BY ROSE KNIGHT
LONDON - Róisín McAliskey, 25, the daughter of Irish nationalist Bernadette Devlin McAliskey, was refused bail at Bow Street Magistrates Court here December 13. Neighbors and supporters from Coalisland, her hometown in County Tyrone, northern Ireland, raised 300,000 (1 = US$1.65) to provide funds for her bail application.

Attorneys representing the government of Germany, which is demanding her extradition, argued that she was likely to disappear if given bail. Supporters organized a picket calling for "No extradition, release Róisín." Her name was also read out along with other Irish political prisoners at a picket the next day outside Belmarsh prison in South London. Picketers shouted "Irish prisoners on remand, Guilty without trial."

McAliskey was arrested November 20 and taken to Castlereagh Interrogation Center near Belfast, northern Ireland. She was interrogated by the Royal Ulster Constabulary (RUC) for five days, from 8 a.m. in the morning until 1 a.m. the following morning. The RUC did not bring any charges against her. But Bonn has demanded her extradition allegedly as a suspect for an attack on the British army base at Osnabruck, Germany, which the German government claims was carried out by the Irish Republican Army (IRA).

McAliskey was then flown to the United Kingdom so that extradition proceedings could begin. She was taken to the women's prison at Holloway, London. She was the first woman to be transferred from there to an all-male high security prison at Belmarsh, South London, where she was put into a special secure unit (SSU), held in solitary confinement for six days without natural light, and denied physical exercise.

Bernadette Devlin McAliskey and her partner, Sean McCotter, traveled to Belmarsh prison for an arranged visit. Fianna Fail T.D. (Irish member of parliament) Eamon O'Cuiv was also due to visit the same day. All were refused entry into the prison. They then discovered that Roisin had been moved back to Holloway. McAliskey's lawyer Gareth Peirce said the sudden transfer was "hardly accidental and deliberate in design" and was aimed at preventing her family from visiting her.

Irish fighters on remand (in custody without a trial) in Britain are treated in ways similar to McAliskey. Of the 14 inmates on remand, 12 are reportedly in SSU's, deprived of educational, recreational facilities, and access to church services. When prisoners at Belmarsh make court appearances they are forced to undergo rubdown searches, two full strip searches, and body searches during which they are made to squat over a mirror to check for objects hidden in their bodies. Resisting this abuse leads to a beating. When their families and lawyers visit, they are separated from them by a reinforced glass screen, and have to communicate via telephone monitored by a prison officer. Sleep deprivation is also practiced: lights are kept on in the cells, and guards wake up prisoners every hour all night.

Fuiscalt, the Irish political prisoners campaign in the UK, is calling for an end to the barbaric conditions in which Irish prisoners are held in English jails. The group's demands include the banning of SSU's, the transfer of Irish POW's to Ireland, immediate release of all Irish political prisoners, and the stopping of extradition to the UK. Fuiscalt is calling for the release of Róisín McAliskey.

The inhuman treatment of McAliskey has exacerbated her medical condition. She is having a difficult pregnancy, complicated by digestive and muscular disorders and stress related asthma. When she arrived in Britain the police doctor who examined her entered a note on her custody record saying that McAliskey should be kept under constant medical supervision and have access to an emergency obstetrics unit. An appointment was made at Whittington Hospital near Holloway prison, but she was transferred to Belmarsh before she could attend. Belmarsh has no obstetric facilities.

At the remand hearing December 13, magistrate Ronald Bartle said the doctor's report made "disturbing reading." It said that McAliskey showed signs of advanced starvation due to repeated vomiting. Peirce, her lawyer, said she was kept in her cell at Holloway for 23 hours a day and that during the night the light was kept on so she could not sleep.

Supporters of McAliskey are asking that letters of protest be sent to German consulates and embassies around the world demanding she be released on bail at the next remand hearing December 20. A picket is also being organized outside Bow Street Magistrates Court, where the hearing will take place.  
 
 
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