On Monday evening, June 24^th, Sean Mac Eachaidh, took us on a stroll through the Ormeau Road area. We stopped off at the Community Centre where we met up with Patricia Breen, a Community Worker, and Gerard Rice, Spokesperson for the Lower Ormeau Concerned Community, (LOCC). Both very graciously spent time with us while I conducted interviews.

DVB: State your name, address, and phone number (laughing, this was a joke as I was having problems with my recorder.)

GR: Gerard Rice, Youth Leader, Community Worker, and Spokesperson for the Lower Ormeau Concerned Community (LOCC). This group was set up following the massacre of five local people in Sean Graham’s Bookie Shop by loyalists, the Ulster Freedom Fighters (UFF). They had guns that were brought into the country by Brian Nelson, who was a British agent. They killed five local people in that one killing, and seriously injured nine others.

The area that I would claim to represent, as David Trimble would say, is made up of about 550 homes. The population is just under 2,400 with an adult population of about 1,200. Over 28 years, loyalists have killed 55 people, simply because of religion. The total area has lost about 61 people. The others were killed through republican feuds and what not. The 55 killed is a huge percentage of the population.

DVB: Weren’t you attacked by the police and injured sometime within the past six months?

GR: Well, I am attacked by the police on a regular basis, within the last six months there have been a couple of attacks.

DVB: Today, are you physically OK?

GR: Yes, today, I am physically OK. The most recent death threat was Wednesday night (June 19,2002). On Sunday, I was warned that I had to be extra careful this week, and extremely careful after Wednesday. In the early hours of Thursday, 12:15AM to be exact, the police called the house to say there is a ‘hit on me’ for Thursday at the high courts, but I wasn’t going to the high courts. There was supposed to be a shooting involving me. I have been told to be extremely careful for the next couple of weeks. Before that, they sent a bullet in the post about two months ago, and have attacked the house a couple of times in between there.

There is a thing here called the ‘Key Person Protection Scheme’. In the past it was used for Unionist politicians, high ranking policemen, and judges, it is basically to protect the 'Right to Life'. When peoples' lives are under a significant threat of attack, it is designed to protect their life. Rosemary Nelson, who was a friend of mine, had applied for it, but she was turned down. She often said "it doesn’t make a difference, if the State wants you dead, you’re dead, it doesn’t matter what protection you have." As you know, they killed Rosemary. After her murder, I applied for the ‘Key Persons Protection’, knowing full well they would turn me down. I brought the police department to court under the ‘Right to Life’ and won. They had to spend 70 thousand pounds on my home, which involved a lot of technology. (I chose not to specify details here.) It is all very cosmetic, if they want to kill me, they are going to kill me in the street. But it is a matter of challenging them. They claimed the 'Right to Life' only applied to protecting the 'Right to Life' of the unionists and loyalists. Republicans and nationalists were perceived to be a threat to the State.

Brian Nelson worked for the State. He actively targeted the nationalists, and was provided documents from the British military intelligence organization, FRU (Force Research Unit). He provided intelligence files on 200 nationalists. Eighty of those were attacked by loyalists, 25 of them were killed, and one was Pat Finucanne. You have Special Branch targeting you, you have MI5 targeting you, and you have all sorts of British agents targeting you. The bottom line is you just have to be extra careful.

DVB: So how do you live a life?

GR: You get on with it, a lot of it has to do with luck, and a big part of it is your community around you. If there are strangers driving around in the area, someone would phone me at work, or at home. A strange car couldn’t sit on the street for five minutes without phone calls being received.

Another thing under the ‘Key Person Protection’, in this building, there are special doors where you came in, cameras all around the building. That is there to deter terrorist people from targeting the building itself. Not just myself or my family, but within the wider community as well. Now saying that, there have been over the years, a number of attempts, and there have been a number of attacks on my home where they shot into my home. There were eleven attacks in eleven months. You just generally have to be careful and hope everyone is praying very hard.

DVB: We are coming up to the parades in a few weeks, how do you feel about what might happen?

GR: I honestly believe the parade issue is over, it’s finished. The parade issue was used by unionists and the Orangemen to oppose the Good Friday Agreement, and to oppose the peace process. Their opposition in rerouting the parades was to put pressure on the nationalist community, to target the nationalists, and nationalist children were burned in their beds. Nationalist taxi drivers were shot in their taxi's, then they were burned So that at the very least, the nationalist community would strike out and defend itself. Then cease fires are broken and you are back in the state of the whole cycle again. Then sooner or later, the unionists claim they are being attacked by the nationalists. So, basically, we believe, and if you listen to the Orange Order themselves, it is about opposition to the Good Friday Agreement.

