• IRA : Withdrawl of Italian troops IRA : Withdrawl of Italian troops By The Telegraph, London, on the IRA and Tony Blair What, exactly, did Martin McGuinness mean when he warned the McCartney sisters to “be very careful” about
• IRA : Withdrawl of Italian troops
IRA : Withdrawl of Italian troops
By The Telegraph, London, on the IRA and Tony Blair
What, exactly, did Martin McGuinness mean when he warned the McCartney sisters to “be very careful” about standing for Parliament against his Sinn Fein candidates in the coming general election? The words can mean very different things, depending on who utters them. On the lips of a man whose IRA associates have just murdered the McCartneys’ brother, slitting open his stomach, goug-ing out one of his eyes and slashing his throat, they speak only of menace.…
The McCartneys have understood, as Mr McGuinness understands, how strongly the IRA depends on Sinn Fein votes to maintain its mob rule, usually with far too little interference from a weakened and partially demoralised police force. They have understood, too, that Sinn Fein is not nearly as firmly entrenched in the hearts of republicans as the party’s 23 per cent showing in the last Stormont elections suggested.…
When he signed the Belfast Agreement, Mr Blair spoke of feeling the “hand of history” on his shoulder. We must wait and see how history will judge a British Prime Minister who, unlike the brave McCartney family, has yielded at every turn to the IRA.
La Repubblica, Rome, on the withdrawal of troops from Iraq
Italian premier Silvio Berlusconi has chosen the most appropriate moment to give the most convenient news. A statesman would have told the Parliament about the decision of Italy to withdraw its troops in September, an important decision that marks a clear rejection of the strategy that the government has followed until now. Such an announcement could have been done in an institutional office, during the day when the Parliament discussed and voted for the refinancing of the Italian mission.
But a mass media politician, to whom audience is more important than the image and propaganda to institution, chooses television, where the message gets straight to the hearts and the minds. …
The withdrawal of Italian troops has to be agreed with the United States. Nobody refuses Italy the right of unilateral withdrawal: this right belongs to the main concept of the “coalition of willing,” the coalition of those who want to be part of it. But for Berlusconi…this would also mean a slap in the face of his friend, George W. Bush.
Associated Press
