NetNews Usenet Archive 1992 #18/NN_1992_18.iso/spool/misc/activism/progress/5855

Text File | 1992-08-17 | 8.9 KB | 198 lines

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From: Blythe Systems <[e-mail]>
Subject: NEWS:Ireland Updates/ECN
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Via The NY Transfer News Service ^ All the News that Doesn't Fit

News: Ireland updates /ECN


from:Irland-Solidaritat@spinnberlin

Northern Ireland:Solidaritat Informs


NO EXTRADITION OF ANGELO FUSCO TO THE NORTHEAST OF IRELAND

Members of the Dublin Anti-Extradition Commitee picketed Leinster
House on July, 8th to protest at the Dublin government's
continuing insistence on handing over its citizens to face British
injustice in the Northeast of Ireland.

The picket had a dual function of publicising the High Court
Appeal of current extradition victim Angelo Fusco. Fusco,
currently free on bail, is appealing against a District Court
order that he should be extradited back to the Six Counties. He
escaped from Cumlin Road Jail in 1981. He was subsequently
convicted in his absence of killing a British army captain in an
incident the previous year when British soldiers attacked a house
which a group of republicans were holding. Fusco was now spent
eleven years in jail, most of them in Portlaoise Prison in the
South of Ireland. Despite having served so much time in prison,
the Dublin government remains committed to handing him over,
despite his claims that his actions were politically motivated.

In a statement the Irish Anti-Extradition spokeswoman Nora
Comiskey called for Fusco's extradition to be halted "on the
ground that he has already served the equivalent of a life
sentence in Portlaoise and that his offences were politically
motivated".


TWO DEAD AND ONE GRAVELY INJURED BY LOYALIST GANGS IN BELFAST

Two men were murdered and one seriously wounded by loyalists in
Belfast in the past week. In the first killing a loyalist mob beat
a catholic man to death while the RUC (Irish Police in the North)
and British army looked on and in the second a retired catholic
teacher was shot in his bed by loyalists in a mixed area.

Kieran Abram, from Lower Falls Road - a catholic quarter - was
bludgeoned to death early on sunday morning July, 5th, by a
loyalist mob in full view of a British army observation post at
their barracks. As he walked the loyalist mob attacked him with
cudgels and beat him to death, inflicting terrible injuries and
leaving him dying on the side of the road.

Sinn Fein councillor for the area, Fra McCann, accused the British
army of "complicity in the killing given the free run afforded to
the loyalists". He said that "the week before saw similar attacks
down the street and again the British army allowed loyalists to
walk past them as they moved towards Falls Road".

The second loyalist attack occured on Belfast's Lower Ormeau Road,
the scene of numerous attacks over the last 20 years. Late at
night a loyalist death squad hijacked a taxi in the loyalist Sandy
Row area and drove to the Lower Ormeau Road. As they passed a
group of elderly men who were standing talking outside the local
Chinese take-away, they fired four shots. One of the pensioners
was shot in the chest and arm and another man was hit by flying
shrapnel. The scene of the attack lies near of Graham's bookmakers
shop, where five men were brutally gunned down in February by
loyalists. In these streets, as loyalists were firing British
paratroopers and the RUC were on mobile patrol yet the loyalists
were able to make their getaway up the Ormeau Road to the loyalist
area. The attack was seen by local people as being a reminder to
them to keep off their streets as the Orange Order again marches
through their district this week.

The third loyalist attack happened in East Belfast on July, 7th,
when the UDA shot dead a retired schoolteacher, aged 51, at his
sister's home.


SEXUAL ABUSE - A BRITISH WEAPON OF INTIMIDATION

Sinn Fein's Women`s Department has called upon all women
experiencing sexual harassment and intimidation at the hands of
British crown forces to come forward, so that the real scale of
this appaling practice can be monitored and effectively challen-
ged. Nationalist women in the North face one of the cruelest forms
of repression in the form of sexual abuse from British crown
forces. verbally and physically they suffer this abuse which often
remains hidden because of fear of embarrasment. Now more women are
speaking out.

In the most recently reported case of sexual abuse and assault by
British crown forces, a young mother from the lenadoon area of
West Belfast endured what her solicitor has described as "attemped
rape" at the hands of a British army footpatrol. In a classic
reaction to the trauma of rape she had initially remained silent
about her ordeal Lorraine said:

"I was walking home from a party. I had spent the evening at a
friend's house and I'd stayed until it began to get light because
I was going to walk home alone. So it was around dawn ... There
was a British army footpatrol walking behind me. One of the
soldiers called out. He shouted: "Where were you? Did you have a
nice time?" He then started get abusive, he shouted "That's a nice
short skirt you're wearing". He said I looked like a "tramp"."

Lorraine ignored the comments and continued walking until he told
her to "halt".

"He asked my name but before I could reply, he grapped me by the
jaw, pushing my head backwards until I hit the back of my head on
a wooden fence. He grabbed my two hands with his other hand and
dragged my arms behind my head so that I was pinned to the fence.
He was still squashing my face with one hand and pulling me up
with my arms with the other. He was very rough and my face was
badly bruised and inside my mouth bled where my jaw had been
pushed onto my teeth. My arms were also very sore."

Lorraine described how she became frozen with fear and disorien-
tated as if it was all happening to someone else. "The soldier was
still holding me, his face was pressed close to mine. I tried to
turn my head away but I was held firm. He said he could do
whatever he wanted to do. He said my family were only scum and I
deserved all I got. He was mouthing obsceneties at me. The other
soldiers were all around me ... One of the other soldiers started
fiddling about with the zip or buttons on his trousers.  I don't
know if he exposed himself, I was too afraid to look. I thought I
was going to be raped."

The soldier who was holding Lorraine said she was scum runninmg
about in a short skirt. He put his hand on her thigh and squeezed
it so hard that Lorraine was badly bruised. When Lorraine strted
to cry, he said "You are not such a hard bitch". Lorraine started
to lose consciousness ...

The soldiers were standing around me laughing. One of them pushed
his face into mine, he said "Do you know what we are going to do
with you? We're going to take your clothes off and leave you
lying. You'll have nothing to hide then". He spat at me. I was
terrified. Literally frozen with fear. One of them kicked grit
from the path into my face. He called me a slag and said lots of
obscene things about my family. He told me I was going to be made
an example of."

The footpatrol was then interrpted when a group of people came
into the view.

During typing this the typist was reminded of a nice bid from the
book "The Free" by M.Gilliland (Attack Intern., BM6577, London
WC1N3XX, England) ...

"They stopped. Two metres away. Just when I was going to attack.
The supervisor's arm shot towards the door, and he began in a
screeching shout, his face going red already ... I hated him so
much, this potent puppet strutting over helpless women. Suddenly I
was entirely calm, totally aware. I moved, all my fury and pain
and frustration homing in on one point.

I stepped forward, smiling, and kicked him a vicious whack in the
balls. In the same moment I danced back. Lifted a cup of steaming
tea from a table. Threw it in the face of the oncoming guard. As
his screams began I took another step, I hit him smack on the nose
with the heel of my second hand. He crashed at my feet as I jumped
sideways, I don't know how I managed to do it.

The manager was backing away, dithering. I should have run then.
But my cold fury was still rising, as the entire canteen stood
spellbound, maybe encouraging me, maybe enjoying the horror. For
those moments I could feel no fear or pain.

I feinted a dart past the manager on his left. Then swung up
sudden over his arms. Chopped with the side of my best hand.
Exactly into his throat, smashing his Adam's apple into his
windpipe. I found myself, for a split second, whirled right
around. Gazing into the eyes of about three hundred horrified
women, as the manager fell flat on his face."

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