Fine Gael motion carried as McDowell denounces IRA
The murder of Belfast man Robert McCartney was cowardly and nakedly evil, Justice Minister Michael McDowell said tonight.
Speaking during a parliamentary motion urging witnesses to come forward, he said Irish people were beginning to realise the threat posed by Sinn Féin and the IRA to Irish democracy.
He said that murder, torture and mutilation were the stock-in trade of the Provisional movement.
But he warned that people shouldn’t be fooled that the IRA is responsible for the thuggery and criminality and that Sinn Féin “is some separate democratic chrysalis seeking to break out of a paramilitary cocoon and to become an exclusively peaceful and democratic butterfly”.
Mr McCartney was knifed and beaten to death in a pub brawl by a drunken IRA mob which later forensically cleaned the crime scene and intimidated more than 70 witnesses.
Mr McDowell added: “The public is beginning to see the shape of the threat to democracy posed by a movement which uses crime on a massive scale to engage in politics. What is on view is but the tip of the iceberg.”
He said the IRA never intended to go away but mutate into a “lightly-armed gendarmerie who would in future act as the enforcers for the criminal and control strategy underpinning Sinn Féin’s drive for political power”.
Praising the McCartney sisters – Paula, Gemma, Catherine, Donna and Claire - and Robert’s partner Bridgeen, Mr McDowell said he was lost in admiration for their unique combination of bravery, dignity, determination and hunger for justice.
“These brave women refused to be trampled down by thuggery. They refused to let the light of justice be snuffed out by fear,” said McDowell.
Sinn Féin’s Dáil leader Caoimhghin Ó Caolain earlier insisted that every avenue must be kept open for witnesses to come forward.
But he said it was “very regrettable” that an amendment to the Fine Gael motion could not be accepted by the party.
“It shows what I can only call a cynical exploitation of this very serious issue for the narrowest of political motives,” he said.
Labour Deputy Leader Liz McManus said Mr McCartney was “cut open like a gutted fish, brutally kicked in the head and left to die”.
She said the McCartney sisters were ordinary women who had become extraordinary out of their tragedy.
“Tonight the democratic community in the Dáil Éireann stand here with them.”
She claimed that the IRA had killed more than the UDA, UFF, UVF, RUC and British Army – and included 400 Catholics among its victims.
Ceann Comhairle Rory O'Hanlon declared the motion carried after the final speaker.
Earlier, Mr O’Caolain repeated Gerry Adams’ remarks that those who had sullied the republican cause must be held account for their actions.
“Sinn Féin supports the thrust of the Fine Gael motion. We do not want to delete one word of it,” said the Cavan/Monaghan TD.
But he went on to say that calling on witnesses to contact the PSNI “restricts the means by which information may be given in order to help bring the killers to justice”.
