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Editor note: SMILE!! It's Saturday!
http://breakingnews.iol.ie/news/ireland/empey-demands-fourparty-talks-over-devolved-justice-powers-431510.html
The domination of the North’s coalition government by the DUP and Sinn Féin must end if the UUP is to support the devolution of policing and justice powers, the party said today.
Ulster Unionist leader Reg Empey said his party was one of four that sit in Stormont’s power-sharing Executive and should be included in key negotiations.
But he said the two largest parties had sidelined the Ulster Unionists, as well as the SDLP, and he demanded round-party talks to secure any creation of a new Ministry of Justice for the North.
The DUP and Sinn Féin have been involved in lengthy talks with British Prime Minister Gordon Brown on the transfer of policing and justice authority from Westminster to Stormont.
Mr Empey today told his party conference: “We have no objection to these powers coming back to Stormont if the terms are right.
“But I do not believe, and the UUP does not believe, that a deal concocted privately between the DUP and Sinn Féin, a deal dependent on the appointment of a puppet minister and subject to a ’sunset clause’, is the right way to transfer policing and justice powers. There is a better way to do this.”
He warned DUP leader and First Minister Peter Robinson that all the parties must be brought into talks on the issue.
“The Executive must sit down to discuss what we might do with policing and justice powers to meet the inevitable challenge we will face if there is no agreed vision,” he said.
“While Peter Robinson said this week that he will not do this policing deal without this party, I must tell him that there will be no support from us for any backroom deal.
“We have set out our terms for this devolution, so, Peter, there will be a price. There must be an open and transparent process to reconstruct the Executive and make it work as a full four-party coalition.
“No more dysfunctional meetings. And we must resolve the policy stalemates that are still there. We simply won’t allow things to continue as they are.”
He said the drop in support for the DUP in the European elections earlier this year, when it lost votes to right-wing challengers, showed the party no longer dominated unionism.
Mr Empey added: “Change is coming, Peter, whether you like it or not.”
http://www.anphoblacht.com/news/detail/39046
A MASSIVE PROTEST was held on Saturday 17 October in Donostia/San Sebastian in the Basque Country to protest against the Spanish Government’s new wave of arrests against the Basque pro-independence and labour movement.
On Tuesday 13 October, 10 prominent activists, including Batasuna leader Arnaldo Otegi and former general secretary of the left-wing LAB trade union Rafa Diez, were arrested and accused of trying to “reorganise the leadership” of the Basque left-nationalist movement. Five of the 10 were arrested in a raid on the national headquarters of the LAB union in Donostia.
On Friday, Judge Baltasar Garzon sent Otegi, Diez and three others to jail, accused of “membership of a terrorist organisation” and of trying to reconstitute the pro-independence Batasuna party on the “orders of ETA”. Batasuna was outlawed in 2003.
On Saturday, more than 37,000 Basques protested against the arrests under the slogan “For liberty, for rights for every person” in a very significant demonstration of unity among Basque society, with several major trade unions from across the political spectrum, left-nationalists and the centre-right Basque Nationalist Party (PNV) marching together.
Batasuna responded to the arrests by saying:
“The aim of these arrests is to stop political initiatives that the Basque pro-independence movement was due to activate, political initiatives to resolve the ongoing conflict and to create a democratic scenario for the Basque Country.”
Sinn Féin MEP Bairbre de Brún said the arrests are a step backwards and will ultimately impact on the task of rebuilding the peace process and dialogue.
“Sinn Féin has argued the need to revive the Basque peace process. The banning of Batasuna, alongside the continued jailing of political representatives, will in no way aid this task.
“The arrest of Arnaldo Otegi as the leader of Batasuna and nine other members of the party by the Spanish Government is a step backwards and will make the process of rebuilding and reinvigorating efforts towards a lasting peace process all the more difficult.
“It will further impede any search for progress, which requires that every effort be made to improve and encourage dialogue between all of the parties in the Basque Country and the Spanish Government. Punitive measures and criminalisation from the Spanish authorities will not advance these goals.”
The latest arrests are part of the Spanish Government’s ongoing campaign of repression against political, social, labour and cultural organisations in favour of self-determination for the Basque Country.
The central thesis of this criminalisation campaign, as formulated by Judge Garzon, is that “everything that surrounds ETA is ETA” – that is, any group or individual that shares ETA’s general goal of Basque independence, regardless of what methods they use, is part of ETA.
This process has often been led by politicians and the media but is given a ‘democratic’ cover and institutionalised by the Spanish courts through a series of judicial rulings initiated by Garzon in 1998 (called the “18/98 macro proceedings”).
