People of the World are Fighting Back What the deluded Americans do not seem to realize is that they are on their own. The only entities willing to support their aggression on Syria is Saudi Arabia and Israel.
By Finian CunninghamAugust 31, 2013 "Information Clearing House - The United States of America stands exposed in the eyes of the entire world as the number-one terrorist threat to the future of humanity. Many have known this fact already, but now it is universally clear.
As the US prepares to launch an overt war on Syria (the covert war has been raging for 30 months), the vast majority of humanity can finally see through all its decades of pretense and conceit as the world’s model of democracy and international law. And what they see is the ugly opposite. The US is a terrorist state that holds international law, democracy and human rights in utter contempt. It is ready, as it always has been, to kill countless civilians for its selfish political ambitions. That is the conventional definition of “terrorism”.
Syria’s President Bashar al-Assad made a profound point recently when he said that his country has faced aggression for more than two years, but only now is the real enemy revealing itself - the US and its minions. But the US terrorist state is not just being called out over Syria. It is being revealed as the enemy to the entire world.
From past wars in the Caribbean, Central America, Philippines, Vietnam and Indochina, through coups and covert ops in Iran, Iraq, Africa, to recent killing fields in Afghanistan, Yemen, Pakistan and Somalia, the historical picture is now complete. All these conflicts and many more - too many to mention here - integrate into one indisputable truth. The US is the world’s biggest terror state. If it is not dealt with definitely, then the future of the world is in peril more than ever.
In previous crimes of aggression, the US ruling elite could invoke the spurious cover of “a coalition of the willing”, or the abused authority of the United Nations or NATO. It was able to do that through deployment of lies, fabrications and a supine mass media that would lend credibility to the mendacity. Now, thanks to alternative, critical media and instant global communications, the American lies don’t work any longer. In an instant, they are exposed; just like the attempt in the last few hours of US Secretary of State John to frame up Syria over alleged chemical weapons use.
The New York Times, BBC and the usual Western media mouthpieces for imperialist propaganda dutifully facilitated Kerry and his US state terrorism with bombastic, important-sounding headlines: “Kerry lays out evidence against Syria”. There was hardly a critical question raised, even though there are grounds for dozens such questions. Years ago, that kind of herd-think might have been enough to buy the US warmongers enough time to launch a war - but not any more. Within minutes of Kerry’s supposedly definitive condemnation, statements, articles, tweets and blogs were pulling the charade asunder, showing that apart from Western-media-amplified bombast, Kerry was not saying anything of value. It was just another risible repetition of earlier hyperbole and empty rhetoric. Or in short, lies.
The people of the world have reached a critical mass of intolerance towards the rogue terror states of the US, Britain, France, Israel and a few other accomplices. We have watched their relentless mass murder and exploitation of fellow humans in Asia, Africa, and the Americas. We have witnessed how this tiny group of state terrorists imposes on the vast majority of humanity their vile criminality and in the process then insult us with grotesque lies and justifications. We have seen how these rogue states have stolen land, poisoned people’s water, burnt their crops, dispossessed their homes, assassinated families with aerial drones and ground drones in the form of death squads. They have committed all these shocking crimes with lies and impunity to the point where now these state terrorists are operating in more than one country simultaneously in a permanent state of relentless war, pushing the very future of humanity to the brink.
However, despite this lawlessness and gangsterism, the people of the world are fighting back.
This week the British parliament voted against the London government’s arrogance to provide its usual criminal special relationship to the Americans. In the execution of past war crimes in Afghanistan, Iraq and Libya - to mention a few - Washington could rely on the trusty British imperialists to give a veneer of “coalition of the willing”. British premier David Cameron’s plans to repeat the criminality by backing Washington’s plans to bomb Syria were dealt a crushing blow by the British parliament voting against any such military action. Cameron was forced to withdraw. The vote in the British parliament is not so much a sign of ethics among Britain’s political class. It is more a reflection of the global awakening among ordinary citizens that this insane state terrorism must stop.
The French government has also backed off earlier bellicose bravado, with French President Francois Hollande belatedly calling for a “peaceful, political solution” over the Syrian crisis. Even Washington’s reliable Canadian puppet Prime Minister Stephen Harper has said that his country will not be getting involved military in Syria. It is also reported that 10 members of the NATO alliance - one-third of the total - are not willing to support American strikes. This latter grouping comprises the usual minions of the US. And we haven’t even yet acknowledged the more strident opponents, such as Russia, China, Iran and the majority of nations elsewhere in Asia, Africa and the Americas.
The people of the world have had it with elite Western rulers acting as terrorists who are holding humanity to ransom. The rulers are presiding not only over military terrorism. They are inflicting economic, social and ecological terrorism with their bankrupt capitalist smash-and-grab system. That system has reached the point of meltdown and that is why we are being pushed into relentless wars - in order for the rulers and their politician puppets to corner the remaining resources. The ultimate solution to end the wars is for the people to overthrow the economic system that US and Western elite rulers preside over. The insane criminality of the US rulers over Syria is exposing this historic challenge facing humanity.
After the British parliamentary setback the US Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel said: “Our approach is to continue to find an international coalition that will act together. It is the goal of President Obama and our government... whatever decision is taken, that it be an international collaboration and effort.”
Can you believe how ridiculous these American puppets sound? What the deluded Americans do not seem to realize is that they are on their own. The only entities willing to support their aggression on Syria is Saudi Arabia and Israel. So, how’s that for credibility? The only support Washington can muster is from a feudal, sword-wielding, head-chopping regime and a criminal pariah genocidal state. Coalition of the Willing? More like Coalition of the Killing.
