Northern Ireland

Dissidents recruiting in North

There are only a few hundred involved in dissident republicanism despite efforts to recruit disaffected youth in Northern Ireland. Colm Heatley reports

A delicate balance between maturity and compromise

  • 15 February 2006
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Sinn Féin's hopes to at least double its Dáil representations are a long cry from the mere platform the southern party wing used to be for the IRA campaign in the North. The hunger strikes broke the mould, showing the Provisional leadership that there were political opportunities outside the armed struggle, and slowly the South began to follow the Northern example.

Raids disrupt political process at key moments

  • 8 February 2006
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The Criminal Assets Bureau has recently made much-publicised raids of properties in Dublin, Meath, Wicklow and Louth as part an investigation into IRA money-laundering. It is just one of a number of dubious operations – north and south of the Border – that have occurred at important times in the North's political process. Colm Heatley reports

IRA activity key to progress for DUP

  • 1 February 2006
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The over-publicised and much-leaked report from the Independent Monitoring Commission will strengthen the DUP's resolve not to share power with Sinn Féin. Colm Heatley reports

No work but all pay

  • 18 January 2006
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For the 2003/'04 year the salary and expenses bill for Northern Ireland Assembly members was £9.2 million, although the Assembly did not sit for a single session in that 12-month period. Now assembly members are outraged at the possibility that their wages might be stopped. Colm Heatley reports

Remembering Bobby Sands

  • 11 January 2006
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The hunger strikes were a watershed in modern Irish history. They are credited with accelerating the growth of Sinn Féin. They did much more than that. They helped to create the conditions which later gave birth to the peace process. For that reason, if for no other, at the beginning of another new year and yet another effort to advance the peace process, the events of that time should be studied and discussed by anyone interested in learning lessons of our past.

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