`Outing' Of Brit Mole In IRA Eyed With Suspicion
by Jim Dee
Boston Herald, Wednesday, May 21, 2003.

BELFAST, Northern Ireland - It's Hollywood blockbuster material: An IRA grand executioner who was feared for his ruthless ability to expose and kill turncoats, was himself Britain's most valued agent inside the IRA for decades.

But is it true?

Explosive claims that Freddy Scappaticci was "Stakeknife," the code name of an alleged longtime Brit super spy, first surfaced May 11 in several British and Irish newspapers.

The reports claimed Scappaticci, 59, was a top member of the IRA's "nutting squads," which uncovered and executed informers.

It was said that dozens died by his hand, including other agents murdered to keep his cover safe - some reportedly with his British spymasters' full approval.

Scappaticci also allegedly assessed new IRA recruits, making him able to give the British scores of IRA names for decades before reportedly retiring in 1996.

When the story broke, British sources claimed Scappaticci was taken out of Northern Ireland for his own safety. They peddled that line until May 14, when he appeared at his lawyer's office in Belfast to deny everything. He admitted involvement in the "republican movement," but said he quit 13 years ago.

Many republicans smell British "dirty tricks," - part of an attempt to sow paranoia within the IRA's ranks at a time when they're facing calls to fold up their tents and fade away forever.

And the British intelligence version does have holes.

They clearly lied about Scappaticci's whereabouts. And, if he'd regularly exposed the identities of new recruits (and presumably senior operators as well) why wasn't the IRA defeated years ago?

Even more bizarre: Although one British source told media outlets the mole's code name was spelled "Steak Knife," another was adamant that it was "Stakeknife." If this was the Mother of All Moles,, shouldn't they at least know how to spell his name?

But there are some republicans who do doubt Scappaticci denials.

They ask why he waited four days to appear, and why he limited his "press conference" to a brief prepared statement. If he had nothing to hide, they argue, why didn't he immediately protest his innocence?

Conspiracy theories abound. One says Stakeknife is a much more highly placed mole, and that Scappaticci was named to throw the IRA off his trail.

This theory claims that, despite knowing IRA members' identities, Britain didn't arrest them. Instead British authorities systematically thwarted IRA operations so the increased failure rate would bolster Stakeknife's clandestine efforts to push republicans toward seeking a negotiated settlement.

Through it all, only Scappaticci's past IRA role appears certain.

Several republicans told the Herald that he did once hold a top IRA internal security post. But perhaps the most intriguing question about the whole affair concerns its timing. Why "out" Stakeknife now if he's been inactive since 1996?

Some republicans think the answer is that British spies wanted the IRA to whack Scappaticci, and thereby destroy any chance of convincing pro-British unionists to rejoin Sinn Fein in government.

The political vacuum would then deepen and possibly threaten the entire peace process.

And this, mainstream republicans claim, is what British Army hard- liners who've bristled at Sinn Fein's political gains in recent years really want - another chance to defeat the IRA militarily.

Too farfetched? Maybe. But maybe not. Because, regardless of who's telling the truth, the only clear message that emerges from the Stakeknife saga is that some people will stop at nothing to achieve their goals in Northern Ireland.

Alleged IRA Top Hawk Pushes Support For Sinn Fein
By Jim Dee
Boston Sunday Herald, April 20, 2003

COALISLAND, Northern Ireland - He's considered the Mother of All Hawks within the Irish Republican Army.

But yesterday, Brian Keenan - a man reputedly situated among the guerrillas' top echelon - urged IRA supporters to remain behind Sinn Fein's efforts, which he insisted are advancing the IRA's objective of Irish reunification.

"People who don't know republicans think that we glory in war," Keenan told a rally in this county Tyrone village commemorating 1916's Easter Rising - the failed revolt that inspired Ireland's subsequent War of Independence (1919-1921).

"We don't believe in permanent war. But what we believe in is permanent struggle until we achieve the objectives of the proclamation," he said, referring to the document in which the Easter Rising's leaders outlined their vision of an Irish republic.

With the IRA currently under pressure to disband, scores of Easter rebellion rallies across Ireland will hear the IRA leadership, in the coming days, urge republicans to remain "resolute" during the current political standoff.

It began last October when the pro-British Ulster Unionist Party forced Britain to ice the North's peace-pact-created assembly over an IRA spying scandal. The UUP says it won't go back into government until the IRA stages a major public disarmament act, and then vanishes forever.

