Support March to Expose Irish Torture

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The campaign to expose the-barbaric treatment of republican prisoners in British imperialist jails in Northern Ireland has been stepped up in the wake of the brutal murder of Brian Maguire at the notorious Castlereagh interrogation centre on May 10.

Maguire, a 27-year old trade union activist, was arrested at 6 am on Tuesday May 9, and taken to Castiereagh, where he was interrogated by the RUC until 11.30 pm.

According to police he was then awakened at 7 am, went to the toilet at 7.10 am and then returned to his cell.

When his breakfast was brought at 7.30 am, prison officers claim they found him hanging from a piece of torn sheet attached to a ventilator.

He was dead.

Scepticism

Police later claimed that Maguire had made a statement the previous day admitting involvement in the recent killing of a policeman.

• Such claims must be treated with extreme scepticism. In the last month alone the sentences of three prisoners were quashed on appeal since the sole basis for conviction had been confessions extracted by police brutality.

80% of current convictions are obtained in this way.

And even if Maguiré had made such a confession the unsolved question is how he could have committed suicide while inside Castlereagh-where overtyning that could be used for a suicide attempt is taken from the prisoner, and the ventilator grill, even if he could have reached it, could not have supported his weight.

This case-which highlights the brutality of the British imperialist occupation in Ireland _has been taken up by the Trade Union Campaign Against Repression, demanding a trade union based enquiry into:

1) The death under torture of Brian Maguire;

2) The vicious and brutal activities of the RUC Special Branch at Castlereagh and at other torture centres throughout the North;

3) The conditions of political prisoners in H-Block and in Armagh jail;

4) Into the general repression of anti-unionist people in the ghettoes of the North.

2,000 protest The day after Maguire's murder TUCAR led a 2,000strong protest strike and march on Transport House, Belfast, and the protest has now been extended to the labour movement in the south.

On May 26, the AGM of the Dublin Council of Trade Unions passed the following resolution moved by TUCAR member Paddy Healy:

"This council calls on the Irish Congress of Trade Unions, through its Northern Committee, to hold a public enquiry into the death by hanging of Brian Maguire, AUEW/TASS branch secretary, in Castlereagh interrogation centre. This council also calls on the British TUC to prevail on Mr. Mason to authorise all the relevant duty officers to give evidence at this enquiry without restriction or claim to privilege, and to produce all the relevant documentation for the enquiry"

A similar resolution was passed by the Dublin Regional Council of the Labour Party, and a resolution calling for an independent, public enquiry, but otherwise similar, was passed unanimously at the Annual Conference of the Irish Transport and General Workers' Union which took place from 30 May to 2 June.

A petition on the same subject has been signed by work in Northern Ireland several representatives of th labour movement, and was th basis of a delegation to Leinste House (the Irish Parliament) o Tuesday 24 May.

The Workers Sociali: League supports this campaig for a trade union enquiry.

But we go further tha simply demanding Labour minister Roy Mason "authorise" duty officers at the Castlereagh torture chamber to give evidence.

Withdraw troops!

We call on trade union branches and Labour Parties, in taking up the case of Brian Maguire, to condemn also the complicity of Labour leaders in the repression of the frish people, demand the withdrawal of all British troops from Ireland, and call for the expulsion of Mason and his fellow overseers of the torture squads from the labour movement.

Full support must also be given to the national demonstration called by the Prisoners in Ireland Committee Sunday July 9 around the demands for:

*Political status for Republican prisoners as guaranteed by the Geneva Convention.

*Support for the war of liberation leading to British withdrawal and an amnesty.

The march leaves Hyde Park at 2.30pm.

PHOTO: Andrew Wiard, Report Orme-left' who helped to repress Irish workers.

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