Ireland and the Fourth International

Papers, journals and pamphlets of the Fourth International's supporters in Ireland, 1969–1996

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In Unfree Citizen: Vol. 3 no. 48, 23 September 1974 · scan page 5 · about 555 words

British troops and the occupation

No public scan is online for this item; the text below was read from a privately held copy.

Machine-read text, not corrected. Cut from the scan by machine, by the size of the headline type. Where columns were set close together, lines of a neighbouring article can run in, and a headline can be missed so that two articles share a page. For anything you quote, read the scan.

Scan page 5

1, Ni mes 4 Owen ‘ wil i ! knew nothing. Twinbrook area 12th July last.

St. James commonplace. found.

Short Strand solitary confinement. Attempts were made to force them to sign statements connecting them with various activities about which they July 2nd — soldiers in Turf Lodge beat a teen-age girl uncomscious with rifle-butts, assaulted a pregnant woman and burst into several houses wrecking them in the process. An old age pensioner in one of them had a heart attack as a result.

In the Twinbrook area, another woman had a heart attack after being beaten with rifle butts by the Black Watch, and to further demonstrate their sectarian bias, the ‘’Patrol’’ drove around this isolated Catholic estate waving a Union Jack and singing Loyalist songs just before In the St. James’ area, the Royal Green Jackets have been leaving their mark too. Again the ‘Unfree Citizen’ told of how 4P.D. members were attacked and beaten up by them, while selling ‘Unfree Citizen’ in the area. Such occurances are In the same area many houses have been wrecked by the army while the occupants.were on holiday. On July 3rd parts of the area were sealed off while the Green Jackets dug up peoples gardens — allegedly looking for arms. None, of course, were On July 30th a 13 year old girl was struck with a rifle butt and a 7 year old boy badly beaten by the army on the same day.

And so the story continues.

In Short Strand, East Belfast, the Royal Horse Artillery have been keeping the true tradition of British Army brutality. The pattern is familiar — houses broken into and wrecked, 12 and 13 year old - children beaten up, midnight raids, arrests and hours of interrogation.

On 19th July, Desmond Mulligan and Raymond Crane had to receive medical attention after being arrested and ‘interrogated’ at the Artillery’s headquarters. Desmond Mulligan was forced to strip naked during interrogation and was then punched and beaten. Raymond Crane received severe bruising to the ribs.

The latest trick of this regiment is to tie the wrists and ankles of men they have arrested and force them to hop, doubled over, while they are beaten with rifle butts and batons.

Belfast not unique But Belfast is by no means unique. In the country areas the picture is the same, only here we also have the UDR terrorising the Catholic population. In Co. Tyrone particularly, the UDR have been playing their terror game, arresting Catholic farmers, interrogating them and beating up many. After one such incident a farmer was hospitalised for two months.

In the same county UDR patrols have also been operating along with groups of men dressed in civilian clothes. Such ‘patrols’ have been... responsible for beating up many’local Catholics. It was also in Tyrone in July that the terrible summary execution by the British army of a young farmer, Patrick Mcllhone, took place outside his own door.

The resistance struggle has been waged and supported by the antiUnionist population for more than three years now. Internment did not defeat it, nor did the policy of saturating the ghettoes with troops. The British have decided that terrorism is part of their policy. Let us continue to stand up and fight and refuse to be beaten again into subjection.

KEEP UP THE STRUGGLE!

← Special Branch Raid ‘an PhoblachtRepresentatives of the Catholics’ Change Their Tune →

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