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Since
the 26 November elections to the Northern Ireland
Assembly (Reported in FRFI 176), stalemate has ensued
pending the review of the Good Friday Agreement set
to begin in February. Loyalist attacks have continued
against the nationalist community and have been extended
to a widespread racist terror campaign against ethnic
groups, exposing the racist character of the loyalist
tradition itself. Further evidence of the widespread
collusion between the British government, its agents
and the loyalist death squads in the terror campaign
directed at the nationalist community has also been
published. The DUP are now setting the pace of the
political agenda in the north and is set to destroy
the illusions of Sinn Fein in regard to the restoration
of devolved power to the Stormont Assembly.
The
Six County statelet is now the race hate capital of
Europe. Every day in Belfast a racist attack is carried
out. The white supremacist loyalist tradition, which
is materially dependent on British imperialism, has
maintained its hate campaign primarily at Catholics
and Irish nationalists for centuries. Loyalism is
racism by definition. Loyalist death squads and hate
mobs have extended their hate campaign in recent weeks
in Belfast against the tiny ethnic community in the
north of Ireland where 99% of citizens are white.
In December Ugandan and Romanian families were burned
out there homes in South Belfast. The Belfast Chinese
community have come under recent sustained attack
from Loyalist hate mobs as have the Muslim community
throughout the north.
Following
weeks of speculation and in the aftermath the election
of Ian Paisleys hard-line Democratic Unionist Party
(DUP) as the main unionist party, Jeffery Donaldson,
the anti-Agreement Unionist, joined the DUP from the
Ulster Unionist Party (UUP). Two other key supporters
followed him, taking the DUP assembly member total
to 33 seats compared to the UUP's 24. This adds to
the crisis facing the Good Friday Agreement as Unionism
turns increasingly hard line.
Barron
report
In
early December, the Dublin government published part
of the Barron report. The interim report of the Barron
Inquiry into the 1974 Dublin and Monaghan bombings
points to collusion between agents of the British
armed forces and loyalists in the atrocity, which
claimed 34 lives. The initial report stated that Barron
could not say if there was collusion at the highest
level, but that the British government had certainly
thwarted any proper investigation into the bombings
at the time and since and had failed to cooperate
fully with the present inquiry.
Several
reports published since the end of last year have
detailed widespread collusion between the British
government and loyalist death squads' campaign to
terrorise Irish republicans and the wider Catholic
community in the Six Counties. In October the British
government refused to publish the findings and recommendations
of a report in to British collusion by Canadian Judge
Peter Cory. Cory had been asked to investigate the
allegations of British state collusion with a number
of killings including those of human rights lawyers
Pat Finucane and Rosemary Nelson and the killing of
Catholic Robert Hamill. Blair had previously promised
to publish the reports but with elections looming
in November their publication was postponed. In mid-January
Judge Cory went over Blair's head to contact the families
directly concerned advising them that he recommended
full public inquiries. Cory described the British
government's attempts to keep them in the dark as
'unfair and cruel'. The family of Pat Finucane have
sought a judicial review in the High Court to force
the British government to publish the Cory findings.
On
January 19th a further report condemned the Royal
Ulster Constabulary investigation into the murder
of Catholic Sean Brown in May 1997 as 'appalling and
unprofessional' with 'serious and unexplained failures'.
The report by police ombudsman, Nuala O'Loan stated
that the RUC 'had made no real effort to track down
the killers'.
The
review of the Good Friday Agreement is due to start
on 3 February. The only movement of significance since
the November election has been a further sop to Unionism
when the British government established a so-called
'Independent Monitoring Commission' in January which
is the only part of the two governments April 2003
Joint Declaration to be implemented. The Commission
will focus almost entirely on Republican armed groups
and will ignore the ongoing campaign of violence by
loyalism. As we argued in FRFI 176 'A review of the
Good Friday Agreement in the next period will attempt
to wrest further concessions from Sinn Féin
to appease Unionists and the British government.'
This remains the case.
Sinn
Fein remain completely tied to the Good Friday Agreement.
There is quite simply nowhere else for them to go.
The immediate political future will be one of ongoing
loyalist attacks on nationalists. Faced with such
loyalist attacks and continued assembly suspension
Sinn Féin's strategy amounts to being reliant
on the 'good faith and commitment' of Tony Blair and
British imperialism. The Unionist veto remains firmly
at the heart of the Northern statelet. It is the DUP
is now setting the political agenda of the north.
The pace of any future 'progress' will be dependent
on the racist bigot Ian Paisley.
Faced
with this harsh reality and the obvious implications
for the Republican strategy. Sinn Féin President
Adams has opted for some wishful thinking. Speaking
in Belfast on 27 January he said 'The review will
not be a renegotiation of the Good Friday Agreement
but it is an opportunity to accelerate the process
of change promised in the Agreement'. The 'acceleration
of change' will be assessed on the streets by the
most oppressed and the victims of state discrimination
and loyalist terror. The real acceleration of change
will not occur within the failed structure of British
rule in Ireland but within the republican movement
itself. Having endured generations of the Orange/Unionist
veto the question for nationalists then becomes how
long will the present consensus endure and where are
the forces emerging from to defend the nationalist
working class from loyalist attack?
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