A West Belfast man has revealed an RUC attempt to recruit him as an informer by offering him £25,000. The plan to entrap the man was exposed on Wednesday at a press conference called by Sinn Féin. The elaborate plot entailed the RUC Special Branch placing advertisements for joiners in the West Belfast newspaper Andersonstown News. Free article

``It is clear that the British government and the Unionists must reject out of hand any notion of the new policing service being a `Continuity' RUC,'' he said. Free article

The British government is likely to come under severe criticism once more on its human rights record after a government Review Group, consisting soley of representatives from the Northern Ireland Office, the Home Office, the Six-County judiciary and the RUC recommended to Peter Mandelson that the Diplock non-jury trial system be retained in the six counties for the foreseeable future, a recommendation which was this week accepted by the Secretary of State. NIO Minister Adam Ingram made the announcement in Parliament in response to a written question from Labour MP Kevin McNamara. The Review Group said it was ``not persuaded'' to recommend the reintroduction of trial by jury. Free article

An elderly Catholic man was viciously beaten in a sectarian attack in Ballynahinch last week.The 64 year old was attacked by a crowd of around 12 loyalists as he was making his way home after leaving a bar on Windmill Street on Friday night. Free article

Government plans to introduce incineration as a method of waste disposal are not going smoothly. After the reversals last week where Louth deferred a decision, and Monaghan County Councillors radically amended the regional draft plan, Galway Corporation this week threw the plan out altogether. Free article

The National Chairperson of Ireland's biggest anti-drugs organisation, the Coalition of Communities Against Drugs (COCAD), has called for a widespread debate about drugs policy in Ireland. Free article