A Chairde
Please allow me, on behalf of the Troops Out Movement to express our
deepest sympathy to the family and friends of Rosemary Nelson. The
shock, disgust and hurt is overwhelming us here so what her family,
friends and the people in the north are going through is
unimaginable. In our view she was not just a solicitor for those she
represented, but was campaigner for justice, freedom and human
rights, an inspiration to all who struggle for those principles.
It was only a week before Rosemary's death that Diane Hamill was with
us in England campaigning for a public inquiry into her brothers
death and speaking highly of Rosemary's work. The day after the
murder our office recieved a cheque for the Robert Hamill Justice
Fund which would normally be sent directly to Rosemary's office as
representative of the fund. Our contact with the Garvaghy Road
Residents Association has also shown us how highly Rosemary was
respected and loved.
This horrendous murder has shocked us to the core. The British
government must take responsibility for this atrocity. They have
created the backcloth against which this type of violence will
continue. They have refused to stand up against the intransigence of
the unionist politicians on implementation of the Good Friday
Agreement. This gives credibility to the bigoted Orange Order who
want nationalists excluded from any significant participation in
politics.
Blair and Mowlam have been permanently in ``honest broker mode'' as if
the problems in the north of Ireland are nothing to do with them. The
British government created the monster of ``Northern Ireland'' and must
get rid of it.
What the unionists, the Orange Order and the British establishment
fear most is the Rosemary Nelson's of this world. She was a women who
believed in her own people. As a qualified solicitor many would have
expected her to become more aloof from her roots - not at all. Like
Pat Finucane before her she put her education and skills to the
common good, for justice and truth. This is the real threat to the
status quo. This is what the elitists and bigots can't accept, that
the ``croppies'' are not going to lie down and the nationalist people
will take control of their lives and participate in the governing of
their country.
Rosemary Nelson was inspirational. You can kill the visionary but not
the vision.
Her vision will live on.
Mary Pearson
Chair, Troops Out Movement PO BOX 1032 Birmingham B12 8BZ
A Chara,
The brutal killing of campaigning solicitor Rosemary Nelson in her
car in Lurgan reminded me of the murder of campaigning reporter
Veronica Guerin in her car in Dublin. Both were very courageous women
who spoke out for truth and justice in the face of severe threats and
intimidation. Both paid the ultimate price, leaving behind grieving
husbands and children.
I am somewhat disappointed, then, in the contrasting responses to
these two remarkably similar women's tragic fates. Within 24 hours of
her murder, Rosemary's death had already been relegated by much of
the media to the margins. Maybe the difference was because Veronica's
murder was without precedent, whereas Rosemary's had been preceded by
the equally shocking slaying of fellow solicitor, Pat Finucane. But,
knowing what had already happened to another human rights solicitor
surely makes Rosemary Nelson's courage all the more admirable and her
killing all the more sinister.
After Veronica Guerin was murdered, no effort was spared, not only to
find her direct killers, but also to put out of business those who
Veronica had alleged had intimidated her and set up her murder.
Alas, the same cannot be said of the northern authorities' response
to Rosemary's allegations. True, the RUC has appointed an English
officer to ``oversee'' the inquiry, but RUC members will still carry
out the investigation. In the past, inquiries into the RUC by English
police have been stymied; Scarman was met by ``a wall of silence'',
Stalker was falsely smeared and removed and Steven's offices were
burned down.
The killers of Rosemary Nelson, whose aim is to wreck the Good Friday
Agreement, will have succeeded if the media fail to maintain the same
level of interest and pressure for action that was so successful in
the aftermath of Veronica Guerin's death.
Is mise, Dessie Ellis, Finglas,
Dublin 11 16/3/99
Letter to the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland
I write with reference to the vicious assassination of northern
Ireland solicitor Rosemary Nelson yesterday. We note the announcement
of an independent police inquiry into the murder and the apparent
wish of the Chief Constable of the Royal Ulster Constabulary that the
murder inquiry will be seen to be both thorough and impartial. One
can only speculate if these steps are designed primarily at assisting
in the arrest of the murderers or at preserving the somewhat tattered
reputation of the RUC, particularly with regard to allegations that
Ms Nelson had made about the service.
There was something ironic to see the vast military and police
presence around the shattered vehicle in which terrorists had planted
the bomb which so cruelly claimed the life of this impressive women.
Vilified and harassed by the RUC in life and denied the support that
any threatened person should expect from a responsive police service,
in death Ms. Nelson's car was surrounded by a police guard.
other, and more perverse irony, is that in the weeks preceding the
murder of Rosemary Nelson the RUC and military apparently had a
stream of intelligence about all manner of imminent outrages (all of
which thankfully have not materialised) and yet in respect of a women
known to be under threat your security forces' intelligence was
noticeably deficient?
Parallels have been drawn between the death of another northern
Ireland lawyer Pat Finucane and no doubt all manner of speculation
will abound. Mr Finucane's death was indeed a travesty but occuring
as it did at the height of a surge of killing and violence it was
many years before it became the focus of the more reasoned
international attention it deserved and is now getting.
