REPRESENTATIVE PETER King, the chairman of the Friends of Ireland in the House of Representatives, received four former loyalist paramilitaries and Senator Martin McAleese in his office at the US Congress yesterday.
“For too many years, loyalists were the forgotten people in the equation,” Mr King said. Consolidating peace in Northern Ireland is one of the rare issues on which there is no disagreement between Democrats and Republicans. The Irish-American Congressmen Tim Murphy of Pennsylvania, Jim Moran of Virginia and Richard Neal of Massachusetts also attended the meeting.
Four members of the UDA, John Bunting, Jimmy Birch, Denis Cunningham and Jackie McDonald, who are community activists in north, east, west and south Belfast respectively, arrived in the US on October 2nd with the purpose of telling American officials their story and learning about programmes in US communities for young people at risk. The trip is not a fundraising mission. Because of their paramilitary pasts, the state department had to provide waivers for them to receive US visas.
Mr McDonald, who served five years in prison for paramilitary activities, captivated the audience at a reception which was co-hosted by Norman Huston, the director of the Northern Ireland bureau, and Ambassador Michael Collins at Mr Huston’s home on Tuesday evening. Mr McDonald said his self-esteem increased when he joined the UDA as a young man. But the situation deteriorated rapidly, destroying his marriage and led much later to an attempted suicide by his daughter.
In Congressman King’s office yesterday, Mr McDonald said Senator McAleese “made it easier for some people who had kept their distance . . . to be associated with us”. John Bunting said it was important for loyalists “to keep that link with the Áras” after the presidential election because there had been “a fear of the Áras from people in our communities.”
Mr McDonald said the Sinn Féin presidential candidate Martin McGuinness “has taken many risks to change from what he was perceived to be to what he has become . . . If he was to become president of Ireland, I am sure he would extend the hand of friendship.” Representative Neal said the Congressional friendship group is particularly interested in the part of the Belfast Agreement concerning the relationship between Dublin and Belfast.
“Today these individuals move back and forth. Members of the UDA visit Dublin and members of the Irish Government routinely visit Belfast, and it is a most significant victory.”