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19 May 2005 Edition

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Dúirt Siad

Stick with the kebabs

Minister for State Conor Lenihan, during a debate in the Dáil with Socialist TD Joe Higgins. Higgins has been campaigning on behalf of Turkish workers mistreated by Construction company GAMA. Lenihan was later forced to apologise for the racist remark. RTÉ, Wednesday 18 May.

I would never join the DUP. I have friends who are Catholics. I couldn't look them in the eye. The DUP is based on ethnic solidarity. It is a Protestant Jihad, some of its members at local level have Neanderthal tendencies.

UUP Larne Councillor Andy Wilson disagrees with fellow party member David Burnside's suggestion that unionists should now unite under the DUP banner. The Guardian, Tuesday 17 May.

The DUP, at heart, is still abnormal. It is more than just the Free Presbyterian Church at prayer these days, but the vast majority of its representatives are still evangelicals and fundamentalists; the vast majority of unionists are not.

UUP adviser Steven King agrees with Wilson. The Belfast Telegraph, Monday 16 May.

Ultimately, the nationalists stood by those who stood by the stabbers of Robert McCartney. The only price the most debased European electorate west of Serbia extracted from SF/IRA was the loss of one council seat.

The Sunday Independent's John Drennan. 15 May.

I want to be clear. No SDLP MP is taking an oath. What we are taking is an affirmation.

SDLP Deputy Leader Alasdair McDonnell confirms that he will be affirming his allegiance to the English queen when he takes his seat in Westminster. Daily Ireland, Tuesday 17 May.

Now we have a Secretary of State coming into Northern Ireland and within days he is telling us that the Agreement was the greatest thing in living memory, giving it his endorsement and insisting no part can be discarded.

New Secretary of State Peter Hain has already managed to annoy Ian Paisley. The Irish Examiner, Saturday 14 May.

I'm not going to condemn anyone as I don't know the true facts about what happened at the church on Saturday night. Once they have been established I will then make a decision.

DUP Councillor Martin Clarke refuses to condemn attacks on cars belonging to pensioners attending Mass in Ballymena, Antrim, last Saturday. Daily Ireland, Wednesday 18 May.

I have met Saddam Hussein exactly the same number of times as Donald Rumsfeld met him. The difference is that Donald Rumsfeld met him to sell him guns and to give him maps the better to target those guns.

MP George Galloway confronts his accusers in the US Senate, denying he had traded Iraqi oil before the war. Galloway used his testimony to unleash an indictment of the invasion in the most heated exchange Congress has seen in years. The Guardian, Wednesday 18 May.


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