Rosemary Nelson's death is, if anything, more poignant occuring
within a period of comparative security calm it was, none the less,
predicted. It's circumstances should and will be, we feel sure, the
focus of minute scrutiny by the international community. A range of
organisations will call for international action to investigate, not
the crime itself awful as that is, but the failure of the British
government and its police and security services in northern Ireland.
It is a sad indictment of the UK and its government that at the end
of the twentieth century, on the verge of the new millennium, it
cannot ensure the security of those who uphold law and human rights.
J B Moffatt
General Secretary
Celtic League
Dear Sir,
I support the Good Friday Agreement. I want it implemented in full.
All four parties have a mandate to be in the executive and all four
have members with talent and ability for public service. I can
certainly see that to proceed apace - trigger d'Hondt, form an
executive, go live - could lock all sides in to democracy. Yet, my
heart and soul baulks at decommissioning.
It's not about guns and Semtex. Weapons aren't the problem - they are
the symptoms of the problem. The real issues behind decommissioning
are trust and intent. It's about hearing a loud and clear ``yes''
response to the question ``do Republicans really want a future for
Ireland based on democracy and non-violence?''
To overcome this impasse and put the `peace' in to `peace process'
Republicans have to find a way - whatever it takes - of filling a
credibility gap in the Unionist psyche. They need to realise they
have previously fulfilled every Unionist expectation of being
untrustworthy and unreliable. Remember their first cease-fire from
1994 to 1996? Just like the Unionists always claimed - it was a
conditional cease-fire. Just like the Unionists always said -
throughout that period the IRA planned and prepared to end it in
spectacular fashion.
Our conflict is so utterly redundant and yet so hard to let go of. We
are like two gangs still fighting over a street corner while a whole
new global corporate army marches in to town. Make no mistake; I will
never, ever respect Republicans for the hurt and pain and suffering
they have caused. But I certainly will begin to respect - and extend
a hand of nascent friendship - when they demonstrate their determined
will to move on.
John Hoey,
Belfast 15.
A Chairde
The Strabane Branch of Tyrone National Graves Association are
organising a coach trip to Kilmainham Gaol, Dublin in August of this
year.
After the success of our trips in the past to Kilmainham Gaol,
Belfast's Milltown and the bus-run to Kilalla, Co Mayo, we as a
Committee decided to charter a coach this summer to tour this renown
Republican Shrine.
Kilmainham Gaol has a fascinating and colourful history but its
harrowing treatment of United Irishmen and Republican Prisoners that
would interest many that visit its dank cells, execution yards and
fact filled museum.
The visit to Kilmainham will be followed by a guided tour of
Glasnevin Cemetery by Dublin National Graves Association. Glasnevin
is the final resting place of very many republican dead and is a very
poignant testament to the struggle for Irish freedom.
For further details please contact myself or any other member of
National Graves. (Strabane)
John Kelly.
A Chairde
As Irish citizens with an absolute right not only to good government
but to take part in government we make the following points:
1) Any investigation into the death of Ms Rosemary Nelson and other
atrocities committed by those who oppose the creation of good
government, will be useless unless the investigators have these two
priorities:
a) To break the wall of silence they will certainly meet in the RUC
and which has been part of the RUC ethos even before the military
conflict started in the early nineteen seventies.
b) To find and go to the heart of a conspiracy which has cost the
lives, homes and happiness of so many people, a conspiracy which will
not be broken by the arrest and imprisonment of a few scapegoats from
the miserable corners where the operators work, but only when it is
admitted that some people are involved who have a veneer of
respectability and enough money and status to enable them to work
effectively, secretly and destructively.
2) The book entitled ``The Committee'' is deeply disturbing. That the
accusations contained in it should have been left uninvestigated by
two governments is shameful. Unless and until a competent
investigation examines these accusations, as well as the still
unsolved acts of destruction in Dublin, Monaghan and elsewhere and
goes to the heart of groups and organisations responsible, any
investigation into the RUC will be worse than useless because it will
give the impression that something useful is being done when in fact
what is being done could not possibly have any real effect. We are
not interested in seeing a few scapegoats put in prison. We are
interested in removing once and for all, no matter whom it effects, a
political and moral cancer which has been not only allowed but
encouraged to grow in this country.
3) We will be impressing these matters on Mr Ahern, President
Clinton, Mr Blair, and others who either have responsibility in our
situation or have taken responsibility for it on themselves.
Noelle Ryan
Desmond Wilson
Elsie Best
for a group of concerned citizens
A Chairde
There is only one response possible to the deliberately provocative
loyalist murder of solicitor Rosemary Nelson that will prevent the
Six Counties from plunging back into the abyss and it is a political
one. The Assembly Executive must be formed and formed now. David
Trimble must stop dragging his feet and come to a realistic
compromise which recognises that IRA disarmament right now, at this
moment in time after the attack on Rosemary Nelson, is unrealistic.
Joe Murphy
Birmingham
Formerly Secretary of the Campaign for the Birmingham Six, England.
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