Ógra Shinn Féin
UCC Martin Hurson Cumann
(originally printed in UCC Motley magazine)
The past is a different country. Last Sunday as I marched from Creggan to Free Derry corner this is a phrase that came back to me. 39 years ago the very route that I was walking, ordinary people, no different from you or me, were shot down by British soldiers. 39 years on and the memory of Bloody Sunday still haunts the city of Derry. Most of the barbed wire is gone. There are no longer slurs of 'paddy' being hurled by camouflaged men with cockney accents. However the ghosts of that occupied city still abound.
The entire six counties are very different place today to what they were in 1972. Internment had just been introduced which rounded up Catholics like cattle and imprisoned them without trial. Many of those interned were active members of the civil rights movement. This was on top of treatment that the nationalist community received from a government dominated by members of the Orange Order. Catholics were discriminated against when it came housing, education and voting.
The situation came to a head when nationalist began to organise themselves into a civil rights group and were beaten of the street by a sectarian police force, the RUC, and the paramilitary police reserves, the B-Specials. This sparked a resistance from the nationalist community from which the IRA emerged.
The family of those killed on that infamous Sunday in 1972 were forced to wait until June last year to receive any form of apology from the British government for what had happened to their loved ones. A report was published in April 1972 by Lord Widgery which absolved the British soldiers of all blame for what happened on Bloody Sunday. The Widgery report blamed the civil rights protestors for what had happened and attempted to blacken the name of those who were killed. This was particularly harrowing for the families of the deceased.
Bloody Sunday is but one example of British cover-ups and whitewashes of events that have happened in Ireland. One such event was the murder of well known human rights lawyer Pat Finucane. The Stevens Report published in 2003 admitted that there had been collusion with police and the loyalist paramilitaries in the killing. The loyalists were given the information they needed and were allowed to carry out the killing without fear of prosecution.
The families of those killed in the Ballymurphy massacre are now campaigning for an inquiry into the deaths of their loved ones. In August 1971 eleven innocent people were killed in the Ballymurphy area by British soldiers roaming the streets. One of those killed was a priest giving the last rites to one of the slain. Another was Francis Quinn who had come to the aid of a wounded man. No British soldier was ever brought to account for these killings and the families have never received any form of recognition from the British government.
There are countless more injustices that were carried out at the hands of the British authorities all over Ireland. Thankfully we now live in a time of peace and reconciliation. There have been trojan efforts on both sides of the community divide to bring those formerly in conflict, together. Former loyalist paramilitaries and former members of the IRA have come together in many community projects and in many areas work together for the aid of their respective communities. However the British government has still many questions to answer about its role in the troubles. They have still to come forward and explain their role in killings right across this country. Until they do many families still are haunted by the ghosts of the past.
No comments:
Post a Comment