The repression against all expressions of Basque nationalism has escalated dramatically during the summer, with the Madrid Government working in concert with the Spanish coalition government that took power in the south-west of the Basque Country in March.
As a result of the Spanish authorities banning left-wing nationalists from standing for election on 1 March – disenfranchising more than 100,000 Basques – the Basque Nationalist Party (PNV) lost control of the regional parliament of the Basque Autonomous Community (comprising three of the seven historic Basque provinces – Bizkaia, Gipuzkoa and Araba) for the first time since limited autonomy was granted to the region in 1980. The two main Spanish parties, the PSE (the Basque branch of the PSOE, the social democratic Spanish Socialist Workers’ Party) and the right-wing PP (Popular Party) allied to outweigh the PNV’s seats and formed government, immediately launching a fierce wave of repression against all expressions of Basque nationalism.
One of the new government’s most significant policies has been to label the display in public of photographs of Basque political prisoners as “glorifying terrorism”.
The Ertzaintza (Basque-Spanish police in the autonomous community) have relentlessly attacked the popular traditional festivals throughout the summer to confiscate pictures of prisoners by force, heightening political tension in the Basque Country.
Demonstrations in solidarity with the prisoners have repeatedly been prohibited and attacked, and pubs and other premises that dare to display prisoners’ pictures have been hit with large fines or closed.
The number of Basque citizens who have been indicted over the summer under the charge of ‘glorifying terrorism’ as a result of the prisoners’ pictures issue has been estimated at 1,000.
In the town of Villabona, on 31 July, the Ertzaintza violently attacked the weekly vigil in solidarity with the political prisoners, which takes place every Friday in about 70 towns and cities across the Basque Country. The police began harassing 27-year-old local pro-independence councillor and deputy mayor Remi Aiestaran, who collapsed and died from a heart attack following the provocation.
Speaking at a conference in the Basque city of Bilbao in early October, the UN’s Special Rapporteur on Protecting Human Rights While Countering Terrorism, Martin Scheinin, criticised the policy of removing the prisoners’ pictures, saying their display is “a personal act by the families of the prisoners” and should not be construed as ‘glorifying terrorism’.
By its longstanding and illegal ‘dispersal’ policy – introduced in 1989 and designed to demoralise and isolate political prisoners and their families – and the repressive and anti-democratic policy enforced over the summer of trying to criminalise even the simple display of photos of their faces, Spanish authorities have ensured that the prisoners’ rights have become a central political issue.
The 741 Basque political prisoners currently in jail – the highest number since the fascist dictatorship of General Francisco Franco – are being held in 82 prisons across France and Spain, on average about 600km from the Basque Country.
The widespread allegations and documentation of torture of political prisoners adds to the movement in solidarity with the prisoners.
The use of torture by the Spanish police while prisoners are detained incommunicado has been documented and criticised by Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch and the United Nations, among others.
Professor Scheinin released a report last December criticising Spain’s ‘anti-terrorism’ regime. The UN Special Rapporteur reported the abuse of the rights of ‘terror suspect’ detainees, who may be held incommunicado for up to five days without charge.
On 15 September, Nicola Duckworth, Amnesty’s Europe programme director, said: “Incommunicado detention must be relegated to the past. No other European Union country maintains a detention regime with such severe restrictions on the rights of detainees.
“It is inadmissible that in present-day Spain anyone who is arrested for whatever reason should disappear as if in a black hole for days on end. Such lack of transparency can be used as a veil to hide human rights violations.”
The Basque human rights NGO Torturaren Aurkako Taldea (Group Against Torture – TAT) listed testimonies of serious torture from 62 people in 2008, most of whom had been held incommunicado, including beatings, sexual assault, asphyxiation with plastic bags, food and sleep deprivation, stress positions, and threats to rape or kill victims or their partners or family members, among other abuses.
In the December UN report, Professor Scheinin slammed the Spanish Government’s Law of Political Parties, ad-hoc legislation introduced in 2002 with the explicit intention of criminalising Batasuna. The law insists all parties must denounce anti-state violence or be banned. Scheinin said the law defined ‘terrorism’ so vaguely that it “might be interpreted to include any political party which through peaceful political means seeks similar political objectives” as those pursued by armed organisations.
Similarly, the Special Rapporteur stated that the law against “glorifying terrorism” “should include the requirements of an intent to incite the commission of a terrorist offence, as well as the existence of an actual risk that such an offence will be committed as a consequence”.
