Continuity IRA (CIRA) prisoners issue Maghaberry deal call
REPUBLICAN inmates alligned to the Continuity IRA in Maghaberry Prison have called for a deal with jail authorities to be implemented.
The call comes as tensions in the high security Co Antrim continue to rise. Several CIRA prisoners are currently held on the Roe Three landing. In the past, prisoners have accused authorities of “reneging” on a 2010 deal to relax controlled movement and end strip searches in the prison. Concerns have also been raised about the continued detention of prisoners on the jail’s punishment block, even though no rules have been broken.
In a statement, CIRA prisoners said the 2010 deal should be put in place. “We would like to highlight that there is a precedent of consequences that followed the denial of political status,”it read. “In the past these consequences have had a high price for all sides, but when it comes to our identity as political prisoners no price is too high.
“With that being said we are simply asked for the implementation of what we agreed upon in the August 2010 Agreement and the only interpretation should be exactly what was agreed not only on paper but also verbally.”
Prisoners also referred to a recent independent stock take of the 2010 deal as a “failed mechanism which was far too ambiguous to have any hope of mending the broken down agreement.”
The statement said the recent appointment of Tom Miller, who is a former member of the prison’s Board of Visitors, as chair of the Roe House Prisoners’ Forum “will never be acceptable” and they not consulted before the appointment was made.
Meanwhile, in a new-year statement the Republican Network for Unity echoed the call for the August 2010 Deal to be implemented. The republican party also described the recent Stormont House Agreement as “nothing more than a neo-liberal orientated document set to increase the gap between rich and poor”.
With many thanks to: The irish News, Connla Young, for the original story.