Cill Cháis (Kilcash) was the great house of one of the branches of the Butlers near Clonmel, Co. Tipperary, until well into the eighteenth century. To the east of the ancient church are the ruins of Kilcash Castle, where Lord Castlehaven, noted Confederate Catholic commander in the 1641-52 war, wrote his memoirs. The haunting early 18th century song Cill Cháis mourns the death of Margaret Butler, Viscountess Iveagh ["Lady Veagh"]. Her first husband, the attainted Jacobite Brian Maginnis (Mac Guinness), having died in the Austrian service, she married Colonel Thomas Butler of Kilcash Castle, a nominal Protestant who connived at her sheltering of Catholic bishops and priests there. ..."What will we do for wood now that the last of the forests are down...".The English hacked down the forests so that the Irish couldn't take refuge in them and raid the planters who had stolen their land.
* 1. You are broadband visitor if you are able to use your telephone and internet at the same time. ** 2. Otherwise you are a dial up visitor. Background Music: Cill Cháis
Caoine Cill Cháis
Údar anaithnid Cad a dhéanfaimid feasta gan adhmad? Tá deireadh na gcoillte ar lár; níl trácht ar Chill Cháis ná ar a teaghlach is ní bainfear a cling go bráth. An áit úd a gcónaiodh an deighbhean fuair gradam is meidhir thar mhnáibh, bhíodh iarlaí ag tarraingt tar toinn ann is an t-aifreann binn á rá.Ní chluinim fuiaim lachan ná gé ann, ná fiolar ag éamh sois cuain, ná fiú na mbeacha chun saothair thabharfadh mil agus céir don tslua. Níl ceol binn milis na n-éan ann le hamharc an lae a dhul uainn, náan chuaichín i mbarra na ngéag ann, ós í chuirfeadh an saol chun suain.
Tá ceo ag titim ar chraobha ann ná glanann le gréin ná lá, tá smúid ag titim ón spéir ann is a cuid uisce g léir ag trá. Níl coll, níl cuileann, níl caor ann, ach clocha is maolchlocháin, páirc an chomhair gan chraobh ann is d' imigh an géim chun fáin.
Anois mar bharr ar gach míghreanni, chuaigh prionsa na nGael thar sáil anonn le hainnir na míne fuair gradam sa bhFrainc is sa Spáinn. Anois tá a cuallacht á caoineadh, gheibbeadh airgead buí agus bán; 's í ná tógladh sillbh na ndaoine, ach cara na bhfíorbhochtán.
Aicim ar Mhuire is ar Iosa go dtaga sí arís chughainn slán, go mbeidh rincí fada ag gabháil timpeall, ceol veidhlín is tinte cnámh; go dtógtar an baile seo ár sinsear Cill Chais bhreá arís go hard, is go bráth nó go dtiocfaidh an díle ná feictear é arís ar lár.
Lament for Kilcash
by Thomas Kinsella Now what will we do for timber, with the last of the woods laid low? There's no talk of Kilcash or its household and its bell will be struck no more. That dwelling where lived the good lady most honored and joyous of women --earls made their way over wave there and the sweet mass once was said.Ducks' voices nor geese do I hear there, nor the eagle's cry over the bay, nor even the bees at their labour bringing honey and wax to us all. No birdsong there, sweet and delightful, as we watch the sun go down, nor cukoo on top of the branches settling the world to rest.
A mist on the boughs is descending neither daylight nor sun can clear. A stain from the sky is descending and the waters receding away. No hazel nor holly nor berry but boulders and bear stone heaps, not a branch in our neighbourly haggard, and the game all scattered and gone.
Then a climax to all our misery; the prince of the Gael is abroad oversea with that maiden of mildness who found honour in France and Spain. Her company now must lament her, who would give yellow money and white --she who'd never take land from the people but was friend to the truly poor.
I call upon Mary and Jesus to send her safe home again: dances we'll have in long circles and bon-fires and violin music; that Kilcash, the townland of our fathers; will rise handsome on high once more and till doom - or the deluge - returns - we'll see it no more laid low.
This verse translation into English is by Thomas Kinsella taken from the book An Duanaire 1600 -1900 Poems of the Dispossesed. There is an English rendering of the song by "Frank O'Connor" Courtesy of: An Duanaire by Tuama & Kinsella, 1981 Courtesy of Jack & Vivian Hennessey, IrishPage.com, (8.08) September 9, 2011 . Back to Poem Index
The cost of policing the continuing union flag protests has soared to over #15 million (?17.5 million
Crowd of 100 loyalists in Newtonabbey last night.
The trouble broke out just after 8.30pm, according to a police spokesman. A building containing the constituency office of Justice Minister David Forde was targeted by the rioters and a number of windows were smashed. A car was also set alight in the violence.
An office belonging to another Alliance Party politician, Stewart Dickson in Carrickfergus, was destroyed by arsonists in December. The party’s only MP, Naomi Long, and a number of local councillors have also received death threats.
Last week, Mr Ford said unionist parties 'drove' the flag protests. Mr Ford the Alliance party's annual conference that the DUP and the Ulster Unionist Party had cynically targeted his party and in particular the Alliance MP for East Belfast Naomi Long for crude electoral purposes.
“It seems to suit unionism better to have people worried about flags and identity, protesting at the City Hall, than have them focus on the fact that their children are leaving school without the essential skills they need to make it in today’s world, and lobbying about that at Stormont,” he added.
It emerged last month that the cost of policing the continuing union flag protests has cost more than £15 million (€17.5 million). PSNI chief constable Matt Baggott outlined the financial implications of the disturbances during a briefing to members of his oversight body, the Policing Board.
Comments (2)
Lot
a)This thuggery occurs not just in the context of the initial opportunism of the DUP but is further componded by the more recent disgraceful and irresponsible commments by Peter Robinson in relation to the PSNI and Sammy Wilson in respect of the judiciary. The First Minister and his cohorts clearly still have a long way to go when it comes to respect for democracy. The silence from the political and media establishment in the 26 counties is deafening. We were first treated to the initial symapathetic noises from the usual quarters towards the flag protests but since the "protestors" haveshown their true colours these commentators have gone silent. Unionists / unionism should be no more beyond criticism from southern quarters than republicans when it is justified. A more direct and honest approach over the years may have helped to avoid prolonging the conflict. The unionsit leadership has once again displayed their complete inability to self-analyse and develop. They still practise the philosophy to be "first to offend and first to take offence".
