'false' : 'true'; 15.5K Followers. They had been for a night out in the, 28 April - Eric Smyth, a 40-year-old ex-member of the UDR, is shot dead by the Provisional IRA at the front of his home on Salter's Grange Road, on the outskirts of Armagh. userID: purchase.granted_by_whitelist_rule.user_id, 31 July 1993 - A British Army mobile checkpoint was fired at by an IRA sniper at Newtownhamilton, County Armagh. userID: purchase.granted_by_app_purchase.user_id, The south Armagh IRA even discovered ground not covered by the watchtowers for sniper attacks in the 1990s. window.IMP.config = flipPayConfig; } Let the message from south Armagh ring loud and clear to the occupation forces. console.log('observer.observe failed:', e); }; His brother Michael Caraher, who was severely wounded in the shooting, later became the commander of one of the South Armagh sniper squads. He had left the RUC 15 years previously and the police rejected an IRA claim that he had been identified as a UDR member who had taken part in recent house searches in the city. A sniper rifle and other weapons were recovered. enable_showcase: true, }); A . Martin McGuinness, then deputy First Minister of Northern Ireland, gave the main oration, while Conor Murphy, then Minister for Regional Development, introduced the families of the dead IRA members. The team, which included Sinn Fein TD Caoimhghin O Caolain's brother-in-law - Bernard McGinn from Castleblayney, Co Monaghan - were sentenced to lengthy jail terms, but released in 2000 under the Good Friday Agreement. On 17 February 1978 the commander of the 2nd Battalion Royal Green Jackets, Lieutenant Colonel Ian Corden-Lloyd, was killed and two other soldiers injured when the Gazelle helicopter he was travelling in was attacked by an IRA unit near Jonesborough. subscriptionFinishDate: '0000-00-00T00:00:00Z', [54][55] On 22 June 1998 a deadly incident involving fuel smuggling took place near Crossmaglen, when former Thomas Murphy employee Patrick Belton ran over and killed a British soldier attempting to stop him while driving his oil tanker through a military checkpoint. } ", Sinn Fein ministers McGuinness and Murphy in illegal parade, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Provisional_IRA_South_Armagh_Brigade&oldid=1098002029. He along with another man were apparently intending to break into the supermarket when Harker was shot by members of a UDR patrol. Martin was from Knockamell Park in the city and was a neighbour of Charles Spence, who was had been shot dead by the IRA two weeks previously. From that point onwards, the South Armagh 'OC' and his associates became millionaires while continuing to donate a reputed 25pc of their earnings to the 'movement'. subscriptionStatus: 'Corporate', window.showSubscriberElements) { $553 (2019) Beds. bundle: bundleValue, return key.indexOf('granted_by_') > -1; There were also frequent gun attacks on foot patrols. It was organised into two battalions, one around Jonesborough and another around Crossmaglen. He had been in the garden of an RUC member's house and was getting ready to launch an attack on him when undercover soldiers shot him during a gun-battle. Other alleged illegal activities involve fraud through embezzlement of agricultural subsidies and false claims of property loss. childList: true, 29 March 1997 - An RUC officer was badly wounded when he was shot by a sniper outside Forkhill joint security base, County Armagh. He had just left children back to the school after they had attended a quiz the, 1 January 1986 James McCandless (39) and Michael Williams (24), both members of the RUC, were killed by a Provisional IRA remote controlled bomb hidden in a litter bin in Thomas Street and detonated when their foot patrol passed by at one minute into the new year. He had charge of the IRA's border sniper team, which killed seven soldiers and two police officers in the 1990s. He is a close associate of the Provos' border boss Thomas 'Slab' Murphy, Gerry Adams and other figures in Sinn Fein. [10], However, the IRA campaign in the area did not begin in earnest until 1971. The culmination of Harnden's work in Northern Ireland was the publication of Bandit Country: The IRA & South Armagh (Hodder & Stoughton 1999), which sold more than 100,000 copies worldwide and is considered essential reading for anyone wanting to understand the Irish Troubles. South Armagh has long been the IRA stronghold and any defections would be a devastating blow to the leadership. These bases acted as information-gathering centres and also allowed the British Army to patrol South Armagh more securely. }; After this, 24 security force personnel and Lord Justice Gibson and his wife were killed in the same areas, roughly a third of the previous yearly rate. The Sunday Independent has learned that the South Armagh 'OC' was outed as a 'tout' earlier this year and that shortly afterwards an IRA bodyguard team was sent from Belfast to ensure that. The team, which included Sinn Fein TD Caoimhghin O Caolain\u0026#039;s brother-in-law, Bernard McGinn from Castleblayney, Co Monaghan, were sentenced to lengthy jailed terms but released in 2000 as part of the prisoner amnesty. 