But as well as the raft of ‘legal’ or legislative attacks on the rights of the Basque left nationalist movement, there is also evidence that the Spanish state security forces are renewing the ‘dirty war’ against the movement.
In the most sinister case, Jon Anza, ETA militant and former prisoner, disappeared on 18 April after boarding a train heading towards the French city of Toulouse. ETA released a statement a month later stating that he was a member of the organisation, that the Spanish police were aware of this, that he was scheduled to meet with other ETA members in France, but that he failed to show up.
On 2 October, Gara revealed that, according to trusted sources, Anza was kidnapped by the Spanish police from the train to Toulouse and taken for interrogation. Anza, who was very ill and almost blind at the time, was killed by the police during the course of the interrogation, according to the Gara sources, and his body buried in an unknown location in France.
Thousands of people have participated in demonstrations across the Spanish and French states, carrying banners demanding “Where is Jon?” since the public announcement of his disappearance in May. But despite the widespread belief among Basque society that Anza’s disappearance was orchestrated by the Spanish security forces, and considerable speculation in the French media about the case, the disappearance has been met with a steely silence by the Spanish media and politicians.
Juan Mari Mujika, Lander Fernandez, Alain Berastegi and Dani Saralegi, all pro-independence activists, have reported being kidnapped, interrogated, threatened and tortured by Spanish security forces this year.
Pro-independence activist and former prisoner Berastegi was called out to do a building job in Irunberri, near Irunea/Pamplona, on 17 July, then kidnapped by 10 armed and masked men, who beat him and asphyxiated him with a plastic bag while asking him to collaborate with them or face jail if he didn’t.
These cases are part of an escalating pattern of illegal kidnappings, detentions and torture by Spanish police and intelligence agents and bring back dark memories of the dirty war tactics of the 1970s and 1980s.
Francoists had waged a dirty war of state-sponsored death squad attacks against ETA and pro-independence activists from 1975-1982, believed to be responsible for killing at least 47 people. Then, under the PSOE Government, the GAL (Anti-terrorist Liberation Groups) organised a series of kidnappings, torture and assassinations targeting the Basque political refugees living in exile in the Basque regions within the French state from 1983-86, killing 27 people – some ETA activists, some political activists and some unconnected to politics.
The PSOE leader and Spanish President during these years, Felipe Gonzalez, infamously said during the GAL trials in the 1990s – which saw former Interior Minster Barrionuevo and his deputy jailed for their role in organising the death squads – that “Democracy is defended in the sewers as well as in the salons.”
The banning of Batasuna in 2003 was followed by a campaign against candidates and activists of other left-nationalist electoral groupings including the ANV (Basque Nationalist Action), the Communist Party of the Basque Lands, and Demokrazia 3 Miloi (Democracy 3 Million) which was formed to contest the 1 March regional elections in the autonomous community but was banned in the lead-up to the poll, meaning the left-nationalists were completely excluded from participating in the elections. Despite the repression, more than 100,000 people (8%) voted using ‘illegal’ ballots the movement had printed itself in a mass act of defiance against the bannings.
Then, in May, the Spanish Government tried to ban the newly launched Internationalist Initiative – the Solidarity of the Peoples candidates from contesting the June European Parliament elections. II was a joint ticket of Spanish left-wing parties and several national pro-independence movements within the Spanish state, with world-renowned Spanish playwright Alfonso Sastre (83) the platform’s main candidate.
The Supreme Court overturned the ban on appeal before the poll took place but several serious cases of electoral fraud were documented, in particular missing ballots, leading the II to say that there was a very real possibility that a rightful seat in the European Parliament was denied them. Despite the evidence of electoral fraud, the II’s complaints received virtually no attention from the Spanish Government and media or EU institutions.
The latest arrests are also the outcome of the political parties law through the 18/98 cases, the Jarrai-Haika-Segi case (that put the leadership of the left-nationalist youth movement on trial), and other cases.
In July, the European Court of Human Rights upheld the Spanish Government’s banning of Batasuna, endorsing “an infringement of the basic rights to political action and representation”, according to the outlawed party. The Spanish Government has delightedly sent a copy of the ruling to all its embassies to back up a campaign to silence international support for the right to Basque self-determination and is seeking the extradition of Basque political exiles from countries around the world. Venezuela and France have recently rejected such extraditions. In Ireland, Basque activists Inaki de Juana and Arturo Benat Villnueva are fighting extradition from Belfast to Spain.
