BY PETE CLIFFORD
LONDON - More than 4,000 people marched through the Garvaghy Road area of Portadown, Northern Ireland, March 22 in a protest against the forthcoming marches by the Orange Order and other rightist groups, which are routed through this Irish nationalist area.

The pro-British parades are aimed at intimidating supporters of Irish self-determination and reinforcing the anti-Catholic discrimination that is a pillar of London's rule in Northern Ireland.

For the last few years there have been major clashes in July as the British Army and police have fired plastic bullets and imposed curfews to facilitate the parades.

Indicating the connection between this issue and the talks on the future of Ireland, Sinn Fein leader Francie Molloy told the demonstrators, "If they trample feet down this road again, they are sending a signal to nationalists that nothing has changed."

The following day Sinn Fein, the party leading the nationalist struggle for Irish freedom and unification, rejoined the negotiations. They had been excluded on February 16 amid false claims that the Irish Republican Army had broken its cease-fire, a precondition set by the British and Irish governments for Sinn Fein's participation in the talks.

Government officials are making contradictory statements about whether an agreement will be reached in the negotiations. After meeting with Sinn Fein president Gerry Adams, British prime minister Anthony Blair said they were "agonizingly close." But just three days later, Irish Taoiseach (prime minister) Bertie Ahern told the Irish Times, "Can we reach an agreement? It is not possible to be certain."

In one of many commentaries in the big-business press, Financial Times columnist John Murray Brown wrote March 6 that when the two governments met to "fine tune" a settlement, "differences emerged over the mechanics."

Adams responded to this speculation in a feature article in the paper Ireland on Sunday. Titled "A bridge to the future," his article stated, "The real point is not whether there will be an agreement by May. It is about what kind of agreement is required to bring about a durable and lasting peace and whether this is the type of agreement the two governments are trying to put in place." Adams charged that while the Blair government "has brought a new approach in style," the "substance of its position in relation to an agreement remains the same as the last government."

Speaking in Belfast shortly after his election last year, Blair declared, "I believe in the United Kingdom. I value the union" between Britain and Northern Ireland. Within this framework, the British and Irish governments proposed a three- strand outline for a settlement on January 12. Known as the "Provisional Heads of Agreement" document, the proposed agreement included an elected assembly in Northern Ireland, an all-Ireland body to promote cooperation between the Irish Republic and Northern Ireland, and a "Council of the British Isles" to review the relationship between Britain and Ireland. Both governments said they hoped to conclude agreement on these proposals by May, and then hold referendums in the Irish Republic and Northern Ireland.

As the days went by it became clear that the linchpin of these proposals was the assembly for Northern Ireland. Blasting this as an "internal settlement," Sinn Fein rejected the proposals on January 19. From the British-imposed partition of Ireland in 1921 until assuming direct rule in 1972, London ruled Northern Ireland through the Unionist Party, which controlled such an assembly based in Stormont Castle, Belfast. Adams made clear in his article that "an internal Six-County settlement is not a solution and that the real question is how do we end British jurisdiction in Ireland."

Adams explained there had been an "erosion of confidence" in the talks among nationalists, not just because of the proposals for an internal settlement but because London continues to maintain the same methods of rule today in Northern Ireland. Speaking to a packed meeting of Irish workers and others in Queens, New York, March 13, Adams said he had told Blair, "If you value the Union, then you value unionism and all its sectarianism."

Illustrating Adams's point, London has sought to defend this year's Orange marches going through nationalist areas. The government has appointed an entirely pro-British body as a "Parades Commission" to supposedly look into the re-routing of these marches. Notable among the appointees is Glen Barr, a former leader of a pro-British death squad, the Ulster Defence Association. The only two Catholics on the body have previously worked for the police.

Nationalists' concern has also been sharpened by revelations about March 3 murder of two men by the pro- British Loyalist Volunteer Force (LVF). Blair reacted with crocodile tears to the killings in a Catholic-owned bar in Poyntzpass, Northern Ireland, declaring that the friendship of the two murdered men, one Catholic and the other Protestant, should "stand as a symbol of the peace process and why it must succeed." A few days later David Keys, one of four LVF supporters arrested for the murder, was himself killed in his prison cell, most likely by fellow LVF inmates. Sinn Fein charged that he had been a police informer.

Calling on the Royal Ulster Constabulary (RUC) to explain the truth, Sinn Fein leader Alex Maskey demanded to know whether Keys "was still an agent at the time of the Poyntzpass killings, and what prior knowledge did the RUC have of the Poyntzpass and other killings." He added, "The murky underworld of those in the RUC responsible for running informants, the levels of collusion between the loyalist death squads, the RIR [Royal Irish Regiment, a locally recruited British Army unit], and the RUC all suggest that elements within the RUC had to have prior knowledge. This view is further substantiated by the fact that all those arrested for the Poyntzpass killings are ex-British soldiers."

Despite there being no change to the substance of London's rule, the British rulers are acting from a position of weakness. They were unable to extend Sinn Fein's exclusion from the negotiations beyond March 23, nor prevent Sinn Fein leaders from carrying out a major speaking tour of the United States and a meeting with U.S. president William Clinton. In response to the international hearing nationalist fighters are gaining, London has also had to end attempts to extradite Róisín McAliskey to Germany to face trumped-up charges, as well as concede a new public inquiry into the British Army murder of 14 Irish civil rights demonstrators in Derry, Northern Ireland, on Bloody Sunday, Jan. 31, 1972.

These moves have strained the bipartisan stance on Ireland in London. Conservative Party spokespersons condemned the McAliskey decision and protested the announcement that Adams was invited for the first time to a reception at the British Embassy in Washington during the March 17 St. Patrick's Day festivities.

While London has been forced to backtrack, Adams said in his article "A bridge to the future" that Sinn Fein's objective of a united Ireland is "unlikely to be achieved" by May. Nevertheless, he said, "There should be agreement on the peace objective of making the island a better place for all the people who live here." After May, "if the RUC or the British Army are still patrolling the streets, or if triumphalist marches go where they are not wanted, or the equality agenda is still only a `wish list,' then there has been no real agreement." The Sinn Fein leader put forward what he described as "transitional arrangements" in four areas that are required by nationalists. They include an all- Ireland body with executive powers with immunity from the veto of any proposed six-county institution; a change in British jurisdiction with no dilution to the claims of Ireland as a nation, along with the extension of representation in the Irish parliament to citizens in the North; a shift from "equity" of treatment to equality for Catholics; the end of repressive legislation, the release of political prisoners, disbandment of the RUC, and the removal of British troops from Ireland. Adams described these as the "minimal requirements if a level playing pitch is to be established."

Meanwhile Irish Taoiseach Ahern is facing a growing debate about moves to dilute the Irish Republic's constitution. Its Articles 2 and 3 lay claim to the whole of Ireland. Ahern has offered to change these as part of a settlement with London. The Irish News reported March 23 that Ahern is being forced to tour the branches of his own party, Fianna Fail, as opposition mounts to this scheme.

Speaking at the meeting in Queens, Adams explained to applause that he had told Blair that if "we cannot have a united Ireland by May, then we cannot have a United Kingdom either." Adams told the crowd, "The Brits will move slowly, the unionists will try to prevent the advancement of the process, but there remains one, simple key to our efforts -we are right."  
 
 
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