B)Time to remind loyalists who are the majority in Ireland and quieten down this howling dog.
Time to remind loyalists who are the majority in Ireland and quieten down this howling dog.
3rd reporter. "Orange bastard kills family pet" A primary teacher explains to her class that she is a Rangers fan. She asks her students to raise their hands if they, too, are Rangers fans. Everyone in the class raises their hand except one little girl. The teacher looks at the girl with surprise and says, "Mary, why didn't you raise your hand?" "Because I'm not a Rangers fan," she replied. The teacher, still shocked, asked, "Well, if you are not a Rangers fan, then who are you a fan of?" "I am a Celtic fan, and proud of it," Mary replied. The teacher could not believe her ears. "Mary, why, pray tell, are you a Celtic fan?" "Because my mum is a Celtic fan, and my dad is a Celtic fan, so I'm a Celtic fan too!" "Well," said the teacher in an obviously annoyed tone, "that is no reason for you to be a Celtic fan. You don't have to be just like your parents all of the time. What if your mum was a prostitute and your dad was a drug addict, what would you be then?" "Then," Mary smiled, "Then I'd be a Rangers fan." A Celtic fan, Rangers fan and a Falkirk fan are lost in the woods together and spot a farm . The three of them approach the farm and knock on the door. A man answers. "Do you have a room for the night? ", asks the Falkirk fan. "Yes, I do but one of you will have to sleep with the pigs". "Fine I will sleep with pigs", replies the Celtic fan. At 2:00 o'clock in the morning the Celtic fan appears at the door, "It is too smelly down there", says the Celtic fan. "Fine then I will sleep with the pigs ", says the Falkirk fan. At 3:00 o'clock in the morning the Falkirk fan says " It's too smelly down there". "Fine then I will go sleep with the pigs" says the Rangers fan . At 4:00 o'clock in the morning the pig appears at the door and says: "It's too smelly down there!!" A man goes to Glasgow airport and eventually goes into the departure lounge to wait for the call for his flight home. The place is a mess. All around him are overturned tables, smashed windows, upturned chairs, broken flight monitors and crowd control barriers littering the floor. "Christ, what happened here?" he asks one of the ground crew. "Oh," he replies. "Bloody hopeless it was, we had the Rangers squad in here this morning filming the new Nike ad!" A Tim, an hun, a hot blonde and a fat woman get on the tube. They go into a tunnel and the lights go out, and suddenly they all hear a loud slap. When the lights come on, the Hun has a big red handprint on his face. The blonde thinks: "Oh, the Hun must have made a move for me, but fondled that fat woman by mistake and she slapped him." The fat woman thinks: "Hmm, that Hun tried to put the moves on that blonde and got slapped. Good for her." The Hun thinks: "Hey, that Tim must have gone for the blonde and she slapped me by mistake!" The Tim thinks: "Boy, I hope we go through another tunnel, so I can smack that Hun fucker again". Alex McLeish and Michael Mols in the pub and there is a cat sitting on the table. One man comes in, picks the cat up and looks under it.. Another man comes in and does the same. McLeish annoyed says the next man to do that I'm going to ask them why. So the next man comes in picks the cat up and looks under it. McLiesh says "Why did you just do that?". The man replies "A man outside told me that there's a cat in here with two arseholes!" Alex McLeish died and went to heaven. God showed him to his new dwelling and it was a rundown shack with with an old tattered Union Jack hanging over the front door. McLeish wasn't too happy with this at all. He looked off into the distance and saw a beautiful mansion with a massive Celtic Flag hanging over the doorway. McLeish thinks to himself, "Martin O'Neill must have died too" and so he says to God, "I don't mean to be ungrateful, but how come Martin gets that gorgeous mansion for a home and all I get is this rundown shack?" God replied, "That's not Martins home, that's mine!." Mols: Hey boss! do you remember that jigsaw puzzle I was doing? Well I've finished it and it only took 6 months! Alex McLeish: 6 months??? What's so good about that? Mols: Well, it says on the box "3 to 6 years" A Celtic fan enters a pub, after a few drinks he turns to the guy next to him and says, "Do you want to hear a Rangers joke?" The guy turns to him and says "Listen mate before you tell the joke I should warn you, I’m 6ft 10 and a Rangers fan, that guy to your left is 6ft and a member of a flute band, and the guy there is 6ft 5 and a member of the orange order, Now do you still want to tell your joke?" The Celtic fan replies, "No, not if I have to tell it 3 times." Following Rangers success in Scotland this season, they have decided to release videos, keyrings, replica shirts and even a new OXO-Cube as the attempt Europe. They have called this a "Laughing Stock". Barry Ferguson is in a restaurant with Greame Souness. The meal was going great, they were all drinking an laughing then the starters arrived. "Excuse me," said the waiter to Ferguson, "would you like some ginger with your melon?" "Naw," replied Barry, "the gaffer got me some wine." Alex Mcleish takes the Rangers team out for dinner after another defea. The waiter comes up and asks him what he'd like. McLeish: "I'll have the prawn cocktail to start, followed by the 16oz steak." Waiter: "And the vegetables sir?" Mcleish :" Oh! They'll have the same" The Rangers board have decided to change sponsorship with Carling to Tampax with effect immediate. They considered it a good change since the club was going through a very bad period! Whos the only women with two fannies... Mrs De Boer What does a hun do after he's just watched rangers beat Barcelona? Turns off the playstation. After an Old Firm match Henrik Larsson and Fernando Ricksen go out for a drink. After their drinks they go looking for some nice woman for a laugh. They find a prostitute. Barry feruson asks how much is it for a wank. The prostitute replies £20. Larsson then asks how much is it for a superstar... Today is Stefan Klos' 30th birthday and he will be having a meal with his team-mates tonight. However, they will have to eat with their hands as they have no silverware. Q: Did you hear that the Post Office just recalled their latest stamps? A: They had pictures of Rangers Players on them and people couldn't figure out which side to spit on.
