FREE THE PEOPLE | Release Martin Corey

Ireland: Martin Corey still denied justice, John Downey arrested Martin Corey is a 63-year-old man jailed in the six counties of Ireland's north still claimed by Britain. He has been held for three years without trial. http://www.greenleft.org.au/node/54224 Sinn Fein president Gerry Adams accused the British government on May 24 of breaching commitments given during peace talks over a decade ago. Adams' comments came after the arrest of leading Donegal Sinn Fein member John Downey. http://www.greenleft.org.au/node/54225 -- “Disobedience, in the eyes of anyone who has read history, is humanity’s original virtue. It is through disobedience that progress has been made, through disobedience and through rebellion.” — Oscar Wilde, Soul of Man Under Socialism “Tmmy?” — Jarvis Cocker The 'Disappearance' of Martin Corey; a man who was removed from his home and family, without giving him the right to know why. Martin Corey is a 62 year old man who has now been incarcerated at the behest of the British Secretary of State in Ireland for over three years. Martin has no charge against him and the only justification for his detention by his captors is that there is a dossier of Secret evidence against him. So what is this secret evidence and who gathered it? It leads me to my next assumption, that there must be Secret Police working in the Occupied Six Counties. Here is a definition of Secret Police: "Secret police (sometimes political police) are intelligence agencies and or police agency, law enforcement office which operates in secrecy and also quite often beyond the law to protect the political power of an individual dictator or an authoritarian political regime. ”Instead of transparently enforcing the rule of law and being subject to public scrutiny as ordinary police agencies do, secret police organisations are specifically intended to operate beyond and above the law in order to suppress political dissent through clandestine acts of terror and intimidation targeted against political enemies of the ruling authority. ”Secret police are notorious for raiding homes between midnight and dawn, to apprehend people suspected of dissent. ”People apprehended by the secret police are often arbitrarily arrested and detained without due process." This description sounds very familiar in the context of the Occupied Six Counties currently under British Occupation in Ireland. Familiar today and not 30 or 40 years ago. The internment of Martin Corey strikes at the very heart of democracy and the right to a fair trial. Martin cannot expect a charge never mind a trial. The British government have removed a man from his home and family, without giving him the right to know why. Because they have given no evidence against him, Martin has no chance to challenge his internment. Martin has simply disappeared and it would seem the general public and media are content to allow this to happen. Although We know where Martin is, he has for all intents and purposes simply disappeared , Disappeared from his home with no charge, locked in a prison cell and told he is there due to Secret Evidence. Of course in the western world he is entitled to object to this through the courts, when he did just that a Judge ruled that he should be released as his continued internment was a breach of his human rights. The Secret Police and those who control them stepped in and ordered that he remain in jail, overstepping the rule of the Courts and removing any illusion of due process. What more evidence therefore do we need that the British Government is running a Secret Police force in Ireland to quell political dissent? The use of secret evidence, a secret police and shady dealings going on between the British Government and the judiciary should be enough for any citizen to publicly question what is going on. It is now time that the media investigated what IS going on, that those concerned with human rights issues and all citizens demand an explanation as to why a 62-year old man was taken from his home and incarcerated due to secret evidence that we cannot see. I question the secret evidence, is there evidence at all? Or is this a well rehearsed ploy to stifle political dissent? Demand the release of Martin Corey, do not allow this inhumanity to continue. By Cáit Trainor, of the Release Martin Corey Committee. "First they came for the socialists,and I didn't speak out because I wasn't a socialist.Then they came for the trade unionists,and I didn't speak out because I wasn't a trade unionist.Then they came for the Jews,and I didn't speak out because I wasn't a Jew.Then they came for me,and there was no one left to speak for me."

http://www.releasemartincorey.com/

GREEN LEFT - Ireland - Martin Corey

Ireland: Political prisoner Martin Corey denied justice

Monday, June 3, 2013

By Barry Kearney

Martin Corey is a 63-year-old man jailed in the six counties of Ireland's north still claimed by Britain. He has been held for three years without trial.

