Dublin and Monaghan bombings from the NIO, he received a ten-page letter refuting allegations of collusion. When Sinn Féin's Caoimhghín Ó Caoláin requested answers from Security Minister Jane Kennedy as to why Barron's investigation had been hindered, he received a letter saying that all relevant documentation had been forwarded.

[AP/RN: Who do you think you are kidding Mr Murphy? ]

Back to the Future?

Wed, 11 Feb 2004 12:05:34 GMT

Fionnbarra Ó Dochartaigh

The campaign to bring about the separation of republican and loyalist prisoners in recent years led to the publication of the Steele Review in September. However, loyalist inmates were of the opinion that while republicans were well served by Steele's recommendation, the POA were dragging its heels on its full implementation because of a dispute with the NIO on the issue of security grants for their members' homes. These were officially approved on Friday, January 16, and vary in size, to a maximum of £20,000.

[The Blanket: Back to the Future?]

Collusion families picket MI5

Wed, 11 Feb 2004 12:01:30 GMT

Fern Lane

On Wednesday morning, a delegation of 70 relatives, representing something like 100 families and 150 victims of British collusion with loyalist death squads in Ireland, together with supporters, picketed the MI5 building, the MoD and Tory Central Office in London.

[AP/RN: Collusion families picket MI5]

Independent Monitoring Body - Smokescreen for Exclusion

Sat, 10 Jan 2004 22:02:07 GMT

Joanne Corcoran

The shambolic sop to unionists, otherwise known as the Independent Monitoring Commission (IMC), came into effect yesterday.The body, which is entirely outside the realm and spirit of the Good Friday Agreement (GFA), is the only element of the two governments' 2003 Joint Declaration that they have seen fit to implement.

[AP/RN: Independent Monitoring Body - Smokescreen for Exclusion]