For Iran – from Ireland on St Patrick’s Day
Never forget the USA and Israel started all of this, and now Iran is just defending itself
Remember: “America is the only country that went from barbarism to decadence without civilization in between” Oscar Wilde
https://www.facebook.com/reel/1253760516307243
ICE Detention/Concentration Camps: An Irishman reports
38- year old Seamus Culleton
has been held in an Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) detention facility in Texas since September last (2025) despite having valid work permit and being married to US national.
Originally from Kilkenny he has lived in the United States for the past 20 years. He is married to a US citizen and was in the process of getting a green card when ICE (Immigration and Customs Enforcement) agents arrested him on his way home from work.He was followed initially by a blue Ford, and then, “out of nowhere, it seemed like there were seven or eight cars and a bunch of officers at the window of the van, telling me to roll down the window.”
The ICE Center, where he is currently being held, is about 4,000 km away from his home in Boston.
“We were cuffed and shackled…and shuttled on to a plane in the middle of the night”
Seamus Culleton entered the US in March 2009 on a visa waiver programme and overstayed the 90-day limit. After marrying a US citizen, Tiffany Smyth, and applying for lawful permanent residence, he obtained a statutory exemption that allowed him to work.
Reason for Arrest, Detention and Deportation: Mr Culleton was facing drug charges in Ireland when he entered the US as a tourist in 2008. He has a warrant issued in New Ross District Court over the alleged possession of drugs and possession of drugs for sale or supply at Ballyverneen, Glenmore, in May 2008.He was also facing charges of allegedly obstructing a garda during a search by throwing 25 ecstasy tablets on the ground.A further warrant was issued by the same court in September 2009, in relation to an alleged criminal damage charge from September 2007 at Weatherstown, Glenmore.
Comment: A warrant is not a crime. He was 18 at the time.
He was offered the choice to be instantly deported to Ireland but instead “chose to stay in ICE custody”, deciding to contest his deportation on the grounds that he was married to a US citizen and had a valid work permit.
Seamus Culleton has said his whole life is in the US and disputes a claim by ICE agents that he signed a form consenting to deportation.
US Comment “A pending green card application and work authorization does not give someone legal status to be in our country.”
Seamus Culleton: When asked what his message to Irish politicians would be, he said: “Just try to get me out of here and do all you can please.
“It’s an absolute torture, psychological and physical torture. I just want to get back to my wife. We’re so desperate to start a family”.
‘I just want him home,’ says Culleton’s wife
This week, Ms Smyth has spoken about how her husband’s health has deteriorated since September and described his detention as “overwhelming”.
“He’s lost a lot of weight,” she said. She described him as someone had always been known for making jokes and goofing around. “And it’s just, I don’t know, that’s gone,” she said.
“I just want him home, I want him safe. Seamus is a good man and he doesn’t deserve what is going on,” she said.
NB In December, the American Civil Liberties Union and other human rights groups released a letter demanding the closure of ERO El Paso Camp East Montana, alleging a pattern of abuses at the camp including beatings and sexual abuse by officers against detained immigrants, beatings and coercive threats to compel deportation to third countries, medical neglect, hunger and insufficient food, and denial of meaningful access to counsel, among other alleged rights violations.
Finally the Taoiseach has told the Dáil that there are five or six Irish people currently being held in ICE facilities.
Refs
https://www.rte.ie/radio/radio1/clips/22582813/
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026/feb/12/seamus-culleton-ice-detention-ireland-drug-charges
The Epstein Files:Who Are You in the Cast?
An Adults-Only Fun Game!!! Faites vos jeux!!
Secrecy, sex, power, and money converge to sustain a mutually supportive scheme that lasted for decades.The ugliest intersection of wealth, power and alleged criminal behaviour that you can envisage
Choose your role and play your cards! Roll the dice!!
Choose who you are in the cast
1) The desperate royal mother who would do anything to keep up appearances and sweep a family scandal under the carpet? Would you pay whatever it takes to keep your son out of court even though that might well make you an accessory after the fact?
2) The elderly leftwing academic who was always sidelined for his political views, yet yearned to be among the “movers and shakers”? Longed to talk to heads of state, be one of the elite?Finally got the opportunity through a paedophile?
3) The former Minister of Culture who defended your links with a paedophile? The man who used his influence and network to maintain a lavish lifestyle? The man who accepted gifts and exchanged favours over seven years, up until the pedophile’s arrest in 2019.