Q: What do Rangers Fans and sperm have in common? A: One in 3,000,000 has a chance of becoming a human being.
Q: What do Rangers Fans use for birth control? A: Their personalities.
Q: How is a pint of milk different then a hun?
A: If you leave the milk out for a week it develops a culture!
Q: What's the difference between a Hun and a sperm?
A: At least a sperm has one chance in ten million of becoming a human being.
Q: How many Rangers fans does it take to change a light bulb?
A: It doesn't matter, they're all condemned to eternal darkness anyway.
Q: What's the difference between a Hun and a bucket of shit?
A: The bucket...
Q: What do you get when you cross a Hun with a pig?
A: I don't know, there are some things a pig just won't do.
Q: Santa Claus, the tooth fairy, an intelligent Hun and an old drunk are walking down the street together when simultaneously they each spot a fifty pound note. Who gets it?
A: The old drunk, of course, the other three are mythological creatures.
Q: What does Rangers and a three pin plug have in common?
A: They're both absolutely useless in Europe.
Q: What's the difference between a busload of Rangers fans and a Hedgehog?
A: On a hedgehog, the pricks are on the outside.
Q: What is the difference between a Rangers Fan and a trampoline?
A: You take off your shoes to jump on a trampoline!
Q: What do you call a Rangers fan who goes to University?
A: A janitor...
Q: What's the difference between a Hun and a coconut?
A: One's thick and hairy, and the other's a tropical fruit.
Q: What do you call a hun in Europe?
A: A tourist...
Q: What do you say to a Rangers supporter with a good looking Woman on his arm?
A: Nice tattoo!
Q: How can you tell E.T. is a hun?
A: Because he looks like one.
Q: You're trapped in a room with a Lion, Cobra snake and an Rangers Fan. You have a gun with two bullets. What should you do?
A: Shoot the Hun Twice.
Q: How do you make Barry Fergusons eyes light up?
A: Shine a torch in his ears.
Q: What do you call a Hun in a three-bedroomed semi? A: A burglar.
Reports are coming to our desk, of a huge rally of several thousand people, under cover of darkness, in solidarity with the interned Marian Price, taking place in Coalisland as we publish. We are awaiting independent confirmation of theses reports, before publishing further details on the International Women's Day rally against internment without trial in British Occupied Ireland. Meanwhile here are the latest updates from Irish Republican News.
1. 'INFILTRATED' CLAIMS FOLLOW MORTAR BID 2. Robinson attacks police, judges 3. Coalition in media push ahead of Meath by-election 4. 'Broken promises' to republican prisoners 5. Pressure mounts for Price's release 6. DUP finds offence in Korean concept car 7. Feature: Mairead Farrell 8. Analysis: Robinson is out of touch
An attack apparently planned by the 'new IRA' against the PSNI's Strand Road base in Derry bore the hallmarks of a similar attack in 1991 by the Provisional IRA on Downing Street, according to security experts in the North.
A van with an open roof and containing a number of mortar rockets was intercepted in Derry on Sunday. The find suggests the organisation, which regrouped last year, has significant technical skills and the capacity to mount relatively complex operations.
Four men were held by the PSNI after the van was stopped on the Letterkenny Road in the city, just after 8pm on Sunday. British army bomb experts who attended the scene came under petrol bomb attack. Two of the men were later released unconditionally.
It is thought the design of the van would have allowed four rockets hidden within to be aimed and fired at a considerable distance. A launching pad similar to the one recovered in Derry was used to attack (then) British prime minister John Major as he presided over a meeting of the British war cabinet.
Local PSNI chief Stephen Cargin said the rockets were within minutes of being fired and suggested the target of the attack must have been the Strand Road barracks, one of the largest Crown Force bases in the North. The base has been the subject of countless IRA attacks over the years.
In May 2010 a mortar bomb was fired at the same station, but failed to explode. It was claimed by another breakaway group, Oglaigh na hEireann. The same organisation claimed responsibility this week for two separate attacks on members of the British Crown forces, both involving booby-trap devices, in November and December of last year. It also said it was behind a punishment shooting in north Belfast last month.
Amid the condemnation of this week's attack, Stormont politicians nevertheless expressed confidence that the 'new IRA' has being subjected to blanket surveillance and deeply infiltrated by British informers.
Their arguments appeared to be borne out when a former member of the 'Real IRA' was shot dead in County Meath, less than 72 hours after the Derry incident, following an apparent dispute within the organisation. Members of the Garda Special Branch who observed the shooting made five arrests, although one man has since been released.
Sinn Fein's Gerry Kelly claimed in a contentious internet message that the "dissidents are so infiltrated, its hard to know if they planned [an] attack on Derry people or state agents did".
Unionist and republican hardliners alike challenged his remark.
"Whenever people did make similar comments [in relation to the Provisional IRA], senior Sinn Fein people were lining up to accuse them of mischief making and to attack them. But now he is making the same type of comment," said the DUP's Gregory Campbell.
He said the same statement could have been made about past IRA actions. The East Derry MP claimed the Provisional IRA "was riddled with informers", and it "wasn't only Denis Donaldson, and others that we know about".
Sinn Fein deputy First Minister Martin McGuinness praised the PSNI for "intercepting" the mortars.
He said: "It was through their good work that we are not talking about a disastrous situation in Derry," he said.
He later claimed to have received a death threat from a nameless dissident organisation in Derry. He said the PSNI had told him of "a real and active threat against his life".
"They linked the threat to my condemnation of the recent attempted mortar attack in the city and other remarks made in support of the PSNI", he said, adding: "I will not be silenced".
The First Minister and DUP leader Peter Robinson has attacked the policing and judicial system in the North after three ringleaders of the recent flags disturbances were arrested last week.