18 April 1992 Brendan McWilliams (50), a Catholic civilian employee of the British Army, was shot and killed by the IRA at his home at Nialls Crescent, off the Killylea Road. In July last year Wilson and south Armagh man Sean Gerard Hughes were returned for trial to face counts of belonging to a proscribed organisation and addressing a meeting to encourage support for . [2] It has allegedly been commanded since the 1970s by Thomas 'Slab' Murphy who is also alleged to be a member of the IRA's Army Council. There were no injuries on either side. It is Pearse's message and it has not changed. [35] The shooting down of the Lynx in 1994 during a mortar attack on Crossmaglen barracks is regarded by Toby Harnden as the most successful IRA operation against a helicopter in the course of the Troubles. bodyAvailable) { The man, who has the official title of officer commanding South Armagh Brigade of the Provisional IRA, is also a member of the Northern Command, which effectively ran the organisation from the early 1980s. Chief Superintendent Harry Breen and Superintendent Bob Buchanan were returning from a meeting with the Garda Sochna in the Republic of Ireland, where they had been discussing a range of issues including ways of combating IRA attacks on the cross-border rail link, when they were ambushed. The incident caused outrage among South Armagh residents, provided the IRA with many new recruits and created a hostile climate where local people were prepared to tolerate the killing of security force members. // Check window.dataLayer object or create. The man, who has the official title of 'officer commanding' South Armagh Brigade of the Provisional IRA, is also a member of the 'Northern Command', the ruling body which effectively ran the organisation from the early 1980s. The \u0026#039;OC\u0026#039; is said to have bought another substantial portion of farmland in Armagh. observer.disconnect(); vars.article.wallVisible = ! } 28 March In an identical attack to the one that killed Derek Monteith, 58-year-old RUC member George Starrett is shot dead in the kitchen of his home on the Newry Road by the Provisional IRA. Since then the security forces travel by helicopter for security reasons.". On 30 December 1990, Sinn Fin member and IRA volunteer,[30] Fergal Caraher, was killed by Royal Marines near a checkpoint in Cullyhanna. }; When he was 17 he had witnessed his father Peter Corrigan, a Sinn Fin member, being shot dead by the UVF in the city. The County of Orange closed the application period for the Emergency Rental Assistance (ERA) Program on April 30, 2021. The Sunday Independent has learned that the South Armagh 'OC' was outed as a 'tout' earlier this year and that shortly afterwards an IRA bodyguard team was sent from Belfast to ensure. She had gone to Belfast after spending some of the night drinking in Armagh, and had fallen in with a crowd of loyalist men and women who, realising that she was a Catholic from Armagh, took her to a house on Cregagh Street on the pretense of having a party. The single Mk-15 mortar bomb landed 40 yards (37m) short of the perimeter fence. A sniper rifle and other weapons were recovered. vars.user.subscriptionFinishDate = subscriberCookie.subscriptionFinishDate || ''; Photograph: Mirrorpix/Getty Images "And almost overnight the smugglers of South Armagh, under the control of the IRA, started bulk-buying . const getCookie = key => { South Armagh IRA rocked as 'OC' is outed as a 'tout', It is not clear how the OC came to be exposed as an agent but he is believed to have been recruited by British Intelligence in the late 1980s or early 1990s. Harnden, Toby (1999). The mortar round hit and shot down the helicopter, serial number ZD275, [1] while it was hovering over the helipad. Shortly afterwards, the Army abandoned road transport in South Armagh." Unlike other operations in which the SAS were involved, members of the sniper team were not killed. 