“This is absurd,” you said.
4) The busy IT /financial tycoon or the hot shot banker / lawyer, desperate to break into society’s top echelon, the real boys’ club? Who all protect each other’s backs. Who belong to a hidden network that never be unveiled, a closed world of wealth, influence and immunity. To find a place among people who will do anything, break any law, cross any line to maintain their control and further their power. Desperate to be in that world and open to any level of betrayal in order to be near power, domination and lack of accountability
“Am in Europe.Back next week.Will you still be in NY? We can meet then”.
” No can do. I’m in Palm Beach”
“My secretary will talk to yours”
5) The former Head of a Prestigious US University who asked the paedophile for romantic advice related to his interest in someone he said viewed him as an “economics mentor”?
6) The FBI agent who listened to the victims and survivors of sex trafficking and tried to get justice for them?
7) A Nordic Princess who emailed the paedophile to ask if it was “inappropriate for a mother to suggest two naked women carrying a surfboard for my 15 yr old son’s wallpaper?”
8) A divorced, British aristocrat mother with 2 daughters, expensive tastes, extensive debts and a pilandering ex-husband? Who will do anything to keep her hands firmly tucked into the wealthy paedophile’s huge bank account?
“You’re the brother I’ve always wanted”
“Marry me”
“I’ll run your households for you”
9) A member of the 119th United States Congress that passed the Epstein Files Transparency Act? Are you a member of the House Oversight Committee?
10) That tall slim young girl who dreamt of a modelling career to escape the poverty of her background? And couldn’t believe her luck when she met an upper-class Englishwoman who promised her everything she ever wanted?
11) The mastermind behind the paedophile ‘s operation as a international conduit for young flesh, perversion and depravation, classified information, blackmail and extortion?
12) The arrogant divorced aristocrat who believes he has the right to satisfy any and all sexual whims and to wheel and deal with foreign Heads of State to ensure his own profit, even within his family home? And, despite losing his titles and mansion, in his view, he has done nothing wrong but now risks being accused of misconduct in public office .
13) The aging NY property dealer, former close friend, who was involved in beauty pageants and competitions, who is now on his 3rd trophy wife and has satisfied every ambition he ever had and more?And has just lighted a conflagration and war in the Middle East for no reason!
14) The upper-class Englishwoman, friend of the arrogant divorced aristocrat, who organized and procured girls and minors for sex trafficking?And is now whiling away her time in a US prison.
15) The Frenchman who co-operated with the paedophile, ran modelling agencies, beauty pageants and was accused of grooming girls, raping minors and of taking part in alleged sex trafficking operation?Whose network delivered new girls from around the world on a regular basis, securing work visas and providing the appearance of legitimate employment
16) The former UK Ambassador who is being investigated for allegations of corruption,conflicts of interest,insider trading and potential misconduct in public office?And now risks being accused of misconduct in public office
17) The outspoken independent journalist whose long-term, intensive investigations uncovered the systemic failures, legal loopholes, and high-profile connections that shielded the paedophile for over a decade.
18) The former US Attorney who, in 2008, allowed the paedophile to avoid federal prosecution for sex trafficking, treating him with a level of deference that suggested high-level, behind-the-scenes intervention.
19) The world-famous philantrophist who allegedly feared he had contracted a sexually transmitted infection and had sought help procuring antibiotics to give his wife without her knowledge .
20)The teenager who claims she had the paedophile’s baby. S/he was taken just minutes after birth. Confidential diary entries describe her life under the paedophile’s control, the alleged role of the upper class Englishwoman, and unanswered questions surrounding the newborn’s fate. The claims remain unverified,
KINCORA UPDATE
Highlights
“Within months of Kincora’s opening in 1958, boys at the facility began coming forward to inform the adults around them that they were being routinely sexually abused.”
“Reports of sexual abuse spiked dramatically in 1971, when a prominent loyalist named William McGrath became the group home’s housefather”
An MI5 document from November 1973 noted McGrath was implicated in “assaulting small boys,”
Comment: British intelligence was legally obliged to report such an “arrestable offence” to the police.By not doing so, it could be argued “the MI5 officers who had this information were in breach of that duty.”
