Frazer plans march on Dáil over torture case

Gardai have said they are willing to facilitate a new ‘Love Ulster’ event in Dublin city centre, raising fears of a potential repeat of the infamous 2006 parade.

Loyalist campaigner Willie Frazer said he is planning to bring around 200 people and one loyalist band for a march through the capital in January or February of next year.

The planned route of the sectarian parade would take marchers down O’Connell street towards Leinster House on Kildare Street.

Frazer said he decided to organise the march after the Dublin government confirmed this week that it would ask the European Court of Human Rights to re-examine the case of the ‘hooded men’, who were tortured by British soldiers during internment in 1971. The South Armagh man has also claimed the 26 County state colluded with the IRA during the conflict.

Eight years ago, the Irish political establishment and mainstream media gravely underestimated the reaction of Dubliners to Fraser’s parade, which lead to some of the heaviest riots the capital has seen in recent decades.

Frazer said he hopes to meet with gardai in the coming weeks to discuss his latest plans. He said he called off a similar protest parade in 2007 after safety warnings.

In a statement, he said: “The Irish government have had every opportunity to help and talk with us but on the world stage and even locally refused to even acknowledge that the Ulster people exist.”

“Well the Ulster people do exist and so the Love Ulster campaign will be going back to Dublin in late January early February 2015 - and we will make sure the world knows all about the IRA and the Irish government.”

Frazer’s group was also heavily involved in disturbances two years which followed the removal of the British Union Jack flag from Belfast city hall. A protest parade in Belfast city centre organised to mark the second anniversary of the event earlier this month passed off without incident.

On Saturday, the annual Apprentice Boys’ Lundy’s Day march through Derry also passed off peacefully. The annual December march has sparked clashes in the past but has taken place uneventfully in recent years.

‘GRADUATED RESPONSE’ COALITION ENDS

Meanwhile, a pan-unionist stance on parading in north Belfast has come to an end after three parties withdrew their support amid allegations of “betrayal”.

Representatives of loyalist paramilitaries joined Jim Allister’s TUV and UKIP in walking away from the coalition, which came together in July after the Parades Commission banned an Orange march from north Belfast’s Crumlin Road.

The smaller parties accused the DUP and Ulster Unionists of reneging on a commitment not to discuss the issue of sectarian parades at the Stormont talks. The larger unionist parties have denied the claim.

Loyalist spokesman Winston Irvine accused the DUP and UUP of “breaking their promise”.

“I think a large section of unionism will see this as an act of bad faith on behalf of the DUP and UUP,” he said. “They will see this as a secret deal cobbled together by the unionist elite.”

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