At a screening of the behind-the-scenes companion show about the making of Spotlight on The Troubles (to be broadcast next week on Thursday at 9pm after the final extended episode airs on Tuesday at 8.30pm), Mandy McAuley explained her shock when victims’ campaigner Willie Frazer – with whom she had worked while making programmes about victims for two decades – admitted to his role in the distribution of weapons to loyalist paramilitaries. Further questions about the making and suppression of US film The Secret War that captured footage of the IRA at work, and the painstaking efforts to line up interviews and tie down evidence is explained.
The penultimate episode of Spotlight on The Troubles: A Secret History asks why some UVF members of a Mid-Ulster gang escaped prosecution – confronting an alleged prolific serial killer – and asks whether there was a deliberate loyalist strategy to kill family members of committed republicans during the late 1980s and early 1990s, during what is described as “the final burst of violence” before the ceasefires? Tuesday evening at 9pm on BBC One NI and BBC Four.
The polite rebel: Sheelagh Murnaghan by Allan LEONARD 3 October 2019 Sheelagh Murnaghan was the only Liberal Party MP (1961-69) in the Northern Ireland Parliament, representing the constituency of Queen’s University Belfast, which was the venue for a launch event of a new biography about her remarkable life. There were many Murnaghan family members in the audience of a few dozen attending. The book, Sheelagh Murnaghan, was commissioned by the Albert McElroy Memorial Fund, which was established to commemorate the …
I am not sure why the early part of Thursday 14th August 1969 seems so ordinary. There was a certain feeling that the storm had passed. There was a sense of shame looking at the self-inflicted damage on the Falls Road after the night before. A certain excitement maybe that some of us had heard gunfire on Wednesday night. And a certain pleasure that the RUC had been defeated and humiliated in the Bogside. The news said they would be …
“We’ve done interviews with just shy of 100 families who lost children during the Troubles,” explains Freya McClements. “And you feel like you know them. The thing above all is that you want to do them justice and to do their stories justice.” Freya is discussing the research that she and Joe Duffy have done for their book Children of the Troubles, which is published in October. She describes the opportunity to write the book as “a privilege”. Freya admits …
“Unless we start listening, we’re not really going to move forward,” says Julieann Campbell, editor of the Unheard Voices collection of women’s stories from the Troubles. She was interviewed in the latest Forward Together podcast. Julieann reflects in the podcast on the impact on her of the interviews with women about their experiences in the Troubles. “I think it has affected me on several levels, emotionally and in my work,” she says. “It is a fact that it has made …
The priority for my family in August 1969 was getting a new house. Our house in that “mixed” street in West Belfast was falling down. Literally. As you walked into the street, you could see a row of houses lean backwards. The house, like most in the street was “condemned”. Sooner or later it would be knocked down, either as slum clearance or “for the road”. Ah yes, “the road” was a big thing in 1969. There were plans to …
To achieve a united Ireland without a return to conflict requires northern society to resolve the problems of its communities that contain deep-seated deprivation and alienation, argues Fianna Fáil Senator Mark Daly. Mark is the former chair of the Oireachtas Good Friday Agreement Implementation Committee and was interviewed for the latest Forward Together podcast shortly after the release of his report, ‘Returning to violence as a result of a hard border due to Brexit or a rushed border poll: risks …
As next month marks the 50th Anniversary of the Start of the Troubles, I expect there will be some reflective or revisionist discussion. As they say, if you can remember the 1960s, you were not there. And if you can remember the start of the Troubles….well it won’t stop people remembering even though they were still in their mother’s womb at the time. That’s the norm at events at An Féile anyway. Of course many will say the Troubles started …
Stephen Nolan needs to find the right balance between allowing people to express their emotions, without making angry people even angrier. The plea was made in the latest Forward Together podcast by Sinn Fein MLA and former finance minister Máirtín Ó Muilleoir. “In this often divided society, I think the tone and timbre of the debate has to be respectful,” says Máirtín. “We have to find ways of not feeding the ratings monster, not sectarianising a discussion, which has huge sectarian …