“MI5/MI6 knew of the child abuse taking place Kincora, and could have even been running the group home as part of a dastardly intelligence plot”
“British intelligence chiefs had a close bond with many individuals who ran the Boys’ Home”.
An MI6 officer revealed MI6 possessed four separate “ring binders” documenting Maurice Oldfield’s “relationship” with Kincora, his “friendship” with its chief Joe Mains, and potential personal connection to “alleged crimes at the boys’ home.”
Question: Who was Maurice Oldfield?
Answer:Maurice Oldfield oversaw MI6 operations in Northern Ireland throughout the 1970s, first as its deputy then chief. He was “a compulsive” user of “rent boys and young down-and-outs,” which was well-known to his security detail.
“Campaigners firmly believe Kincora was exploited to compromise and control Unionists, who committed pedophilic offenses at the Home”.
“In December 1981, Mains, McGrath, Semple and three other individuals found to have abused young boys at two other state-run group homes in Northern Ireland finally stood trial”.
“Mains was jailed for 6 years, Semple for 5 and McGrath for 4”.
A June 1982 document provided by MI5 showed how it planned to counteract any inquiry. MI5 discussed creating “false files” to counteract “lines of enquiry which it was anticipated” might be pursued.
Comment: MI5 was actively seeking to deceive police investigators through forgery.
British intelligence “somehow persuaded the government to bury Kincora files until 2065 and 2085.”
“The British state has illegally spied on people trying to expose the truth in Northern Ireland for many years, in what they call a ‘defensive operation’. Senior local police chiefs have admitted surveillance tactics were deployed against 320 journalists and 500 lawyers over a decade”
See also:https://eurofree3.wordpress.com/2014/01/12/ian-kyle-paisley-highlights-of-his-life-3/
Now that she’s not here
Queen Elizabeth II, the only UK monarch everybody under 75 years of age has ever known, was matriarch of both a country and the most famous family in the world. She was Head of:
The UK state;
The Anglican Church;
The judiciary;
The armed forces;
The Commonwealth;
People mourn the queen as an individual in The ( 5 mile long) Queue. . . .
The death of any human being is sad and should be respected, as should the bereaved family at this time.
. . . but
There is a difference between being respectful of the family and getting caught in the trap of the pageantry and ceremony that supports an institution that’s an affront to democratic values.
The QIIE Legend
- She and the royal family have provided ‘stability’, ‘held this country together – held countries together’
- She was ‘the rock on which modern Britain was built’ ,
- She displayed ‘unwavering dedication and devotion’
- She embodied “the epitome of steady grace and resolve”
- She ‘served’ her country diligently in doing her ‘duty’ for 70 years.
Comment: The Royal Family take pride in their lives of “sacrifice” and “selflessness”
Queries: How do selfless members of the public who sacrifice time, energy and maybe even money, compare?
How does the “sacrifice” of volunteers who aid the homeless or toil in soup kitchens and food banks, compare with the “sacrifice” of the Royal Family?
Do these volunteers live out their lives in greater or lesser luxury?
Which sacrifice should we celebrate more?
Which is more useful to the nation?
The QIIE Reality
She liked dogs and horses and rarely betrayed strong emotions
She seemed to accept that her role was to be shown things – so many factories,ships, tanks, hospitals, local customs and types of cheese
She waved, cut ribbons and unveiled plaques
She received so many bouquets of flowers from small curtsying girls
She never appeared bored or irritated
She “consented” to laws that suited her and her family and property
QIIE Legend vs Reality
Queen Elizabeth II was born out of Empire and colonisation
Yet she is re-imagined as liberator
Comment:The Monarchy can have no responsibility for the Empire and the Commonwealth which they lead, because they are mere humble servants
Queen Elizabeth II was a “humble servant of the nation”,
Yet one of the wealthiest people in the world
She was a quiet, un-ostentatious woman
Yet wore diamond and emerald tiaras, rode in gold carriages and spent her life in enormous multi-room palaces with acres of gardens and grounds
Her Royal Family is held up as the symbol of the perfect, ideal family
Yet it was dysfunctional and covered up sexual depravity (Prince Andrew and Epstein, King Charles’s friendship with Jimmy Saville)
Her Royal Family is a modern institution
Yet for the 2nd time in its history couldn’t cope with one of its members marrying an American divorcée
Queen Elizabeth II reigned when public services were sold to private companies
Yet the Royal Family enjoys unique tax advantages and King Charles III will not pay inheritance tax on any of his mother’s assets
Comments: The notion of the royal family as symbols of duty or sacrifice to the nation is a lie.
