FOLLOWING the killing on March 19 of two plain-clothes soldiers who smashed into a republican funeral (see IV 138), the British forces in Ireland have launched a savage offensive against the citizens of West Belfast who took part in the defence of the funeral cortège.
The earlier massacre at Miltown cemetery by a loyalist gunman has been written out of history, in the same way as the long history of state attacks by the Royal Ulster
Constabulary (RUC) and the British army.
JOHN McANULTY
MMEDIATELY after the deaths of the soldiers the RUC announced that it would be seeking to arrest up to 30 people. Within a week four men had been arrested and interrogated. Then, after a long pause, on April 22 a further 13 men were arrested in dawn raids and, after interrogations, seven were charged.
The charges, ranging from murder to grievous bodily harm, false imprisonment and withholding information, have no moral or legal basis. They are simply a device by
Britain to seek revenge and create an atmosphere of mass terror in which the entire nationalist population will be on trial.
All this was accompanied by a wave of hysteria in the
British press, which plumbed new depths. The Sunday Times used photographs and information supplied by the British intelligence services to identify republican militants in the cortège and lead the slander campaign and witchhunt against them.
Two people arrested in the mass raids who were named by the Sunday
Times were
Terrance (Cleeky)
Clarke, a leading republican, and Jim
Neeson of the Falls Taxi Association.
They were denied bail even though the charges against them (grievous bodily harm and false imprisonment)
were not major ones, and even though they had refused to run away but had remained at home to face the charges.
In a tragic development, the wife of
Jim Neeson attempted suicide the fol-
28 lowing day. The British demonstrated
International Viewpoint #142 • May 30, 1988 their "mercy" by allowing him four hours bail.
Media support for the witchhunt did not save them from falling victims themselves. The Prevention of Terrorism Act was used to seize film from the TV companies and executives were threatened that they would be charged with withholding information if they refused.
The most extreme step was the suspension of Belfast City Council employee Roisin McDonagh for writing an article in defence of the people of West Belfast in the Irish Times. She was threatened with the sack, but support from her union and from the community prevented this, and she has now returned to work with a reprimand
Britain is to blame for the violence. The British army, the RUC and their loyalist auxiliaries have all played their part in bringing violence and death to the funerals of IRA volunteers. Now they are attempting to criminalize the people for undertaking their own defence. Solidarity in the form of international protests against the witchhunt and for the release of the prisoners is urgently needed. *
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