As the repression escalates, the international community can show its support for the rights of the Basque people by protesting against the ECHR’s politically-motivated ruling that disenfranchises Basque citizens and closes off avenues to dialogue and peace, and by campaigning for a rejection of the extradition attempts of Basque activists – which would be an international rejection of the Spanish Government’s criminalisation campaign as being against international standards of democratic and human rights.
In the wake of last week’s arrests, Batasuna released a discussion document, reported in the left-nationalist newspaper Gara on Tuesday 20 October, which outlined this new initiative aimed at resolving the political conflict in the Basque Country “without any violence and external interference”.
Batasuna says it aims to build the broadest possible united front of nationalists against Spanish aggression, in favour of the defence of the democratic process, the release of political prisoners and the reconstruction of the negotiation process.
About 35 people of all ages took part in a sponsored walk of Belfast's Black Mountain on Saturday 17 October to raise funds and awareness for the Don't Extradite the Basques Campaign. The next event being organised is a protest outside the Laganside court in Belfast when Iñaki de Juana's hearing begins in November
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/northern_ireland/8322667.stm
Thirty five MI5 officers are to give evidence against three County Armagh men arrested after an operation against the Real IRA, a court has heard.
The trio pleaded not guilty at Belfast Crown Court to the charges, linked to what police believe was an international gun-smuggling operation.
The officers have applied to give evidence anonymously behind screens.
The court heard 90 hours of bugged conversations will be played at the trial, due to begin next April.
Paul Anthony John McCaugherty, 43, from Beech Court in Lurgan, denies a total of seven charges.
Portuguese restaurant
Mr McCaugherty is charged with conspiring to possess firearms and explosives and using 46,000 euros in Bruges and Amsterdam for the purposes of terrorism.
He is also accused of membership of a proscribed organisation.
He faces additional charges of entering into an arrangement to make the deeds of a restaurant in Alvor in Portugal available for the purposes of terrorism.
Dermot Declan Gregory, 41, also known as Michael Dermot, of Concession Road in Crossmaglen, faces a similar charge relating to the Portuguese restaurant.
Desmond Paul Kearns, 44, of Tannaghmore Green in Lurgan, is charged with conspiring to possess firearms and explosives.
All the offences are alleged to have happened between 23 May 2005 and 20 June 2006.
Mr Justice Hart was told by defence lawyers the legal papers were "voluminous" and the taped conversations would take months to transcribe.
The trial is expected to last up to three months.
http://www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/news/politics/tories-would-end-costly-probes-into-northern-ireland-troubles-14542074.html
A future Conservative government will refuse to fund costly inquiries into the Northern Ireland Troubles, shadow foreign secretary William Hague said today.
He told the Ulster Unionist Party (UUP) annual conference in Belfast that it was time for Northern Ireland to move forward.
And he joined UUP leader Sir Reg Empey in claiming their parties' plan to fight the General Election under a joint banner allowed Northern Ireland voters a chance to play a real part in UK politics.
Mr Hague again pledged that any MPs elected on the joint Conservative/UUP ticket would sit in a future Tory government, but the Ulster Unionist Party's sole MP Lady Sylvia Hermon has failed to back the pact and did not attend the conference.
A government-sponsored report on dealing with legacy issues after the decades of violence has, meanwhile, proposed a special commission to deal with the needs of victims and examine unsolved murders.
One of the authors of the document, former deputy chair of the Northern Ireland Policing Board Denis Bradley, has warned the Conservatives against binning the plan.
He called on Conservatives to support efforts to resolve ancient hatreds at the heart of the violence in Northern Ireland for the sake of future generations.
Today Mr Hague said he had accepted the need for the Saville Inquiry into the deaths of Bloody Sunday, when British troops killed 14 civilians, but he expressed concerns that the probe cost taxpayers £200 million.
And while he did not specifically mention the report compiled by Mr Bradley and former Church of Ireland Primate Lord Robin Eames, Mr Hague pointed to his party's concerns over the cost of further inquiries.
"Under a Conservative government there will be no more costly and open-ended inquiries into the past," Mr Hague said.
"It's time for Northern Ireland to move forward."
But with the Ulster Unionists and the Conservatives currently selecting joint candidates ahead of the next election, Mr Hague's speech focused on their new political future.
"Our aim is clear. We want to end the semi-detached political status of Northern Ireland and bring you back into the mainstream of United Kingdom politics," he said.
"It's time to put Northern Ireland at the heart of the union."
He added: "Any Conservative and Unionist MP elected here will take the Conservative whip and have the same rights and responsibilities as every other Conservative MP from England, Scotland and Wales.
