IMC Turns A Blind Eye

It seems that the Independent Monitoring Commission in Northern Ireland is having some trouble in reading the reports that they themselves have compiled. Not so long ago we were informed, by the IMC, that the IRA had lied about is "historic" disarmament and they had in fact kept some of their weapons. We were also informed that they continued to be involved in organised crime and that their intelligence gathering apparatus was still intact and functioning- and that they continued to gather information about those in the security services.

Despite all of that however, the IMC has come to the conclusion that terrorists lying about giving up arms, being involved in criminal activity (including the multi-million pound Northern Ireland bank robbery) and continuing its spying operation is nothing to worry about. No, really, it's okay that terrorists are still armed, still active and still, according to another report, recruiting and training members in terrorist skills, because they have, don't you know, "committed to the politcal process".

Of course we can take their word on this- why on earth shouldn't we believe them about that? It's not like they lied about destroying all their weapons or anything...oops.

What's more unusual about the IMC's conclusions is that they also said this-

Referring to IRA intelligence gathering, the IMC said: "This is an activity which we believe is authorised by the leadership and which involves some very senior members.

"While some of it may be for defensive purposes, it is predominantly directed towards supporting the political strategy.

"It involves among other things the continuation of efforts to penetrate public and other institutions with the intention of illegally obtaining or handling sensitive information.

"This raises the question of whether the commitment to exclusively democratic means is full and thorough going, or whether there remain elements of a continuing going subversive intent beyond the boundaries of democratic politics."

In other words, the threat of a return to a violent, murderous terrorist campaign continues to hang over the political process in Northern Ireland. If they don't get their way...

And just so you know, the devolved government which was in power here, was suspended over claims of Sinn Fein/IRA spying. Seems to me that while nothing has changed, we are being asked, yet again, to allow them to continue to break the law, threaten our lives and still continue to be in positions of authority at the highest levels of our government.

Tony Blair's policy of appeasing armed and active terrorists continues.