On April 16, 2010, Corey’s house in Lurgan was visited by members of the Police Service of Northern Ireland (PSNI) and Corey was arrested.

When he asked what the charges were, Corey was told that the police officers “did not know”. All they were told was to arrest Corey.

Corey is a republican who, in his youth, fought against the foreign occupation of his land. During this struggle, he was charged with the murder of two members of the Royal Ulster Constabulary (RUC), the forerunner of the PSNI. Corey was found guilty and sentenced to life imprisonment in December 1973.

Corey served just short of the next 19 years behind bars; he was released in June 1992. He did not sign any documents imposing conditions on his release.

Corey returned to Lurgan, where he set up a successful business as the local grave digger, formed a long-term relationship and settled down to a peaceful life.

That was, until his arrest three years ago.

Corey is still in jail and he still does not know what the charges against him are. Corey’s legal team also do not know what the charges are and nor does any judge hearing the case against him.

This is because, according to the British Northern Ireland Office (NIO), he is being held on “Undisclosed or Secret Charges”. A special advocate appointed by the NIO can view the evidence and tell the judge what they can do.

This makes a mockery of the judicial system when a politician, the secretary of state for Northern Ireland who is unelected by people in Ireland's north, can determine a person's freedom. Corey is selectively interned by an unjust British system.

As a prisoner with a life sentence, Corey is entitled to a parole hearing every 12 months. However, since he was arrested in 2010, this has been continually adjourned or not even scheduled.

The conditions Corey is being kept under are a disgrace. Mail has been kept from him for weeks at a time, craft that he has made has been smashed by vindictive prison officers and he has been denied proper medical treatment within a reasonable time.

In May last year, Corey appealed his jailing on the grounds that he had not been charged with any crime nor brought before a judge.

In his verdict on the appeal, Justice Treacy said Corey's human rights had been breached. He ordered Corey to be released immediately and placed no conditions on the release.

Corey returned to Maghaberry Prison to pack his belongings and his family travelled from Lurgan to take him home. While Corey waited in the prison's reception area he was told the then-secretary of state for Northern Ireland, Owen Paterson, had ordered him to be returned to his cell.

The NIO had appealed Treacy’s decision, but only after Treacy had boarded a plane and was about to leave the country. With Treacy out of the way, a patsy of the British NIO upheld its appeal and Corey was sent back behind bars.

When Corey’s legal team found out, they immediately launched legal action against the NIO's appeal, but to no avail. Corey finally got to appeal the decision in the High Court on July 11, more than six weeks after Treacy's original decision.

The NIO's appeal was upheld and Corey's case was set to be reheard on November 26. At the rehearing, a panel of three appeals judges upheld the NIO's decision to keep Corey incarcerated.

Corey’s legal team then applied to the High Court for permission to take their case before the Supreme Court in London.

They were confident of winning in the Supreme Court, but in early May, their euphoria was cut short as the appeal was denied without any valid reason being given.

If you look beyond this denial, you will see British intransigence at its best. Denying Corey the right to appeal to the Supreme Court blocks his application to the European Court of Human Rights, as he has not exhausted all domestic avenues.

British politicians can be quick to point the finger about human rights abuses elsewhere in the world, but are quiet when such are abuses are carried out by their own government.

The 1998 Good Friday Agreement, signed as part of the peace process to end armed conflict in Ireland's north, came with the promise of equality and justice for all. But 15 years on, Corey is one of those still suffering from a great injustice at the hands of a vindictive British government.

The law of the land must prevail. If the British authorities believe Corey is guilty of a crime, then they must charge him and bring him before a court of law, where he has the right to defend himself. Rather, he has been forced to fight an invisible foe in the guise of undisclosed charges.

The time is well passed when Martin Corey should be freed.

[Barry Kearney is a member of the James Connolly Association Australia, Melbourne.]

From GLW issue 968

Tags:

• Britain
• civil liberties
• democracy
• Ireland
• national liberation