(ot fe

ny

| ticle Nov. 5 said the Salvador
Junta is on the verge of collapse |

| the Pentagon to study were a

| Under international law, a

Woolutely demand that

Re -endangering playing with

WORLD _

Civil rights,

__ With the end of the historic hun-
_ 8 strike by the H-Block prisoners,

the issue of Northern Ireland has

-ONce again been relegated to a few

short paragraphs in the back pages
Of the newspapers. The film crews
ave gone, convinced that what-

_ “ver happens in Belfast or Derry
Probably: isn’t newsworthy any-
_ Way,
_ But according to Northern Ire-

latid Civil Rights Association or-
8anizer Kevin McCorry, that has
less to do with the realities of Nor-
thern Ireland than it does with the

_ View of the news media which insist

ON Seeing the country in black-and-
White, either Catholic versus Prot-
“stant or Provisional IRA versus
the British army.

_McCorry, a lawyer and an acti-

| Vistand organizer for NICRA fora

‘ecade, was in Vancouver this

Week as part of a’ cross-Canada

tour aimed at alerting Canadians
to the continuing struggle for de-

_ Mocracy and civil rights in North-
_€m Ireland and raising a campaign
| Msolidarity.

NICRA was the subject of con-

| Siderable media coverage in the ear-

\ypart of the’70s — part because of
the role played by MP Bernadette
Vlin — but has hardly had a ref-
‘fence at all since the press and tele-
vision have focused on the military
activities of the Provisional IRA.
But, says Kevin, NICRA has
fen no less prominent in the long
d continuing struggle against
British rule in Northern Ireland.
h ‘We're continuing the work —
Olding meetings and conferences,
Organizing rallies — and hammer-
Ing away at civil rights issues,”” he
Phasizes.
Headed by P. J. Maclean, one of
“Nose interned and tortured by the

CUBA

Continued from page 1
. Unnamed Reagan ad-
Ministration key officials
Quoted in a New York Times ar-

and there is a general feeling that
Something must be done.”’
, Among options Haig asked

blockade of Nicaragua and/or

and an invasion of Cuba
by U.S. or Latin American
Orces. The Pentagon opposed
Combat use of U.S. troops in
paul America or the Carib-

blockade constitutes an act of
a - Such a blockade is also il-
€gal under the U.S. constitu-
Hon, which says that only Con-
8ress can declare war.

_ The Times article pointed out

at Pentagon officials did not

lieve Congress or the U.S.
oa would support such a

ti Nonetheless, the U.S. con-
Inues its provocative policy,
with Teports that its forces inthe
tibbean-Central American
Tegion have been placed on |
Military alert, with Cuban
-Orces similarly placed on alert
response to the threat.

Nn Moscow, the Communist
be newspaper Pravda this
week warned the U.S., stating,
~Cuba’s friends and_ allies

.ashington immediately end its

KEVIN McCORRY ... urges
broad front around civil rights
issue. ;

‘British in 1971, the organization

has some 300 activists but an affili-
ated membership that far exceeds
that number, including several
trade unions.

More recently, NICRA won the
support and endorsement of the
British Trades Union Congress
which has been crucial in mounting
pressure on the Thatcher govern-
ment.

And the task of NICRA is for-
midable. In the centuries-old cam-
paign of subjugation of the Irish
people, successive British govern-
ments have erected a massive re-
pressive apparatus that. includes
such legislation as the Emergency
Provisions Act and the Prevention
of Terrorism Act and the scores of
punitive regulations that make up
those laws.

“That’s why civil rights is the
basic demand,’’ McCorry insists.
“The urgent need is to unite work-
ing people around issues of de-
mocracy and in so doing to make
inroads into the sectarian policy
that has enabled Britain to domin-
ate Ireland for so long.”’

Although NICRA was part of

democracy real
issues in Northern Ireland

evidence,”’ he says.

Usually in law, confessions ob-
tained under duress are thrown out
as inadmissible. But under the Dip-
lock court system — as the new sys-
tem, named after its originator,
was called — prisoners were in-
stead, forced to prove that police
had used brutality in exacting con-
fessions — a difficult if not imposs-
ible task. : :

As a result, McCorry says,
‘Righty percent of the convictions
are obtained on -the basis of con-
fessions.”’

“The whole aim of the British

policy was to ‘criminalize’ the op-:

position to British rule in Northern
Ireland.”

“But at the same time,’’ he em-
phasizes, ‘‘although the prisoners
are the victims of the British policy,
the issue is much larger than just:
prisoners.

“The issue is the whole British
system of domination — the emer-
gency legislation, the presence of
British troops, the deliberate Brit-
ish perpetuation of sectarianism,
the official policy of violence
against the people of Northern Ire-

. land.”

