Walls divide factions in Belfast

Press, 12 April 1984, Page 20

Walls divide factions in Belfast

By

Ed Blanche

The British have built a 6.5metre red brick wall that snakes through west Belfast, separating the Protestant Shankill and Catholic Falls Road districts. More walls, topped by razorsharp metal spikes, divide other “interface” zones on the front line in Northern Ireland’s sectarian warring. The walls have gone up over the last few years to replace the ramshackle “peace lines” of barbed wire-topped corrugated iron erected a decade ago to keep the rival communities from each others’ throats. British officials call the walls “environmental barriers.” But they symbolise Ulster’s deepening sectarian divide and the refusal of Protestants and Catholics to bury the hatchet after centuries of hostility. Nearly 2400 men, women and children have been killed since 1969 in the fighting known as “the troubles.” The Belfast “Telegraph,” the province’s non-sectarian evening newspaper, calls the barriers “The Walls of Shame.” Britain’s Northern Ireland Secretary, Mr James Prior, said last month that he perceives a lessening of sectarian hostility. To be sure, many of Ulster’s 1.5 million people are weary of the bloodshed, Thousands have fled to England, Canada, Australia, New Zealand and the United States. But among the 500,000 Catholics, there is burgeoning support for Sinn Fein, political front of the Irish Republican Army. I.R.A. guerrillas are fighting to end British rule in Northern Ireland and unite the province with the Catholic Irish Republic and set up a socialist State. Among the million-strong Protestants, there are growing fears that the British, weary of trying to pacify the unruly province, might

of Associated Press in Belfast

be prepared to talk about unification — a solution London so far opposes. The violence drags on, against a backdrop in both parts of Ireland of chronic economic malaise, evermounting unemployment rolls, and a growing disenchantment with political and church leaders, especially among the young. Mr Brian Feeney, a moderate Catholic Belfast councilman, said: “These walls say that we’re never going to have reconciliation, that we’re always going to be divided. “The walls are part of the British Government’s policy of containing the nationalist community in west Belfast. It’s very effective.” In an interview, he said: “At the urging of Protestant politicians, they want to corral Catholics in north and west Belfast into War-saw-style ghettoes. It’s still going on.” Mr Tom Hartley, a veteran Sinn Fein activist, said in an interview: “Over the years the Brits have penned us in. Most of west Belfast can be sealed off in minutes now.” The authorities also have built a major six-lane highway that creates a barrier between the rival strongholds of the Falls and the Shankill. The link road, including a 12metre deep underpass that made a ravine between the Falls and the city centre, cuts off the troublesome unity flats complex from the Catholic stronghold. Mr Eamon McConnell, a 25-year-old Catholic social worker who lives in the shadow of the wall in Bombay Street, burned in the riots of 1969, said the barrier has curbed Protestant attacks. “People do feel more secure,” he said in an interview. “But the kids ■ still lob bricks over the wall. The people who live close to the wall want it even higher.

“But everyone else sees these walls in a much more ominous light.” The polarisation of the two communities has deepened in recent years, extinguishing hopes that flickered in the late 1970 s that reconciliation was possible. Mr Hartley, a member of Sinn Fein’s eight-member central committee, said: “We’re sitting on a timebomb. The Brits have built up a police state of enormous proportions here and the nationalist people are reacting against it.” Across town in east Belfast, a Protestant stronghold, Mr John McMichael, top strategist of the Ulster Defence Association, said Protestants “now believe in the big bang theory, that we must prepare for the final conflict within the next few years.” Mr McMichael, aged 37, said: “We would hope to avoid that conflict, but the I.R.A. and Sinn Fein are not interested in reconciliation. “Unionism and republicanism are irreconcilable. We’re not talking about politics, but the existence of Northern Ireland, our home. “Many Protestants believe the Republicans are winning because the British do not have the will to defeat the 1.R.A., and because most British politicians, in spite of their claims Britain will not withdraw, are no longer interested in keeping Ulster in the United Kingdom.” In Dublin, the new Ireland Forum set up last May by the Irish Prime Minister, Dr Garret Fitz Gerald, is expected to report this month on what choices are open to end the Ulster bloodletting. Authoritative sources in Dublin said the forum will propose three choices — an all-Ireland State ruled from Dublin, a federal arrangement between Dublin and Belfast, and joint authority of the north by Dublin and London.

Northern Protestants have made clear they are not interested in anything that diminishes their British connection. Mr McMichael stressed: “The forum is irrelevant. There is no chance of a political

solution on the basis of Dublin telling us what to do. What Dublin is saying is that we' have a republic hellbent on getting the Brits out and we’ll deal with the Prods (Protestants) later. No’way.”