September 30, 2003 Members Of 32CSC/IRPWA Physically Assaulted
Members of 32CSM and IRPWA physically assaulted by RUC/PSNI.

CONTACT: ANDY MARTIN.
PHONE: 07742 439 449 OR E-MAIL belfast32csm@yahoo.com

This evening a number of members of the 32 County Sovereignty Movement and activists from the Irish Republican Prisoners Welfare Association were physically assaulted by the RUC/PSNI. The incident took place in Strabane, Co Tyrone, where earlier in the day police arrested five people including one woman, a leading prisoner’s welfare activist.

The RUC/PSNI screeched into a street where a number of republicans were standing and stormed up the driveway assaulting a number of people including a man who was cradling a young child. The assaults took place under the guise of a house search and only ended when someone from across the street produced a camera and proceeded to photograph the assaults. A number of people came out of their houses and began to chant SS/RUC at which point the police in riot gear began to climb back into their land rovers.

When the land rovers began to pull away the police began to shout “yes yes/ RUC, we are the RUC”. A short time later the police returned and raided the home of the person who took pictures of the assault and seized the camera.

The 32 County Sovereignty Movement condemn these assaults and blame the likes of Dennis Bradley and his policy of selective condemnation on the issue of threats and violence. Bradley has for some time been actively trying to provoke the Provisional IRA into attacking anti-agreement republicans and trying to create an atmosphere where it can happen. We urge Bradley to condemn the violence directed towards our movement as eagerly as he condemns threats to members of the DPP’s and ask how he can support a police force who, by their own admission in Strabane tonight, are the unreconstructed RUC. While Bradley and his ilk claim that nationalists support the supposedly “new” policing arrangements, it is clear that republicans, and indeed the police do not.