SF slams Trimble’s talks with Colombian VP
Sinn Féin has hit out at the North’s First Minister for meeting the Colombian Vice-President today to discuss allegations that the IRA provided training to rebels in the South American country.
Party spokesman Gerry Kelly said David Trimble used the meeting on the fringes of the Earth Summit in Johannesburg to advance the views of the Ulster Unionist Party when he should have been acting in his capacity as First Minister.
He also accused the UUP leader of “deliberately prejudicing the right to a fair trial” of the three Irishman currently facing charges of training the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC), a rebel army that has been fighting the Colombian Government for almost 40 years.
“David Trimble is in South Africa in his capacity as First Minister to attend the World Summit on Sustainable Development,” Mr Kelly said.
“For him to use his visit to promote the partisan politics of the Ulster Unionist Party in order to undermine the peace process and to interfere in the upcoming trial of three Irishmen is appalling.”
The three Irishman – Martin McCauley, James Monaghan and Niall Connolly – were arrested in Bogota in August last year after arriving on a flight from FARC territory in the south of the country.
They were subsequently charged with training the left-wing rebels and are due to go on trial later this year.
