Sunday Business Post, Sunday, October 6, 2002
Government to quiz British on Sinn Fein raids in North
By Seán Mac Cárthaigh and Paul T Colgan
Dublin, Ireland, 6 October, 2002
Irish government officials will quiz their British counterparts this week
about the peculiar circumstances of last Friday's raid on Sinn Féin's
Assembly offices at Stormont. Sources say the timing of the raid is seen as
suspicious and there are concerns it was politically motivated.
The raid, which involved dozens of armed PSNI officers and netted just a
Windows 98 CD, was greeted with glee by embattled unionist leader David
Trimble. Claiming the police had uncovered a republican mole working as a
porter at Stormont, Trimble said it was a bigger scandal than Watergate.
Trimble is expected to seize on the events to demand a suspension of the
North's power-sharing institutions. Sources within his Ulster Unionist Party
last night predicted the British government would "suspend and review" the
Assembly later this week, which would stave off elections.
Taoiseach Bertie Ahern is due to meet British Prime Minister Tony Blair on
Wednesday. The Irish side is hostile to a suspension of the institutions,
elements of which are now part of the Constitution. Ahern is expected to
reject any proposal that does not continue the work of the Good Friday
Agreement.
Irish government sources said the man suspected of photocopying sensitive
Northern Ireland Office documents for republicans stopped working at
Stormont more than six months ago. They also noted with concern that the
raid coincided with the first day of the trial of the three Irish
republicans in Colombia accused of assisting FARC guerrillas. In a
statement, the Minister for Foreign Affairs Brian Cowen insisted there
should be "no rush to judgement... This is clearly a very sensitive time in
the peace process. Interface violence, paramilitary activity and
sectarianism are ongoing challenges. It is vitally important that all of the
parties continue to strive to sustain and enhance the peace and progress
that the people of Northern Ireland have achieved."
The SDLP's police spokesman Alex Attwood said there should be no "kangaroo
courts". "It is very serious for the police if they haven't got it right,
and it's very serious for the IRA and the peace process if they have got it
right," he said. Sources say PSNI officers left Sinn Fein's Assembly offices
hurriedly once the media appeared. They carried with them just two CDs -- a
Windows 98 disc and an insignificant back-up disc.