Wednesday 24 October 2001

Unprecedented

I had such a great day today, in terms of tasks achieved, little highs and amazing news. 

First, I did a full hour (!) of weights and stretching; then I scrubbed the kitchen floor; I had a little lunch (that is, a small lunch and, not what many Australians associate with the phrase "little lunch" which was the  c. 1960s name for the little snacky thing kids had at morning recess) then headed into town for a little shopping and browsing.

I bought four - yes, four! - books from my Wish List; Reaper Man, Fatherland, The Shell Seekers, and The Private Life of the Brain. I bought garlic and pure cotton - pure cotton, whee! - knickers at Marks and Spencer. I looked for but did not find suitable shoes or underwear for this severely aggravating event I have to attend in February. Yes, that would be my wedding. I predict "not finding" said shoes and underwear will be a recurring theme. Mostly because I know precisely what I want and that is Never A Good Thing, probability-wise. Sigh. 

Back home, recovering from the excitement (books! and pure cotton knickers!) I spent some time writing/replying to emails, before Sam got home from work and we walked to our local shopping centre to do the Weekly Shop.  I won't actually list all items (count yourself lucky this time).

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Then while I started dinner, which was Thai style fish cakes (recipe pending), oven fries and steamed cauliflower, broccoli, peas and carrots, we logged on to the BBC News Online to find:

IRA in arms breakthrough

Yeah suuuure we thought. Like that's ever gonna happen.

I clicked on the story. And it had happened.

The de Chastelain commission* confirmed on Tuesday: "We have witnessed an event which we regard as significant in which the IRA has put a quantity of arms beyond use. The material in question includes arms, ammunition and explosives."

*John de Chastelain is head of the decommissioning body.

Has anyone any idea how amazing this is? I mean, it's up there with "pigs might fly" and way ahead of me finding pretty shoes, probability-wise ... The IRA have been digging their heels in and failing to meet any of the agreements of the Good Friday Agreement (referred to around here as the Good Friday Kinda Grumpy Maybe).

As background, a couple of weeks ago I wrote the following in an email to a friend:-

And DON'T get me onto the subject of the USA funding the Sinn Fein/IRA/Real IRA, who are the ones deadlocking the peace process, refusing to decommission arms, getting stuck into the terrorism and training of terrorists (a couple of the Sinn Fein MPs are convicted terrorists, for fuck's sake). Look, the UDA/UFF/UVF are a bunch of guntoting insane maniacs too, but to my knowledge their fundees are not fighting a war against terrorism in the Middle East at the same time as handing $$$ to another group to continue terrorism? 

Just My Totally Biased View, peeps. But kinda relevant.

Even before the events of 11 September, talks were being held between the US envoy and Republic of Ireland ministers regarding the arrest of IRA terrorists conducting training "programmes" in Columbia (nb: not a good thing for Irish-American relations). Following 11 September, and along with the whole "war against terrorism" position, these talks continued, and further action taken. Namely, the FBI closed down the USA-based (fundraising) website of the Provisional IRA. 

Seems to me as though the US realised that more people would be questioning - and more publicly than I - its role in N. Ireland and the hypocrisy inherent in that involvement. And that external pressures - that thee and me will never know about - must have been brought to bear on the IRA and Sinn Fein, to lead to such an unprecedented move as to put arms "beyond use". 

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However it happened, it is truly the most amazing news, and I can't believe that I'm here, in N. Ireland, at this time, thirty-odd years after the commencement of "the Troubles", to see what may really, truly, be a beginning to an end.

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