do not want to give his name, a picture does not even speak. "Write that my name is Walter ..." at the interview agreed, after lengthy namowach. Why the mystery? "Walter" has worked for several years in the prison service in Northern Ireland. He worked in the years when the conflict was the most bloody and brutal, while in prison also at times very hot. For several years, has retired. He lives in a quiet town near Belfast. He asked not to give more details. Several years ago, when I no longer worked in uniform, someone shot out the window of his house then.
first witness to many events from the time of the local conflict. What do you like most branded in your memory?
- The worst was probably in 1972. I finished school in 1970, then started working in Belfast, worked in the office real estate. I lived in Newtownards and daily dojeżdżałem bus. One Friday, the IRA placed a bomb across Belfast. The whole town was blocked, were evacuated train stations, bus stations. I remember that was the afternoon and returned home on foot, because no communication work. Walked around the bombed bus, I saw the bodies of victims. Coming out of the city on foot, and when I looked up and looked at Belfast, saw the smoke from explosions, the city looked like from the times of war, as a city after the raid ... It was Bloody Sunday, as later called that day. To this day it hurts that this day no one remembers, even though there were so many casualties. Do people who died when they were worse? On the investigation into the Bloody Sunday was paid hundreds of millions of pounds, and the people who were behind the attacks in Belfast today are in government circles. I do not know whether this is fair.
- Do not talk about the innocent, ordinary people. All the time it was said, and talks about the IRA, a UVF, UDA with paramilitary organizations. And really, most people never wanted. Nobody wanted the conflict, no one wanted war. Now there is peace, but its costs are too great. Nobody does not say, but all of these organizations still conduct their business, but now last deep into the ground. Money flowing from the UK, sail from Ireland, flowing from America in order to be calm. IRA announced a solution to the military, Peter Robinson, deputy prime minister confirmed this some time ago officially, the UDA and the UVF is also the International Monitoring Commission is also talking about disarmament, but these organizations still exist. Why?
over ten years, we have peace in Northern Ireland. Believe that the conflict is already past?
- I hope that all this is behind us, really I have a great hope. But I can not get rid of the doubt. I know the history of this country, I remember what happened before. This country has suffered so many times, he was repeatedly torn conflicts. And every twenty or thirty years history repeats itself ...
- Some areas are heavily affected by the hatred associated with religion, but there are also a place where for years the Protestants and Catholics live side by side, where even during The Troubles, they do not the great conflicts. I think that such a bastion of quiet areas are North Down and Ards Peninsula.
- In my opinion, the true cause of the outbreak of The Troubles is completely different than the historians say, than say the journalists. It was not a matter between Protestants and Catholics, it was not a conflict between supporters and loyalists of the republic, it really went a sphere of influence paramiliatarnych organization. This is what is being said, as the reasons, it was a pretext. For all permanent criminal organizations, such as the mafia, fighting for spheres of influence in extortion, drug trade, for all such activities. These people depend on the conflict, depended on the fact that the war was here, because they could play their interests. Innocent people are caught in the conflict died, and they did business.
worked in the service uniforms. The conflict was sometimes hard for you ...
- It was hard times for everyone, not just for me. I just wanted to ensure a peaceful family life, give them a good life and keep away from conflict. Fortunately, we stayed away from Belfast, far from the Falls Road, from the Shankill Road, from the Ardoyne ... Now my children are grown and living outside Northern Ireland, also because over the years of conflict, this country lost time, lost years. Even looking at the conditions in England and in Scotland you can see that the conflict left deep wounds here ...
- I've seen people who have committed horrible crimes since the Second World War. I've seen people who have made the idea of \u200b\u200bthe appearances, the crimes for which he should never be released from prison. Shankill Butchers, Butchers of Shankill peeled skin people alive. They were psychopaths, and argued that they do so in the name of the idea of \u200b\u200bloyalty. And they were released from prison, because that was the agreement. In other parts of Britain gets for such crimes prison for life, never goes out of it ... Here, it looked as if it was another country. In other countries, murderers are hanged in America, police killers get the death penalty. Here were killed during the conflict more than three hundred police officers, not counting soldiers. And the last death sentence carried out in the early sixties ..
Were not you afraid for your safety?
- Someone had to do it, someone has to carry out such work to the public. Over the years, I had to perform a series of steps to verify its safety. Every morning I check the car, commuting to work different routes, reflex to look at my rear-view mirror today. Do not buttoned belt in the car, in the event of fire can do dodge. And so for over twenty years. The worst thing in all this was not just a danger that would threaten me, but a threat to the family. There have been threats, we got different news, one evening, when my wife was pregnant, drove through the windows of a car and died of his shots. The ball flew through the window and hammered into the wall. His wife was in that room. Moved. Many many people I know who knows where I worked. I went through a lot, I was in prison, in which there was a rebellion, the objectives to me with a firearm. But I managed to get out of all of these situations. I believe we acted fairly. And like most people who live here want peace.
0 comments:
Post a Comment