PSNI Chief Simon Byrne has been strongly criticised after releasing a
propaganda photograph of himself in the company of heavily-armed Crown
Force gunmen on Christmas Day.
The DUP have come under pressure to relinquish their veto over political
change at Stormont following round-table talks over the future of the
Belfast Assembly this week. Both the London and Dublin governments
accused the party of blocking a pre-Christmas deal on restoring the
North’s suspended political institutions.
A tribunal in England has confirmed that British military intelligence
has the legal power to direct unlimited criminal offences by its agents,
including torture, bombings and political assassinations.
Increasing numbers of mainstream political and media figures have said
they believe a united Ireland could come about within the next decade as
a result of Brexit and other recent political developments.
The new Conservative government in London has set out its intention to
block future investigations into British soldiers who murdered civilians
in the north of Ireland -- even as a jailed republican was found liable
for a 1982 IRA attack.
Two new Irish nationalist MPs have made protest statements while
swearing allegiance to the British Crown in the House of Commons, a
process required before they are allowed to speak in debates, vote or
receive their salary at the Westminster parliament.
Scotland’s First Minister Nicola Sturgeon has officially begun the
process of holding an independence referendum, calling on the London
government to transfer the power to do so.
Historian Mary McNeill says of Jemmy Hope; “He represented the almost
inarticulate aspirations of the strongly revolutionary element among the
Presbyterian labourers both rural and urban: he was indeed the most
radical of the United Irishmen – in some respects the greatest of them
all.”
No one should be forced to simply accept the fact that their
family members were murdered by the state. But Boris Johnson has now admitted he doesn’t care.
The north of Ireland has voted for more nationalists than unionists in a
Westminster parliamentary election for the first time after two hardline
unionists were voted out.
Brexit is unionism’s “biggest ever own goal” and it may lead to the
break-up of the United Kingdom, former Ulster Unionist Party leader Mike
Nesbitt has admitted.
The Scottish National Party pulled off a resounding general election
victory in the Westminster election on Thursday, pushing open the door
to finally ending their union with England and staying within the EU.
As the DUP lost its influential position of holding the balance of power
at Westminster, the leader of British Labour Party, Jeremy Corbyn, has
signaled his intention to stand down as Labour leader in early 2020.
Sinn Féin has presented a dossier on the homelessness scandal to Taoiseach Leo Varadkar and Housing Minister Eoghan Murphy. Party leader Mary Lou McDonald said Leo Varadkar was
living in a ‘Tory Boy’ bubble over the housing crisis.
A Saoradh member has described a heavy-handed home invasion by
British Crown Forces during which himself and his brother were detained
and hauled off to Musgrave Interrogation Unit.
A lot of emphasis on the fact that, after Thursday’s election, for the
first time there are more nationalist MPs than unionist; Sinn Féin and
the SDLP outnumber the DUP 9-8.
John Finucane has taken the north Belfast Westminster seat from the
DUP’s Nigel Dodds in a stunning victory for Sinn Féin and a historic
election for nationalism in the north of Ireland.
Polling stations have now closed in the Westminster general election and
a major exit poll in Britain has predicted a large working majority for the
Conservative Party and a landslide for the SNP in Scotland.
Turnout is high so far in the Westminster general election in both
the north of Ireland and in Britain, where pollsters have been predicting a
very slim Tory majority in the House of Commons or a hung parliament
following today’s vote.
The north of Ireland appears set for an extended period of unionist
protest after an event took place on Friday night at the Ulster Hall,
the latest in a series of meetings organised by loyalists which have
echoed with the word ‘betrayal’.
The US House of Representatives has backed a resolution outlining
support for the Good Friday Agreement as US support for Ireland in the
face of Brexit continues to grow.
A spate of sectarian attacks have taken place against Catholics due to
move into a new social housing development in north Belfast. Windows
were smashed and a flag was hung from a drainpipe at a property in the
loyalist Ballysillan area, one of three recent attacks.
Eoghan Murphy has started a rot which is spreading through the
government, according to one of his colleagues, after the Minister for
Housing narrowly survived a motion of no confidence.
A Derry woman who is challenging restrictions on her right to legally
identify as Irish has called for Dublin to support
efforts to uphold the rights of nationalists under the Good Friday
Agreement.
December is the traditional time to remember republican political
prisoners. The following is an up to date list as maintained by the
Irish Republican Prisoner News Facebook page, with addresses of the
prisons for sending cards and good wishes.