This falsehood is at the centre of a deeply unequal UK
Blurred is the distinction between the virtues of the late Queen as a person and the virtues of the monarchy as institution
Blurred is distinction between the virtues of the late Queen and the virtues of the “united UK” she supposedly stood for
Elizabeth II was Queen when British officers tortured, maimed and killed Kenyans during the Mau Mau uprising.
She was Queen when her troops killed civilians, her very own British subjects, in Northern Ireland
She was Queen when her government let one of its MPs die on hunger-strike in Long Kesh
Remember: “Her” Governments sanctioned and committed all these atrocities
Comment: She incarnated and ably helped sell her nation and its system while never criticizing or apologizing for its past
6) Elizabeth II was an enigma, a blank screen
that people can project their own fantasies on to
She meant so much to so many
She was the “adored mother, grandmother.
She understood me as one of her people.
I “knew” her
Comment: Elizabeth II’s greatest asset as queen was her blankness. She was good at being what people needed at the time they needed.
Maybe she had great personal qualities and maybe she didn’t – it didn’t matter
7) Elizabeth II was an expert saleswoman
Over 70 years Queen Elizabeth II got many people in Britain and around the world to buy into a Ruritanian pantomime. She managed to convince them that a small family should rule the UK, Realms and Commonwealth. That it was right they were chosen simply by virtue of their birth.
Comment: Upon her death, members of the Royal Family all rotate upwards in a self-perpetuating process of obscene unearned wealth, massive privilege, special tax breaks, nauseating deference, silly titles and even sillier uniforms.
The mourning period
is tied in with the message ‘Here is your new Monarch and you have no say in it’
Britain’s media speak with a single, respectful voice about the Queen and her unimpeachable legacy.
Every single newspaper and broadcaster in the country is united in supporting the accession of an unelected head of state.
The media lauds every Royal family action, sings their praises as a venerable institution at the core of British society, dutifully acts as the royal PR mouthpiece in reporting on their charity work, and marginalizes any talk of doing away with the royal family altogether as “republican rabble-rousing.”
Their implicit justification is that to air any other viewpoint would be disrespectful towards what Queen Elizabeth II was all about.
The arrest of anti-monarchy protesters and the condemnation of others who dissented showed that the royal succession “is as much about coercion as consent”
Comment: Silence is not a politically neutral act. It is a demand that we collude in a corrupt system of establishment rule and hierarchical privilege.
The British establishment expects every man, woman and child to do their duty by lowering their head, showing respect for the Queen and her family.
By emphasizing that the nation is “united in respect for the Queen and in respect for monarchy”, an idea of community is constructed.
Everybody is doing this or at least should be.
Making people understand that “now is not the time” to criticise the late Queen, the monarchy or British society in general is a very powerful way of asserting a sense of national identity and reinforcing a particular meaning to national identity.
Comment: It’s callled “bullying” in any other context. If you don’t conform, you’re outside the community. And indeed, you’re even worse, you’re inhumane. You’re not showing grief at the death of another person and you’re daring to criticise those of us that do.
Queries: Isn’t this about much more than an eccentric pageantry of death?
Isn’t it, like King Charles III’s whistle-stop tour of Scotland, Northern Ireland and Wales, about reinforcing the Union?
Isn’t it about strengthening the idea that unearned privilege and wealth is normal?
Isn’t it about cementing Charles III’s succession without any dissent?
Her legacy
The Britain left in her wake is a Britain of economic decline, a Britain of massive wealth inequality and poverty, epitomised by the hereditary wealth and privilege of the British Royalty
She was one of the richest women in the world with children in her domain living in poverty
Queen Elizabeth II did nothing to fight racism during her reign
Queen Elizabeth II was the head of a criminal imperial organisation and was widely considered the last link to the Empire. The Royal family and UK museums count amongst its ‘private property’ the loot of ages, cultures and continents.
Comments: South Africa wants the Cullinan Diamonds back, together with all the gold, diamonds stolen by Britain.India wants its Koh-i-noor diamond. Greece wants the Elgin marbles. Easter islanders want one of their statues.Ethiopia wants its tabots.