"And that means being eligible to serve as ministers in a Conservative and Unionist government for the whole of the United Kingdom."
Critics inside the UUP have claimed the Tory pact risked isolating traditional supporters with left-wing views, but Mr Hague said the promise of a role in a future Cabinet was something no other Northern Ireland party could offer.
Mr Hague pledged Conservative support for savers in the crisis-hit Presbyterian Mutual Society.
He also declared that his party would ban double-jobbing among politicians in Northern Ireland, forcing Ulster Unionist politicians make a choice between sitting in the Stormont Assembly or in Westminster.
The senior Conservative party spokesman condemned dissident republican violence and branded loyalist paramilitaries as thugs. He called on the security forces to deal strongly with groups who fail to embrace peace.
UUP leader Sir Reg Empey said a way had to be found to deal with the legacy of the Northern Ireland Troubles.
But he warned against a "one sided inquisition into the activities of State forces" which he said was being sought by republicans.
Sir Reg also echoed Mr Hague's condemnation of the dissident republican paramilitary groups opposed to the peace process who shot dead two soldiers and a police officer in separate attacks in March.
The UUP leader said that as Northern Ireland's employment minister, he was keenly aware that 2009 had been a tough year for the many people who had lost their jobs.
He said the Stormont Executive had to work harder on the economy and he called on the Government to help the Presbyterian Mutual savers.
He repeatedly endorsed the electoral pact between the two parties, insisting the UUP/Conservative alliance offered a fresh choice to voters.
"The union is not going to be secured and Northern Ireland is not going to be improved if the Ulster Unionist Party just twiddles its thumbs and whistles on the sidelines," said Sir Reg.
"I believe our strategy of building this alliance with the Conservatives cements, secures and safeguards the union."
The Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) has attacked the UUP/Tory pact and said its plans to stand in every Northern Ireland constituency risked splitting the unionist vote and handing seats to republicans.
But Sir Reg said he would not take lectures from the DUP and argued that it was wedded to Sinn Fein in government.
He said his party was ensuring Sinn Fein president Gerry Adams would be thwarted in persuading a future British government to support Irish unity.
"Picture the scene," he told his conference, "when he and Sinn Fein sit down with a future British government to try to discuss his plans for Irish unity and staring across the table from him is, potentially, a member of this party?"
Sir Reg added that successful candidates in the General Election could also help shape UK-wide social and economic policy.
"This is the real politics, the mainstream UK politics that Northern Ireland needs and deserves," he said. "This is what it means to be at the heart of the union."
http://www.derryjournal.com/strabane/Strabane-republican-commemoration.5624949.jp
West Tyrone Sinn Fein MLA Barry McElduff will be the main speaker at this weekend's commemoration held in memory of republican dead from the West Tyrone.
Outlining details of Sunday’s event, Sinn Fein councillor and Chairperson of Strabane District Council, Kieran McGuire said: “Twenty four republicans are listed on the West Tyrone Roll of Honour and Remembrance and this annual commemoration, organised in conjunction with Strabane National Graves, provides an opportunity for family, comrades and friends of our local patriot dead to come together to honour their memory in a collective way.
“The people of this area have continually demonstrated their support and respect for republicans who have sacrificed everything in the cause of Irish Freedom and, on behalf of the organisers I would encourage local republicans to make a special effort to participate in this year’s event.”
The annual commemoration parade will leave from “Ballycolman shops” at 3pm and make its way to the Republican Plot at Strabane Cemetery where Barry McElduff will deliver the main address. En route, a wreath will also be laid at the Hunger Strike Memorial at Townsend Street.
Tea and sandwiches will be served afterwards at Fountain Street Community Centre
http://www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/opinion/dissidents-leave-loyalist-guns-deal-on-a-tightrope-14541869.html
Recent dissident attacks have the potential to derail loyalist decommissioning, writes Alan Murray
Saturday, 24 October 2009
If AIf Andre Shoukri keeps his pledge to hand over all UDA weapons under his control by the decommissioning deadline day next year, a significant cache of guns will be destroyed.
So, too, will his ability to bargain or barter with what his north Belfast UDA faction managed to smuggle into Northern Ireland for terrorist purposes.
New Uzi-type sub-machineguns remain secreted around Shoukri's old stomping ground, but he has given a commitment that these and every other firearm he can pinpoint will be surrendered to General John de Chastelain. So why did he do it?
