SF visits POWs in England
A Sinn Féin delegation spent Monday and Tuesday of this week
visiting the remaining five POWs in English jails who are
awaiting repatriation to Ireland or transfer to the H Blocks. On
Monday the delegation, Sean Crowe, Edel Kelly and Eoghan Mac
Cormaic, visited Jan Taylor in Frankland prison, and in the
evening spent an hour and a half with Patrick Kelly and Jimmy
Murphy in Full Sutton. On Tuesday morning they travelled to see
Nicholas Mullan and Michael Gallagher in Long Lartin.
Sean Crowe said that the prisoners were all in good spirits. Sinn
Féin remained determined not to allow the impending transfer of
the five to act as an obstacle to the release of those already
transferred. He criticised the linkage of their transfer to
British Home Office control over when the prisoners would be
released from an Irish prison. He called for their speedy
transfer and an end to the uncertainty which families are
enduring. Crowe also slated atempts by David Trimble to re-write
the Good Friday agreement by creating links where they do do
exist between prisoner releases and decommissioning
Edel Kelly said, ``the British Home Office have sought to protract
what should have been a straightforward procedure, and have held
these five prisoners as hostages for several months. Now that the
latest `obstacle' has been cleared there is no reason why the men
should spend another day in England, and all the families want to
see the Dublin Government processing the transfers with all
haste''.
Saoirse Chair, Eoghan Mac Cormaic said that the demand for all
political prisoners to be released remained as strong as ever.
``Welcome as it is for these men to be brought home, the real
objective is to clear the prisons. The continued imprisonment of
prisoners already transferred, some of whom are entering their
25th year in prison, is a disgrace. Saoirse remains focused on
securing their release.''
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