We are seeing less disturbances around the July period, however, there is another dimension. Everybody now expects July to be a particularly bad month. If you can afford to, you take a holiday, everyone just buttons down the hatches. The media has also begun to switch off around the July period. We have actually begun to see the switch, from July, to all year round. Trouble was in the Short Strand, this month and last month, (June and May) the Ormeau Road, the Donegall Pass area, and North Queen Street last night. We have seen the whole disgrace outside Holy Cross Primary School. So you see, it is now going on a yearly cycle, with a 12 month affect on people. Before it was the two or three weeks in July, where people could look forward to take a holiday, everyone was disappearing, it wasn’t a big issue. The Brits had everything in place, like the major fortifications so that the loyalists would wreck them within their own area. Do you know what I mean? They couldn’t really antagonize us because even in this area, they couldn’t get in.

Some say it’s escalated, more filtered out, it’s happening more on a regular basis in a very coordinated and more organized way. Take these last three months in the Ardoyne and Whitewell areas, although they are miles apart, they are North of the city. North Queen Street is also North of the city, and the Short Strand is East of the city. The trouble doesn’t all happen at once, but does involve different areas. It might involve the UFF, the Ulster Freedom Fighters or the UVF, the Ulster Volunteer Force, which is the PUP, the military wing of the Progressive Unionist Party. It might be the UVF this week, it could be the UFF or PUP on the Ormeau Bridge next week, or it could be the UVF on the Donegall Pass the following week. All of this is happening in the build up for the elections for Stormont in May, creating the illusion that there is no peace and the Good Friday Agreement (GFA) has delivered nothing. It keeps the pressure on.

DVB: So with all the provocation you have to go through, it’s going to bring the IRA back out?

GR: Well that is their intention, and you have seen the Short Strand area. Basically, the Short Strand area is a small nationalist, republican set of homes with about 3,000 people surrounded by 60,000 odd thousand loyalists, unionists. What I witnessed over there when guns were finally used was an attempt to burn the nationalist homes. It is one thing to damage homes with bricks, bottles and paint, you can still live in them like that. But when you start throwing petrol bombs, the Short Strand can’t afford to loose a hundred homes, it hasn’t enough homes to house the people that are in it anyway. There is no where else to build because it is surrounded by loyalist areas. When they attempted to burn those homes, yes, the republicans defended the area, and yes, they shot five loyalists who were all community workers. They were all there for the purpose for doing staunch community work in their community But nobody happens to explain where the pipe bombs came from, or where the petrol bombs were coming from. There were over 200 homes in the Short Strand where they don't have any roofs and there are no windows anymore. That's the level of damage.

One night about three weeks ago, I was over in the Short Strand, it was the Queen Mother’s birthday, or something. They played ‘The Queen’ all night, with really loud music all around the district. All of sudden, it would get dead quite, then the petrol bombs would come over, and then the music would start all over again. It went on from 7:00PM at night until 7:00AM in the morning. It has been going on like that for months and months. There was an incident in which five loyalists were shot, you have to defend your homes. It is as simple as that.

DVB: You are right. I read after that, that the IRA broke their cease fire. (I say this sarcastically).

GR: People are saying the IRA broke their cease fire. What I am saying, there was an attempt by loyalists to burn down one hundred family homes. A hundred homes that people can’t afford to give up, and people were shot for doing it, but not in a way that there were any life threating injuries. They were shot in the legs, and it was enough to prevent them from burning the houses. The IRA could have shot five people dead if they wanted to, but small arms were used, and they were used in a way that people were injured and not killed.

The reason I am saying this is, if the British Army had stopped these people from doing this night after night for weeks, there wouldn’t have been any need for the IRA to shoot them. If the police and British Army had been doing their job by stopping these people from attacking the homes, then there would have been no one shot. Now in saying that, after those five people were shot, the RUC and British Army moved in and stopped these people from attacking the homes. There was no one shot after that. What were the RUC and British Army doing? Were they protecting the nationalist homes? I don’t think so. They were insuring that no more loyalists got shot.

DVB: What can Americans do? Is there anything we can do?

GR: Basically, I am very worried about the message America is sending out at the moment. Everybody has great sympathy for what America went through in September. Every nationality was affected, it was an attack on ordinary citizens, so everybody has great sympathy. But the Americans actions following that have been used to justify all sorts of things. America has always been hailed as someone who protected citizens rights. They have always protected their own citizens rights as opposed to protecting citizens outside America.

Just recently there was someone who might have been involved in September 11^th, I don’t know, and an American politician or a member of the foreign office was on the television. They were keeping him in Morocco. They were using tactics and means to extract information from him in Morocco that wouldn't be legal in America.

Now if you’re an American in Morocco, you shouldn’t be using any tactics in Morocco that you wouldn’t use at home. It sends out a message that things are alright to do whatever you have to do.

Brian Nelson and the British state killed. We have most definite evidence that they killed 25 innocent Catholics in a war against the nationalist community. Now, with American tactics being that dirty war is justified, and if it wears your supposed enemy down, there are no words of engagement. I am very worried at what the present leadership in America is showing the rest of the world.

DVB: I don’t know if it’s right or wrong for me to say, just because our government says and does one thing, doesn’t mean that everyone supports that.

