A HISTORY OF ARMAGH JAIL .......
The women's prison in the North of Ireland is situated in the centre of the Protestant/Loyalist city of Armagh .
It was built in the 19th century , a huge granite building which today sports all the trappings of a high-security jail such as barbed wire , guards , arc-lamps , and closed circuit television cameras .
First published in the booklet ' STRIP SEARCHES IN ARMAGH JAIL' , produced , in February 1984 , by 'The London Armagh Group' .
The details leading up to a sustained assault on the women prisoners by male and female prison officers , in February 1980 , are harrowing ; male warders had been on the prison wing for three days during which time the women were not allowed access to the toilet - they began to empty their excreta out of the spyholes and windows . When these were blocked up , they smeared it on the walls .
The women prisoners were offered a return to 'normality' if they would cease their ' no-work' protest for political status - this they refused to do . ('1169.....' Comment - we wonder how many of their sons and daughters are now members of this political party which , in 1998 , signed away that same right to political status in return for a political career ?) As their own excrement was almost the only part of their lives over which they could exercise control , they used it as another form of protesting against the political nature of their imprisonment .
In March 1980 , on the anniversary of their previous picket in 1979 , 'Women Against Imperialism' called for a mass demonstration ; feminists travelled from the rest of Ireland , from England , Scotand , Wales and elsewhere to support the prisoners' claim for political status and to assert the right of 'Women Against Imperialism' to picket their local jail on International Womens Day . Those pickets are now an annual event .
Protesting POW's in the H-Blocks of Long Kesh began a hunger strike for political status in October 1980 - they were soon to be joined in the protest by the women in Armagh Jail .......
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ELECTION INTERVENTIONS.......
Despite the fact that SINN FEIN has been contesting local elections in the 26 counties for more than two decades , much comment has been passed and incorrectly interpreted about Republican involvement in elections - north and south of the British-imposed border - in the past several months .
Here we review Republican interventions in the electoral process for the past century and more .
From 'IRIS' magazine , Volume 1 , Number 2 , November 1981 .
The Free State government called a general election for August 27th , 1923 ; Sinn Fein declared its intention to contest 87 seats on an abstentionist basis - the Free Staters moved against the Sinn Feiners . Harassment of election workers , arrests and attacks on Sinn Fein members (one man was killed) seriously disrupted Sinn Fein's election machine . Despite this , the Republicans returned 44 TD's , with the Staters winning 63 .
Later , in by-elections in November 1924 , Sinn Fein increased its vote in all five constituencies contested . The Republican underground government of the Second Dail continued to meet - in consulation now with those TD's elected in 1923 and 1924 - and although the Republican vote continued to rise in every by-election contested since the general election of 1923 , massive discriminatory laws against Republicans were forcing more and more activists - released from prison or home from a life 'on the run' - into exile . The Free State government's system of patronage and its use of the oath to the Free State constitution as a condition of employment in almost every sphere of work made it most difficult for Republicans to live in Ireland : in 1925 , more than 30,000 people emigrated to countries outside Europe .
The victory of 1918 was reduced to ashes ; nine short years after the Easter Rising - exhausted and demoralised by a bloody war against the British and by a shorter but bloodier war between Irishmen - the Irish people had nothing but partition and embitterment to show for their aspirations and struggle . Republican Ireland is still recovering from the effects of that period in our history ; partition , with its effects , has become one of the single greatest obstacles to the unity of the Irish people . Republicans have contested elections since then - with varying degrees of success - in 26 County , 6 County and Westminster elections.......
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IN THE SHADOW OF A GUNMAN .......
The aspirations of SINN FEIN THE WORKERS PARTY towards socialist respectability are undermined by the continued military operations of the OFFICIAL IRA and that Party's own ideoligical contortions .
From ' MAGILL' magazine , April 1982 .
By Vincent Browne.
The man in charge of the eight-man Official IRA punishment squad is from the North and was formerly a member of Clann na hEireann (the Sinn Fein Workers Party British support organisation) and was deported from England ; he carried out several robberies in that country for the organisation prior to his deportation . It was he who led the gang of eight men to The Dockers Pub that Sunday morning and it was he who assembled that gang for the operation . They had convened earlier that morning in a house near the North Strand in Dublin , a place where the Official IRA Dubin Unit still meets regularly . Information about this incident comes primarily from one of the eight men who were involved , and from one of the victims .
People who were members of the Official IRA until recently tell us that there is no way that this incident could have happened without explicit authorisation for it from a senior Officer in the Official IRA , who is also a member of Sinn Fein The Workers Party . As the two victims had been involved with the Communist Party there were protests from the latter about this incident to the leadership of SFWP , who denied any knowledge of the attack or the involvement of any of its members in the whole affair .
In the course of an interview for this article with Tomas MacGiolla , President of SFWP , and Sean Garland , General Secretary , they both recalled hearing of the incident at the time and remembered the correspondence with the Communist Party - they both denied that members of SFWP had been involved and said that as they were unaware of the existence of the Official IRA they were not in a position to make any observations about its involvement or otherwise in the incident . Such incidents are almost unique in the South of Ireland , where SFWP is keen to project a respectable image while it competes for votes as a regular conventional politial party of the left . But those incidents are commonplace in the North of Ireland .
The leadership of Sinn Fein The Workers Party now consistently deny any knowledge of the Official IRA or any involvement by the party in military activity .......
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