Robinson lashed out over what he suggested was discrimination against loyalists when two of those arrested, Jamie Bryson and Willie Frazer, were initially refused bail. After months of disturbances involving riots, roadblocks and illegal parades, the two leaders of the 'flags protests' and a third man, right-wing extremist Jim Dowson, were arrested and charged last week with public order offences. Frazer and Dowson were later awarded bail.
The violence began following a vote by Belfast City Council in December to reduce the number of days on which the British flag is flown over City Hall in central Belfast. It reached a climax in January with several days of rioting by the unionist paramilitary UVF outside a small nationalist enclave in east Belfast.
After weeks of police inaction, the force was apparently stung into action when it was accused by the Parades Commission of ignoring law-breaking in connection with the loyalists' illegal parades.
Bryson managed to avoid arrest for two days last week, and even teased the PSNI through the internet over their failure to find him. He continues to be refused bail, although it was unlikely he would have accepted bail in any event -- he had previously urged loyalists to reject bail conditions as a protest against their arrest.
Appearing in court earlier today [Friday], it was heard how the PSNI had made considerable efforts to capture the 23-year-old; firstly at his home, and secondly after being spotted in Bangor, County Down. He was eventually found in a converted attic at the home of a pastor, who, the court heard, attempted to prevent the PSNI from gaining entry into the house.
Bryson later claimed that following his arrest, he had carried out a one-man hunger strike for more than 24 hours.
The judge at his bail hearing, while refusing bail, condemned as "ill-informed" comments this week by the First Minister. The DUP leader had urged the North's top judge, Declan Morgan, to be more lenient with loyalists (and harsher on republicans) in order to address "public disquiet" over what he said were "perceived differences in their treatment".
At the same time, Robinson also carpeted the police over the arrests and bail decisions. On Monday, PSNI chief Matt Baggott and his senior command team were summoned to Stormont, where the First Minister complained that two republicans had recently been awarded bail. He was referring to the terminally ill Brian Shivers, whose conviction for a 2009 'Real IRA' attack was quashed in January, and Sean Hughes, a former political activist accused of attending an alleged 'IRA meeting' in Belfast eight years ago.
Speaking after the meeting, Robinson claimed a "large section" of unionists "don't believe the police have been impartial in dealing with these issues".
"Therefore, in my view [it is] an imperative issue for the police to show why they take decisions, with regard to a set of circumstances, differently than another," he declared.
SDLP assembly member Conall McDevitt, a member of the Policing Board, said Mr Robinson's comments were "outrageous" and "only serve to undermine the PSNI" and heighten tensions.
McDevitt received a loyalist death threat this week, while a viable bomb, the second in two weeks, was left outside a Catholic church in Newtownabbey, north of Belfast. Sinn Fein's Michelle Gildernew was also the subject of a hoax loyalist bomb attack.
Robinson said his meeting with Baggott provided an opportunity for the PSNI chief to promise he would go easier on the loyalist extremists. He said he had only advised him to say that his force would be "even-handed" in the future.
Alliance Assembly member Stewart Dickson, whose offices were set on fire by loyalist gangs earlier this year over his party's support for the flags decision at Belfast city council, accused the First Minister of only increasing tensions.
"This has just confirmed what we already knew; that Peter Robinson is only interested in the politics of 'us and them'," he said.
"No politician should ever seek to direct a judge on an individual case.
"He has said that he is the First Minister of the people but this statement shows that he is only interested in being the First Minister of Unionism."
Rejecting Robinson's comments, Sinn Fein's Gerry Kelly also pointed to the immense disparity between the judicial processes for Catholics compared to Protestants. He pointed out that 147 nationalists had been charged in connection with political protests in recent months, compared with only three loyalists.
The perception of loyalists is "not the reality", he said.
>>>>>> Coalition in media push ahead of Meath by-election
A two-year coalition 'progress report' published by the 26 County government has been described as an attempt by the coalition to give itself a 'pat on the back'.
This week Taoiseach Enda Kenny of Fine Gael and Tanaiste Eamon Gilmore of the Labour Party published the coalition's second annual report, to mark two years in government.
Mr Kenny said that after two years of cuts, "people's hard work and sacrifices are beginning to pay dividends".
But his claims of success over the two years were ridiculed by the opposition. Commentators linked the new campaign to promote their political achievements with the government parties' decline in opinion polls and the upcoming by-election in Meath East, set for March 27th.
Sinn Fein leader Gerry Adams said the government should 'take a hike'.
"If it wasn't so serious, it would be funny," he told the Dublin parliament.
"Here we have a government patting itself on the back. This is a government that was elected two years ago and it has done the exact opposite to what it said it was going to do."
Mr Kenny insisted the report showed the coalition was successfully implementing its 'Programme For Government', and that the economic decline had been stabilised.
"Just two years in, two-thirds of the commitments in the Programme have been progressed satisfactorily," he said.
"Because they have, stability is returning. We will continue to work with that hard-won stability to sustain our ambitious but realistic agenda."
Mr Gilmore admitted the government "had not done everything right" and he singled out tackling mortgage arrears and high youth unemployment as two areas they had yet to 'tackle properly'.
But Mr Adams accused Fine Gael and Labour of presiding over two years of austerity and of significant hardship for citizens.
"In 2011 people voted for change," he said. "Instead Fine Gael and Labour broke their election promises and implemented Fianna Fail's policies.
"The Labour Party promised to protect the people from the most draconian of Fine Gael's policies yet after two years household incomes are devastated by stealth taxes and cuts to wages.
"Unemployment is at 14.2%. Youth unemployment is 27.7%. Some 87,000 have emigrated in 2011 and that trend has continued.
"Companies are tearing up agreements with workers, arbitrarily paying them off or denying them wages or redundancy payments.
"On Fine Gael and Labour's watch there have been a succession of savage cuts to wages and incomes and the introduction of new additional stealth taxes, like the household charge and family home tax; water charges; increased VAT; increased motor tax; as well as cuts to child benefit; cuts to home help hours, to the carer's respite care grant and much more.
