Northern Ireland
Keep BNP off the BBC
Protest - 5.30pm Thursday 15th October, BBC Broadcasting House, Ormeau Ave, Belfast
The BBC have offered the BNP a platform on Question Time. The far-right BNP won 2 seats in the recent European elections. This party is attempting to develop a respectable image, but their core is out-right fascism. Their founder called Hitler’s ‘Mein Kampf’ his ‘Bible’ and Nick Griffin, the current leader, regularly denied the Holocaust.
Cllr Domhnall O Cobhthaigh resigns from Sinn Fein to join the Socialist Party
Sinn Fein councillor Domhnall O Cobhthaigh today announced his resiganation from the party at a press conference in order to join the Socialist Party to “build a cross-community opposition to the right-wing economic policies of the Assembly Executive”.
August 1969 – When British troops went in to Northern Ireland
By Peter Hadden
August 1969 was a turning point in the history of Northern Ireland. It was then that the Labour Government of Harold Wilson took the decision to send troops onto the streets, first of Derry, then of Belfast.
Northern Ireland: Who can fill the political vacuum
By Peter Hadden
THE NORTHERN Ireland European election results have placed a huge question mark over the long term future of the Assembly. The crestfallen faces of DUP supporters at the count said all that needed to be said about the impact of the vote for Jim Allister and his Traditional Unionist Voice.
Norther Ireland: United Against Racist Attacks
In the past week, the Socialist Party in Northern Ireland has been central to protests organised in opposition to a spate of racist attacks on Romanian families living in Belfast. Over 20 families were forced from their homes in vicious attacks in which stones and planks of wood were used.
NI: Visteon occupation – Action gets results
By Peter Hadden
THE WORKERS at Visteon – through their month long occupation of their factory – have written an important chapter in the history of the labour movement in Northern Ireland.
Had they done as was demanded of them and meekly left the factory when administrators arrived to take it over they would have walked away with their basic state entitlements and nothing more.
Northern Ireland – Returning to sectarian conflict?
By Gary Mulcahy
THE AFTERMATH of the recent killings of two soldiers at Massereene barracks in Antrim and of a PSNI officer in Lurgan in March has demonstrated the fragility of the peace process.
In recent years, the various dissident republican groups have made many attempts at killing a PSNI officer. Even with high levels of State infiltration, it was only a matter of time before one of the dissident groups succeeded. The original aim of killing a PSNI officer was to undermine attempts by Sinn Fein to encourage Catholics to join the PSNI. Hence, most of the early attacks were on Catholics who had joined the police. But the strategy of the dissidents has broadened further than just attempting to intimidate Catholics and stop them from supporting the police.
NI: Visteon workers battle for jobs
Visteon/ Ford workers in Belfast, Basildon and Enfield have taken the lead in the struggle to save jobs. In Belfast the response of the workforce to the news that the factory was to shut, and to the attempt by administrators to remove them from the premises, was to occupy the plant. PETER HADDEN reports
NI: Unions must fight every job loss & wage cut
By Gary Mulcahy
THE JOBS massacre spreading across Northern Ireland and Britain is devastating entire towns and communities. Unemployment in the North has surged by 62% in the past year. At least 1,000 jobs are expected to be lost every month this year, which would bring the number of officially unemployed above 52,000.
NI Learning from the history of the Troubles
By Ciaran Mulholland
THE CONSULTATIVE Group on the Past, or Eames-Bradley group, has published its report on the Troubles. Lord Eames, one of the report’s authors, says it is time for a “final step out of the conflict by dealing with the legacy of the past.” The problem is that this report does anything but deal with the actual legacy of the past.