24 February - Reginald Williamson, a 46-year-old RUC member from Armagh, is killed when a Provisional IRA booby-trap bomb explodes under his car near the village of Loughgall. When they arrived, they were surrounded by 16 SAS men, who ordered them to surrender. The truck bombs were sent to England by ferry. A sniper rifle and other weapons were recovered. }).map(function (key) { He regarded as exceptions the East Tyrone IRA unit, led by Jim Lynagh who was killed in an SAS ambush during an IRA attack on Loughall RUC base in 1987, and the "tight as a drum" South Armagh . The IRA claimed that he was a member of the UDR, something that was denied by the police and army. Between 1971 and the erection of the hilltop sites in the mid-1980s (the first in 1986), 84 members of the security forces were killed in the Crossmaglen and Forkhill areas by the IRA. Funding for FRONTLINE is provided through the support of PBS viewers and by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. The South Armagh Brigade of the Provisional Irish Republican Army (IRA) operated during the Troubles in south County Armagh. The gunmen then escaped in a Ford Cortina which was found abandoned a short time later in the Windmill Hill area of the city. }); document.cookie = subscriberCookieName + "=" + JSON.stringify(cookieData) + ';path=/;domain=' + domain + ';max-age='+cookieExpiryInSeconds; 7 September 61-year-old Catholic RUC man John Wasson is shot dead by the INLA outside his Duke's Grove home in a nationalist area of the city. From that point onwards, the South Armagh \u0026#039;OC\u0026#039; and his associates became millionaires while continuing to donate a reputed 25pc of their earnings to the \u0026#039;movement\u0026#039;. Then, in January 1976, after a series of loyalist Ulster Volunteer Force (UVF) attacks on Catholic civilians in the border areas (including the Reavey and O'Dowd killings the previous day), the group shot and killed ten Protestant workmen in the "Kingsmill massacre" near Bessbrook. He had just left Drumadd Barracks and was on his way to nearby. His father-in-law, Joseph Wilson, a member of the UDR, had been shot dead by the Provisional IRA a short distance away in 1976. The fierceness of the republicanism expressed by people like the local historians I spoke to is unsettling. [4], As well as paramilitary activity, the South Armagh Brigade has also been widely accused of smuggling across the Irish border. {"gigya.api.key":"4_CO8231Ix1RbYi2EmMbsrlw","gigya.screenset":"Default-RegistrationLogin","gigya.mobile.screenset":"Default-RegistrationLogin","gigya.authFlow.redirect":"true","gigya.check.enabled":"true","gigya.check.host":"gigya-check.independent.ie","competitions.submit.endpoint":"https://competitions-api.independent.ie/entries","competitions.api.key":"0b15feaa-62b2-45a2-8244-723a9e80748e","subscriptionwall.cookie-domain":".independent.ie","subscriptionwall.metered.missing.fields":"data.occupation,data.phone,data.salutation,data.yearofbirth,profile.firstName,profile.lastName","subscriptionwall.welcome_url.home-delivery":"https://subscribe.independent.ie/welcome/home-delivery/","subscriptionwall.welcome_url.premium-plus":"https://subscribe.independent.ie/welcome/premium-plus/","subscriptionwall.welcome_url.premium":"https://subscribe.independent.ie/welcome/premium/","kaching.enabled":"true","outbrain.kaching.enabled":"true","quantcast.enabled":"false","didomi.enabled":"true","newsletter.subscribe_url":"https://member.independent.ie/quicksubscribe/IN:Daily/subscribe","social-embed-consent-wall.enabled":"true","homepage.regional.sections.mapping":"Cork:regionals/corkman/:corkman,Dublin:regionals/dublin/:dublin,Kerry:regionals/kerryman/:kerryman,Louth:regionals/louth/:louth,Sligo:regionals/sligochampion/:sligochampion,Wexford:regionals/wexford/:wexford,Wicklow:regionals/wicklow/:wicklow","active_cmp":"didomi"} {"url":"https://shared.mediahuis.be/ka-ching/independent/ka-ching.umd.js?20210830","adunit":"m.independent.ie/Irish_News","targeting":{"art_id":"34944633","article_id":"34944633","kw":["South","Armagh","IRA","rocked","as","OC","is","outed","as","a","tout"],"gs_channels":["gs_notprocessed"],"article_type":"standard"},"platform":"MOB","pageType":"Article","lazyload":true} {"@context":"http://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","headline":"South Armagh IRA rocked as \u0026#039;OC\u0026#039; is outed as a \u0026#039;tout\u0026#039;","inLanguage":"en","publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Independent.ie","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://m.independent.ie/theme/_base/"},"@id":"independent.ie"},"image":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://www.independent.ie/incoming/65cdb/34944440.ece/AUTOCROP/w1240h700/provos.jpg","height":"700","width":"1240"},"mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://www.independent.ie/"},"dateCreated":"2016-08-06T22:16:02.000Z","dateModified":"2016-08-06T22:40:34.000Z","datePublished":"2016-08-07T01:30:00Z","keywords":"","thumbnailUrl":"https://www.independent.ie/incoming/65cdb/34944440.ece/AUTOCROP/w1240h700/provos.jpg","author":{"@type":"Person","name":"Jim Cusack"},"description":"The second most senior IRA man in South Armagh is being \u0026#039;protected\u0026#039; amid claims that he worked as an agent for British intelligence, according to usually reliable security sources. 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