"Last week the government again targeted the most vulnerable in our society by scrapping the Mobility Allowance Scheme and the Motorised Transport Grant Scheme.
"Today we learned that the number of households disconnected by gas suppliers jumped by 36% in the third quarter of 2012."
Mr Adams warned that a new Public Service wage agreement would make things worse.
"I believe the Croke Park 2 agreement will exacerbate the austerity driven agenda of this government and that working families - those on low and middle incomes - will be squeezed again. Frontline workers have been especially and unfairly targeted.
"Austerity is not working. It is the disadvantaged and low and middle income families who are bearing the burden - again.
"The leaders of Fine Gael and Labour are in no position to pat themselves on the back. They have implemented two years of austerity policies and caused significant hardship for citizens."
Republican Sinn Fein have said that promises of a breakthrough in ending full-body strip-searching of prisoners in Maghaberry jail in County Antrim "have come to nought" following the announcement last month that the electronic scanning machine will not now be installed in the jail.
The promise of the scanner was made by British Minister for Justice at Stormont, David Ford, towards the end of 2012. It was a key factor in the republican prisoners suspending their dirty protest after three years in November 2012 "in order to give the prison regime another opportunity to acknowledge and implement the agreement all parties signed up to in August 2010".
The ending of strip-searching and the establishment of free association for all republican political prisoners were cornerstones of that agreement.
The agreement was reached after protracted talks involving the prison authorities and Stormont officials.
On February 14 this year, Ford's office and the prison authorities suddenly announced that the electronic scanners -- hi-tech equipment similar to that used at airports -- would not now be installed.
The British authorities claimed that the machines "failed to find concealed items such as drugs, scissors and knives during a trial", even though airlines around the world routinely use the machines for security scanning.
It was claimed that more than 1,000 ODCs ('ordinary decent criminal') prisoners who took part in the trial were searched using the alternative scanners at Magilligan prison and Hydebank Wood over the past three months.
"The use of selected prisoners from the mainstream prison instead of using PoWs from Roe House for the trial tells its own tale," RSF said.
"Mainstream prisoners don't have a lot of choice when it comes to 'offers' from the prison authorities. It is common to offer inducements to mainstream prisoners to co-operate with the authorities the 'it is in your own interests', a veiled threat. Add to that the fact that it was prison warders who conducted the trial."
In another turn, the prison regime added a further 'rule' previously unheard of with republican prisoners -- the prisoners have been told that they have to accept a drugs test before they can be granted parole.
Forced full-body strip-searches, and brutality used in these searches, are now being carried out on republican prisoners in Maghaberry jail, RSF said.
"This practice will never be acceptable. Neither will the continued harassment and intimidation of the POWs by the warders".
"While we will not tar them all with the one brush, they will continue to obey orders from Whitehall and Stormont to make PoWs lives as miserable as possible as the alternative is unacceptable to them -- a well-run Roe House where Republican Prisoners of War are treated as such -- PoWs with full political status."
Fermanagh District Council has passed a motion calling for the immediate release of interned political activist Marian Price. It agreed to write to the current British Direct Ruler, Theresa Villiers, calling for her release.
Marian Price, a 59-year-old former IRA Volunteer, was interned by the British government almost two years ago. The then British Direct Ruler Owen Patterson revoked her life sentence licence after she was arrested over her involvement in a republican rally in Derry's city cemetery at Easter 2011.
She is now under armed guard at Belfast City Hospital where she is being treated for depression, arthritis and lung problems.
Last month she was refused permission to attend the funeral for her sister, Dolours. The two sisters had been force-fed for over 200 days to prevent them dying on hunger strike following their arrest in England in the 1970s.
Independent Councillor Bernice Swift proposed the motion calling for Marian's release at this week's meeting of Fermanagh District Council.
"Marian Price is being illegally interned," she said. "As a woman, there is a blatant violation of her human rights. This makes a mockery of our peace process," said Councillor Swift.
"I object," replied the Democratic Unionist Party's Bert Johnston, "She is a bomber."
Twelve councillors, including members of Sinn Fein and the SDLP voted for sending the letter to Villiers, while 10 members of the unionist parties voted against it.
Former DUP Minister Arlene Foster said she was "disgusted" at the outcome of Monday's vote.
"The fact this comes just a few months after the decision by Dungannon Council to support the release of Gerry McGeough, makes vote even more disgraceful," she said.
Her internment had the force of law, she said, and republicans had to accept that.
"The DUP is absolutely clear in our view that everyone must be treated equally under the law but it would seem that republicans and nationalists seem to believe that this should not apply to certain sections of the community."
But she reserved her deepest anger for the moderate nationalist SDLP.
She said: "Whether it is members of their party carrying the coffins of INLA members, supporting play-parks being named after IRA gunmen or calling for the release of dissident republicans, it would seem that there is no shade of republican terrorism which cannot find support from within the ranks of the SDLP."
However, John O'Kane of the SDLP defended his support for the motion. He said his party remains opposed to internment without trial.
"My party is at the opposite end of the spectrum from Marian Price but we do consider that, if there is any real evidence against Marian Price, then she should be brought to trial instead of being kept in ongoing detention."
Mr O'Kane said it was a "rather flimsy excuse" used to revoke Price's licence and added: "Our record over the years is supporting civil rights and non-violence."
PAROLE HEARING
Meanwhile, Deputy First Minister Martin McGuinness attended a hearing by the Parole Commissioners and also visited Ms Price in hospital this week, according to Sinn Fein.
At a closed court in the Laganside complex in Belfast, Parole Commissioners listened to submissions from Marian Price's lawyers who argued that she should be released.
A spokesman for the commissioners said they could not make any comment on the hearing. Mr McGuinness also refused comment.
A Sinn Fein spokesperson said: "The continued imprisonment of Marian Price and Martin Corey is an affront to justice and they should be released immediately. They are held without charge or trial."
The DUP has drawn international amusement and scorn after claiming to be offended by the name given to a proposed new car by Korean manufacturer Kia.