In his own side of the city two nights ago, a pipe bomb was thrown into the grounds of a TA base. Any credible security forecast for the future would factor in regular and increasingly sophisticated terrorist attacks by dissident republicans.
Since the Belfast Telegraph's sister newspaper, Sunday Life, revealed that the Shoukri-led UDA faction actually decommissioned weapons 11 months ago, his former paramilitary associates have been in something of a pickle, anxiously trying to fathom his intentions.
Previously, a major excuse his Inner Council opponents cited for not decommissioning all their weapons was the concern that Shoukri and others would exploit their defencelessness and wage murderous attacks upon their ranks.
But the south-east Antrim UDA decommissioned the bulk, if not all, of its 'gear' in June and now it has been confirmed by the Independent International Commission on Decommissioning that weapons were handed over by the Shoukri faction last November and destroyed. Being told that the south-east Antrim brigade had decommissioned wasn't the greatest surprise, but being told that the Shoukri faction had followed suit most definitely was.
Given the bomb hoax delay to the funeral of Ihab Shoukri last November, it wasn't considered even remotely likely to happen. And to learn that some decommissioning happened the day after that funeral, and that the intention is to have all the guns decommissioned by the February deadline, is something that wasn't anticipated.
The message from Andre Shoukri so far is clear and unequivocal: the guns are going and he and others will return to north Belfast to live and, in his case, rear his four young children. Whether he is allowed to do that, given his high-profile and easily recognisable face, is a story for another day, but he has in a sense put the cat among the pigeons as far as the UDA Inner Council-controlled brigades are concerned.
No longer can the Inner Council proffer the excuse that Shoukri is a danger, or in a few months' time if he keeps his word, say that he and his supporters are even armed.
When Jackie McDonald - the man referred to as the leader of the Inner Council - decided to divulge that Shoukri had met General de Chastelain he didn't know that guns had actually been decommissioned. He does now.
McDonald doesn't know what weapons were decommissioned - few do - but it was a "significant" haul rather than a substantial haul and the Northern Ireland Office is hugely relieved that what was given over is off the streets.
Now that he knows guns have been handed over by the Shoukri faction, McDonald and those supporting him should be able to argue more compellingly that the threat is vastly diminished.
Last week's car bomb in the First Minister's East Belfast constituency is the bad news that seems to have drowned out Shoukri's move in the rest of the media. However, there are those within the Inner Council grouping who remain opposed to decommissioning before the deadline - the Londonderry/ north Antrim brigade, for one.
A few weeks ago a UDA gun was used to wound a young man for alleged 'drug-dealing activities', so while the guns under the control of Andre Shoukri have remained silent, the Inner Council's have not.
After last week's car bomb and pipe bomb attack, we must hope the dissident republican elements waging a potent new terrorist campaign do not stall the momentum for decommissioning emerging from the loyalist paramilitary shadows.
http://www.westtyronesinnfein.com/news/14836
Speaking in response to the publication of devolution proposals contained in a letter sent to Joint First Ministers Peter Robinson and Martin Mc Guinness by British Prime Minister Gordon Brown, West Tyrone MP Pat Doherty said
'The fact that the British government are now offering to transfer these sites as part of a devolution package is proof that when the politicians and key stakeholders work together it is possible to make seismic progress on a range of matters.
'The campaign to get these sites transferred has been arduous and punctuated with highs and lows. In particular, I remember a terse engagement with a very recalcitrant Defence Minister, Des Browne in Westminster. At that stage, Mr Browne was adamant that transfer was out of the question and that the sites would have to be paid for at full market value, despite commitments made in British Irish agreement of 2004.
'However, such lows were counterbalanced many highs. These included the support and co operation between Omagh District Council and the Educational Campus working group, the creation of a Programme Board headed by Minister Caitriona Ruane and the allocation of over £2 million towards exemplar design work on the site.
'During the past 2 years, we have also had many Ministerial visits to St Lucia and Lisanelly. The vast majority of our local Ministers have been on site and the subject has been the topic of an adjournment debate and formal motion in the Assembly.
'We have also had the Secretary of State, Shaun Woodward, Shadow Secretary of State, Owen Paterson and a delegation from the NI Affairs Committee, including its Chair, Patrick Cormack on site.
'All of these visits helped to raise the profile of this ambitious project and in many ways helped to persuade the British government of the importance of these sites for the future of Omagh. I was particularly gratified that the Lisanelly schools project was specifically mentioned in the letter from Downing Street to the Joint First Ministers last week. Whilst we are not quite there yet, the project certainly has taken a huge leap forward'.
Updated: 11/5/2009
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