Tribunal exposes British crimes, bul fails to call for Troops

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have been arrested • under the Prevention of Terrorism Act if the police authorities had so wished.

The wide-ranging powers open to the police can be used to declare such a conference as 'giving support to' or furthering the interests of an illegal organisation.

This was one of the many facts that were hammered home to delegates from the labour and trade union movement in the case presented to indict British imperialism in Ireland.

The British government failed to respond to an invitation to present their defence, Lawyer But Kieran McAnally, a lawyer from the 26 counties, presented the historical account using entirely British government documents.

He outlined extremely well the relationship between the three parties involved, British imperialism, Irish nationalism and the plantation settler group in the North.

He also scotched the various misconceptions which surround the Irish struggle.

Irish Republicanism is not parochial; it drew inspiration from the American and French revolutions.

And, since the Irish were already fighting British domination three centuries before Luther came on the scene, therefor this could not have been based on religious differences.

McAnally highlighted the legal duplicity of British governments as well as the brute force; repression, economic exploitation, media distortion and cultural deprivation.

For example in 1783 the Renunciation Act signed in Westminster gave up "for all time" any so-called right to legislate for the Irish people.

UDI This "forever" lasted only seventeen years-until the 1800 Act of Union!

He likened the movement among the Colonists in the North in 1782 to lan Smith's UDI and claimed that apartheid was first introduced in Ireland, not South Africa.

Ernie Roberts chaired the first day and reported that only 18 Labour MPs • had voted against the continuation of the Special Powers Act the previous day in Parliament.

SDLP careerist Gerry Fitt had revealed in the debate that 29 complaints of torture had been made since the discussion on the Bennett Report and that systematic torture clearly formed an integral part of British oppression in Ireland.

The constituency Roberts represents, Hackney North and Stoke Newington, has put forward a motion on reland to the Labour Party Conference.

Special conference

It calls for a Special Conference on Ireland. Although Roberts continually stressed the need to find ways of fighting for British withdrawal inside the labour movement, he failed to give a lead himself and put forward a depressing view of the difficulties. PHOTO: Laurence Sparham (IFL)

Ernie Roberts But before blaming other people, Roberts himself needs to answer why he voted for the re-election of Callaghan as leader of the Parliamentary Labour Party given his longstanding record as a torturer and murderer in Ireland.

The most moving speaker was Lily Fitzsimmons whose eldest son is in 'H' Block at the Long Kesh concentration camp.

She read a letter smuggled out from 'H' Block, where 350 Tory 'outrage' at the late night BBC TV interview with a member of the INLA is likely to cause the final collapse of BBC resistance to demands for total censorship.

Already the BBC has promised to review its policywhich for years has been 99% total censorship/1% token defiance. That 1% is now likely to disappear.

The press has played a Judas role in the affair, turning on the BBC with savagery and refusing to defend the right which it claims to hold most dear-freedom to publish.

Cant

Although on the part of owners and most senior editorial executives this 'freedom' is total cant and hypocrisy-like avowals of chastity in a brothel -there is at the same time a genuine contradiction.

Bourgeois democratic rights were not given to the press; they were taken in defiance of Kings Republicans are 'on the blanket' fighting for the restoration of political prisoner status-some for as long as three years.

The attempts to criminalise and brutalise the prisoners by prison screws receiving enormous special supplements and bonuses were shown to be insufficient to overcome the unbreakable spirit of the liberation fighters.

Censorship

Evidence was given by other prosecution witnesses under the headings: censorship; repressive legislation; economic and social; women and police and army.

The indictment was passed nem con. It stated:

"We Indict Britain on the following counts:

1.. That throughout the period of rule of Britain in Ireland it has persistently pursued policies which have resulted in the death of countless Irish men and women, the denial of their human rights and in their economic and political exploitation.

2. That in 1800 by an international tort, namely by bribery, corruption and coercion exercised against the then independent Irish Parliament, Britain reneged on the Renunciation Act 1783 whereby it had voluntarily renounced forever the "right" to legislate for the people of Ireland; by the and Governments.