The company is to unveil the design, a coupe-style 'muscle car' with an orange roof, at the Geneva Motor Show later this week. Tentatively called the 'Kia Provo', the name incensed DUP MPs Gregory Campbell and Willie McCrea.
The name 'Provo' is commonly used across Ireland as a slang term for the Provisional IRA.
However, the DUP duo dispelled any idea that their comments were an attempt to bring some light-hearted relief to the serious problems facing the North of Ireland. The hardliners quickly brought a motion before the Westminster parliament in London demanding Kia use a new name "which is not associated with terror and mayhem".
Kia pointed out the vehicle was not due to be sold in Ireland or Britain under that branding in any event. The Korean manufacturer said they did not mean to cause offence, and that the 'Provo' title had been chosen at the company's European headquarters in Frankfurt.
"The name comes from 'provoke' as in provoking a reaction, which the car is meant to do," they said, pointing to the car's angular styling and flame-top roof as the key attractions of the design.
Kia chief designer Gregory Guillaume described the car as an "emotional and muscular car aimed at delivering pure fun and performance for today's city-based enthusiast driver".
He said it was "cheeky and cheerful in its compactness" with a "hint at the fun awaiting on the open road".
But Campbell claimed Kia had caused "deep offence".
Only adding to the absurdity, the East Derry MP later claimed a success when informed the name would not be used in Ireland and Britain, and praised Kia for its "swift action".
Mairead Farrell was 31 when she was assassinated by the SAS in Gibraltar Sunday March 6th 1988. Eyewitnesses described how she, Sean Savage and Dan McCann, members of an unarmed IRA unit, were shot without warning and were deliberately killed at close range as they lay wounded on the ground.
The British media, with the exception of Thames TV's "Death on the Rock, repeated the British Army propaganda that the three were armed and the local eyewitnesses were lying. There was also shock expressed at how a "woman like Mairead' could have become involved with the IRA. To Mairead, however, her membership was a logical decision made as a result of a political analysis drawn from both personal experience and a study of Irish history.
Mairead was born in Belfast on the 3rd August 1957; the second youngest of six children and the only girl. She was twelve when the British Army took over the streets of Belfast in 1969. Mairead found school work easy but left after taking her O-levels. Politics was an important issue in the Farrell household. Mairead listened to her grandfathers stories but it was her Belfast experiences that politicized her, "It was really more the events of those years growing up in the Falls we had to pass through the Brits during the curfews you could only get out for a certain number of hours. We were all victims of the British occupation really you just accepted that you would be involved to defend your country.
She joined the IRA and said later, 'A lot of 17 to 19 year olds were involved, maybe looking back I was very young then but I was politically aware. I know that now because my views haven't changed if anything I have become stronger, more committed." One of the attractions was "being treated equal to the lads. I don't think sexism is rife in the Republican Movement, although that's not to say we were exempt from it either. I suppose I've always believed we had a legitimate right to take up arms and defend ourselves against the Brits' occupation. I wouldn't have got involved if I hadn't believed that."
In 1976, Mairead was arrested after taking part in the IRA's campaign. She was convicted of possession of explosives and membership of the IRA and sentenced to fourteen and a half years imprisonment. Mairead was sentenced at a crucial turning point in British policy and was to become the leader of the women in Armagh jail when the republican struggle was focused on the prisoners.
When Mairead entered Armagh in April 1976 she was the first woman republican prisoner to be sentenced under the new regulations and was refused special category status. She was isolated from the Republican organization in Armagh and only able to talk to the other fifty or so republican women for ten minutes after Mass on Sundays. She began a "no work protest" against the loss of special category status, "I knew now the battle would begin - the real battle - that the struggle would be a long and lonely one for us all
As other newly sentenced women entered Armagh they joined Mairead in protests. Mairead became Commanding Officer. 'There was no kudos in it, I had to take decisions that would effect all the prisoners. There were times I felt very alone, even though I knew I had the support of the others at all times.'
The dirty protest that began on 7th February 1980 was forced on Mairead and her comrades. The Republican women were able to wear their own clothes; they were all dressed in black skirts and white blouses at a ceremony to honour Delaney. A week later, to crush this example of organised solidarity, a squad of 60 male and female warders surrounded the women at lunch time. Tim Pat Coogan stated that the women "were kicked and punched until order was restored' Their cells were searched and wrecked by the warders and after the women were returned to their cells, "Men in riot gear armed with batons appeared in the cells again. The girls (sic) were beaten and carried down the stairs to the guard room to receive their punishment. The toilets were locked and they were confined to their cells for 24 hours.'
Mairead described the events to her parents: We were not allowed exercise nor out to the toilet or to get washed. We were locked up for 24 hours and allowed nothing to eat or drink. Male officers are still on the wing, they have not left and are running the wing got something to eat still not allowed use of toilet facilities. We have been forced into a position of "Dirt Strike' as our pots are overflowing with urine and excrement. We emptied them out of the spy holes into the wing. The male officers nailed them closed." Then later: 'Male officers are still running the wing Lynn O'Connell was beaten twice, the second time was the worst. The officers jumped her as she was going out to the yard her face is badly swollen and cut.'
In early April 1980 Mairead wrote to her relatives, "The stench of urine and excrement clings to the cells and our bodies. No longer can we empty the pots out the window as the male screws have boarded them up regardless of day or night, the cells are dark for 23 hours a day we lie in these celIs' The protest lasted 13 months. It was to Mairead the most frightening time of her imprisonment. Women were locked in pairs in cells measuring 3m x 2m (9ft x 6ft). During this time, Mairead told Tim Pat Coogan, "We are in a war situation. We have been treated in a special way and tried in special courts because of the war and because of our political activities. We want to be regarded as prisoners of war.
On 1st December 1980, Mairead, Mary Doyle and Mairead Nugent went on hunger strike in united action with the men in the Long Kesh 'H Blocks. Afterwards she recalled how important was the support received from outside and also how she hated the distress caused to her parents. She continued on hunger strike until 19th December when it seemed the N.I.O. had agreed to the prisoners' demands. This agreement was then retracted.
