Loyalist Paramilitary Violence after the Belfast Agreement
2008; Taylor & Francis; Volume: 7; Issue: 1 Linguagem: Inglês
10.1080/17449050701847285
ISSN1744-9065
Autores Tópico(s)Policing Practices and Perceptions
ResumoAbstract This paper analyses the use of violence by Loyalist paramilitaries over the course of the peace process and after the Belfast Agreement. The focus is on a largely understudied area in post-Agreement Northern Ireland. It is argued that Loyalist paramilitaries have continually used violence to serve several objectives. These objectives of violence have shifted in dominance as the peace process unfolded. A typology of the objectives of Loyalist violence is presented which identifies violence as either between or within groups and in search of political, sectarian, economic, social and territorial aims. In conclusion, the article considers some implications of continuing Loyalist paramilitary violence for state and society. Acknowledgements The author would like to thank Dr Roger MacGinty and anonymous reviewers for useful comments on earlier drafts of this article. Notes 1. The Northern Irish peace process and negotiations were put in serious jeopardy on various occasions as a direct result of Republican involvement in violence (even when only suspected). For example, the alleged IRA involvement in a £26 million armed robbery of the Northern Bank in Belfast on 21 December 2004; the alleged IRA involvement in the murder of Belfast man Robert McCartney in January 2005; the arrest of three IRA men accused of training members of the Colombian insurgency rebel movement, FARC, in Colombia in August 2001. (BBC News Online, Citation2002; BBC News Online, Citation2006). This stands in contrast to the ability of the peace process to almost seamlessley absorb continuing Loyalist violence. 2. The Loyalist ceasefires have been a bone of contention, even though it did not cause the macro-political disruptions that the dispute over the IRA ceasefire has. In July 2001, the UFF and UVF withdrew their support for the Belfast Agreement (BBC News Online, Citation2001). By October 2001 the Northern Ireland Secretary declared an end to the UDA and UVF ceasefires, but they were recognised again a few years later. 3. This peace accord is also commonly referred to as the Good Friday Agreement, but this article uses the alternative term often preferred by Protestants: the Belfast Agreement. 4. The LVF announced in October 2005 that they were to stand down in response to the IRA's declaration of disbanding the previous month. Despite this promise, few really expect the organization to disappear for all practical purposes, and it has been speculated that this move was merely part of a truce called between them and their rivals the UVF to end a recent feud (Connolly, Citation2005). 5. Efforts by paramilitary-linked political groups, most notably the Progressive Unionist Party (linked to the UVF) and the Ulster Democratic Party (linked to the UDA) to enter into mainstream politics have been dubbed the ‘New Loyalism’. The rise (and stumble) of New Loyalism have been detailed by McAuley (Citation1997, Citation2002, Citation2005) and Bruce Citation(2001). 6. Statistics include only the most serious offence with which a person is charged and includes murder, attempted murder, firearms offences, explosives offences, armed robbery, hijacking, petrol bomb offences, membership, withholding information, arson and rioting. Statistics refer to charges brought against a person after the original period of detention (including extensions). Any subsequent changes, additions, deletions to the original charges are not included. 7. Bruce Citation(1992b) has typologized Loyalist paramilitary violence as ‘pro-state’ terrorism (as opposed to the IRA's ‘anti-state’ terrrorism). Loyalists' use of anti-state political violence, as conceptualized in this article, does not mean that they do not support the British state in Northern Ireland, but rather is indicative of their frustration with the British government's increasing distancing of itself from Northern Ireland. Loyalists' use of direct violence against the state's security forces speaks of their frustration with what they perceive as the state's luke-warm attitude towards them and of their perceived unfair criminalization by the state, rather than of a secessionist desire. 8. It is difficult to quantify sectarian attacks, since official police statistics fail to classify incidents as such. Any quantification of sectarian attacks relies on accounts by NGO's, newspapers and community organizations. 9. Patterns and types of racist abuse in Northern Ireland have been described and documented by Connelly and Keenan Citation(2001), Jarman and Monaghan Citation(2004) and Jarman Citation(2003b). 10. It is worth noting that the PSNI statistics do not distinguish between violence directed at ‘civil’ or ‘political’ crimes, but group them all under the category of ‘paramilitary style attacks’. 11. Paramilitaries (either Loyalist or Republican) are not solely responsible for organized crime in Northern Ireland. By 1999 the Northern Ireland Organized Crime Task Force has identified 78 groups as being involved in organized crime—and only approximately 50% of them have current of historical links to any paramilitary organization in Northern Ireland (Northern Ireland Organized Crime Task Force, Citation2001). 12. These figures are based on draft accounts of killings in Northern Ireland, available at http://cain.ulst.ac.uk/sutton/
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