Orange Parades Undermine Justice and Policing

national | rights, freedoms and repression | opinion/analysis

Tuesday January 26, 2010 17:34

by Peter Mulholland - none

Two Centuries of Corruption

This review of the history of Orange triumphalism and violence does not attempt to deny the need for, or peoples' right to practice rituals that celebrate and reinforce their religious convictions, cultural identity, or sense of belonging and community. Rather, I am posting it on the internet in the hope of undermining the DUPs attempt to make policing and justice in Northern Ireland conditional on securing sectarian parades through Nationalist areas.

Orange Parades Undermine Policing and Justice in Northern Ireland.
The full text of this paper is available at http://orangecitadel.blogspot.com/
It is based on research carried out by myself while campaigning to have Orange demonstrations barred from Nationalist areas of Portadown. It was partly inspired by Orange Order and RUC claims that the violence associated with Orange marches in the Obins Street area of Portadown was a recent phenomenon and that it was the result of a secretive Republican campaign, instigated and orchestrated by Sinn Féin.
The findings were issued in pamphlet form to journalists and other visitors attending the scene of the Drumcree Siege of 1997. The findings appear to have been used selectively and without any acknowledgment by at least one journalist/author.
They were also summarised as part of the Garvaghy Road Residents' Coalition submission to the North Commission: Independent Review of Parades and Marches (1996). And an edited and updated version was included in the book Garvaghy: A Community Under Siege; Beyond The Pale. 1999.
It should be remembered that the vast bulk of the material detailed below was gathered from Unionist and/or Orange owned publications and newspapers. It should be remembered because material emanating from those sources was not likely to tell the whole story of Orange violence and the corruption of policing and justice in Northern Ireland.

Policing and Justice and Orange Parades 0.33 Mb