Alex Maskey: First among equals

AS ALEX MASKEY steps down as a councillor after 27 years to focus on his role as an MLA for South Belfast, CAITLÍN NÍ RUNAIDH interviews him about his time on Belfast City Council and his plans for the future.

I MET the unassuming man himself in the glamourous setting of the South Belfast Sinn Féin Office.
On a cold and dreary Sunday afternoon, Alex... Free article

By Bairbre de Brún MEP

IT WAS a real pleasure for me this morning to watch my good friend and colleague Eva-Britt Svensson, Chair of the European Parliament Committee on Gender Equality chair a session to mark the 100th anniversary of International Women's Day, with European Parliament President Jerzy Buzek, Irish former President Mary Robinson, and former European ... Free article

National Hunger Strike Exhibition at Belfast's Linen Hall Library.

SDLP LEADER Margaret Ritchie has been accused of sour grapes after saying Sinn Féin “could have done better” than getting 14 TDs elected, up from five.

Ritchie is still smarting that her party has been overtaken by Sinn Féin in the Six Counties and is becoming ineffectual and irrelevant.

Northlands Sinn Féin Councillor Gerry Mac Lochlainn said:

I think it is rich for the... Free article

SINN FÉIN MEP Bairbre de Brún has met Communications Workers' Union Vice-President Cormac Ó Dálaigh and CWU colleague Martina O’Connell in Brussels to discuss the worrying prospect of the privatisation/liberalisation of the postal market.

Bairbre de Brún said:

Experiences across Europe have continually shown that the liberalisation of the postal service has resulted in a... Free article

MARY LOU McDONALD celebrates being elected TD with former Dublin Central candidate Nicky Kehoe at the RDS on Saturday with Larry O'Toole (left) and Gerry Adams alongside.

MARCH EDITION An Phoblacht out on Friday. Price €2.

EAMON DUNPHY, the outspoken TV and radio pundit, has urged people to vote Sinn Féin “to send Brussels a defiant message” over the banks, the IMF and Irish sovereignty.

Describing Election 2011 as “the most important election of our lifetime”, he wrote in The Dunphy Files column in the Irish Daily Star last Saturday:

This election is about deciding whether we continue to support... Free article