OUTRAGE OVER ‘APOLOGY’ FOR LYRA MURDER
Republican wing disgusts the country with grotesque parade in Dublin
POLITICIANS and friends of New IRA murder victim Lyra McKee have expressed outrage after the terror group’s political wing marched past the GPO and offered a cynical apology to her heartbroken family.
Dissident Republican group Saoradh, whose banners proclaim that there is an ‘unfinished revolution’, held a paramilitary parade up and down O’Connell Street in Dublin yesterday, which was described as a ‘celebration of murder’ by one horrified protester who witnessed it.
Senior ministers Simon Harris, Regina Doherty and Paul Kehoe told of their revulsion after about 150 people, two marching bands and a full colour party, dressed in military garb with berets and sunglasses, stopped traffic and trams.
They even paused to hear the 1916 Proclamation being read out in front of the GPO. Dee Fennell, a spokesperson for Saoradh,
‘No place for the odious, shameful degenerates’
described Lyra McKee’s murderer as a ‘Republican volunteer’, while adding that her family should receive an apology.
She said: ‘Just like in the past, the IRA can make mistakes and the IRA cannot shy away from those mistakes when they occur.’
She claimed that ‘a Republican volunteer fired shots at the PSNI following a number of house raids that were designed to antagonise’.
She added: ‘Those shots tragically killed a young journalist named Lyra McKee standing behind Crown Force lines. The death of civilians has never been the intention of Republicans, but when it happens, Republicans need to take responsibility. If an IRA volunteer fired shots that accidentally killed Lyra McKee then the IRA should publicly admit responsibility and apologise. They should apologise for no other reason than it is the right thing.’
However, Séamus Ryan from Limerick, who didn’t realise the march was taking place until he arrived on O’Connell Street yesterday, questioned one of the participants about the murder, but was aggressively confronted until the situation was defused by plain-clothes gardaí.
‘Why are we allowing this s*** to happen on the streets of Dublin?’ Mr Ryan asked.
‘I know people who knew her [Lyra], this would not have been appropriate at any time but it’s especially not appropriate now, after her death. The actions of those guys are disgraceful and do not represent the people of Ireland. This is a celebration of murder.’
A Mail on Sunday reporter was also pushed and harried as he asked marchers if they condemned the murder.
After the parade National Chairman of Saoradh, Brian Kenna, refused to condemn the killers.
But in response, Health Minister Simon Harris told the MoS yesterday: ‘It was a distasteful and insulting attempt to intimidate. Tomorrow we will gather as a State to commemorate the Easter Rising with the real and only Irish Army. There is only one army and it is made up of men and women who do our country proud and keep us safe. The others are not fit to tie their boot laces. They have no place in our democracy. Cowards who cover their faces. Not in our name. It was an outrage.’
Defence Minister Paul Kehoe also dismissed the apology, saying: ‘The only appropriate response from New IRA and their fellow travellers is to disband and lay down their arms. It is all the more appalling that this miserable apology for the horrendous event was delivered on O’Connell Street, the foundation stone of the Republic.’ And Mr Kehoe said that the main Northern parties should take cognisance of this murder.
The DUP and Sinn Féin should ‘live up to their responsibilities and restore a working Assembly in Northern Ireland’, he said.
Social Protection Minister Regina Doherty said: ‘These odious, shameful degenerates have no place on the streets of Ireland. The shots fired on Thursday night were a deliberate act… no accident.’
Fianna Fáil leader Micheál Martin told the MoS: ‘There should be no place for the so-called New IRA on the island of Ireland. A half-hearted apology after Lyra’s life has been taken in her prime is way too little and far too late a response.’
Ms McKee’s close friend Matt Hughes, a journalist from Liverpool, told the MoS: ‘I think, for me, an apology is pointless because she is gone. If Lyra was here today, she’d be asking questions as to why an 18- and 19-year-old embarked upon this path? They [those arrested] belong to the peace generation. I don’t understand why people chose this path.
‘Without a shadow of a doubt, Lyra
would frame this story, if she were writing it, looking at the people who did it and why they did it.
‘While I can’t claim to speak for the family, or Lyra, from what I knew about my friend, I think she’d accept the apology. I think she’d forgive them. Lyra lived her life with a real Christian ethos.’
A spokesman for the gardaí said they were made aware of the march in advance and had a presence there.
Meanwhile, the two men, aged 18 and 19, who were arrested yesterday were held under the Terrorism Act after the murder of 29-year-old Ms McKee on Derry’s Creggan estate on Thursday night. Earlier, PSNI Detective Superintendent Jason Murphy warned: ‘What we are seeing is a new breed of terrorist coming through the ranks and that for me is a very worrying situation.’