The Progressive Democrats and Fine Gael have been baying for over a fortnight now for the Government to come up with some pretext upon which to jail the "Colombia Three", writes Mark Brennock.
It would have to be a pretext, because at this point nobody has identified a legitimate basis in law for doing so. There is the possibility of a conviction of one of them for a passport offence. But the demands for the men to be arrested, for the "full rigours of the law" to be applied, for Ireland to show it is "tough on terrorism" are code for just one thing: those making these demands want the men to be put away for a long time.
But how to do it? Lawyers and politicians agree that extradition cannot happen. So the Tánaiste has raised the possibility that the men could be made serve their sentences here. But it is doubtful whether Irish courts would tolerate this notion, seeing as those sentences emerged from a process which any lawyer here would regard as, well, dodgy.
The latest idea to do the rounds in political circles this week is that they could be charged with IRA membership. The word of a senior Garda is accepted as evidence in the courts, so we could bang them up in no time. Sure we all know what they were at over there, eh?
Well why stop there? Last Wednesday Michael McDowell emerged to suggest that Gerry Adams, Martin McGuinness and Martin Ferris TD had been party to sending the three to Colombia on IRA business in the first place. If the Minister believes this, then there must be a senior garda who would tell a court that he or she believes it too. So presumably those who believe the "Colombia Three" should be charged with IRA membership believe Adams, McGuinness and Ferris should also be charged. The pursuit of these men could become absurd.
Whoever trained Colombia's Farc guerrillas to use mortars in urban areas is guilty of truly revolting activity. On the day of the current Colombian president's inauguration in 2002, Farc mortars killed more than 20 civilians. This was in the year after the "Colombia Three" were arrested, having returned from the Farc-controlled area.
So the shrill demands for the Government, the Garda, anybody, to do something to lock up these men arises from anger at the belief that three bad guys are getting away with it. More generally, these demands arise from a deep hatred of the Provos and of what they spent 30 years doing on this island and in Britain. But the Provo-haters often forget perhaps the most important aspect of what the conflict was about. The Provos would have it that it was about the struggle to free Ireland from 700 years of etc, etc. But for those within nationalist Ireland who opposed the Provos it was about something deeper.
It was that we were different from them. They believed in killing, maiming and torturing: we did not. They believed they could decide themselves upon whom to impose summary punishment, and just go ahead and do it. We believe instead in a refined legal process which had a necessity for solid evidence, for convictions to be obtained beyond reasonable doubt, for a right of appeal, and only then for the imposition of punishment.
In short, they imposed terrible suffering upon whoever they felt deserved it. We insisted we only imposed punishment on those against whom it had been proven, beyond all reasonable doubt, that they had done wrong. They believed in military victory, we believed in negotiation and compromise. They killed, we didn't. At times our societies gave in to temptations to cut corners with our police and legal processes, but generally they stuck to these values.
Of course the Provos didn't see it like that. They dismissed as neo-unionists, west Brits and Free Staters not only those who despised them for what they stood for, but those who despised them for what they did. They said we opposed them because they were republicans, while most of us only opposed them because they were killers or supporters of killers. Of course there was more to them than that, but it paled into insignificance beside their central point of difference with the rest of us.
And the good guys won, or so it seems. The thinking Provos have copped on to the fact that you will not get the support of the mass of decent people here if you kill and maim to make your case. It is a triumph for a whole range of democratic values which include the right to life, rule of law, due process, the presumption of innocence and so on.
So here we have three guys whom many believe were involved in nasty activity in Colombia. But after a lengthy trial they were acquitted. Not only that, the trial judge suggested that the two main prosecution witnesses should be investigated for perjury.
And then came a twist in the legal process which we simply would not tolerate here: a tribunal, sitting in private, where the men were not allowed be represented, overturned the verdict, decided it believed the evidence after all, and sentenced the men to up to 17 years each.
Our notion of due process includes the right to be represented in any hearing which could end up in your being jailed for a quarter of a lifetime. It includes the notion that if a trial judge has been convinced that certain evidence should not be believed, then no other judge can decide, without hearing the evidence, that it is to be believed after all.
It seems out of the question, therefore, that the Irish courts could allow sentences imposed in this way for a conviction obtained in this way to be served in Ireland. Such standards and safeguards occasionally let guilty people walk free: they are also the mark of a civilised society.
However, there has been no let-up in the threatening-sounding verbal onslaught against the men, almost entirely from the PDs and Fine Gael.
Early after they announced their return to Ireland, Tánaiste Mary Harney demanded that they give themselves up, and PD Senator John Minihan demanded that they be "arrested immediately". They were not specific about why this should happen.
Enda Kenny said the Government should explore "the possibility of agreeing a bilateral arrangement which could see these men serving their sentences in Irish jails if their extradition is not possible". Really? Does Fine Gael accept without question the legitimacy of the process that brought about these sentences? The dissenting judge in the appeals tribunal (the not-guilty verdicts were only overturned by a two-to-one majority) described some of the evidence against the men as "unreal, fantasy-like and contradictory I was overwhelmed by the countless amount of technical evidence used in this case that was questionable", said Judge Jorgé Enrique Torres. He said it was not possible to condemn the men unless there was "certainty".
Happily for Enda Kenny, he is not plagued by such uncertainty.
Mr McDowell says the rule of law must apply. Well it is the rule of law that has - so far - kept these men out of jail in Ireland. Defending that rule of law is what three decades of resistance to the Provos was about. That great victory should not be sullied by seeking to contrive a ruse to put a few people behind bars just because we think they may well deserve it.