Northern Ireland - Peace in our time? Powersharing brought in on 8th May 2007...

Northern Ireland First Minister Ian Paisley is to stand down from the post in May, he has announced.

He also said he would be resigning as leader of the DUP, a party he has led for almost 40 years.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/northern_ireland/7277886.stm

Is he about to croak or is about to be found out as a crook?

Worrisome.

it's not quite a return to the situation pre ceasefire, but yeah even the tiny minority of maniacs that are still out there could cause a lot of harm.

Hearing Martin McGuinness condemning the use of violence is always a bit startling

apparently victim is irish catholic originally from the south. member of the northern irish police force. yep, he definitely got what he deserved, a great blow for freedom.

The violence a reaction to the increased surveillance on the part of the British army maybe? Or a show of strength to shore up gangster operations?

reaction to the increased surveillance on the part of the British army

praps -- but this is chicken-and-egg stuff.

possible response to mod actions? the timeline is suspicious.

The violence a reaction to the increased surveillance on the part of the British army maybe?

I read somewhere else that the unfortunate soldiers-and-pizza-deliverers incident at the weekend which seems to have kicked things off again was less than 24h after that announcement and seemed to have required more than 24h planning. I don't really know what kind of planning would have been involved but I don't have the stomach to look into it too closely.

I was hoping that would've been a one-off and there might not be any escalation, but between that, this, and bomb threats at a police station and a Sinn Fein office... ugh.

i think the escalation in surveillance was itself a response to the fact that aim #1 of the fanatics has been to ice a policeman. i read that some time ago, before the weekend, anyway.

Yes, think this has been coming for some while

I just find it all so terribly sad. Here's hoping that it unites people against the nutjobs anyway.

Guys. It's all going to be fine. They're about to talk about it on Liveline. I was very worried there for a moment...

http://blogs.channel4.com/snowblog/2009/03/11/will-n-ireland-come-out-on-the-side-of-peace/

There’s a generation growing up, a tiny minority of whom think they missed something. Many of these are kids of desperate housing estates like that in Craigavon, growing up feeling their fathers and grandfathers found an identity that has eluded them.

Thoughts? Is it down to the economy, stupid?

i think it's definitely a factor- apparently there's a whole new wave of paramilitaries ready to start over, rather than the more common perception of 40+ year old who can't let go of a conflict they were actually a part of for most of their lives.

most depressing aspect, imo- it's not like there's ever been a 'need' for the troubles, but for a new generation to almost voluntarily elect to regress to this level after so long seems particularly redundant.

http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/breaking/2010/0223/breaking1.html

trying to take advantage of the political hiccups there've been up there lately?

Perhaps. There's been some other incidents recently. There was a bomb scare when I was going up to the bloody place a few months ago.

I've not been keeping up to speed other than what appears on news bulletins, and that's been primarily about problems at Stormont the past few months.

paisley heart attack?

sounds like a 60s revival band. But yes, maybe so. Though he is well out of the political game now.

He's also stopped preaching too... from the pulpit that is... possibly the old monster's lost his raison d'etre

by the way, are people familiar with the theory that the Northern Ireland troubles basically stopped in 1971, except they were kept going by a number of Australian tribute acts?

that was the version we learnt out wesht, yes

The IRAC/DC

No. Tell us this theory.

I heard it advanced by Andrew Mueller, Cathal Coughlan, and Luke Haines. They apparently discovered it when they retrieved some secret documents that had been buried in the North Sea.

the more comes out about these letters the more absolutely fucked my head gets