On the evening of July 27, Barry McElduff spoke to a meeting of 32 supporters of the Irish freedom struggle at Green Tavern in North East Philadelphia. McElduff is a member of Sinn Fein's Six County Executive Committee, the Sinn Fein Mid Ulster Constituency Representative, and the Party's official spokesperson on legal affairs and justice. This meeting was part of the peace process in Northern Ireland.
In a short speech, McElduff outlined the current situation in Northern Ireland and Sinn Fein's strategy in the peace process. The Sinn Fein leader's main points were: 1) that it was the Republicans who initiated the peace process and are the ones pressing for an agreement. "We are the people who are talking of an agreement. We are the people talking of a new Ireland that will have room for everyone....The cease-fire came about because the IRA decided to create political space for mass struggles." 2) The British government has invented a series of excuses to avoid all-party peace talks, while continuing to hold hundreds of political prisoners and occupying Northern Ireland with 3,000 soldiers. "Britain seems to have no agenda for peace." 3) Sinn Fein's demands are: the release of all political prisoners, creation of a nonsectarian police, and the withdrawal of all British troops."
"Until the British leave resistance will be permanent," he said.
The speech was followed by a lively discussion lasting over an hour. Responding to a question about the Protestants, McElduff replied, "After British withdrawal an agreement with the one and a half million Protestants is absolutely necessary. The Unionists are not the enemy. There are all sorts of class differences and religious differences in the Unionist community and many are beginning to think. We learned a few things from the ANC on our trip to South Africa."
The majority of the people at the meeting were young Irish immigrants, with a sprinkling of older Irish-American Noraid activists.
Roy Inglee
Wilmington, Delaware
Activist fights deportation
"Are the British really serious about this peace process
that's going on when they're chasing after four men 6,000
miles from the north of Ireland to get them back into a
prison in the north of Ireland?" This was Jimmy Smyth's
response to the ruling of a three-judge panel of the Ninth
Circuit Court of Appeals that he be deported.
Smyth was interviewed by phone from San Francisco by Twin Cities radio station WCCO on July 29, two days after the panel's ruling. Smyth, who escaped from Long Kesh prison in 1983 and has lived in the U.S. for eight years, visited the Twin Cities July 9-10 to present his case to supporters here and to introduce a new video, "Uncensored Voices," which contains nearly an hour of interviews with leaders of the freedom struggle in the north of Ireland.
On July 9, he was the guest speaker at the Irish Community Picnic in St. Paul, addressing 120 people. "You don't have to be an Irish Republican or support the IRA [to oppose the extradition]," Smyth said. "You just have to believe in civil and human rights." That evening, he spoke to 40 people at Arise Bookstore.
The next day he spoke to 30 people at a showing of "Un censored Voices" at the Minneapolis College of Art and Design. He also met with the director of the Center for Victims of Torture in Minneapolis.
Tom O'Brien
St. Paul, Minnesota
Haitian refugees
On July 19 the Miami Herald reported the U.S. Coast Guard intercepted a Haitian freighter with over 150 people. The Herald described this group as "the largest number of Haitian refugees intercepted in South Florida since...Aristide returned to power in October." The refugees were taken to the infamous Krome Detention Center to be "processed for exclusion."
This event punctuates the findings of the Militant reporting team to Haiti - that little improvement in the economic conditions faced by Haitian working people has resulted from the U.S. military invasion. The "special period," a term Cubans use to describe the impact of the world capitalist depression on their country, goes on in Haiti.
Now it is easier for many to see the real problem in Haiti, which is continued domination of the island by U.S. capitalism and the International Monetary Fund. There are no plans to improve Haiti for working people any more than there are plans to help Mexico. This is what will continue to drive both Haitian and Mexican workers into the United States.
Jim Kendrick
Miami, Florida
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