With the easing of strict COVID regulations in Scotland, campaigners for the Craigavon Two were out at the very first opportunity to publicly raise the case of the unjust imprisonment of these two Irishmen. Fight Racism! Fight Imperialism! supporters from Glasgow and Dundee joined with the campaigners as the Justice For the Craigavon Two banner was raised at the top of Glasgow’s busy Buchanan Street and leaflets handed out which detailed the shoddy evidence used by a British court in the Occupied North of Ireland to frame these innocent men. Having spent three years on remand after their arrest for the killing of a Police Service of Northern Ireland constable in 2009, Brendan McConville and John Paul Wooton were eventually sentenced to 25 years and 18 years respectively.
A recent TV documentary on these unsafe convictions reviewed the rotten course of prosecution trial evidence with the added sinister involvement of MI5 state agent Dennis McFadden. He had played a major role in the illegal entrapment of the Irish Republican Saoradh Nine and Palestinian activist Issam Hijjawi last year. McFadden had likewise infiltrated the campaign for justice for the Craigavon Two to the point of running its social media pages.
Highly dubious material had already been used to secure Brendan and John Paul’s convictions in a British non – jury court. For example, the main witness came forward 11 months into the investigation. His eyewitness testimony was established in court as medically impossible due to severe visual impairment. The use of a paid state spy and informant to infiltrate the men’s campaign for justice – a widespread tactic revealed by the current Spycops investigations – further undermines their convictions. As shown over the last five decades, British rule in Ireland is based on judicial frame-ups, state terror and violence.
FRFI supporters let campaigners know about the message which Brendan McConville sent to FRFI’s Break the Chains protest for political prisoners in London on 24 April.
Raising this vital issue on the streets of Glasgow and London was contrasted with the timidity of Scotland’s trade union movement which has voted to retreat online and abandon any street demonstrations on May Day. Who will stand by trade unionists like Ricky Tomlinson of the Shrewsbury Pickets, framed up and jailed in 1972, a few months after Bloody Sunday in Derry, when future trade unionists are likewise framed and jailed again by a corrupt British court?
The FRFI comrades took JFTC2 leaflets to hand out at demonstrations on May Day in Dundee and the Glasgow protest opposing dawn raids against asylum seekers (here)
By standing by the Craigavon Two’s battle for justice we are extending the hand of solidarity to the Irish people under British rule and organising to defend all of our rights.
Free the Craigavon Two!
No to the repressive Police Bill!
Victory to the Irish People!
Michael MacGregor
