BY PAUL DAVIES AND SHELLIA KENNEDY

LONDON - Working people in Catholic areas of British- occupied Northern Ireland are stepping up their fight for the re-routing of marches through their neighborhoods organized by right-wing loyalist thugs.

People from all over the Six Counties converged on Garvaghy Road, Portadown, on July 20 to protest the decision of the Royal Ulster Constabulary (RUC) to allow a loyalist Orange Order to march through their community.

Sinn Fein leader Jim Gibney stated, "They were there to say thanks to the local people for standing up for all the nationalists and for asserting in their own blood - spilt on Garvaghy Road, from bones crushed by RUC batons and plastic bullets - that nationalists have rights and no-one, no force, no matter how powerful, will be permitted to trample over those rights...They were there to celebrate the resistance of a small community, surrounded on every side by hostile forces, to tell them they were proud of them."

The action in Portadown was one of several to take place in the past ten days. Throughout the summer months loyalist forces organized actions aimed at intimidating Catholics as part of their attempts to preserve the system that allows Protestants to be treated preferentially. This caste-like system has been at the center of the sectarian state in Northern Ireland since its establishment in the 1920s, following the defeat of a democratic revolution to end British rule throughout Ireland.

At a press conference in London, Sinn Fein leader Martin McGuinness held the British government responsible for the attacks on Catholic areas. "We are not against Protestants marching," he said, "but they can't march through nationalist areas. It's like the Ku Klux Klan marching through Black townships. Sinn Fein wants to discuss with the Orange Order and the RUC how everyone can march without confrontations."

The RUC, which is an armed, paramilitary police force under London's direct control, has been the backbone of the defense of the loyalist marchers.

The Constabulary has donned riot gear and fired thousands of rounds of lethal plastic bullets in this effort.

Despite plastic bullets and violence that caused injury to several people, the RUC was unable to shepherd a rightist parade through a Catholic area in Keady, County Armagh, July 27.

Residents of the small village of Dunloy, also prevented a rightist march on July 11. Dunloy Residents and Parents Association chairman Paddy O'Kane said, "We are a nationalist community here, there are no Protestants. The people who come to parade in this village, come from far and wide, even Newcastle, County Down. We had a very peaceful 12th of July. The Orangemen came here on the 11th of July to parade, but they didn't."

The Residents Association had attempted to meet with the Orange Order on several occasions to no avail. The 1,500 residents of the village have now raised the 3,000 (US$ 4,650) needed to seek court action to block the August 10 rightist demonstration, traditionally the biggest of the Orange Order marches.

When republicans took to the streets in north Belfast they too were met by extreme RUC violence. "Casualties kept coming in from all over the area," said local activist Kieran O'Sullivan. "Most were plastic bullet injuries, people had injuries to the head and upper body despite `regulations' on the use of plastics. In all my years I've never seen so much blood coming from one district. It was a bloodbath and the RUC enjoyed every minute of it."

Community leaders in the predominantly Catholic Bogside area of Derry have succeeded in arranging a meeting with the rightist "Apprentice Boys" group about a planned August 10 march through the city. The march formally commemorates the siege of Derry in 1689, led by forces loyal to the British king, William of Orange, during Britain's military conquest of Ireland.

This is the first time that the rightist group has been prepared to talk with community groups in Derry led by republican ex-prisoners. The talks were announced 12 hours after 1,000 workers and youth took to the streets, demanding an end to loyalist marches through their area.

The ongoing republican resistance is fueling the visible crisis of British rule in Northern Ireland. The so-called "peace talks" relaunched in June have stalled as representatives of London and Dublin, bourgeois nationalists, and different brands of Unionists haggle over the proposed agenda and the ground rules for negotiations. Sinn Fein, the leading nationalist group, remains excluded from the talks.

Prime minister John Major let the cat out of the bag as to his real objective in excluding Sinn Fein: London's desire to maintain British rule. "Northern Ireland is part of the United Kingdom, just like Surrey," he said. Surrey is one of the richest counties in south east England.

London's pretext for excluding Sinn Fein - the ending of the IRA cease-fire-was shown to be spurious when on July 22 Major met with leaders of the Progressive Unionist Party and the Ulster Democratic Party. The two organizations are tied respectively to the loyalist death squads Ulster Volunteer Force and the Ulster Freedom Fighters.

Sinn Fein national chairperson Mitch McLaughlin blasted the British government. "The parties he is meeting today are part of the unionist conspiracy, during which two men were murdered, nationalists were burnt out of their homes and widespread damage was caused," McLaughlin said. "Unionists clearly broke the Mitchell principles, yet Major refuses to meet Sinn Fein. His refusal to meet Gerry Adams lacks any credibility. He should meet him immediately."

Former U.S. senator George Mitchell, chairman of the talks, has proposed that the decommissioning of paramilitary weapons be removed from the main negotiations, now due to start in September. He proposed organizing discussion on decommissioning alongside the main talks.  
 
 
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