Andit is in taking up those issues
that NICRA has won considerable
support.

A focus of the association in the
months to come will be the cam-
paign to block the renewal of the
Prevention of Terrorism Act which
comes up for annual renewal in
February, 1982. The Act is a
sweeping abrogation of civil rights
and is the target of a potentially

_ wide campaign. “

the international campaign de--

manding that the Thatcher govern-

ment accede to the five demands of .

the H-Block hunger strikers, it has
opposed the tactics of the Provi-
sional IRA, which has renewed its
bombing campaign following the
calling off of the hunger strike.
“The Provisionals have essen-
tially resorted to terrorism again,”’
McCorry. notes, pointing to the
bombings of the stores in London.
“The bombings are intended as

a response to the British army’s.

continued use of plastic bullets. But
those tactics won’t end the plastic
bullets.’’ :
According to McCorry, the pris-
oners’ campaign, which attracted

international attention, was reallya —

symptom of the larger issue of Brit-

ish domination. In the early 1970s,
the existing system of British tule
broke down, compelling the British
government to impose a direct ad-
u eae Finergency Provi
Utilizing the Emergen -
sions Act (which replaced the old
Special Powers Act of civil war
days) and later, the Prevention of
Terrorism Act, the British brought
in the army and moved swiftly to
arrest and dean any op-
nents of Britis es
age first, the repression: entailed
mass internment of civil rights ac-
tivists, republican sympathizers
and others. McCorry. himself was
interned for three months in 1971,

held, like hundreds of others, with-
out a charge being brought against
him

“But later, rather than a policy
of blanket internment, the British

established a mew court system

which changed the rules of : law,
particularly on the admissibility of

The Act functions not only in
Ireland, but also in Britain where
authorities use its provisions to de-
tain ‘‘almost anybody who has an
Irish accent,’’ McCorry says. He

himself was picked up twice on —

trips to England, held by the police
and fingerprinted without charges
being laid.

NICRA has also been waging a
campaign against the army’s use of
plastic bullets which have already

resulted in several deaths. The ar- |

my introduced the plastic bullet to
replace the rubber bullet which it

claimed was causing too many fa- ~

talities.

“But the plastic bullet has al- -

ready resulted in two and one-half

times as many deaths,”” McCorry ©

says, citing the. British govern-
ment’s own statistics. —-
British prime minister That-
cher’s economic policies, devastat-
ing enough in Britain but near cata-

strophicin Ireland, have also creat-

ed new dimensions to the struggle
in Northern Ireland, with trade un-
ionists being compelled to chal-
lenge British policy in Northern Ire-

_ land.

With unemployment as high as
50 percent in places like Derry, and

“plants closing right and left,”’
trade unions, many of them with

predominantly Protestant mem-

- bership, have organized demon-

strations and rallies including a
mass rally in Derry recently of
10,000 people protesting the British
government cuts. .

At the same time, he warns, the
economic depression has created
new tensions and a new potential
for violence if the British can con-

- tinue to exploit sectarian divisions.

“That is why it is so important to

get the broadest possible front for

democracy — and to see British

“rules as the problem,” he empha-

sizes.

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COMING EVENTS

NOV. 15 — Southern Africa Action
Coalition Film Show: YOU HAVE
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NOV. 19 — Regular meeting Cana-
dian Cuban Friendship Association.
Britannia Centre family activity
room (opp. library), 8 p.m.

NOV. 20 — Annual AUUC Fall Ba-
zaar, 805 East Pender St. starting at
4 p.m., Ukrainian Dinner, Bingo,
Market Place, Handicrafts, Rum-
mage Sale, Home Baking,
Children’s Night :

NOV. 21 — Annual AUUC Fall Ba-
zaar continues starting at 2 p.m.
Same program. Everyone welcome
to attend. :

NOV. 21 — Peace petitioning
downtown.. Meet at B.C. Peace
Council office from 11 a.m. to 3
p.m. Rm. 712 - 207 W. Hastings
St., Vancouver. eee

NOV. 28 — C.0O.P.E. Cabaret with ;

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0.A.P. available at Co-op Books,
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{ : : 4
DEC. 6 — Christmas Labor Bazaar,
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GRAMMA PUBLICATIONS.
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HANDYMAN, reas.
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FOR SALE

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RANKIN, STONE, McMURRAY
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HALLS FOR RENT

RUSSIAN PEOPLE'S HOME —
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rates. Ken

.WEBSTERS CORNERS HALL —

Available for’ banquets, meetings,
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685-5836.

UKRAINIAN CANADIAN CUL-
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Dining
Dancing
Entertainment

COPE Cabaret

Benefit Show for COPE.

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PACIFIC TRIBUNE—NOV. 13, 1981—Page 11

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