Give Us The Truth
By Paul Donovan
Morning Star
26 November, 2002
While the focus of the present political crisis in Northern Ireland has again shifted to the Republicans, it is important to note that the root of the problems began with David Trimble's declaration about IRA disbandment.
In order to placate his own party Trimble announced that republicans must "demonstrably establish a real and genuine transition from paramilitary activities to exclusively non-violent means." This was portrayed in the media as Trimble endeavouring to keep the anti agreement members of his Ulster Unionist Party on board.
The events that followed this announcement are instructive. The Police Service of Northern Ireland entered the Stormont buildings and took away computer discs. The high profile event had all the appearance of being stage managed for the media. Indeed, the comments afterwards of the new chief constable Hugh Orde gave the impression that he was less than happy with the operation. The question that begged to be asked was whether the new chief constable was in full control and if the situation was not being used by certain anti agreement elements within the police force.
The other two background issues always brought up to substantiate the threat from the IRA are the three accused Irishmen in Columbia and the Castlereagh break in. Innocent until proven guilty is something that is suspended in media circles when it comes to Irish republicans. The three men in Colombia have already been charged and found guilty by the British media. It is a remarkable that no British publication has thought it worth doing a proper investigation into the events in Colombia. Instead it is much easier to judge that the men guilty of being Irish.
Similarly over the Castlereagh break in. Early indications were that it was an intelligence services operation, similar to the one conducted years earlier when an army unit allegedly burnt down Sir John Stevens office when he was investigating the question of collusion between the security services and loyalist paramilitaries. The source for intelligence service involvement at Castlereagh was none other than the then chief constable of the Police Service of Northern Ireland, Sir Ronnie Flanagan. Later there followed arrests of Republicans working with ex-prisoners and former hunger striker Raymond McCartney. This symbolic act, like the invasion of Stormont, threw the media pack toward the IRA as the source of the break-in. Again the lack of any evidence to support such an assertion has not proved a problem.
Consequently Colombia, Castlereagh and Stormont are pulled together as proof of Republican duplicity. The conclusion based on no evidence whatsover is that the IRA have not given up the war but are continuing it via covert means. This myth is run out regularly by Trimble and parroted by many in the media. If someone were trying to destroy the GFA and return Northern Ireland to war the events of recent weeks could not have been better choreographed.
What does not fit in with this picture ofcourse is the reality of Catholics getting burned out of their houses and areas by Loyalists mobs. The same scenario in fact that happened when Catholics demanded their civil rights back in the late 1960s. Loyalist paramilitaries have quite clearly not been on ceasefire and it is from this quarter that the threat to the GFA really emanates.
Over recent months there has been much violence on the streets of Northern Ireland but most of it has been perpetrated by Loyalist paramilitaries. A look at the Pat Finucane Human Rights Centre's monthly account of sectarian incidents show 95 per cent of such attacks being perpretrated by Loyalists against Catholics. Apparently this is ok, there is to be no January deadline for Loyalist paramilitaries to cease violence. The media also has no interest in reporting Loyalist violence - it does not fit the feuding tribes model with Republicans at the epicentre.
The great lie of recent months has been the media coverage of the violence in Northern Ireland. The traditional feuding tribes model of Protestant against Catholic with security forces in the middle trying to keep the peace has meant that every time Loyalists launch violent attacks against Catholics the media have to look to find some equivalent act in order that the whole facade of tit for tat violence can be sustained.
The overwhelming amount of violence of recent months has come from the Loyalists yet the skewed view of balance taken by the media has completely misconstrued what is happening. Indeed the situation has become so ludicrous in parts of the British press that almost any violence is automatically blaimed on Republicans even when it is often being directed against them by Loyalists.
It was good on a recent Newsnight programme to see former Irish Prime Minister Albert Reynolds inform the audience about what was happening to Catholics in areas like the Short Strand in Belfast. The Loyalist mobs and pipe bombings. Presenter Jeremy Paxman did not like this side of things being aired, it did not fit the tit for tat model at all, but Reynolds succeeded in shedding a little light on the real situation for the viewers.
Non-reporting of Loyalist violence is not a new phenonoma. Last year I did a piece on why hundreds of pipe bombings by Loyalists against Catholics from January to April were not reported in the British media. I approached newsdesks and the comments varied from the Daily Telegraph's "it would not be possible to report violence on the ground every day from Northern Ireland" to the Daily Mirror's "even in Northern Ireland people are not shocked by pipe bombs going through people's windows." My story about the non-coverage then took on a life of its own. The Independent commissioned the piece, accepted it and gave me a date for publication. It was not published because I was told it had to be run past David McKittrick, the paper's Northern Ireland correspondent. McKittrick then blocked it not surprisingly given that he had not reported the attacks either. The story was eventually published in the Morning Star and Sunday Herald in Scotland.
Trimble has benefited from the media misrepresentation of the situation. If Loyalist violence were being reported for the one sided thing that it is then surely even Trimble could not ask Republicans to disarm whilst completely ignoring the main source.
The British media needs to break with its own past and report exactly what is going on in Northern Ireland. The violence from Loyalist paramilitaries should be reported, not ignored or massaged to fit the tit for tat frame that appears to dictate all British media coverage of events in Northern Ireland. If the media really did adopt an objective approach to violence in Northern Ireland who knows people might get to know the truth.