Former colonies, except Ireland and Malta, are known as 3rd world countries. Nobody likes to be called a “third world country.” Of course the difference is, those poor nations didn’t do it to themselves
It’s clear that the British Monarchy was/is not universally adored
“Neither in science, nor in art, nor in literature, nor in exploration, nor in mechanical invention, nor in humanising of laws, nor in any sphere of human activity has a representative of British royalty helped forward the moral, intellectual or material improvement of mankind.’- James Connolly
Final Thoughts
Words written over 100 years ago about Royalty and the Monarchy apply equally well today
Once the emotions of the Queen’s passing subside, the unifying effect she provided as part of the glue of British identity will not be so easily replicable by her successor
QIIE acted as a retardant on the slow deconstruction of the British identity, and without her processes that have already been unleashed will accelerate to reach their natural conclusion
Deference and blind loyalty belong to the past
The Scottish Proclamation – 1st September 2022
It was read out today in front of the British Government Offices in Edinburgh
“We declare the right of the people of Scotland to the ownership of Scotland and to the unfettered control of Scottish destinies, to be sovereign and indefeasible. The long usurpation of that right by a foreign government has not extinguished that right, nor can it ever be extinguished except by the destruction of the Scottish people”.
Queries: Remind you of anything? Maybe this?
The 1916 Proclamation of the Irish Republic
“We declare the right of the people of Ireland to the ownership of Ireland and to the unfettered control of Irish destinies, to be sovereign and indefeasible. The long usurpation of that right by a foreign people and government has not extinguished the right, nor can it ever be extinguished except by the destruction of the Irish people”
Unlike the 1916 Proclamation of the Irish Republic which proceeded with a call to arms, the 2022 Scottish Proclamation proceeds with a call for signatures, with the aim of setting up a modern, Scottish National Congress, “to defend and assert our rights and to end the abuses of a foreign government that now threatens our lives and very existence as a nation”.
You can support it by signing up here https://liberation.scot/index.php
Remember: No spaces as you type in your name. Check spam folder if verification message does not arrive immediately.
Comment: I presume they welcome all supporters, not just Scots in and outwith Scotland
Queries: Will Nicola Sturgeon and the SNP join in with this? Will they make it public if they sign it?
The Salvo group who delivered the Scottish Proclamation held a memorial for Scots who had killed by the Union
Reaction: really emotional to watch people laying flowers in memory of the victims of the Union, so glad I went along to take part.
Neale Hanvey MP (Alba party) made a speech that was dedicated
To the victims of the Union 1707 – 2022
It started: “I was not born a Scottish nationalist, but I am very proud to be one. My early years were imbued with the unionist exceptionalism of Northern Ireland”
Comment: He’s originally a Belfast man! Another Irish Connection!
The SSRG (Scottish Sovereignty Research Group), a non-partisan Scottish think-tank which was set up in 2020 and has upwards of 16 members, welcomed and endorsed The Edinburgh Proclamation, describing what they envisaged the Scottish National Congress could be.
Remember: Watch out for further developments!
Comment: The 1916 Proclamation of the Irish Republic is the Foundation Document of Modern Irish Nationhood. It is perhaps the single most important and most iconic document in the context of Modern Irish History.
Query: Will the 2022 Edinburgh Proclamation resonate in the same way throughout the Scottish nation and over time ?
Refs: https://yoursforscotlandcom.wordpress.com/2022/09/01/much-more-than-talksolid-action-underway/
Neale Hanvey’s speech: https://yoursforscotlandcom.wordpress.com/2022/09/01/an-exceptional-speech-on-an-exceptional-day/
Ooh Aah, Up the Ra!
Uproar over a chorus of “Ooh Aah, Up the Ra!” in the Belfast Feile
Cue the latest in Unionist/DUP/Do-Gooder attempts at censoring what bands play and what 10,000 people sing along to.
For those of you who missed it, here is what they objected to – the chorus of the Celtic Symphony that was written by Wolfe Tone’s lead singer and songwriter, historian Brian Warfield, in 1987 for the centennial of Celtic Football Club
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DMjr5Z8m_F0
The chorus of one song in a concert that lasted for hours and featured other bands. Doors opened at 3pm and the Wolfe Tones didn’t get on stage until 10pm
If Unionists/Loyalists and Do-Gooders get their way in their calls to “End all funding for the Feile”unless the content is approved by them, Nationalist/Republican freedom of expression will be censored this year and the next, one song after the other.