The right to criticise and the right to report Parliament are two examples of such rights won in struggle.

This material origin ensures that within the press-and within TV and radio-there are those for whom the right to publish is taken seriously.

Pressured

It was that element within the BBC that pressured for the INLA interview to be shown and it was to that pressure that lan Trethowan, BBC director general, bowed.

In renouncing his decision and saying that he had clearly 'misjudged the emotional impact of the broadcast, Trethowan is set to wipe out that thin seam of defiance for ever.

The programme was shown late at night and without any 'trailing'-a deliberate decision according to Trethowan. It was seen by only a small audience.

The immediate reaction was muted. Most papers gave the gist of the interview, in which Neave PHOTO: Andrew Wiard, Report Act of Union in 1800 it sought to reassert its domination of Ireland and that its "right" to rule in any part of Ireland was in breach of her prior committment and renunciation.

3. That the creation of the Northern Ireland statelet was brought about by the encouragement of and submission to Orange/Unionist terrorism and in flagrant disregard of the democratically expressed wishes of the Irish people in the 1918 General Election.

4. That Britain sponsored and planned the creation of a sectarian state wherein the Irish people were deprived of the right of effective self determination and the nationalist minority in the north of Ireland were deprived of basic human rights and relegated to the status of second class citizens. was accused of being a torturer, and published protests from hard-line Tories.

Widow

It was a week before the row broke out in earnest with a denunciation in the Daily Telegraph, followed swiftly by protests from Neave's widowwhose family had decided not to tell her the programme was on but who had nevertheless switched on.

Trethowan was in full retreat. Already his boss, Sir Michael Swann, chairman of the Board of Governors, was promising a review of the guidelines.

Trethowan, who thinks they do not need altering, responded by boasting that the BBC had shown only four interviews with terrorists' in ten years.

Too little

In a letter to the Telegraph, Trethowan said:

"We are, indeed, more often accused of attempting too little in this field of reporting.

5. That Britain can only rule in Northern Ireland by commiting breaches of internationally recognised Human Rights Charters and with general breaches of the rule of law.

6. That the presence of British rule in Northern Ireland constitutes a crime against international peace and justice and that the methods used to enforce it constitute a crime against the internal peace of And that in the event you are satisfied that the charges mentioned above have been clearly established against the British government, the prosecution invites you to conclude that the only effective remedy for these wrongs is for the British government to reconstitute its international relations The impact of an appearance on film is so strong that one does have to apply special criteria, but we believe that, on very rare occasions, the public can be reminded directly of the nature of the terrorists by the normal methods of television reporting."

After Thatcher's broadside against the BBC in the Commons-backed by Labourite Merlyn Rees-the Telegraph, the Daily Mail and the Mirror all led on the subject.

PHOTO: Chris Davies, Report Rees 383. with Ireland or a basis of mutual equality and respect and to recognise the right of the Irish people to self determination in accordance with Article (1) of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights."

The impact of the evidence on the struggle in the British labour movement for immediate withdrawal of troops was lessened, however, not only by a small attendance, but also by a failure of the indictment, amid its legal phraseology, to spell out the simple demand : Troops Out Now!

Without building support for this demand as the centre of campaigns on Ireland, no amount of well intentioned calls for "Civil and Political Rights" can hope to succeed.

The Mail headlined "Appalling Error by BBC", the Mirror "Terror Quiz at the BBC"

But even the threat of prosecution under the PTA of BBC staff was not sufficient to persuade the press to support them.

The gutter press managed to avoid open comment while running large stories slamming the BBC and-in the care of the Daily Mail-exhuming an interview with Neave himself condemning interviews with IRA members.

The Guardian-in one of the most mealy mouthed leaders even they have published-gave a defence of the BBC which was worse than the attacks.

Accusing the BBC of errors and lapses the Guardian said that such interviews should not be banned-so long as they were rare events.

That is the authentic cowardly and whining voice of liberalism.

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