The Eames-Bradley report was the best approach yet to how Northern Ireland should deal with Troubles legacy issues, argues Mark Durkan. The former SDLP leader and deputy first minister was interviewed for the ‘Forward Together’ podcast series immediately before declaring his candidacy for Fine Gael for the Dublin constituency in the European Parliament elections. Mark argues that the proposals tabled for the 2013 talks mediated by US envoy Richard Haass were “not as good as Eames-Bradley”. The challenge is also …
On Good Friday 2018, the Ulster Museum opened its doors, and its collections, to a new commemorative exhibition entitled ‘The Troubles and Beyond’. Displayed across hundreds of objects and images, the gallery documents social, political, and cultural changes in Northern Ireland from the civil rights era to today’s post-conflict society. The ‘Troubles’ affected almost everyone who lived in Northern Ireland and many others from further afield. Inevitably the interpretation of this period of our history is contested in terms of …
Linda Ervine is a community worker in loyalist east Belfast, who is also an Irish language activist. Her classes have attracted literally hundreds of people to study Irish at the Skainos Centre on Newtownards Road – proof that Northern Ireland must not be seen merely as a narrow concept of two communities. “We’ve got to reach across the divide,” says Linda in the latest of the ‘Forward Together’ podcast interviews. “Sadly 20 years after the Good Friday Agreement we are …
Last year, an incident of domestic violence was reported to the PSNI around every 18 minutes each day in Northern Ireland. In 1992, a previous study on domestic violence in Northern Ireland, led by Professor Monica McWilliams and Joan McKiernan highlighted the serious consequences of domestic violence for women and children during the Troubles particularly given the availability of guns at that time. It also showed how the conflict limited access to police thereby increasing the power and control of …
Today I’m preparing for my 11th meeting with the World Mental Health Survey initiative, in Harvard. At my first meeting in 2005, Professor Brendan Bunting, Dr Sam Murphy and myself were planning the NI study of Health and Stress (NISHS), the largest study of mental health in NI, and part of an incredible initiative, which studied the rates of mental illness, treated and hidden, in countries all over the world. In 2005, we were having discussed whether people here would …
I’ve never spoke on a public platform before, but feel moved to break my silence and contribute to the 50th anniversary civil rights Program. I always remind my twin brother, Fionnbarra, that I am his senior, being born one hour before him at 134 Bogside, which was then known as a single street which ran from the Slaughter House to the junction of Lecky Road & Rossville Street. My mother Mary Ellen, born 1908. hailed from Ballee, Ballymagory near …
Our Primary 7 classroom shook silently for a second before the noise reached our ears. When it did, it was a low thud followed by a deafening grumble. We all knew what it was; we’d heard many explosions before. After the blast I turned towards the window of the classroom which looked out onto the Glen Road. Someone shouted, ‘That’ll be the barracks again.’ The Andersonstown RUC Station, known locally as ‘the barracks’ would become one of the most bombed …
Without fear or favour: 30 years of Troubled Images
by Allan LEONARD for Northern Ireland Foundation
28 November 2016
The latest incarnation of the Troubled Images project — the launch of a free downloadable iBook — was cause for a reunion of sorts at the Linen Hall Library for the original team that compiled and published its original CD-ROM 15 years ago.
Peacebuilding a shared Northern Irish society ✌️ Editor 🔍 Writer ✏️ Photographer 📸 https://mrulster.com
Digitising the peace process by Allan LEONARD for Northern Ireland Foundation 1 September 2016 “You have to go to the archives!” an academic supervisor once advised me. At the time, this meant physically traveling to where the precious documents were stored, with your official letter requesting access permission, and spending hours transcribing (sometimes with only a pencil allowed). You were thankful if the items were available on microfilm or microfiche, because it took less time to review more material. And …
Funny the things you notice when someone is standing in front of you with a gun. On this particular occasion (because there were many) I noticed three things. Firstly, this person was about the same age as me. Secondly, he looked really pissed off. Thirdly, and I don’t know why I looked at his hands-oh yeah, he was carrying a gun that was pointed kinda in my direction in his hands- I noticed that he had tattoos across his knuckles. …
