danny kinahan

Ambassador, you’re confusing us!

Next week Sir Vincent Fean, KCVO, is scheduled to give evidence to the Northern Ireland Affairs Committee. Sir Vincent was educated at Saint Theodore’s Roman Catholic High School and the University of Sheffield and speaks Arabic. According to the  Oxford Research Group , the retired ambassador is particularly interested in Libya’s future.

On 8 June 2008, he wrote to Tony Blair , re the talks between Libya and the USA, in the following terms:

“HMG is not involved in the talks , although some British Citizens might be affected by them [Lockerbie plus some Northern Irish litigants].

It remains a UK objective to promote the City of London as a safe and profitable place for Libya to invest its Sovereign Wealth Fund through the Libyan Investment Authority, which  we hope will open a London office this year.”

He then went on to extol the virtues of selling some arms to Gadafy, a contract worth £400 million  to the UK .

When Sir Vincent appears I will be interested to hear him respond to the following questions.

  1. Having established that Gadafy funded the IRA and provided the Semtex which killed hundreds in the UK, was it OK to be his friend?
  2. Having known about Gadafy’s human rights abuses, was he satisfied that the money to be invested was not stolen from Gadafy’s subjects?
  3. When is money the proceeds of crime and when is it legitimate, or does that depend on which arms company is twisting the Ambassador’s arm?

Small chocolate, anyone?

Tobias Ellwood, a shameful performance

With that insouciance and practised air of effortless ease , Tory Grandee-in-the-making, Tobias Ellwood appeared in front of the Northern Ireland Affairs Committee in September.

He was accompanied by an official from the FCO, Mr Dart.

It should be explained that the Committee is about Paddies.

The  subject matter was irksome and somewhat tiresome. Why had every other nationality been compensated for Libyan Semtex murders except  those from the United Kingdom?

Cue Tobias. Ex Royal Greenjacket.

First up. No, he had not read the transcript of the evidence from the previous week. He had “scanned through  it”. [stuff about Paddies is as interesting as diesel carbon emission statistics].

Second , having scanned through it, he had come to the immediate conclusion that evidence given by experienced lawyers was wrong.

Third. The deliciously named Mr Dart dropped him in it by telling the Committee that the decision not to espouse the victims’ claims was a political one.

Fourth, he had no clue about the value of frozen Libyan assets.

Fifth and most astonishingly, Tobias agreed with Mr Dart that the holders of the frozen bank accounts were entitled to be paid the annual interest accruing. He even indulged in a conversation about this with Ian Paisley.

It will come as no surprise to you, Dear Reader, that the Treasury has told me today that Dart and Ellwood  [do I think of sunglasses at this point?] are completely wrong.

The point about this sorry tale is that Tory ministers pay scant attention to Northern Ireland and can’t even be arsed to pretend.

Let’s hope that those relatives of the victims from Tunisia understand where Perfidious Albion’s interests lie.

It is not with the victims of terrorism then or now.

Humpty Dumpty sat on the fence

Humpty Dumpty told Alice that if he ever fell off the wall, the King would send all his horses and all his men to pick him up.

Our own policing Humpty Dumpty can look forward to the Queen sending him a knighthood, providing he stays on the fence.

Last night Sharon O’Neill asked him a very obvious question; “Who is the leader of PIRA?”

His answer was that membership is a criminal offence and he wasn’t going to do or say anything or speculate on anything which could undermine any future court proceedings.

So there you are Dear Reader, the Chief Con is on the case “following the evidence”. Can’t you see him with his magnifying glass and cape , accompanied by Joe 90, examining the footpaths of West Belfast?

Of course he could have arrested a sizeable proportion of PIRA high command the other week when he met them in a hall in West Belfast, a hall being guarded by a PIRA run security company. He shook hands with a man who has murdered many innocent people. The butchers boy from the Bogside.

To imagine for a moment. George causes a file to be sent to Barra-Boy. It contains evidence against senior members of PIRA, it being a proscribed organisation. Barra, because of his past would have to pass it to the team which bought you such block busters as Cahill and McCartney.

This is just a little fantasy for two reasons.

  1. A number of the northern command and the Belfast brigade PIRA are state agents. Therefore George and MI5 know exactly what is going on in PIRA and keep the Secretary of State informed.
  2. I have been asking since 1990 why no senior member of PIRA was questioned about the murders of my parents.

No senior member of PIRA has ever been convicted.

As Northern Ireland descends into chaos and farce with this , Nama, Red Sky and other imbecilic acts, will the unionist parties have the courage to act?

Don’t hold your breath. As they often say in Ahoghill; “Deus ex machina”.

Libya, Semtex , PIRA and the duplicitous British Government

The regular readers of my blog will know that I have a personal interest in the craven behaviour of the British Government in relation to compensation for the PIRA use of Semtex.

There will be more of this in the coming weeks because the Northern Ireland Affairs Committee has promised to conduct an investigation into why every other nationality received compensation except holders of a United Kingdom passport.

It might interest readers, in the meantime, to ponder this statement.

On 11th September 2008, Gordon Brown [surely the worst prime minister since Spencer Perceval] said, in a letter to my lawyers; “Libya has answered questions about its involvement with the IRA to the satisfaction of the UK government”.

So there you have it. Libya supplied tons of arms, ammunition and explosives to the IRA. Hundreds of people were killed but the UK Government is satisfied.

Of course, at this point Blair had done his deals and UK firms were flocking to Libya. So much for the Paddies…..

Martin McGuinness a sense of outrage?

Given the remarks by participants in BBC Spotlight and previous accusations by me and others, what does it take for McGuinness to be arrested and questioned?

You might think that the DUP and the UUP would be outraged on behalf of their constituents but they are silent. I wonder why?

Will this community never face the truth?

Let me be clear, as politicians are keen to say.

Martin McGuinness is a multiple murderer who was in charge of northern command PIRA and a member of the army council. He probably retains those roles.

He was instrumental in the killing of my parents. He has been accused of all these matters before yet he has not chosen to contest the allegations in court.

I wonder does he have an assurance from the state that he will not be prosecuted?

Shall we ask Barra McGrory, his former lawyer? Now , God help us , Director of [some] Public Prosecutions.

Willie awakes

It’s good to see that the Reverend Doctor William McCrea has taken time out from pastoring and singing to front a statement about victims. He says that the DUP will seek a definition of a victim which excludes terrorist perpetrators.

Most often seen as a nodding head behind his more capable colleagues at Westminster, the reclusive MP for South Antrim [he has twice failed to answer queries from me] describes the current law as “immoral”.

This will be of huge comfort to the victims of Libyan Semtex who, after twenty five years, have yet to see any compensation and much action from the DUP.

Of the one hundred “demands” as the Irish Times described them today, only one relates to victims and this is it.

Victims and their survivors might ponder that in the voting booth.