[Mb-civic] Guardian Unlimited: We won't give up fight for justice, say sisters

[harry.sifton at sympatico.ca]

HS spotted this on the Guardian Unlimited site and thought you should see it.

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We won't give up fight for justice, say sisters
With no breakthrough in the hunt for the killers of Robert McCartney, hundreds defy threats to turn out in Belfast for vigil
Angelique Chrisafis, Ireland correspondent
Monday April 18 2005
The Guardian


Several hundred mourners and protesters yesterday packed the narrow Belfast alleyway where Robert McCartney was murdered and held a vigil despite threats to his sisters and rumours of a counter-demonstration by republicans. 

Paula McCartney said the turnout in torrential rain beside Magennis's bar, where Mr McCartney was stabbed and beaten by IRA members after an argument, exceeded expectations.  

She said she was heartened by the number of people who had turned out from her area, the small Catholic enclave of Short Strand in east Belfast, where, she said, she was intimidated handing out flyers this week and told that she would be forced from her home.  

"After the difficult week we have had, it has restored my faith in human nature," she said.  

Eleven weeks after Mr McCartney's murder, and despite an international campaign that has taken his sisters to the White House, there have been no breakthroughs and no charges. Paula McCartney said a senior republican expelled from the IRA over the murder was still being protected.  

The sisters vowed to continue their campaign until witnesses gave full accounts and the killers were brought to court.  

The oldest of the McCartney sisters, Gemma, a district nurse, broke down as Father Tom Layden led the vigil beside dozens of bouquets of flowers in the narrow redbrick lane. It was the first time the sisters and Mr McCartney's fiancée, Bridgeen Hagans, had visited the murder scene together.  

Standing away from the crowd, Ms Hagans carried her four-year-old son who stared blankly into the now familiar scrum of camera lenses.  

"To Robert, missing you and needing you more than ever," read the short note on her flowers.  

A note on flowers left by Mr McCartney's two sons read: "Daddy, we love and miss you so much. Love you forever, your two wee men."  

One of those at the vigil, a mother from County Armagh, said: "The longer it goes on, the more difficult things are going to get for them, so I had to come out in support."  

Magennis's bar, which stayed open on the day of the funeral, was closed. There was no sign of a demonstration against the McCartneys.  

Sinn Féin's justice spokesman, Gerry Kelly, and the Westminster candidate for south Belfast, Alex Maskey, attended the vigil.  

Sinn Féin has withdrawn two local election candidates who were in Magennis's bar on the night of the killing and has stressed its support for the family.  

One Sinn Féin election candidate told the Guardian this week that some voters had   raised the McCartney case on doorsteps but he did not expect it to greatly affect the party's vote.  

The SDLP deputy leader, Alasdair McDonnell, said: "Sinn Féin refuses to answer the key questions. They won't say how many of their members were in the bar. They won't say how many are suspended.  

"They won't say how many were election workers for Alex Maskey ... And it is clear that at least some of the men supposedly expelled from the IRA are back in again."  

Meanwhile, three of the McCartney sisters joined a rally of up to 100 people in Derry on Saturday in support of two other Catholic families who claim that the IRA murdered their sons, James McGinley and Mark "Mousy" Robinson.  

Carrying a banner demanding "justice", Mark Robinson's aunt criticised a "twisted campaign" by republicans to justify the killings.  

Grafitti in support of the IRA among Derry's famous gallery of republican murals read: "Justice for scum" and "Justice for junkies, joyriders and burglars?"  

Sheila Holden, Mr Robinson's aunt, said of the killings allegedly carried out by IRA members: "We say to the republican movement: make these people accountable, they bring shame on the cause of republicanism and they bring shame on the republican movement.  

"By harbouring them you must realise that is damaging to your cause ... The selfless sacrifices made by hundreds of republican volunteers, my brother included, who gave their lives in the struggle to achieve freedom in Ireland is besmirched and damaged by the criminal actions of the people who killed Mark, James and Robert." 

Copyright Guardian Newspapers Limited