This
evening a number of members of the 32 County Sovereignty
Movement and activists from the Irish Republican Prisoners
Welfare Association were physically assaulted by the
RUC/PSNI. The incident took place in Strabane, Co
Tyrone, where earlier in the day police arrested five
people, including one woman, a leading prisoners welfare
activist.
The
RUC/PSNI screeched into a street where a number of
republicans were standing and stormed up the driveway
assaulting a number of people, including a man who
was cradling a young child. The assaults took place
under the guise of a house search and only ended when
someone from across the street produced a camera and
proceeded to photograph the assaults. A number of
people came out of their houses and began to chant
SS/RUC at which point the police in riot gear began
to climb back into their land rovers.
When
the land rovers began to pull away the police began
to shout yes, yes, RUC, we are the RUC.
A short time later the police returned and raided
the home of the person who took pictures of the assault
and seized the camera.
The
32 County Sovereignty Movement condemn these assaults
and blame the likes of Denis Bradley and his policy
of selective condemnation on the issue of threats
and violence. Bradley has for some time been actively
trying to provoke the Provisional IRA into attacking
anti-agreement republicans and trying to create an
atmosphere where it can happen. We urge Bradley to
condemn the violence directed towards our movement
as eagerly as he condemns threats to members of the
DPPs and ask how he can support a police force
who, by their own admission in Strabane tonight, are
the unreconstructed RUC. While Bradley and his ilk
claim that nationalists support the supposedly new
policing arrangements, it is clear that republicans,
and indeed the police, do not.
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