NI will be back in the 1920s-1970s when you could be jailed or interned for waving a tricolour, meeting in groups of more than 3, singing Amhrán na bhFiann or any other “rebel” song.
The Wolfe Tones called the uproar right in designating it as Unionist “crankiness”.
Synonyms of cranky are:disagreeable, irritable, malevolent, ill-natured,captious,peevish,cantankerous,
Comment: Not one admirable trait in there!
Unionist/Loyalist crankiness is wearying, day in, day out.
Their nit-picking amounts to permanent objections to whatever Nationalists/Republicans do in NI
If it isn’t a funeral, it’s a song.
If it isn’t a song, it’s a mural.
if it isn’t a mural, it’s something somebody said
If it isn’t something somebody said, it’s something somebody might have thought!
Time to stop putting up with it!
Once and for all
Comment: There are no Croppies to lie down any more.There are no chocolates in Unionist boxes anymore
And there are no Diamonds in their Minds
UPDATE 18/8/2022: Potential Job Loss
Girl, understood to be from the Lurgan area, who sang ‘ooh ah up the ‘Ra’ at Feile na Phobail was suspended from her job at top NI car dealer the Agnew Group, pending further investigation. She was identified on a video from among 10,000 concert-goers.
Query: Are all 10,000 threatened with job losses?
Inquiring minds need to know!
Update 23/8/2022
Footballer John Herron has lost his job
Larne FC suspended Herron, formerly from Celtic FC, after photos appeared online that appeared to show him wearing a T-shirt with pro-IRA slogan when he was attending the concert at Feile. The T-shirt design referred to his old club and to the Celtic Symphony which was written to celebrate its centennial.
John Herron’s contract with Larne FC has now been terminated.
Lord Trimble amongst The Dead
Lord Trimble, arch Unionist, intellectual Loyalist and convinced Brexiteer, was laid to rest.
An Orangeman, a man of fascist-type Vanguard rallies, whose leaders worked with Loyalist paramilitaries and called for Catholics to be exterminated. A man who supported the reactionary Loyalist Workers Strike. A man who participated in the Orange Order Siege of Drumcree and the Garvaghy Road stand-off which was linked to the death of 3 children.
British, Unionist, anti-Catholic, anti-Irish to his finger-tips.
An unpleasant character, by all reports. Rude, cold, arrogant, easy to anger.
Ostensibly, a man of peace, authority and caution, far-seeing, percipient, worthy recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize.
In the run-up to the Belfast/Good Friday Agreement Lord Trimble insisted his people must not linger on in the past but embrace the present.
Yet he did exactly the opposite.
Lately he supported Brexit, hindering any move forward on the Northern Irish Protocol (NIP), contradicting judicial findings that the NIP breached the 1801 Act of Union and supporting Unionist refusal to accept a SF First Minister in Northern Ireland.
He ultimately encouraged a tribute to the past, the supremacist past of Unionism that lives on in present Unionist parties.
Comment: RIP Let the dead bury the dead
Lord Trimble acquiesced to the 1998 (Belfast/Good Friday) Agreement because
a) he had no other choice. The British, Irish and USA governments offered no alternatives to Sunningdale Mark 2, except Joint Sovreignty with the Irish Republic. A fate worse than death for Unionists/Loyalists.
b) the IRA/SF were already on board pursuing peace. Being off-side and left out, was not a good look for the Unionist/Loyalist image and
c) the Belfast/Good Friday Agreement secured another 25 and counting years of Unionist hegemony in Northern Ireland.
Queries: What was there not to like?
A mere quibble about power-sharing for slow learners?
Lord Trimble knew Unionist/Loyalist hard-liners were not slow learners.
A long, long time ago they had learnt how to wield slogans in their favour.
“No Surrender” and “Never, Never, Never” guaranteed their place in Northern Ireland and Westminster, particularly when the Conservative Party needed to be make up numbers to form a government.
NB: The Conservative party in England were comparatively slow learners in this regard.
“Brexit is Brexit” and “Take Back Control” came much later.
Unionists/Loyalists had no intention of, nor are they ever going to, share power with the IRA/SF.
Parity of esteem is a foreign (EU?) concept to them.
