When will they ever learn?
By Sean Marlow
I know that the new repressive legislation has already been well
covered in An Phoblacht but I make no apologies for returning to
it because the effects will be with us for a long, long time.
Almost everyone agrees that the horrendous bomb in Omagh, which
killed 28 people and injured another 200, was intended to
undermine the Good Friday Agreement. The foolish, knee-jerk
response of the Dublin and London governments is in serious
danger of fulfilling the bombers' objective. An important part of
the Agreement was the commitment to get rid of repressive
legislation and usher in a new era of respect for human rights.
Clearly, the new legislation is directly contrary to that
commitment.
The short-sighted stupidity of the governments' reaction may be
seen in its potential to revive the dwindling fortunes of the
small group of militarists who carried out the Omagh bombing. At
the moment these people are totally discredited, especially in
the republican community.
But the application of such Draconian laws, with the probability
of many miscarriages of justice, may provide a lifeline for them.
Indeed, miscarriages of justice are a virtual certainty, just as
they were when similar reactive legislation led to the wrongful
imprisonment of the Birmingham Six, Guildford Four, Maguire
Seven, Sallins Four and many, many others whom the police said
they believed were guilty. Only this time around it is even
worse. The discredited RUC are to be given the effective power to
jail anyone on the word of a senior officer.
As anyone who is familiar with the North is aware, senior RUC
officers are not renowned for telling the truth - in fact, they
tell blatant lies when it suits them. Take just a couple of cases
from the hundreds of the past 30 years:
1. When Nora McCabe was killed by an RUC plastic bullet as she
was going to the shop at the corner of her street, the RUC
Commander for West Belfast, James Crutchley, admitting that he
gave the order to fire, claimed there was a serious riot going on
at the time. Fortunately a Canadian TV crew were recording at the
time of Nora's killing. The footage, shown later on Channel 4,
showed that there was no rioting at all when Nora McCabe was
killed. Not only was Crutchley not charged with murder or
manslaughter, he was not even disciplined and was later promoted
to Assistant Chief Constable.
2. When John Downes was killed with an RUC plastic bullet outside
the Sinn Fein centre in Andersonstown, RUC Deputy Chief Constable
Michael McAtamney claimed at a (damage limitation) press
conference that Downes was hit by a ricochet and was not
deliberately targeted. Later that evening, TV news showed a fat
RUC man aiming at Downes and hitting him in the chest from a
range of about four metres. Again McAtamney was never charged or
disciplined.
3. Only last month the RUC was forced, through lack of evidence,
to drop spurious charges against three West Belfast men, which it
used as an excuse to have Sinn Fein ejected from the peace talks
earlier this year.
Incredibly this is the bunch of liars that are to be given the
power to point to you, you and you and say ``I believe you're a
member of an illegal organisation''. Then it's up to you to prove
your innocence. You can't challenge the source of the RUC's
``belief'' as they will claim privilege for their ``source'' (which
may be malicious, mistaken or non-existent). So you are left with
the option of getting a member of the illegal organisation to get
up in court to deny that you are a member - hardly bloody likely!
The result is that there will be no real trial and anyone can be
interned for 10 years on the word of the proven liars of the RUC.
Almost as bad is the use of the accused's omission in challenging
media reports naming her or him as evidence. This means that any
potential accused would have to constantly monitor every
national, local and foreign newspaper, radio station and TV
programme, many of which are now polluted with so-called
``security correspondents'' who peddle yarns from ``intelligence
sources''. Remember Colin Wallace, a British Army prtess officer
who admitted making up all sorts of false stories about
individuals for these gullible ``reporters''.
It is for these reasons, among several others, that a very
sensible statement urging both governments not to allow the
bombers to succeed in their objective of undermining the Good
Friday Agreement and to compound the original tragedy by
destroying even more innocent lives was issued by five prominent
Human Rights groups including Amnesty International, of which, I
am proud to say, my cousin Jolene Marlow who died in the Omagh
bombing, was an active member.
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