GR: I know that from my experience in meeting people from America. There will be 700 kids on Thursday, who will leave streets such as this, from the Ormeau Road, the Short Strand, the Falls Road, and the Shankill Road, throughout Portadown and other areas. They will get on a plane and go out to America for six weeks to get away from the mayhem here. It’s fantastic, it’s brilliant! That is your ordinary decent American, they do a lot of good work.

Just recently one of our primary schools was burned by loyalists. An American group sent money to repair the school, which was able to be repaired very quickly, and our kids didn’t lose a day of school.

For two weeks, beginning next Friday, we will have 38 international observers, 30 of them will be from America. They will be on the streets for 24 hours a day, on the interfaces, at the flashpoint areas, observing what goes on, and holding the people accountable. If the State would do its job when the loyalists are attacking the Catholic homes, then the Catholic community would not have to defend themselves. But the RUC stand by the side of the road and let it happen, then the Catholic community needs to defend themselves. If the State would do its job you wouldn’t have this trouble. We find if we put observers on the ground, at the very least, it forces the RUC to do their job.

As you say, it's not every American. American Foreign Policy does not make Americans

Because once you begin infringing on other peoples human rights, all other peoples human rights are up for grabs.

DVB: You’re right, and I am hearing that in different pockets as well.

GR: If you want, I will take you over to the Short Strand tomorrow.

SEAN: She got stoned today.

GR: Out on the street, if I see a kid throwing stones at anyone, it doesn’t matter if it’s the PSNI or a loyalist, I take him home to his parents. The new plastic bullets they have are lethal. It’s a miracle they haven’t killed anybody yet If a child gets hit with one of these plastic bullets now, and it takes nothing, it could be deadly.

I have known children who have been killed with plastic bullets, one girl was simply carrying a pint of milk. So when I see a kid throwing a stone, my first thing is to take them home, which is what you do right at your interface. I know that is what Paud Devinney had done.

I know that when that trouble broke out on the Short Strand, Paud Devinney was there, trying to calm the situation. I know that the PSNI know that. I know they deliberately took him and beat him in such a way, that the people in the republican and nationalist community in the Short Strand would be very angry. It's all this peripheral response. Thankfully the people on the Short Strand didn’t respond. It was some four weeks after that when the loyalists were attempting to burn a hundred homes that people in the Short Strand responded to protect their homes.

DVB: How is Paud Devinney doing today? Wasn't he a community worker?

GR: He is a very, very good community worker, and he was very busy. The PSNI brutally beat and seriously injured him. His brain was damaged, and the bone was fractured going into his brain. His speech is a little slurred, but his faculties are all there. He's just a wee bit slower, and is gradually coming around. His thought process is good. We are hoping there is no long term damage.

DVB: How is his spirit?

GR: Paud came through the Hunger Strikes and Blanket protest so you are not going to break his spirit by breaking his head. At the minute he is in respite, just taking things very easy, because the next six months will be crucial. It takes the brain a long time to heal.

DVB: Is he still living in this area?

GR: He was away for a few weeks, but is back home in the Short Strand, he will be away regularly on weekends. Before you would have called for him every day, particularly in times when there was trouble on, like now. He has been told to just stay at home and take it very easy, he has no choice.

DVB: I was very interested in learning about him, because since his initial beating and seeing the photograph, I haven't read anything about him.

GR: There was an article on him about two weeks ago in the Irish news, basically about what had happened to him. Peter Montgomery was shot in the elbow with a plastic bullet. It shattered his elbow and the bone on either side of his elbow. They had to operate from his wrist to his shoulder and rebuild it, he will never have full use of that arm. The last plastic bullets killed kids. These new plastic bullets actually travel at twice the speed.

DVB: All the action you folks have pursued on the plastic bullets, you are not getting anywhere with them, are you?

GR: No, the police claim they need them, but they don't need them in England. Although they have them, they don't fire them in England. There has been only one plastic bullet fired there despite members of their police force being killed. There have been a lot of race riots in England over the past several years, very serious race riots, and they have no call to use the plastic bullets. But here, it is the first response.

We saw an attack on the Short Strand last week The people were having a rally in support of what has become known as 'The Siege of the Short Strand'. The community leaders urged their community not to get involved, do not react when people are throwing stones, or when they begin to throw petrol bombs. Follow the community leadership. During that rally, the RUC let something like 700 loyalists into the middle of the Short Strand Estate. There was some serious fighting for about 10 minutes to remove these people from the Short Strand. Given that there were 700 loyalists that came into the Short Strand, there were nine plastic bullets fired. There were six Catholics hit with them, and one loyalist. The weapon is still used in a sectarian use, as it was used before the Good Friday Agreement (GFA). They were not shot by the RUC or the PSNI, but by the British Army, do you know what I mean? It doesn't make a difference.

You can see the loyalists come out of the Shankill and go mad for a night, doing all sorts of damage. They shoot all sorts of fireworks, you see it on the TV's in America. The next day you hear on the news that maybe three or four plastic bullets were fired. If that happened in the nationalist areas, you would be hearing 80, 100 or 200 plastic bullets were fired. They are used in that kind of way.

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