I’ve been loath to touch the following as there is loads of gaming going on around it and it is difficult to identify where the truth is. So take a pinch of salt before reading on and making up your own mind.
From what I understand during a recent meeting of the Familes Friends and ex-Prisoners group on Republican Prisoners, a member of the Republican Network for Unity (RNU) had property stolen.
Amongst this property was an alleged internal communication reproduced online, that some claim has been altered. Though using Scribd for hosting usually indicates a document being scanned and wouldn’t be a simple/normal mechanism to host altered material.
The document appeared via a bebo page that also seems to have a pure scan. While that page claims to be a RNU page, it seems to have been recently created with the sole purpose of hosting this (stolen?) document.
The allegations involved seem reasonably serious for those mentioned and Slugger certainly can’t stand over any of them. If true they would indicate serious divisions within RNU in Belfast and not fully stated questions over the motivations of some members.
Though the saga also seems to expose someone willing to go to extreme lengths, including theft, to create problems for the RNU. Who could that be? I’m also aware this document is being heavily punted to the media by people hostile to dissenting republicanism and was pitched to Slugger (by whom I’m not sure) after I came across it.
With other examples of dirty tricks including the distribution of a list with names of alleged dissidents in Loyalist areas and claims mainstream republicans are visiting the homes of people protesting on behalf of prisoners I’m not 100% convinced of the pedigree of the document and even if it is real the timing of its appearance, at a minimum, seems to fit very neatly with a SF agenda.
There is the possibility of legal action around this so we/I request people use an element of caution in any discussion (how realistic the claim of action is I’m unsure but lets not make Mick subject to it).