While the loyalist campaign was in full flow last week, the British government considered the IRA cessation. On the matter of sectarian violence, John Reid claimed during his Commons statement last Wednesday that British forces have been sent in to, in his words, dominate interface areas to stop the violence. He seemed blissfully unaware that his claim was being contradicted almost as he spoke, not only by the experience of the Catholic residents of those areas, but by the RUC/PSNI itself. Its spokesmen (and they are always men) insouciantly claim - on the rare occasions that attacks on Catholics make it into the news - that the force does not have the manpower to tackle the loyalist mobs who invade Catholic areas on an almost nightly basis. Free article

Over the next two weeks, GERRY KELLY, Sinn Féin spokesperson on policing, will examine what conceivably have been two of the biggest tests of effective accountability since the RUC became the PSNI - that is, the Ombudsman's report into the Omagh bomb and the new Policing Board's response to this. This week, he looks at the Ombudsman's Report. Free article

You have to feel sorry for former Fine Gael minister, party chairperson and trustee Michael Lowry and former ESAT boss, tax exile and multi-millionaire Denis O'Brien. They are being unfairly victimised by outrageous publicity stunts and worse still by unfounded "innuendo". Free article

Rapists in Ireland can be pretty confident that the chances of their being brought to justice are slim indeed. This opinion will scarcely be dented by Michael McDowell's announcement last week of plans to tackle the severe backlog of such cases by relegating rape trials to the circuit courts. It was only after years of lobbying by women's groups that the law was changed so that all rape trials are held in the Central Criminal Court in Dublin. Free article

Shaul Mofaz, the chief of staff of the Israeli Defence Forces (IDF) who retired last week, was a primitive and amoral commander. In the Talaba, Gaza, Nablus and Jenin refugee camps (about 1,000 alleged deaths since the start of last winter's Israeli offensive) he was termed "the executioner". Many human rights organisations believe he should be brought before a court of justice, alongside Ariel Sharon, for crimes against humanity and war crimes. Free article

Following the UN Report on Human Development, the DRAOI RUA has a few comments about the disgraceful standing of Ireland as the second most unequal society in the world Free article

Celtic Identity and the British Image By Murray G H Pittock Free article