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Relatives of those killed in a Loyalist massacre in Derry 50 years ago today will gather tonight to remember their loved ones. Charles Moore, Frank McCarron, Michael McGinley, Barney Kelly and Charlie McCafferty were shot dead as they enjoyed a drink in Annie's in the Top of the Hill area of Derry, just five days before Christmas in December 1972. There will be a special Remembrance Mass at 6pm this evening (Tuesday) at St Columb’s Church on Chapel Road. It was from this same church that some of the victims were laid to rest following Requiem Mass in the days...

Northern Ireland police faced a barrage of petrol bombs and rocks on Thursday, an AFP journalist said, as violence once again flared in Belfast despite pleas for calm. Riot police on the republican side of the divided city were pelted with projectiles as they tried to prevent a crowd moving towards pro-UK unionists. British Prime Minister Boris Johnson and Irish counterpart Micheal Martin had earlier called for “calm” following days of violence that included a petrol-bomb attack on a moving bus. Martin and Johnson held telephone talks in which they stressed that “violence is unacceptable” and “called for calm”, the...

Loyalist paramilitary groups have told the British and Irish governments they are withdrawing support for the Good Friday agreement in protest at Northern Ireland’s Irish Sea trade border with the rest of the UK. The Loyalist Communities Council, an umbrella group that represents the views of the UVF, UDA and Red Hand Commando, wrote a letter to Boris Johnson and Ireland’s taoiseach, Micheál Martin, warning of “permanent destruction” of the 1998 peace agreement without changes to post-Brexit arrangements for Northern Ireland. The letter said unionist opposition to the Northern Ireland protocol – the part of the Brexit deal that keeps...

The remains of "monumental temples" dating to the Iron Age and medieval buildings may be hidden underground at Navan Fort, an archaeological site in Northern Ireland, a new study finds. Exactly what's left of these ruins, however, remains to be seen. Archaeologists discovered the buried structures by using remote-sensing techniques that allowed them to map the hidden landscape and detect anomalies, such as architectural features made by humans. These Iron Age and medieval buildings suggest that Navan Fort was "an incredibly important religious center and a place of paramount sacral and cultural authority in later prehistory," study co-researcher Patrick Gleeson,...

The High Court of Northern Ireland has ruled that a no-deal Brexit would not breach the Good Friday Agreement, which supports the peace process in the British province. Northern Ireland, known colloquially as Ulster, was for decades wracked with violence perpetrated by terrorists claiming to be fighting on behalf of the minority of the population which supports leaving the United Kingdom and uniting with the Republic of Ireland, and to a lesser extent by loyalist paramilitaries. This conflict, known as The Troubles, was significantly wound down by the Good Friday Agreement, or Belfast Agreement, signed in the 1990s... Campaigners seeking...

NORTHERN IRELAND & LONDON — "I'm starting to hear things that I haven't heard in a long time," Eileen Weir told Business Insider. "There was a republican funeral here yesterday and they shot over the coffin. I know that's a matter of honour for that fallen comrade, but at the same time, the IRA said all of there guns were out of use, so where did they get that gun?" Weir runs a cross-community women's centre in Shankill, west Belfast. Shankill was a focus of violence during The Troubles. Irish republican and unionist paramilitaries carried out lethal bomb attacks and...

London (AFP) – A no-deal Brexit could lead to a united Ireland as more people in Northern Ireland would “come to question the Union” with Great Britain, Irish prime minister Leo Varadkar has said. His comments came after new British prime minister Boris Johnson said the current Brexit deal was unacceptable and set preparations for leaving the EU without an agreement as a “top priority” for his right-wing government. Tension around the withdrawal deal centres on the so-called Irish backstop — a mechanism designed to keep Northern Ireland in the bloc’s Single Market and prevent a customs border between it...

Just over one in five schools in Northern Ireland have said they cover lesbian, gay or bisexual (LGB) issues with pupils. That is one of the findings of a Department of Education (DE) survey of more than 420 schools. Schools were asked whether they covered LGB issues in relationship and sex education (RSE) or other parts of the curriculum. More than half - 59% - said they did not. Just over 21% said they did cover LGB issues with pupils and 19.4% preferred not to answer the question. Additionally, almost seven out of ten respondent schools said they were not...

FULL TITLE: 'Charlie Gard's parents inspired me to fight for my daughter's life': Father's race against time to raise £200,000 Robbie Emerson has been told my doctors that his daughter's condition is terminal and that she should be taken home to die A father who claims his baby daughter has been 'left to die' says Charlie Gard's parents are the inspiration for his fight to keep her alive and secure life-saving treatment abroad. He believes British doctors have given up on his child, but is refusing to stop battling on her behalf. Little Jorja Emerson has a rare chromosome disorder...