A fresh row erupted on April 10, when British Prime Minister Tony Blair and Irish premier Bertie Ahern canceled the unveiling of their logjam-breaking plan because they felt an IRA statement concerning its future wouldn't satisfy unionists.

Blair and Ahern received a revised IRA statement last Sunday. Since then, they've sought and received clarification from the IRA about certain points. But they're still resisting Sinn Fein calls to publish their plan, which includes further British army demilitarization and judicial and policing reforms in return for IRA concessions.

Blair and Ahern don't doubt the IRA, which has been on cease- fire since 1997, is serious about peace. But UUP leader David Trimble, who's seen the IRA's statement in private, considers it "a long way short" of his bottom line.

If no deal is cut this week, negotiations could be "parked" until the fall, which could jeopardize scheduled May 29 assembly elections.

But amid the gathering gloom, a highly significant passage in Brian Keenan's speech yesterday offered a glimmer of hope.

He stressed that republicans see the governmental bodies created by 1998's Good Friday Agreement "as a method of building more political strength. And the more strength we have, the harder it will be for British imperialism to stay in this country."

Here was allegedly one of the top military minds of the IRA - a movement which once sought to topple the North's government - emphasizing that its restoration is crucial to the long-term plans of Sinn Fein and the IRA. Thus, republicans may - eventually, that is - compromise to advance their long-term strategy.

Of all the peace process compromises the IRA has made, sanctioning Sinn Fein's participation in the North's Stormont assembly has unsettled its ranks the most.

But aside from two small bands of IRA dissidents, the likes of Keenan have kept the IRA together at crucial junctures such as the current one by staking their reputations on the fact that the leadership hasn't sold out.

Addressing yesterday's crowd, which included many relatives of IRA men killed since 1969, he said, "Don't be nervous. Republicans aren't going to let you down after this long. We will do what is right. We will do it with surety. We will do it with strength. And we will achieve the republic."

Trimble Speaks Volumes With Exit From Talks (Interview: Mark Durkan, leader, Social Democratic Labor Party)
by Jim Dee
Boston Sunday Herald, March 9, 2003

BELFAST, Northern Ireland - If ever there were a defining moment in the Irish peace process, it came at 7 p.m. Tuesday. That was when Ulster Unionist Party leader David Trimble bailed out of two days of intensive talks aimed at restoring the North's power-sharing government so he could attend to unspecified "parliamentary business" in London.

In addition to Irish premier Bertie Ahern and the dozens of assorted politicians and British and Irish civil servants left behind by Trimble at Hillsborough Castle was one Tony Blair.

Blair, who might be risking his job as British prime minister by sticking with President Bush despite widespread opposition in his country to war against Iraq, had earlier canceled an important meeting with the Russian foreign minister in order to stay at the talks.

Trimble's exit highlighted his haughty assumption that his needs outweigh those of all others.

Instead of robustly defending the Good Friday peace agreement, Trimble has triggered several crises since 1998 by demanding concessions from Sinn Fein to help him silence grumbling peace pact foes in his own party.

In contrast, Sinn Fein's Gerry Adams and Martin McGuinness have consistently sold the accord's big-picture merits to their base. That has helped them deliver groundbreaking IRA disarmament moves and, even more stunningly, a republican admission that Ireland won't be united until a majority in Northern Ireland votes for it to be.

Adams and McGuinness haven't exactly faced lightweight opposition: IRA dissidents killed 29 people with a 1998 car-bombing in Omagh aimed at trying to sink the peace accord.

Despite Trimble's exit, a deal was almost cut to revive the assembly, which Britain mothballed in October amidst a burgeoning IRA spying scandal.

Blair and Ahern will return next month hoping to seal a deal involving major moves on British army demilitarization; judicial and policing reform; and a qualified amnesty for IRA fugitives in return for dramatic IRA disarmament moves and a statement that the group's war is over.

An independent monitoring panel would judge compliance.

The pro-British UUP wants immediate sanctions imposed on Sinn Fein if the IRA is ever deemed in breach. Sinn Fein says this would violate the terms of 1998's carefully crafted peace pact.

Both sides label the issue of sanctions a "deal-breaker."

Mark Durkan, leader of the pro-Irish nationalist Social Democratic Labor Party, thinks a deal can be done, thereby allowing assembly elections on May 29 (Britain last week scrapped the original May 1 election date to give parties time to sell any new deal).

