Don't Do It, Mr PresidentNot the port deal. Meeting
with the IRA.
Last year, amid bitter controversy over the IRA’s role in the £27.5 million Northern Bank robbery and continued paramilitary violence, Mr Bush snubbed Mr Adams and Mr McGuinness. Instead, he met the relatives of Robert McCartney, who was murdered by alleged members of the IRA after a pub brawl in Belfast.
Relations have since improved slightly following the IRA’s declaration that it had abandoned its armed struggle. There has also been concerted lobbying from Republican congressmen, with large numbers of Irish-American voters, for the ban to be lifted ahead of November’s mid-term elections. I don't know any Micks (Irish myself) who are griping about the snub of Gerry Adams and Martin McGuinness last year; I know a couple who will be griping about it if Bush lets them visit in 2006. While the decommissioning of the IRA was a hopeful sign, the fact the McCartney sisters have had to move out of their homes due to threats from the thugs who participated in the killing of their brother and the cleansing of the crime scene, should mitigate against any recognition to Adams and McGuinness.