The Dirty Protest was called off in January 1981 in preparation for the second hunger strike in the H Blocks on 1st March 1981. A difficult decision not to join this was made by the women prisoners. It was the worst time for them as the women waited for news of the deaths, "I know it will be more difficult this time to win anything. It will take longer for the pressure to build up." At the end of the interview Mairead said, "I am a volunteer in the Irish Republican Army and a political prisoner in Armagh jail. I am prepared to fight to the death, if necessary, to win the recognition that I am a political prisoner and not a criminal.'
In December 1982 strip searching was introduced at Armagh. The women republican prisoners refused to undergo these searches that were made before women were allowed out of the prison. Her last inter-prison visit to see her fiancee in Long Kesh was in October 1982 and she did not see him again until her release four years later. The remand prisoners suffered most from strip searching as they were searched before and after court hearings and were subject to regular beatings. The women republican prisoners ended their resistance to strip searching because of the fear of increasingly serious assaults. Mairead was strip searched on her release from Maghaberry Prison, "I felt it was the final insult. It's designed as psychological torture, as a way of intimidating us." Looking back on years in prison she saw them as teaching her the real values in life and making her more committed to her political beliefs.
During her last years of imprisonment, Mairead took Open University courses in Politics and Economics, and gained a place at Queen's University on her release. She worked with the Strip Searching Campaign, speaking at meetings all over Ireland. She then reported back to the IRA. Just before her death she said, "You have to be realistic, you realise that ultimately you're either going to be dead or end up in jail."
"Everybody keeps telling me I'm a feminist. I just know I'm me and I think I'm as good as anyone else and that particularly goes for any man. I'm a socialist, definitely, and I'm a republican. I believe in a united Ireland; a united socialist Ireland, definitely socialist. Capitalism provided no answer at all for our people and I think that's the Brit's main interest in Ireland Once we remove the British that isn't it, that's only the beginning."
Imagine the British prime minister calling into question the professional integrity of the Metropolitan Police. Better still, consider what the fallout would be if the comments were made in defence of a gang of people who had engaged in rioting, road blocking, causing millions in damage to the economy and injuring more than 100 police officers in the process. Unthinkable, isn't it?
Now welcome to Northern Ireland where this week First Minister Peter Robinson told Matt Baggott that he must regain the confidence of the "unionist community" who feel they are being "treated unfairly".
And for unionist community please read loyalist flag protesters.
Loyalists feel they are being treated differently from their nationalist neighbours which in some ways is true.
This is because it is loyalists who after three months of mayhem are now being subjected to the legal consequences.
Loyalist flag protesters are being arrested because it is loyalists who have been breaking the law since the start of December.
The lawful section of society, the majority who are in danger of losing their jobs, businesses and possibly homes because of thugs draped in a flag think the PSNI haven't been tough enough.
Far from thinking that the flag protesters are being mistreated most people believe up until the last week they have been treated with kid gloves.
The first minister has missed a golden opportunity to show leadership. He is drastically out of touch with the vast majority and rather than be progressive has pandered to the lowest common denominator.
Among those arrested and apparently hard done by is Jim Dowson, a former fundraiser for the far-right British National Party and now administration manager of the splinter group Britain First.
Despite the myth that loyalists are not being granted bail, he was released by a magistrate.
Also granted bail was a Carrickfergus man who allegedly posed as a member of the media to get up close to officers and abuse them in the course of their duty.
Willie Frazer told a magistrate he didn't want to apply for High Court bail because he preferred the company of the "crooks" in prison to the ones in government.
Granted, young Jamie Bryson - whose hunger strike lasted about as long as a pound shop battery and who taunted police on Facebook while 'on the run' - wasn't granted bail.
But then Mr Bryson told his band of hapless followers not to apply for bail once arrested even though he did just that, with his mummy promising he'd be a good boy.
This is the same Mr Bryson who believes the UVF is the "people's army'' and not a bunch of terrorists, despite it murdering more than 600 people - many of them members of its own community.
The 23-year-old, who lives in an affluent seaside suburb full of tree-lined streets and detached homes, travelled to a volatile interface each weekend to preach about loyalist deprivation and discrimination before making his way home to Donaghadee where the whirr of an overhead police helicopter is never heard.
The Patten report, which was a key aspect of the peace process, was supposed to hail a new era in policing - not that you would know it.
Politicians from both sides, 13 and a half years on, are still screaming 'political policing', despite consistently interfering in due process which is in fact the very definition of that overused phrase.
Peter Robinson says a "large section of our community" does not believe the PSNI is being impartial.
"Our job is to express the concerns as we hear them in the community," he said.
I would question the use of the phrase "large section of our community".
If unionist politicians had spoken out in December and told the 'small section' of lawbreakers to desist in no uncertain terms rather than - as several DUP councillors did - stand blocking roads with them, then those now aggrieved protesters wouldn't be facing the wrath of the criminal justice system.
The trouble of the past three months could have ended much sooner with far fewer arrests had unionism stepped up to the plate and reassured the loyalist community rather than feeding into their fears and hysteria.
Matt Baggott responded to the first minister's comments yesterday by saying: "Policing does not hold the solutions alone to the current dispute and grievances which requires renewed political dialogue and innovation."
Unfortunately political innovation is in short supply as politicians have instead blown the cobwebs of the outdated rhetoric of the past and recycled it for 2013.
1. Broad Band visitors click here for song. *
The silence from the political and media establishment in the 26 counties is deafening. We were first treated to the initial symapathetic noises from the usual quarters towards the flag protests but since the "protestors" haveshown their true colours these commentators have gone silent.
Unionists / unionism should be no more beyond criticism from southern quarters than republicans when it is justified. A more direct and honest approach over the years may have helped to avoid prolonging the conflict.
The unionsit leadership has once again displayed their complete inability to self-analyse and develop. They still practise the philosophy to be "first to offend and first to take offence".