Durkan, who was the Cabinet's deputy first minster, believes the sanctions' standoff could be defused if parties sign an "implementation compact." And, if problems arise, a gradual four-stage, all-party review process would then propose consensus solutions.

"Our approach is solution focused. The others are sanction focused - about parties finding fault with each other," insists Durkan. "Ours turns a problem into a solution, theirs turns a problem into a crisis."

Of the many talks convened during the crisis after crisis that have followed 1998's peace pact, Durkan said, "At times you wonder: How can there be so much talk with so little communication?

"There's been a lot of posing and posturing throughout this process," he said. "A large part of this process has involved people milking not doing things, so that they can then go on to milk doing those things later."

He said some parties have an exaggerated sense of their global importance.

On a January visit to study aid projects in the famine-stricken African country of Malawi, he was ribbed by that nation's vice president over the instability of the North's government.

Which makes you realize, he said, "that in one of the poorest countries in the world our political situation is taken as a political joke.

"We have this thing of telling each other here that the eyes of the world are upon us," he added. "The reality is, the eyes of the world are more usually rolled up towards heaven when they see us trapping ourselves and tripping each other, instead of going down the path of progress."

IRA Splinter Groups Eyed In Booby-trap Killing
by Jim Dee
Boston Sunday Herald, August 4, 2002

DERRY, Northern Ireland - David Caldwell got to his job at 7 a.m. Thursday in a British army base on Derry's outskirts. Clearing a cluttered work table, he removed a lunch box someone had left behind, unaware it was a booby trap.

The bomb inside exploded in his face.

The 51-year-old Protestant construction worker died in the hospital soon afterward.

Although no group claimed responsibility, some who have splintered off from the Irish Republican Army are being blamed.

The murder of Caldwell, who once served in the British army's locally recruited Ulster Defense Regiment, occurred after months of sectarian violence in Belfast and 11 days after pro-British loyalist paramilitaries randomly shot dead a Catholic teenager in the city.

On Friday, 3,000 people attended a rally at Belfast City Hall protesting the violence. Tomorrow, an anti-sectarian march will proceed from the site of Caldwell's killing to Derry center. His wife, Mavis McFaul, who now must raise their four daughters alone, has urged that there be no retaliation for her husband's killing.

Of the bombers, she said, "If they could see the families they leave behind, the heartbroken, they wouldn't do this."

Two small bands of IRA rebels remain active in the North: the self-styled "Real IRA," who are considered the chief suspects in Caldwell's murder, and the Continuity IRA.

The RIRA called a cease-fire a month after carrying out the Omagh bombing of August 1998, which killed 29 people and injured hundreds more. But police believe they've carried out dozens of unclaimed small-scale bombings since February 2000.

Two weeks ago, for the first time since 1998, the RIRA claimed credit for a grenade attack on a police car near Downpatrick. They vowed then to continue their campaign "until the British occupation of our country is ended once and for all."

An army spokesman said the base where Caldwell was killed closed down a year ago and is used now only by teenage army cadets and "medical units engaged in peacekeeping and humanitarian missions all over the world. These people save lives. It's outrageous that such an incident should occur in such a place."

Caldwell's slaying was condemned by politicians across the political divide.

Sinn Fein's Martin McGuinness, a former IRA commander who is now the North's education minister, called it "absolutely and totally wrong."

Before the mainstream IRA's current five-year cease-fire, it often left booby-trapped devices at army bases. The IRA also targeted civilians repairing the damage done to bases by IRA bombs. IRA dissidents could claim they're continuing those tactics.

But, regardless of the rationale, they're clearly ignoring the dramatically changed political landscape ushered in by 1998's Good Friday peace agreement.

The accord is backed by more than 90 percent of the North's pro- Irish nationalists. And Sinn Fein's political rise - in which it became the largest nationalist party in June 2001 - owes much to its energetic depiction of the accord as a springboard to Irish reunification.

In contrast, the RIRA haven't explained how they'll drive Britain from Ireland, something the larger and better-equipped mainstream IRA couldn't do during 25 years of fighting.

Michael McKevitt, who is said to be the RIRA's founder, will go on trial in January on charges of directing the group. The chief witness against him is Dave Rupert, an American who was paid to infiltrate the RIRA, and who is now living under FBI protection.

