Oh dear god here we go again.
Sinn Fein is refusing to say if it will hand over to gardai the minutes of a star chamber-style inquiry into 100 cases of suspected sex abuse involving members of the Provisional movement, held in Dublin eight years ago.
The secret investigation flies in the face of repeated denials by Sinn Fein leadership of their knowledge of a culture of sexual abuse within the Republican movement.
I guess Sinn Fein learned from the bishops? And Holy Mother Church?
The 2006 ‘review’ was carried out in the wake of information which emerged in Northern newspapers and the Sunday Independent that a “rape victim” had been summoned to appear before a Provo kangaroo court. This was a reference to Mairia Cahill, though she was not named at the time. This was the meeting Ms Cahill was ordered to attend at an apartment belonging to a Sinn Fein member in west Belfast and at which Martin Morris, her alleged abuser, was given her statement. After Ms Cahill’s allegations against Morris, Sinn Fein apparently moved him to a more prominent position in the ‘policing’ body.
It was only in 2006 when Sinn Fein was pushing for more British and Irish government money for their community policing project that the matter over the rape allegations came to a head. The rape allegation was brought to the attention of the Irish Government by the SDLP in a damning document about the conduct of Morris, who was referred to as ‘CRJ’. Only then was Morris moved out of Belfast, initially to Donegal.
No attempt was made to bring the allegations about Morris to the PSNI, and gardai were not notified of his ‘re-settlement’ in Donegal. Morris subsequently moved to England and remains living in north London.
So the answer is yes – Sinn Fein learned from the bishops and the church. Well done.
On Friday, SF’s Martin McGuinness, the North’s Deputy First Minister, refused to apologise to Ms Cahill for the IRA’s handling of her abuse allegation. “I suppose the sad thing about the Mairia Cahill case is the alleged abuser has disappeared into the smoke and people are focusing their concentration on people who were not involved in the sexual abuse of Mairia Cahill, and I think that’s a mistake,” he said.
Oh that’s the sad thing, is it? And people who didn’t themselves sexually assault Mairia Caihill but who did cover it up and protect the perp – they have nothing to be sorry for, is it?
Bastards.