Taoiseach Bertie Ahern and his Fianna Fáil/Progressive Democrats government are to force the 26-County State into the NATO camp next week when they push a motion through the Dáil seeking approval for membership of the so-called Partnership for Peace. Free article

US Senator George Mitchell summed up the mood of most observers, when he said of the peace process this week, ``there is a very real threat of it not proceeding.... ``the whole process is under great stress'' and that what would follow if it failed ``would be entirely unpredictable'' Free article

Sinn Féin President Gerry Adams, in his address to the Ogra Shinn Féin National Congress, spoke of the need for a radical overhaul of the system north and south of the border and the need to gain further support for republicanism. Free article

Figures released this week show that Catholic families in the Six Counties earn almost £200 (or 15 per cent) a month less than their Protestant counterparts. The figures, released by the NIO Statistics and Research Agency, also show that Catholics are more dependent on social welfare benefits than Protestants. Free article

The loyalist Red Hand Defenders group is claiming that it attacked a Catholic taxi driver when they threw a pipe bomb at his car on Monday night, 4 October. Free article

A North Belfast man was detained in hospital for three days in order to receive microsurgery to his face, reconstruct his jaw, and elevate part of his cheekbone after he was attacked by the RUC. Free article

It is now a matter of public record. William Stobie, the UDA quartermaster who supplied the weapons to the loyalist gang who murdered Belfast human rights lawyer Pat Finucane, was working for RUC Special Branch at the time of the killing. Free article