A pastor is facing a court trial this week on a government charge that his message, delivered through a public electronic communications because it was online, was grossly offensive to the point of being criminal. The decision that results from the case, which is based on the pastor’s description of Islam as a “doctrine spawned in hell,” could determine whether Christian pastors will be allowed to preach biblical doctrine in the United Kingdom going forward. U.TV in the United Kingdom reports that Pastor James McConnell, 78, of Shore Road, Newtownabbey, is facing a three-day trial for charges stemming from alleged...

In 1594, soldiers loyal to Queen Elizabeth I, sent to relieve a garrison besieged by Irish chieftain Hugh Maguire in Enniskillen Castle, were ambushed as they crossed the Arney River... and their supplies were thrown into the river. It became known as the Battle of the Ford of the Biscuits. According to the history books it took place near Drumane Bridge, close to the modern main road between Enniskillen and Dublin... Local people, like farmer Maurice Owens, thought they knew otherwise from the stories passed down through the generations. "We were always told that the battle took place down here...

September 12, 2014 Northern Ireland Firebrand Ian Paisley Dead At 88 DUBLIN -- The Rev. Ian Paisley, the divisive Protestant firebrand who devoted his life to thwarting compromise with Catholics in Northern Ireland only to become a pivotal peacemaker in his twilight years, died Friday in Belfast, his wife said. He was 88. Paisley was Northern Ireland's most polarizing politician throughout its three decades of civil strife, during which the evangelist's blistering oratory was often blamed for fueling the bloodshed that claimed 3,700 lives. Yet at the zenith of his peace-wrecking powers, Paisley in 2007 stunned the world by delivering...

Hillary Clinton has called for an end to “unacceptable” violence in Northern Ireland as she visited the region amid a revival of sectarian tensions. The US Secretary of State said she was “distressed” to hear about a death threat to Naomi Long, the East Belfast MP, and the discovery of two unexploded bombs. … Mrs. Clinton landed in Belfast as part of four-day European trip, just hours after police seized an unexploded bomb from suspected Republican dissidents in Londonderry. A second device was found in a postbox. …

Six police officers were injured and seven people were arrested during overnight clashes in east Belfast, the Police Service of Northern Ireland said. Rioting broke out following the Protestant “mini Twelfth” parade on Friday, a force spokeswoman said. Police vehicles were damaged and missiles were thrown at officers trying to quell the “significant disorder” in the Castlereagh Street and Albertbridge Road areas of the city. Officers used rubber bullets and a water cannon to try to disperse the crowds, finally bringing calm to the area in the early hours of Saturday. Six officers were hurt when youths threw by blocks...

A large car bomb exploded today in Northern Ireland, causing large-scale damage to a shopping centre. The device, planted in a Vauxhall Corsa, detonated just after midnight outside a bank at the back of the Da Vinci retail complex near the University of Ulster in Londonderry. A spokesman for the Police Service of Northern Ireland said: 'A warning had been received just an hour earlier and a cordon was in place. 'Initial inquiries suggest there were no injuries. Substantial damage was caused to the retail complex and to the car.' Dozens of homes and businesses, including a nursing home, were...

BELFAST, Northern Ireland (AP) — Northern Ireland leaders condemned Irish nationalist rioters Tuesday who wounded 82 police officers during two nights of street clashes sparked by the province's annual parades by the British Protestant majority.

After having exhausted Edinburgh, I announced I was headed on to Belfast, Northern Ireland. I disremember exactly all that was going on at the time--there hadn't been any explosions or murders (there however were to be shortly after I left, dozens and scores murdered, but I was already in Wales by then), but the American embassy strongly advised Americans to not go there, and the British government was trying to discourage all non-residents of Northern Ireland from going there. I have no idea how they knew, but they knew. I was reminded of this, and it was suggested that there...

David Cameron is to launch the biggest shake-up of the Conservative Party for decades as part of a bold plan to win support across the whole of the United Kingdom. The Tories are to forge a new party with the Ulster Unionists to try to secure broader backing for Mr Cameron before the next election. The move to restore a link severed more than 30 years ago forms a central plank in a new Conservative strategy to broaden the party's appeal outside England.

'Gay counselling' call rejected Iris Robinson said gay people should seek counselling A gay rights campaigner has rejected a Northern Ireland assembly member's call for homosexuals to seek psychiatric counselling.David McCartney from the Rainbow Project was responding to comments from Iris Robinson, who is the chair of the Stormont health committee. Mrs Robinson said with help, gay people could be "turned around". Mr McCartney said there was "no body of evidence" to support this and asked to meet the MP. Mrs Robinson made her comments on BBC Radio Ulster's Nolan Show on Friday. She said she would defend her...

Hillary Clinton had no direct role in bringing peace to Northern Ireland and is a "wee bit silly" for exaggerating the part she played, according to Lord Trimble of Lisnagarvey, the Nobel Peace Prize winner and former First Minister of the province. Hillary Clinton with the Rev Ian Paisley and Martin McGuinness after their meeting in Washington last year "I don’t know there was much she did apart from accompanying Bill [Clinton] going around," he said. Her recent statements about being deeply involved were merely "the sort of thing people put in their canvassing leaflets" during elections. "She visited when...