Since 1998, the Stormont Assembly has staggered from one debacle and collapse to to the next.
Unionists forever walk in smaller “No No No” circles, a minority in the “wee pravince” they once dominated.
After the latest elections the DUP refuse to participate in the Stormont Assembly, thus blocking everything.
Ostensibly because they do not like the NIP which the British government they supported negotiatiated, ratified and attempted to implement to a certain extent.
Ostensibly because they will not play “bridesmaid” to a SF First Minister.
Comment: Unionists/Loyalists and Westminster are not yet sick of Ireland, not yet sick of being where their supremacism is unwanted.
Remember: Unionist/Loyalist attraction to Northern Ireland is not rooted in love of place and people but in their desire to control the people and impose their will upon everybody living there
Today Unionism/Loyalism/The Loyal Orders are shadows of a past, flickering in a world in which the living and the dead meet, haunted in these summer months by the legacy of 10 dead IRA Hunger Strikers.
The Stormont Assembly music has stopped.
Unionists/Loyalists will not permit the Assembly to function unless they get what they demand.
The rest of the parties and MLAs gather at the door, coats on, ready to leave if the DUP gets what it wants.
If not, what are all the conversations about a “New /Shared Ireland about?
Payback time for the DUP
Today, hardline Brexiteers in the ERG (a Conservative party group who will use anything and anyone, no matter what ensues, to fulfil their Britannia Unchained fantasies and ideology) and their henchmen and women in the DUP had their demands satisfied. They warmly welcomed the Northern Ireland Protocol Bill to Westminster parliament.
It shows that:
- the European court of justice will not have a role in Northern Ireland
- a green/red lane set-up i.e. no checks on goods from Great Britain to Northern Ireland; checks for those going to the Republic of Ireland
Query: What does a lorry with a mixed load do? Which lane does it use? British? Irish? Both?
- the NIP has no effect in the UK
- UK ministers reserve powers to override other parts of the NIP (and presumably any other International Treaty) if they deem it necessary.
Remember: 1) domestic legislation cannot overrule an international treaty – it if could, no government in its right mind would ever sign one.
2) Any attempt to vary the provisions NI Protocol by use of UK law is illegal as it violates Article 27 of the Vienna Treaty governing Treaties. A party may not invoke the provisions of its internal law as justification for its failure to perform a treaty. This rule is without prejudice to article 46.
Back in 2017 the DUP negotiated a £1 billion“Confidence and Supply” agreement, as brokered by Jacob Rees-Mogg of the ERG, to prop up PM May’s minority government.Mutual interests converged and the deal was done.
True to their supremacist instincts and desire to wield power, the DUP and NI Unionism in general have carried on pushing with the ERG for the hardest of hard Brexits ever since.
The NIP blocked Unionism’s drive to conserve power and hegemony i.e. Unionist /Orange Order leadership or dominance over all others, in NI. The border shifted to the Irish Sea, thus subverting their place in the UK. NI remained in the Single market and Customs Union, thus potentially subverting their unfettered power in NI.
Add in the SF victory in the May 2022 Local Assembly elections, coming top in the number of seats, flanked by the constitutionally neutral Alliance Party of Northern Ireland. The only surprise was how long it took for the UK Government to prepare its long-announced NIP Bill to redress Unionism’s “manufactured grievances”.
Minister for Foreign Affairs and the EU, Liz Truss said the government is basing its move on the “doctrine of necessity,” saying it has no choice but to act.
The UK government’s “doctrine of necessity” means the necessity of Johnson keeping his job by placating the ERG and DUP.
It means the necessity for the ERG and DUP to lie, cheat, break the law, anything, to gain power and keep hold of it.
Remember: Legally, necessity rarely excuses a breach, and only when (inter alia) the State’s act is the only way to safeguard an essential interest against a grave and imminent peril, and when no other essential interest is seriously impaired by the breach
Well Unionism would say their essential interest in NI was in grave and imminent peril, wouldn’t they? Because it is, isn’t it?
If the UK Govt hadn’t acted to prop up Unionism in NI, they were facing a SF administration in Northern Ireland, further loss of Unionist supremacy and a probable SF administration in Dublin within a couple of years.
Which certainly wouldn’t suit the Minister for the Union, PM Boris Johnson himself.
Or the DUP which has no intention of ever playing “bridesmaid” to Sinn Fein in Stormont
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