Rupert infiltrated the RIRA by first approaching sympathizers in the United States who long have been busy raising funds for IRA dissidents in barrooms and clubs from Boston to San Francisco.

These days, anyone wishing to make a contribution to help out the "Auld Sod" has many legitimate options, from human rights watchdog groups to political parties to charitable organizations both in Ireland and in America.

Or, one could give money to a group that hides explosives in lunch boxes, so unsuspecting workmen who are struggling to put food on their families' tables die in horrific circumstances.

Such groups will unite Ireland, all right - but in disgust at the brutality of callous actions purportedly carried out on behalf of "all" Irish people, including David Caldwell's now-grief-stricken family.

Brick By Brick, Foundations Of Peace Crumble
by Jim Dee
Boston Sunday Herald, June 30, 2002

BELFAST, Northern Ireland - As armored police jeeps retreated from the scene of yesterday's heavy nationalist rioting on West Belfast's Springfield Road, a 10-year-old boy with a brick in his hand eyed them with satisfaction.

"Is that them all away?" said the boy, who'd been in the thick of the battle that was sparked when police guided an unwanted Protestant march through the area.

"We put them out, didn't we?" he said, beaming.

In this part of Belfast, the police have been seen as the armed wing of pro-British unionism ever since Britain partitioned Ireland in 1920.

The Irish and U.S. governments, along with most of the North's major parties, back Britain's November 2000 police reforms. Sinn Fein doesn't, insisting they don't go far enough.

And, as vividly underscored by yesterday's violence, in Sinn Fein and Irish Republican Army heartlands the policing issue remains as volatile - and potentially destabilizing - as ever.

Policing will be on the agenda when British Prime Minister Tony Blair and Irish Prime Minister Bertie Ahern convene crisis talks Thursday about mounting Belfast street violence and allegations of renewed IRA activity.

The IRA is accused of stealing classified intelligence information from a Belfast police station in March, giving explosives training to Colombian rebels last year, and shooting at pro-British loyalists during recent civil unrest in East Belfast.

In addition, anonymous British intelligence sources recently told the BBC that the IRA was testing new weaponry of its own in Colombia, and that it's been updating its files on potential targets. The IRA denies the allegations.

Sinn Fein says the most recent charges are designed to shift attention away from a damning BBC documentary last week that alleged British soldiers and police systematically helped loyalist paramilitaries murder scores of nationalists during the conflict.

Regardless of who is right, a crisis is brewing.

Ulster Unionist Party leader David Trimble is once again muttering about possibly quitting his first minister's post if Blair doesn't punish Sinn Fein for the IRA's alleged infractions.

Trimble says actions speak louder than words, insisting that, while the IRA talks of supporting peace, its activities suggest otherwise. But do they?

The IRA has held a cease-fire since July 1997, and for all but 17 months since August 1994. In the last 10 months, it has carried out two unprecedented disarmament acts - something it swore it would never do and something the major loyalist paramilitaries still refuse to do.

And, crucially, the IRA said it moved on disarmament specifically to save the peace process from collapse.

The IRA also has sent its political allies in Sinn Fein into a British-financed parliament at Stormont, a building long despised by republicans and nationalists.

Indeed, seeing Sinn Fein at Stormont is one of the most striking developments in the peace process, because it was once hailed as a "Protestant parliament for a Protestant people" where widespread discrimination against Catholics was openly advocated by unionist prime ministers.

In addition, Belfast's first-ever Sinn Fein mayor, Alex Maskey, will lay a wreath at City Hall tomorrow to honor the Protestants and Catholics of Ireland who died fighting for Britain in Word War I.

This will be a enormous symbolic step and one that has angered some republicans. But Maskey's gesture is in line with the pledge he made upon being sworn in this month that he'd use his yearlong term to build bridges with unionists, whose city councilors all opposed his election.

However, unionists remain skeptical of his and the IRA's intentions. So the brewing crisis is likely to continue to deepen with the approach of next May's crucial assembly elections - a de facto second referendum on the peace pact.

This means the clock may be ticking for the accord and, more importantly, for the 10-year-old with the brick in his hand on the Springfield Road.

A failure by politicians now doesn't only run the risk of sinking the new political arrangements. It also risks replacing the boy's brick with a rifle in 10 years time, a nightmare scenario no one wants, but too few appear to be acting to prevent.